The Spinning Babies Workshop
Spinning Babies Workshop description
The dates and locations of all Gail's workshops are on the Classes and Events page.
9 am to 4:30 pm, with a 12-1:30 lunch break (lunch on your own)
Each sponsor sets the registration fee.
6 contact hours
This all-day workshop is for doulas, childbirth educators, midwives, labor and delivery nurses and physicians. Beginning with basic information suddenly what seemed simple becomes profound as you begin to associate unexpected causative factors with labors you have wondered about. The spatial explanations and visual aids make the Spinning Babies Workshop so valuable. Even the experienced provider will bring home new techniques and understanding.
In the morning, we will have a pregnant volunteer to show us a series of pregnancy activities. You will have a chance to try the major techniques for fetal rotation with another participant in the class.
Dress for action. You will be moving and sometimes be on the floor. Bring a pillow, a birthing ball, a rebozo and your notebook. Bring your lunch or go out to a restaurant or the coop.
Whether you read the researchers that think fetal position is random or the researchers that find fetal position matters, these techniques shorten labors. You will see in your practice that these techniques help a good number of long labors, stalled labors and back labors.
More than Optimal Fetal Positioning, you also find body balancing techniques, traditional midwifery perspectives, and the spirit of the doula!
Questions about Spinning Babies Workshops
Can I have a Spinning Babies Workshop in my town?
Gail has a limited schedule at this time. 2011 is full until November, though workshops may be posted until all the arrangements are in. Gail will be in Europe in 2012 and is taking bookings for some dates in February and March 2012.
Gail will be hosting online workshops to be available to answer the requests for more workshops. Those dates are also posted on the events page.
I often like to present a 3-hr workshop for the area midwives on Resolving Shoulder Dystocia the night before or after a Spinning Babies Workshop. See more info on that at the bottom of the Resolving Shoulder Dystocia page on this site.
Can I bring my baby?
Babies under three months are welcome when the mother and baby are well rested and happy. Four-month-old babies and older like to verbalize and can keep the audience more entertained than I can.
Seriously, though, others have come to hear the workshop. Mothers hear over their baby's talk, but others don't tune out babies as well. Please make arrangements for your children.
I haven't taken a doula training yet, can I come?
A doula training gives excellent beginning information that will make the Spinning Babies Workshop more valuable to the learner.
Childbirth education series are also valuable before this workshop. Childbirth teachers that attend an occasional birth will be able to follow the workshop material.
Birth experience is the best teacher. Less experience means you will miss some concepts and will experience more frustration with the level of material presented. Prepare yourself by knowing anatomy of birthing, fetal positioning, stages of labor, modern obstetrical interventions and why they are used, and natural birth as well as epidural use and cesarean. Additionally, you can browse the Spinning Babies Website.
I'm a parent, can I come?
Sometimes a pregnant woman or couple comes who have had a long or otherwise difficult previous labor due to a baby's posterior presentation. They realize that they will not 'get' most of the workshop but will get the techniques and general ideas of when to use them. If you really want to come to an all day workshop, please email Gail and let her know you want to come.
I'm a nurse, can I come?
Labor and Delivery nurses make up a large minority of Spinning Babies participants when I do travel. Its particularly fun for a group of nurses to come together, or have your hospital sponsor a workshop. Feedback shows that these techniques are raising the nurse's confidence in helping active, birthing women at their hospitals.
I'm a physician, can I come?
Joking around here, but yes, once in a while a physician or medical student/intern has come. There is much to learn in a warm environment that is like a learning-vacation from the stress of med school or the labor and delivery floor. Unfortunately, I don't have CEUs for physicians, but I'd welcome the efforts of an enthusiastic doctor would like to help with that. You will be warmly welcomed and surprised at the usefulness of the material in your practice.
I'm a midwife, I probably know all this already, right?
You know some techniques; I know some techniques. The workshop is more than techniques. Most midwives learn quite a bit at the workshop. You'll learn "when to use what" more effectively and why some OP babies rotate and some do not. The soft tissue body balancing techniques will be so useful.
Want to reduce transports for babies that don't seem to fit? Or, sit up nights at long labors that wear you and the mother out? Would you be willing to start assisting mothers in pregnancy by teaching her a few activities to do before labor? Would you like a way to assess if a labor might be more challenging or not? The first hour will be boring, but will help you anyway. The next five hours will be useful and I promise, you will get to sleep more often over the rest of your midwifery career for having attended this workshop. In other words, you'll get a good return on your time!
Is there research to prove what you teach?
