Family Health

Healthy Lives, Healthy Families and Healthy Childbirth and Parenting

Our Healthy Lives, Healthy Families Program emphasizes prevention, education and wellness for growing families. This program includes a focus on healthy parenting and healthy kids.

Support for Family Caregivers

Caregivers: Support for Family Caregivers of Loved Ones with Serious Illness

Mindfulness-Based Childbirth & Parenting

This program is an invitation to begin or deepen the practice of mindfulness for meeting the profound changes in our bodies and minds during pregnancy, childbirth and parenting.

Through mindfulness meditation, yoga, and group dialogue we will learn a way to fully live the joys and challenges of this transformative time and cultivate lifelong skills for healthy living and wise parenting. Read about the Mindful Birth in Greater Good Magazine.

In this course, you will:

Access deep physical and mental relaxation
Learn to engage the mind to work with pain during labor
Understand the physiology of childbirth, breastfeeding, and babies
Practice prenatal yoga for strength and flexibility
Increase confidence and courage for labor and delivery
Develop tools for managing stress in pregnancy, parenting, and daily life

Price: $590 per couple, $295 per single. $531/$265.50 with UCSF Discount. $40 material fee, including book, workbook and two audio CDs. Your course will be taught by Nancy Bardacke, CNM, MA, or Judith Cuneo, MD.

Upcoming Dates:

Wednesdays, January 25 – March 21, 2012, from 6:45–9:45 pm
Wednesdays, April 18 – June 13, 2012, from 6:45 – 9:45 pm
Wednesdays, June 6 - August 8, 2012, from 6:45 – 9:45 pm
Wednesdays, September 12 – November 7, 2012, from 6:45 – 9:45 pm

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The Mind in Labor: Working with Pain in Childbirth

Childbirth can be a challenging experience that often involves physical pain and anxiety. How we use our minds to relate to that pain and anxiety can make a huge difference in our labor and delivery experience.

Based on the mind/body work at the pioneering Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic founded by Jon Kabat-Zinn, PhD at the University of Massachusetts, this will be a weekend for looking deeply at pain and fear during childbirth and for cultivating tools to work with them in the process of giving birth. In this workshop, you will:

Practice various mind/body modalities for working with pain in childbirth
Experience using the breath as an anchor to the present moment
Tap into inner reservoirs of strength, confidence and courage
Learn how to be fully present to give assistance as a birth partner
Begin to cultivate the powerful tool of mindfulness, moment-to-moment awareness, for the challenges of birthing and parenting

This workshop is an excellent complement to any childbirth education class, including refresher classes. It can also be helpful for those who anticipate a birth experience that needs special medical attention or who have had a difficult previous birth experience. This workshop allows you time to go deep into the mindfulness practices, and includes partner-based experiential exercises.

We meet Friday evening from 7:00 pm - 9:30 pm, Saturday from 9:30 am - 4:30 pm and Sunday from 10:00 am - 4:30 pm.

Price: $385 per couple.

Instructor: Nancy Bardacke, CNM, MA, Founding Director of the Mindfulness-Based Childbirth and Parenting Program.

Upcoming Dates:

Friday, February 10 – Sunday, February 12, 2012
Friday, May 4 – Sunday, May 6, 2012

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Participant Quotes:

"I feel much more confident that I can handle the pain of childbirth--and anything else that happens!"

"Everything I learned over the weekend is a useful life skill, not only for childbirth but for parenting too."

"I'm much calmer about the birth and now really understand how to support my wife--and myself--through the experience."

Resources

Mindful Birthing – Programs for Mindful Family Living, founded and taught by Nancy Bardacke, Certified Nurse–Midwife and mindfulness teacher.

*These programs are presented in collaboration with the
UCSF National Center of Excellence in Women's Health.