HypnoBirthing Blog

Today Shook Itself And Went Off In The Other Direction

Days do that sometimes, a bit like the path in Alice in Wonderland.  You think they’re going to do something.  And then they do something else completely different.

Today lulled me into a false sense of security.  It started well.  I woke up early, the sun was streaming in and the birds were singing.  So far so good.  So very good.

I did a little work, and then I drove to the station to catch the train.  Bedwyn is a very small country station and must have one of the best views of any station in the country.  (At this point I detect a howl of voices raised in protests about the delights of their own station.)  You stand on the platform and look across the watermeadows with a stream meandering through and a thatched cottage beyond.

The train was on time and I had a very pleasant walk through London to the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital.  I’m very excited because I’ve been chosen to teach Hypnobirthing classes for the Chelsea and Westminster through the Me And My Baby Clinic and we were gong to have a launch at the hospital:  buffet lunch and meet the midwives and obstetricians.  It was indeed a very delightful occasion and the culmination of a great deal of work by Lisa Barnwell who runs Me And My Baby.

I spoke to one midwife who had been a student when I lectured at Bournemouth University about Hypobirthing a couple of years ago.  I was also told by a colleague that she had met someone at the Northcott Road Fair in Clapham who had been to my Hypnobirthing class.  He told her that it was wonderful, and their little boy had slept through the night from 7pm to 7am from a very early age and was really smiley and happy.

It was definitely a good day!

I got back to Paddington in time to catch the 2.18pm train home and this was where things began to change.  There were hundreds of people milling around and beside my train on the Departure Board it said CANCELLED.  It transpired that vandals (not goths apparently) had cut a line to the signals at West Drayton which had thrown the lines out of Paddington into chaos.

I wouldn’t have wanted the job of the unfortunate Customer Information Manager at Padington this afternoon.

However, about 15 minutes later a train to Reading was announced and a wave of humanity swept through Paddington to board it.  It seemed to be the only train going westward for some time, and I wondered what it would be like if there was a real emergency and everyone was trying to evacuate London.  Under those circumstances I’m sure it would be safer to stay put or at least to walk.

From now on fate was definitely on my side, because I got a seat in the train.  Now when I had left home that morning, I had put the papers in my bag to go through the wonderful Teleseminar with Alun Richards from yesterday evening and do the exercises prescribed.  These involved creating product, and I had been meaning to create various CDs for months, but never quite got around to it.  So, on the very slow journey to Reading, I started to work through the exercises.

We had an unscheduled stop at Slough, which relieved the pressure of bodies in the train a little, with a corresponding drop in temperture, which was a welcome relief.  At Reading I got out and wondered when the next train would go to Bedwyn.  There was absolutely no indication of when that might be as the departure screens were blank and the staff had no idea what was going on.  There appeared to be an occasional train meandering through the station in a completely random manner.

However, in about ten minutes, a train left for Newbury, stopping absolutely everywhere in between, so I had a further 20 minutes study time.  In Newbury it seemed likely that a train that had just reached Reading might wend its way in our direction at some time, and then proceed to Bedwyn.  This gave me a further 40 minutes of uninterrupted study; a luxury I never have at home where I have the distractions of the telephone, emails, and any number of other things.

The train duly arrived, and gave me a further uninterrupted 15 minutes of work.

This is work that has been at the back of my mind to do for months, and thanks to Alan and the vandal (the goths definitely can’t take the credit for this) I had the great gift of two hours’ uninterrupted study time in which I devised the format for my next CD, sketched out what I want to say, wrote a hypnotherapy script, and nearly completed the rest of the CD.

Definitely a gift to be accepted gratefully.  You never know when you’re going to get these gifts, do you?  And the wonderful Hypnobirthing launch at the Chelsea and Westminster as well.

Some days are interesting, aren’t they?

(And the strawberries from the local farm that I bought from the village shop on the way home were picked utterly ripe and mouthwateringly delicious.)