Preparing For Birth

In westernized countries, television and the internet have almost completely replaced the generational teaching and learning found in the “circles” of the past. Women would gather over sewing, quilting, canning, and life events including pregnancy and childbirth. They offered support, told their stories, spoke of family life, shared their everyday knowledge, wisdom and expertise while [...]

Below is a compilation of common terms and acronyms that women often will come across during pregnancy, labor, and delivery.  Check back as more will be added from time to time. AROM – Artificial Rupture of Membranes – using a finger or tool to open the amniotic sac to to allow the fluid to release. [...]

Nausea is such a common complaint among pregnant women.  Usually the extreme nausea passes by the time a woman enters the second to mid-second trimester, however, some women experience it throughout pregnancy. Though no solution is full proof, there are some things that can be done to aide in a calmer digestive system.  Remember that [...]

Choosing the place of birth for your baby – It is incredibly important that you understand where you fit best prior to choosing where to birth your baby. Take hospital and/or birth center tour, call and talk to L&D floor, get facts on home birth by talking to home birth midwives, other moms who have [...]

Women have supported women throughout the ages.  In our very busy and ever transient culture, the woman to woman education and support of yesteryear is sorely lacking.  It is very common for an expecting woman not have family nearby or to have support women who know the ways of natural, normal pregnancy, labor, delivery and [...]

This is a  slight re-do from a popular blog post from early 2008. The information is vital and pertinent to the near 1.5 million women (based on previous CDC data) who will have a cesarean surgery this year. Having a cesarean section will almost always  get you a baby.  Generally there is much more to [...]

I am revisiting the thought that women just aren’t the same these days and no longer able to spontaneously go into labor or birth today. There are some theories out there that the pelvis is evolving out of ability or that withaqll the intermingling of cultures that the option to grow a baby that plain [...]

Whenever I am asked why I am a doula, I need to stop and think for a moment.  My response every time is that as a doula I am filling the gap (along with others)  that is missing in today’s transient and autonomous society. When I respond, I am thinking of the days when girls [...]

I am often asked what someone needs to take to the hospital or birth center.   I am going for items that may not be normally thought of along with some tried and true items. Wherever a mother is going to have her baby – it is her space, her labor cave as it were.  Now [...]

ACOG recently updated guidelines for fetal monitoring in labor.  They call it a refinement.  Very interesting. Directly from the press release “Since 1980, the use of EFM has grown dramatically, from being used on 45% of pregnant women in labor to 85% in 2002,” says George A. Macones, MD, who headed the development of the [...]