Some good reading ...
Rhea Dempsey - Birth With Confidence
In this straight-forward book, Rhea Dempsey draws on over thirty years’ experience to show how a woman’s choice of caregivers, support team and birthplace, as well as her life experience and personal attitudes to pain, will affect her birth outcomes.
Featuring real-life stories, the latest Australian statistics and opportunities for guided personal reflection, Birth with Confidence provides the knowledge and practical advice that women need for the best chance of normal birth in today’s birth culture. Birth With Confidence will:
Ina May Gaskin - Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth
What you need to know to have the best birth experience for you. Drawing upon her thirty-plus years of experience, world’s most famous midwife, Ina May Gaskin, shares the benefits and joys of natural childbirth by showing women how to trust in the ancient wisdom of their bodies for a healthy and fulfilling birthing experience.
Ina May’s Guide to Natural Childbirth gives expectant mothers comprehensive information on everything from the all-important mind-body connection to how to give birth without technological intervention.
Filled with inspiring birth stories and practical advice, this invaluable resource includes:
Janet Balaskas - New Active Birth
This book will help you and your partner prepare for and experience an active birth.
Naturally, throughout time and the world over, women have chosen to walk, stand, squat, lie – to move their bodies freely and actively to find the most comfortable positions for labour and birth. It is only we in the west who have the extraordinary notion that a woman should lie on her back in a position that defies the laws of nature and gravity.
With this book you can learn to develop all your body’s resources to deal with the instinctive experience of childbirth. It is also for partners, teachers, midwives and everyone involved, to help mothers get up off the delivery table and to bring back some of the common sense which has been overlooked by modern obstetrics.
Henci Goer - The Thinking Women's Guide to a Better Birth
Henci Goer, award-winning medical writer and internationally known speaker, is the author of The Thinking Woman’s Guide to a Better Birth. Her previous book, Obstetric Myths Versus Research Realities is a highly-acclaimed resource for childbirth professionals, and she is an acknowledged expert on evidence-based maternity care. The book is now a little dated, but nonetheless, has some empowering information. In her book, Henci Goer covers the following topics and more:
Pam England - Birthing from Within
England provides a challenging and empowering book: there’s lots of practical advice for first-time pregnancies including positive discussion on the benefits or otherwise of birth plans and support people.
Pam England makes good use of art therapy and creative visualisation. The book is also full of photographs and fascinating art work and illustrations.
Dr Sarah Buckley - Gentle Birth Gentle Mothering - The wisdom and science of gentle choices in pregnancy, birth and parenting.
Michel Odent - Birth and Breastfeeding - Rediscovering the needs of women during pregnancy and childbirth
Nancy Bardacke - Mindful Birthing - Training the mind, body and heart for childbirth and beyond
Kerstin Moberg - The Oxytocin Factor - Tapping the hormone of calm, love and healing
Blandine Calais-Germain and Pares - Preparing for a Gentle Birth - The pelvis in pregnancy
In this straight-forward book, Rhea Dempsey draws on over thirty years’ experience to show how a woman’s choice of caregivers, support team and birthplace, as well as her life experience and personal attitudes to pain, will affect her birth outcomes.
Featuring real-life stories, the latest Australian statistics and opportunities for guided personal reflection, Birth with Confidence provides the knowledge and practical advice that women need for the best chance of normal birth in today’s birth culture. Birth With Confidence will:
- Outline the benefits for mothers and babies of a normal physiological birth
- Help you understand how our current birth culture can undermine your attempts at normal birth and the steps you can take to make sure it doesn’t
- Explain how the various ‘circles of influence’ around you – from your friends and family to the wider culture ” can support or sabotage your birthing potential
- Help you identify your own attitude to pain (your ‘pain type’) and what it will mean for your birth
- Provide practical and emotional steps you can take to raise your pain threshold
- Give you a framework for deciding on the best caregivers and support people to help you work through any ‘crisis of confidence’ during labour
Ina May Gaskin - Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth
What you need to know to have the best birth experience for you. Drawing upon her thirty-plus years of experience, world’s most famous midwife, Ina May Gaskin, shares the benefits and joys of natural childbirth by showing women how to trust in the ancient wisdom of their bodies for a healthy and fulfilling birthing experience.
Ina May’s Guide to Natural Childbirth gives expectant mothers comprehensive information on everything from the all-important mind-body connection to how to give birth without technological intervention.
Filled with inspiring birth stories and practical advice, this invaluable resource includes:
- Reducing the pain of labour without drugs — and the miraculous roles touch and massage play
- What really happens during labour
- Episiotomy — is it really necessary?
- Common methods of inducing labour — and which to avoid at all costs
- Tips for maximising your chances of an unmedicated labour and birth
- How to avoid postpartum bleeding — and depression
- The risks of anaesthesia and caesareans — what your doctor doesn’t necessarily tell you
- The best ways to work with doctors and/or birth care providers
- How to create a safe, comfortable environment for birth in any setting, including a hospital
- And much more
Janet Balaskas - New Active Birth
This book will help you and your partner prepare for and experience an active birth.
Naturally, throughout time and the world over, women have chosen to walk, stand, squat, lie – to move their bodies freely and actively to find the most comfortable positions for labour and birth. It is only we in the west who have the extraordinary notion that a woman should lie on her back in a position that defies the laws of nature and gravity.
With this book you can learn to develop all your body’s resources to deal with the instinctive experience of childbirth. It is also for partners, teachers, midwives and everyone involved, to help mothers get up off the delivery table and to bring back some of the common sense which has been overlooked by modern obstetrics.
Henci Goer - The Thinking Women's Guide to a Better Birth
Henci Goer, award-winning medical writer and internationally known speaker, is the author of The Thinking Woman’s Guide to a Better Birth. Her previous book, Obstetric Myths Versus Research Realities is a highly-acclaimed resource for childbirth professionals, and she is an acknowledged expert on evidence-based maternity care. The book is now a little dated, but nonetheless, has some empowering information. In her book, Henci Goer covers the following topics and more:
- Breech babies
- Epidurals
- Inducing labour
- Episiotomy
- IVs
- Vaginal birth after caesarean (VBAC)
- Electronic fetal monitoring
- Doulas / birth attendants
- Rupturing membranes
- Deciding on a doctor or midwife
- Coping with slow labour
- Choosing where to have your baby
Pam England - Birthing from Within
England provides a challenging and empowering book: there’s lots of practical advice for first-time pregnancies including positive discussion on the benefits or otherwise of birth plans and support people.
Pam England makes good use of art therapy and creative visualisation. The book is also full of photographs and fascinating art work and illustrations.
Dr Sarah Buckley - Gentle Birth Gentle Mothering - The wisdom and science of gentle choices in pregnancy, birth and parenting.
Michel Odent - Birth and Breastfeeding - Rediscovering the needs of women during pregnancy and childbirth
Nancy Bardacke - Mindful Birthing - Training the mind, body and heart for childbirth and beyond
Kerstin Moberg - The Oxytocin Factor - Tapping the hormone of calm, love and healing
Blandine Calais-Germain and Pares - Preparing for a Gentle Birth - The pelvis in pregnancy