Knowledge is power. If you are expecting a baby there is a wealth of information out there to support your pregnancy and birth, as you have no doubt discovered.
You've probably read some blogs, joined some apps and booked a pregnancy yoga class, new parent class or NCT class. You may have been given information by your midwife, or at antenatal appointments. Friends and family may have offered you advice.
Through all of this information is threaded the medical model of pregnancy, labour and birth, this is the basis for how we learn about pregnancy and birth.
Whilst the development of medicine and technology has supported the labour and birth process, in other ways it can get in the way. We have replaced handed down knowledge from generations of women, with medical rules and systems that makes pregnancy and birth appear to be a hospital procedure, something done to a woman, rather than a process led by and owned by the woman herself.
Here are 4 books that will give you wider information and help you to have an active labour and birth. They include tools and techniques to help your labour progress positively and even joyfully; how to ensure both mother and baby are well supported, empowered and able to make confident choices whether in hospital or at home. Everyone expecting a baby should read at least one of these – mother, partner and anyone supporting a mother and baby.
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