Affirmations That Actually Work: The Honest Version for Pregnant People
“I am glowing and grateful.”
Here's what everyone tells you: "I am glowing and grateful. My body knows exactly what to do. I'm not afraid. Birth is a natural, beautiful process."
And here's what your actual brain does when you try to say those things: rejects them immediately as lies.
Because you're not glowing. You're swollen and tired and your skin looks like a map of somewhere you didn't want to visit. Your body doesn't feel like it knows what to do—it feels like a betrayer that's changing without your permission. You're absolutely afraid, and pretending you're not doesn't make the fear smaller. It just makes you feel dishonest on top of terrified.
This is where affirmations lose most pregnant people. Not because affirmations don't work, but because the ones circulating in pregnancy culture are designed to convince you to feel something you don't actually feel. They're asking you to gaslight yourself in the name of positivity.
The good news: affirmations that are actually honest? Those work. They just look different from the Instagram version.
The Lie vs. The Truth
Toxic affirmations are built on denial. They ask you to affirm something that directly contradicts your lived experience, and then they wonder why you can't stick with them. "My body is beautiful" doesn't land when you've spent decades criticizing yourself. "I am not afraid" falls flat when your nervous system is legitimately trying to prepare you for something enormous. "Everything will be fine" becomes a promise you can't guarantee, which means it's just another thing to feel anxious about.
The problem isn't that affirmations don't work. The problem is that affirmations built on lies don't work. Your nervous system is too smart for that. It can smell the gaslighting from a mile away.
Real affirmations don't deny what's true. They acknowledge the full picture. They say: "I am afraid AND I am capable." "My body has changed AND I am still me." "I don't know what's coming AND I know how to meet it." Both things true at the same time. That's the kind of affirmation your nervous system can actually absorb.
How Affirmations Actually Work (It's Neuroscience, Not Magic)
Affirmations aren't about manifesting or positive thinking or forcing your brain into a different reality. They're about nervous system regulation.
When you're pregnant and terrified, your nervous system is stuck in threat mode. Everything feels dangerous. Your body feels like a threat. Labor feels like a threat. Parenthood feels like a threat. Your amygdala is working overtime, trying to keep you safe from something it perceives as a massive danger. Affirmations don't change that danger. But they give your nervous system an alternative groove to fall into.
Repetition matters because your brain loves patterns. If you repeat something often enough—even if you don't fully believe it at first—your brain starts to find that pathway easier. It's not that you're tricking yourself. It's that you're literally creating a new neural pathway. The panic response is still there. But now there's another option. Your brain can toggle between "oh God, what if something goes wrong" and "I have survived difficult things before." Both are true. But the second one is also available now.
The key is that affirmations have to be believable to you. Not generally believable. Not believable to other pregnant people. Believable to your specific nervous system, with your specific history and fears and relationship to your body.
That's why generic affirmations fail. "My body is a miracle" might be objectively true in some sense, but if your relationship to your body has been complicated, that affirmation doesn't land. It triggers shame instead of regulation. A better affirmation for someone with body distrust might be: "My body is doing something I didn't have to understand to accomplish. That's remarkable." Same general idea, but honest enough that it doesn't trigger your resistance.
The Affirmations
Here are affirmations organized by what you're actually afraid of. Pick the ones that make sense to you. Skip the ones that feel like bullshit. Modify them until they feel true. These are starting points, not scripture.
For Fear About Your Body (What if it fails me? What if I can't handle the pain? What if something goes wrong?)
"My body has carried me through hard things before. This is hard, but not impossible."
Not denying the difficulty. Not promising it will be easy. Just reminding yourself that you have a track record of surviving things you didn't think you could survive.
"I don't have to understand my body to trust it right now. Understanding can come later."
Because the truth is you don't need to have perfect faith in your body. You just need to be willing to work with it during labor instead of fighting it. Understanding comes later.
"Fear is information, not direction. I can feel afraid and still move forward."
This one is huge. Fear isn't telling you to stop. It's telling you that something important is happening. You can acknowledge the fear and make your own decisions about what to do with it.
"My body knows how to do this, even if my brain doesn't believe it yet."
Separating the nervous system's knowing from the intellectual knowing. Your body has ancient knowledge. Your brain has anxiety. Both can coexist.
"I am allowed to ask for what I need. My needs matter."
Because labor care is relational. You're not doing this alone. And you're allowed to advocate for yourself in the process.
For Body Image (I don't recognize myself. I hate how I look. Will I ever look like myself again? This doesn't feel like my body.)
"My body is doing work I couldn't do before. That's different from pretty. It's powerful."
Separating what your body is from how it looks. Function over aesthetics. Your body right now is literally building the foundation for another human's life. That's powerful regardless of the packaging.
"I can grieve what my body looked like before and accept what it looks like now. Both are allowed."
This is permission to feel loss about your body changing while also not hating yourself for the changes. You're allowed to want your old body back AND understand that your new body has done something your old body couldn't do.
"This body that feels foreign is also mine. It's me in a temporary state, not a permanent failure."
Reminding yourself that pregnancy is temporary. Your body will change again after birth. This swollen, strange version of you is not forever.
"I'm allowed to take up space. My growing body is not an apology."
Because pregnant people often feel like they should shrink themselves or apologize for taking up room. You don't have to. You're allowed to be huge and present and unapologetic about it.
"My body isn't the problem. The story I've been told about what bodies should look like is the problem."
This one gets at the deeper work—the cultural messaging about what bodies are supposed to be. Your body isn't failing those standards. The standards are garbage.
For Trusting Your Instincts (What if I make the wrong choice? Should I listen to other people instead? What if my gut is wrong?)
"I have been living in this body my entire life. I know it better than anyone else ever will."
This is about authority. You are the expert on your body. Not your doctor. Not your mother. Not the internet. You. You get to have the final say on what happens to your body during pregnancy and labor.
"My intuition is information. I don't have to act on it immediately, but I also don't have to ignore it."
Because sometimes your gut is telling you something important. Sometimes it's just anxiety. You can trust that intuition is worth paying attention to without letting it run the show.
"I can listen to other people's advice and still make my own choice. Those aren't mutually exclusive."
Permission to be influenced without being controlled. You can hear what people say and then decide for yourself.
"What feels right to me is valid, even if other people don't understand it."
Because you might make choices that don't make sense to anyone else. And that's okay. This is your birth, your body, your life.
"I know myself. I know what I can handle. I know what I need. I trust that knowing."
The big one. This is about rebuilding relationship with your own authority after a lifetime of being told you're too emotional, too dramatic, too sensitive to trust your own judgment. You're not. You know yourself. Trust that.
For the Identity Shift (I'm losing myself. I don't want to become a mother. What if I can't do this? What if I hate it?)
"I can be a mother and still be myself. Those things don't cancel each other out."
Because the fear is real that becoming a parent means losing your identity entirely. It changes, but it doesn't disappear.
"What's ending is not me. It's a version of my life. I get to grieve that and build something new."
Permission to feel the loss of your old life while still moving into the new one. Both are real.
"I don't have to know how to do this. I just have to be willing to figure it out as I go."
Because nobody actually knows how to be a parent. You'll learn it in real time, with your specific baby, in your specific circumstances. That's how it works for everyone.
"I am allowed to change. I am allowed to become someone new. I don't have to apologize for my own evolution."
This is about permission to grow and transform without guilt. Motherhood will change you. That's not a tragedy—it's just what happens when you take on something enormous.
When Affirmations Work (And When They Absolutely Don't)
Affirmations work when they're honest enough that they make you feel something. Sometimes that something is a little cry. Sometimes it's a moment of "oh, yeah, that's actually true." Sometimes it's resistance that tells you this particular affirmation isn't the right one for you.
They work when you say them out loud. Your voice matters. There's something about hearing yourself say these things that makes them land differently than reading them.
They work when you use them strategically. Not as a daily ritual you resent, but as a tool you reach for in moments of panic. During a contraction. When you're doubting your body. When you're spiraling about your changing appearance. When you're second-guessing your choices.
They work when you use them with other practices. Affirmations plus breathing. Affirmations plus movement. Affirmations plus support from someone who believes them for you when you can't believe them for yourself.
Here's when they don't work: when they feel like gaslighting. When they're asking you to deny something real. When you're using them to bypass actual fear that needs professional support.
Affirmations are not therapy. If you're having intrusive thoughts about harming yourself or your baby, if your anxiety is completely overwhelming, if you're in a genuinely unsafe situation—affirmations are not the answer. You need actual support. A therapist. Your care provider. A crisis line. Someone trained to help with the real stuff.
How to Actually Practice Affirmations
Don't try to do all of them. Pick one per week. Live with it. Say it out loud every morning. Say it in your car. Say it when you're panicking. By the end of the week, your nervous system will have new pathways available. Then pick a different one.
Mirror work works for some people. Looking yourself in the eye and saying the affirmation. It feels awkward and powerful at the same time.
Write them down and put them in places you'll see them. Your bathroom mirror. Your car visor. Your phone home screen. Your nightstand. Repetition matters.
Say them during movement. Walk and affirm. Breathe and affirm. Dance and affirm. Stretch and affirm. Your nervous system absorbs affirmations better when your body is also involved.
Use them during labor if they feel right. Not all affirmations translate to active labor. But some do. "I'm doing this. My body is opening. I can handle the next contraction." The ones that are grounded in what's actually happening can become a form of narration that keeps you present.
Modify them. If an affirmation is close but not quite right, change it. This is your practice. Make it fit.
When Affirmations Aren't Enough
If you've been working with affirmations for weeks and the fear isn't getting smaller, if you're still lying awake at night catastrophizing, if your anxiety is interfering with your ability to function—something else needs to happen. Therapy. Somatic practices. Medical support. Conversation with your care provider. Midwifery care that takes your fears seriously and helps you process them, not just override them.
Affirmations are a tool. They're a helpful tool. But they're not a substitute for actual care when you need it.
If you're struggling with the deeper fears underneath the surface—if affirmations help but something still feels unsettled—reach out to Nets, here at Fruit of the Womb. Midwifery care that honors both the practical and the emotional side of pregnancy can help you work through what affirmations point to. Nets specializes in meeting you with whatever you're carrying—fear, doubt, grief, excitement—and helping you build trust in yourself and your body. That trust is what affirmations are trying to create, but sometimes it needs more than words.
Schedule a free consultation at [Fruit of the Womb contact page] or reach out directly at 240-997-5319 or netsitsah@hotmail.com. Serving Baltimore City, Baltimore County, Carroll County, and Howard County, Maryland; York County, Pennsylvania.
Frequently Asked Questions
What if saying affirmations out loud feels ridiculous or embarrassing?
Then whisper them. Write them instead. Say them in your car with the windows closed. Say them in the shower. Say them in your head. The method matters less than the practice. Your nervous system will benefit from the repetition whether you're saying it out loud dramatically or quietly mouthing it to yourself. If mirror work makes you want to die, don't do mirror work. Find another way. The goal is that the affirmations reach your nervous system, not that you follow a specific protocol perfectly.
When should I start using affirmations—early pregnancy or closer to labor?
Whenever they feel useful. Some people want to start building new neural pathways early, so affirmations throughout pregnancy help them arrive at labor feeling more solid. Some people don't need affirmations until things get real and they're actually afraid. There's no wrong time. If you start early and they stop working, take a break. If you wait until labor is imminent, that works too. Trust your timeline.
What if I don't believe the affirmation I'm saying?
That's actually fine. You don't have to believe it for it to work. You just have to be willing to try it. Say it anyway. Your brain doesn't know the difference between believing something and repeating something often enough that it becomes believable. Repetition creates belief. So say the affirmation you don't believe yet, and notice what happens over time. Sometimes the belief follows the words.
Can I use affirmations during labor, or is that only for preparation?
Both. Affirmations can be something you practice during pregnancy so they're available to you during labor. Or you can create labor-specific affirmations and save them for when you actually need them. Some affirmations work better in active labor than they do in early pregnancy because they address what's actually happening in the moment. "This contraction is temporary. This is work, not punishment. My body is opening." Those land differently when you're in it.
What if affirmations make me feel worse or more anxious?
Stop using them. Not all coping tools work for all people. Some people find affirmations regulating, and some people find them anxiety-inducing because they feel inauthentic or too aspirational. If they're making you feel worse, they're the wrong tool for you right now. Try something else. Breathing practices, movement, talking to someone, journaling—there are other ways to regulate your nervous system. Use what works for you.
