Birth Imprints: Why You Might Fear a Birth You’ve Never Had, with Nicole Moore
By Alexia Leachman, founder of Fear Free Childbirth.
Alexia cleared her own tokophobia and developed a method that has helped women clear theirs for more than 10 years.
After the war, Nicole Moore’s grandmother sailed from Australia to England on what was known as a ship of brides. She was newly married, her husband was on a different boat, and she was pregnant with Nicole’s mum. Some of the women on those ships got telegrams on board telling them they weren’t wanted and not to come. By then they were already at sea.
Nicole’s grandmother was one of the lucky ones, but Nicole says there was still “a fair degree of anxiety coursing through her veins”, along with morning sickness and her first time on a big boat. Then she told me the bit that stopped me. A girl’s eggs form while she’s still in the womb, so the egg that became Nicole was already forming inside her mum, on that ship.
When Nicole learned that, her own tendency towards overwhelm and a stress response she’d been managing her whole life suddenly made sense. “No wonder,” she said.
In this article:
The part of your story you can’t remember
Nicole lives on the east coast of Australia. She had both her babies at home, off-grid, half an hour down a dirt road from the nearest hospital, surrounded by women in her community who’d done the same. These days she works with birth imprints through the Birth Into Being method, developed by her teacher, Elena Tonetti-Vladimirova.
Birth imprints is an umbrella term for what we take on into our beliefs and our way of operating from the very start of life: how we were conceived, carried and born. It’s a theory, and some of what Nicole shares in this episode is her belief and her experience of the work rather than settled science. It fits a lot of what I’ve seen in my own life and in my work with women. When I went back to my own time in the womb, it answered so many questions about the stuff I kept wrestling with. I remember thinking: why did I not learn about this sooner?
Frightened of a birth you’ve never had
This is the part I most wanted you to hear. Some of the women who come to me have primary tokophobia, a severe fear of pregnancy and birth when they’ve never been pregnant or given birth. And they say to me: “I don’t understand. I’ve never been pregnant. How can I fear something I’ve never experienced?”
I think it can go back to that time in the womb. It isn’t in your conscious memory, which is exactly why it’s so confusing. You can’t find anything in your life that explains it, because it might not be your experience at all. It might be your mother’s. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve worked with a woman and found that her own birth was one of the main things behind her fear of pregnancy and birth.
Nicole was quick to add something I want to pass on too. If this is new to you, and you suspect yours might not be great, it isn’t a life sentence. Understanding it gives you something to work with. “It’s actually a blessing to find out about birth imprints,” she said, “particularly if you think you’ve got shitty ones.”
And if you’re pregnant now and having a rough first trimester, please don’t add this to your list of worries. We were all carried by women who had feelings. Working through the shock of an unplanned pregnancy, the questions and the wobbles, is very human, and it isn’t something to carry blame or shame about.
The midwife who sent her to talk to her mum
Nicole’s own birth was a vaginal birth after caesarean (VBAC). Her mum had an emergency caesarean with Nicole’s older sister in the 1970s, at a time when there was no language for birth trauma, and she ended up in hospital for her mental health afterwards. With Nicole, she asked to give birth naturally and, as Nicole puts it, somehow pulled it off.
Nicole didn’t know anything about birth imprints when she was pregnant herself. But her home birth midwife, who’d spent 30 years bringing babies in, asked her to talk to her mum about her birth. They were giving birth a long way from a hospital, so they wanted to deal with anything that might show up in labour before she got to labour. The two of them are still friends. Her midwife went on to teach Nicole’s children about where babies come from at their school.
What to ask your mum about your birth
If you want to understand where your fear might be coming from, Nicole suggests starting with what was going on around your birth:
- Was the country at war? Was your mum living in poverty?
- What was her relationship with your dad like?
- How much support did she have from her family?
- What did the people around her believe about birth?
Then, if you can, ask her how she felt. Ask more than once, Nicole says, because women were often encouraged to forget their births. She mentioned twilight sleep, the mix of drugs that left women with little or no memory of giving birth, and the stories she’s heard many times of women being told to hold back when they were ready to push, because the doctor wasn’t there yet.
If you can’t ask, because your mum has died or you’re not in touch, Nicole’s suggestion is to give yourself time to notice how birth feels in your body. What happens inside you when someone talks about giving birth, or when you see a birth in a film? Is it a wonder, or the most horrific thing you’ve ever seen? Whatever comes up, don’t push it away just because it’s uncomfortable.
If you think this might be you
The free Tokophobia Test takes about five minutes and gives you a picture of what you’re dealing with, whether or not you’re pregnant.
Take the free Tokophobia Test › (Provided by our approved partner Fearless Birthing, founded, like Fear Free Childbirth, by Alexia Leachman.)
A gentler story of conception
Nicole showed me a photograph from the Swedish photographer Lennart Nilsson’s book A Child Is Born: a single sperm approaching an egg many times its size. The story most of us learned is that thousands of sperm batter away at the egg until one gets in by chance. Nicole’s point is that the egg opens. For her, that changes how it feels to have been made at all. “There was a moment of acceptance,” she said.
It made me think about fertility. When we recorded, I was working with a woman about to start her ninth round of in vitro fertilisation (IVF), and we’d been looking at exactly this level of work. I asked Nicole whether some women might be blocked at a deep level, by fear passed down to them, for example. She said there are many factors, and that for her, it needs to be an unequivocal yes.
The one thing worth investing in
Parents spend a lot of time thinking about the right schools. In my opinion, the thing to worry about is the emotional blueprint, because what your child will need in this world is an emotional system that can cope with it: thinking clearly, making decisions, relating to other people. So if there’s one thing to invest in for your child, it’s you, before the birth.
Nicole takes it further. She sees how we’re born as part of how we relate to each other and to the planet. I’m with her. If you want to heal the world, I think you start with birth, because of the ripple effects. It’s why I keep coming back to this work, however many times I try to park it.
Questions I get asked about this
What is primary tokophobia?
Primary tokophobia is a severe fear of pregnancy and birth in a woman who has never been pregnant or given birth. Secondary tokophobia develops after a previous pregnancy or birth, often a difficult one. Many women with primary tokophobia can’t work out where their fear comes from, which is part of what makes it so confusing.
What are birth imprints?
Birth imprints is a term used in the Birth Into Being method and in prenatal psychology for the beliefs and patterns we may take on from how we were conceived, carried and born. It’s a theory rather than a clinical diagnosis, and researchers are still exploring how early experiences shape us.
Can your own birth affect how you feel about giving birth?
In my work, a woman’s own birth often turns out to be part of her fear of birth, and Nicole sees the same in hers. That’s what we’ve observed, not something research has proved. If you’re curious, talking to your mum about your birth is a good place to start.
How do I ask my mum about my birth?
Start with the circumstances: what was happening in the world and in her life when she was pregnant with you, and how much support she had. Then ask how she felt, and ask more than once. If you can’t ask her, notice how you react to birth in conversations, books and films, and stay with whatever comes up.
Where to go from here
If this episode has stirred something up, there are a few places to start.
The free Tokophobia Test takes about five minutes and tells you what you’re facing.
If something from a past pregnancy, yours or one in your family, feels unfinished, the Fear Free Childbirth shop has a Pregnancy Wound Healing kit and a Birth Wound Healing kit (£45 each). There are also Fear Clearance tracks for specific fears, such as Fear of Pain and Fear of Losing Control (£22 each).
For support with fear of birth, the Tokophobia Support Circle is a small monthly membership where women who understand make sense of it together, with a live group call each month. For focused one-to-one help, there’s the Tokophobia Support Programme. Both are run by our approved partner Fearless Birthing (founded, like Fear Free Childbirth, by Alexia Leachman).
To find out more about Nicole’s work, go to Birth Into Being, where you can watch a free 25-minute version of Birth As We Know It.
If this has brought something up for you, talk to your GP, midwife or health visitor, or call NHS 111. Samaritans are there 24 hours a day on 116 123, for free. If it’s your own birth that has left you struggling, use the words “birth trauma” when you ask for help. Outside the UK, contact your local emergency services.
About Nicole Moore: Nicole Moore lives on the east coast of Australia and is a mother of two, both born at home. She works with birth imprints through the Birth Into Being method, carrying forward the work of its founder, Elena Tonetti-Vladimirova. At the time of recording, she ran an eight-day immersive retreat in Europe each year, with training to follow. Birth Into Being ›
About the author: Alexia Leachman has specialised in tokophobia and reproductive anxiety since 2015, and has personal experience of tokophobia. She is the founder of Fear Free Childbirth and hosts its podcast. She developed the Head Trash Clearance Method, which she uses in her work with women and teaches to perinatal professionals. She is the author of Fearless Birthing and Betrayed By Your Biology and a contributor to Childbirth, Midwifery and the Media. Alexia has hosted the Fear Free Childbirth podcast since 2015. More about Alexia ›
Read next:
- In-utero and birth imprint trauma: the hidden factor shaping pregnancy anxiety and birth fears
- The root of toko: what if the fear didn’t start with you?
- Thomas Verny, father of prenatal psychology
Fear Free Childbirth is a publication and is not a substitute for medical or mental-health care. If you’re struggling to cope or in crisis, please contact your GP, midwife or a qualified professional.
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