God is LAUGHING.......at us.

Sometimes in my life...a movie REALLY touches me.
Last night I watched "The Business of Being Born".
AMAZING!
Its a beautiful, lovely documentary.
Ricki Lake(yes, the talk show host) produced a movie that was ALL about Midwifery and birth.
AND homebirth.......
Yes...homebirth.
Its a scary word.."homebirth".
Let it sink in...Homebirth.
I know...scary.
That's what we are programed to think.
Because...BIRTH has become a BUSINESS.
Why a homebirth?
Here's why......

In most cultures throughout history, women have given birth at home. The majority of women worldwide continue to birth their babies in non-hospital settings today. In many cultures birth is viewed as an integral part of family life. The advent of obstetrics in this century had a tremendous effect on childbirth customs in the United States. The birthing process became segregated from mainstream family life. Many were led to believe that the only safe birth was a hospital birth. Though doctors and hospitals took credit for statistics that indicated that birth was more successful than in previous centuries, in reality better nutrition, hygiene and disease control improved outcomes. Even today US statistics don't support the premise that the only safe birth is a hospital birth. The US ranks 28th among industrialized nations for healthy births, at 7.0 infant deaths per 1000 births. (These data are based on 2002 statistics from the Maternal and Child Health Bureau: US Department of Health and Human Services.) Hospitals have never been proven a safe place to have a baby.

By the 1950s, most births in the US were taking place in hospitals. Cesareans, epidurals and heavy doses of pain medication became the norm. Women were denied feeling and experiencing birth through their bodies, and the drugs were having adverse effects on mothers and babies.

In the 1960s and '70s, women began to question and challenge the way obstetricians were treating them—as though childbirth were a sickness. Women began to reclaim their power, and the homebirth movement was born.

The 1990s became a time of maternity awareness. People were concerned with making all of pregnancy and birth a family experience. Today, a carefully monitored homebirth has been proven to be very safe and successful for women who have been helped to stay low-risk through nutrition and good prenatal care.

Ok, Ok.....Homebirth is NOT for everyone.
There are ALWAYS some cases where a homebirth is NOT POSSIBLE.
I am not an idiot...just a realist.

This film is SHATTERING the ILLUSION of what we are all fed as a society.
I have had BOTH kinds of birth and can tell you that I would NEVER do it any other way AGAIN.
Homebirth changed the way I view childbirth.
Life is a blessing....
Most of the time-Interference is UNNECESSARY.