Labour and birth bead line

On our Doula training course we were introduced to the idea of a beaded birth line, where beads are used to represent the different stages and phases of labour.

Katherine Woodbury offers workshops on how to make a beaded birth line and bead lines for sale, see her site for details: http://www.beyondbirthing.co.uk/beyond-birthing-workshops-for-collegues.html

Here is my birth line and the story for each bead.

The silver balls represent changes in stages so we start off with the latent phase of the first stage, with amber representing the rests and ruby representing the contractions. See how the rest periods gradually become shorter as the contractions or surges start to come closer together. We then move through the silver bead into active labour, where the contractions, now represented by the oval pink beads are more intense, and the rests, the pink spheres, are shorter and more predictable. This continues until the mother is around ten centimetres dilated, represented by the round pink bead showing the open cervix. We then may see the transitional stage - a starfish representing the spiky nature of transition experienced by some women, before passing into the second stage of labour.

At the start of the second phase, there may be a 'rest and be thankful' pause, illustrated by the oval teal bead, before involuntary pushing starts which is shown by the regular silver and lilac beads. At crowning, shown by the red bead representing the sensation of crowning, the baby starts to pass through the last stage of his or her journey and is born - the little blue baby bead.

After the birth of the baby, the placenta will be born, shown by a large red bead and the golden hour occurs, represented by the large gold bead. After that are four pearly days of colostrum as the mother and baby move into their fourth trimester, shown by the large golden heart at the end.