What I'm Reading

Labour of Love is a book about midwives and tells their stories of birth. It tells about many different places of birth in Australia whether they be busy understaffed rural hospitals, birth centres or hospitals full of nosy medical practitioners.

It gives an interesting perspective into childbirth from the people who see it day in day out. A behind the scenes look into the amazing world of birth.

I have really enjoyed reading the stories. It is nice reading the stories of the women going through labour knowing just as the midwives do that they are going to get through it and more times than not have a baby at the end.

Many of the stories tell of the medical model of childbirth with epidurals, inductions and  Syntocinon for the third stage. These stories have made me feel good about my decision to go natural if I can. I'm sure the book is a little biased but the natural birth loving midwives seem a lot nicer than the pushy stirrup loving obstetricians.

There is a section on birth in remote areas which, on the other side of the coin makes me feel so blessed to have those obstetricians around just in case. I know that my baby will have the best chance of surviving. So many babies and mamas around the world and even around this country are not as lucky.

I've had many a laugh and shed many a tear reading this book and it has opened my mind to the many many different ways that women give birth.

The other book I have been reading is New Active Birth by Janet Balaskas.

It is all about natural active birth which means birth in which the mother is the most active person. She controls the way she stands and labours depending on what her body is telling her it needs to do.

It had an interesting section on the history of birth. For most of history women birthed sitting in birthing stools, standing or squatting. It is only since the medicalisation of birth that women have done the deed on their backs.

It showed that your back is probably not the greatest place to give birth as it actually makes the birth canal smaller and does not make use of gravity.

The book has some great pictures that I loved scaring showing Myl and some helpful prenatal exercises to do to help for labour.

It goes through the stages of labour and talks about the things that can go right and wrong in a helpful way. It talks about pain relief methods other than epidural which I found really useful.

Two great books. I've got a whole pile more. My mum gave me about three on breastfeeding alone.