The head had come out, mostly. The chin pressed deep into the mother; it didn’t emerge in the way expected. The baby grimaced but stayed tight. His chin didn’t arch and swing to the side so that he could face his mother’s thigh. My mentor said softly but firmly, “check for the cord.” Slipping my finger out of sight, I felt an odd crease around the baby’s neck but couldn’t get under it; so, no cord, I thought. I placed the same finger on his shoulder and pressed gently to corkscrew the baby. I worried that pressure could cause him discomfort. My finger pressed tentatively. No movement resulted at all.

 Read more…. Shoulder Dystocia: The Basics

A friend reminded me in a recent e-mail of the world of risk we are now part of in the West. It was one of those circulating e-mails, and it took a look at the differences in the world we grew up in compared to the one our children are a part of now. According to the risk measures we apply to the life of our children it is clear many of us should not have survived! Children now have become more protected and cocooned than we ever were.

 Read more…. Fear, Society, And Birth

“Tokophobia” is an intense anxiety or fear of death that leads to some women dreading and avoiding childbirth despite desperately wanting a baby. So, can we call this yet another piece of iatrogenic morbidity? How many women had this a hundred years ago? What has the Western childbirth model done to women?

 Read more…. Tokophobia

Lotus birth is the practice of leaving the umbilical cord uncut, so that the baby remains attached to his or her placenta until the cord naturally separates at the umbilicus—exactly as a cut cord does—at 3 to 10 days after birth. This prolonged contact can be seen as a time of transition, allowing the baby to slowly and gently let go of his or her attachment to the mother’s body.

 Read more…. Lotus Birth: A Ritual For Our Times

In the past 27 years of practice, I have evolved from the new-nurse-technowizard in the birth environment to a well-seasoned holistic practitioner.    During the past decade as the creator and coordinator of a hospital-based doula program and a perinatal education specialist, I have become aware of the impact that the birthing environment has on the laboring mother, her social support and the birth experience itself.

 Read more…. Balancing Chi And Integrating Feng Shui

Drumming has a rich and long history rooted in ancient cultures. Drums were used for communication and primeval expression in virtually every area of the globe. Drummers were healers. Drummers were women. Women and their clans drummed for many occasions including both spiritual and physical rites of passage. The drum was an empty shell to be filled with expression, the birthplace of healing sounds, a womb.

 Read more…. Creating A Sound Environment: Drumming For The Childbearing Year

Editor’s note: This article first appeared in Midwifery Today, Issue 66, Summer 2003.Join Midwifery Today Online Membership Selena and Mac are country people.* I attended their births early in my career and learned a lot from them, especially when they had Sophia, their third baby and first daughter. Mac didn’t believe in hospitals or doctors. He and I had lengthy debates and I had pointed out to him that he went right to the emergency room when his leg was broken. However, he saw that as somehow different from childbirth. I made sure he knew what my protocols were and what kinds of situations I believed were safer in the hospital. Sophia turned to a breech position when she was 32 weeks along and Selena started doing the tilt board and some acupressure points to encourage her to return to head first. My phone rang a little after six one morning. It was Selena and her voice was a tearful wail. “I’m in labor!” she said. “I’ve been having cramps all night and I’ve been telling myself I ate something bad, ’cause I’ve had a little diarrhea too. But it’s not that! I can feel the pressure! Can you come and see if I’m in labor?” “I’ll be right there!” I replied. I pulled her chart from my files. Just as I thought, she was not yet quite 36 weeks. And possibly still breech! Hurriedly, I dressed and drove to their home. Selena was lying on the thick rug in their living room, her legs propped up on a big pillow. A quick exam revealed the irregular presenting part of a complete breech, covered by the taut, smooth surface of the waterbag. No cervix could be felt. “You’re complete,” I said. “And the baby’s still breech. And premature, Selena.” “What… Read more…. Marion’s Message: Making the Best of the Birth Environment

 Read more…. Marion’s Message: Making the Best of the Birth Environment

A number of authors have called attention to the language we commonly use in discussing birth and how particular words shape our understanding of birth.

 Read more…. A Question Of Words

Classical homeopathy embraces the whole person. We look beyond the individual symptoms a client presents to see the constitution as a whole in order to find the appropriate remedy. The characteristics of a substance help us to understand some of the healing properties of the homeopathic remedy.

 Read more…. India Ink: Homeopathic Sepia

Working in hospitals that serve as the place of birth for thousands of women a year provides many nurses with opportunities for mother-friendly nurse intervention. Mother-friendly nurses all over the world provide supportive measures that normalize birth.

 Read more…. Mother-Friendly Nurse Intervention

Since the 1960s, there has been a lot written about the place to have a baby. The “safety” lobby has pushed more and more for all hospital births, while, with a strength of its own, the “normality” lobby has pulled birth back into the home. The debate about whether home is best has continued in and out of the newspapers and professional journals, with women supporting the desire for choice to birth in either area.

 Read more…. The Sacred Place Of Birth

I began interviewing Dutch midwives and obstetricians in an effort to understand how they successfully negotiate working together, especially in the hospital setting. I wanted to know what the Dutch do differently when, in other countries, the differing philosophies of birth that typically characterize these two professions have often made for tense and even hostile working relations.

 Read more…. Working Relations: Midwives And Obstetricians In The Netherlands