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Recommended Reading

Reclaiming Childbirth as a Rite of Passage · Dr Rachel Reed

This book contains a lot of information about physiological birth, findings from birth studies, and wisdom from down the ages, as well as ways of understanding care provider practices as preventive rituals in the order of ancient birth practices. I enjoyed her Eve narrative depicting undisturbed birth and her discussion of how the way we approach menstruation in our culture impacts how we approach childbirth, which in turn affects the way we cope with menopause and aging. There were also many tidbits that I still recall because they were useful to be able to cite for expecting mamas, such as vaginal examinations are only accurate 52% of the time, and even when they’re accurate they tell us nothing about what is going to happen next in this labour if left alone. I would recommend this one to anyone interested in birth from both a clinical and cultural point of view, though I would say I found significant biases at work in the ‘her-story’ chapters that begin the book.

Indie Birth - Radical Birth Love · Maryn Green, Margo Blackstone

This book details how Maryn and Margo follow the call to serve birthing women. It centres on how they see autonomy manifested in childbirth as something that comes from within the mother. This comes through in various ways throughout the topics and birth stories that are expounded in the volume. Maryn describes the mother’s role in always choosing her own prenatal care, while Margo unpacks the concept of ‘professionalism’ in midwifery and how this can unfortunately position the mother as an amateur at birth. Both authors drive home the importance of seeing the woman as spirit as well as body, yet the intellectual side to understanding physiologic birth can liberate some women from their fears and prepare them to make confident decisions in pregnancy and labour. It also forms part of the sacred science paradigm that Margo describes as incorporating both the mystery and physiologic nuance of pregnancy and birth, as well as the role technology can play in assisting birth when the mother discerns a need.

I really appreciated the emphasis on intuition and innate wisdom that we have as birthing women, and how this needs to be encouraged in a community context where women help other women because it’s just what we do, learning from one another from very young so that we are ready to become mothers and to serve other mothers. This is certainly my dream for women and something I want to help create as a doula until my role as a hired birthworker is one day redundant and women are instead served by their mothers, sisters, aunties, friends, mentors… whoever it may be! This is the antidote to what Maryn identifies as the “old paradigm” where birth approached with fear based on intervention-filled control-based systems and media continue to portray birthing women as “weak and stupid and incapable of birthing in a powerful way”. 

Ultimately, however, a birthing woman is “at the center of the spiral[…] and has the power to call on whatever she needs” (p. 138). This book is a clarion call to awaken that power in all of us. 

Gentle Birth, Gentle Mothering · Dr Sarah Buckley

The book deals with first birth then mothering via personal stories and empirical research. Several chapters end with a helpful list of suggestions or recommendations for different topics, including decision-making around prenatal testing, physiological birth, undisturbed third stage, attachment style parenting, and safe co-sleeping. 

I found especially insightful the information Buckley included throughout which connects the hormonal events of birth with the developing mother-baby relationship in the immediate postpartum and beyond. In the first few hours after the birth, a complex interdependent system of “mutual regulation” is establishing and continues to form over the following weeks and months, especially when physical contact is maintained.

After two physiological home births with actively managed third stages and complicated breastfeeding journeys I will be eager to apply much of the wisdom in this book to my own subsequent experiences. I see it as a must-read for mamas and birth workers, though I’m sure much of the research cited has been updated since the time of publishing.

More to come…