Journeying towards better birth
The Clitoris in Labour
Did you know that, like an iceberg, most of the clitoris is hidden beneath the surface? I didn’t until a couple of years ago but there was a spate of pretty pink 3D clitorises (?sp ??clitorati) on the net and it got me thinking and Googling. I found an article by...
Kick starting labour – a new model of uterine function
Kick starting labour – a new model of uterine function. The current management of women in labour is based around RCTs of what health professionals do – or don’t do – to women under their care. Physiology comes right at the bottom of the hierarchy of evidence in...
Zen and the Science of Birth
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance has replaced Arthur Ransom’s The Picts and the Martyrs as my desert island book. My daughter says that no one ever should be told that they ought to read a book but my son recommended ZAMM when I was agonising over two...
Traumatic Childbirth
Yesterday’s Observer (7/5/2017) had a heartrending piece about traumatic childbirth. The comments section confirmed that the author was not alone. There were accounts dating back 30 years or more of appalling injuries which remained unresolved to this day, damage...
Dangerous Liaisons?
“Why should women have to prepare themselves and psyche themselves up for encounters with health professionals? It’s ridiculous.” Not my words, but those of a Nicky Grace, a midwife. The maternity system seems unable to organise itself so that women meet a...
Journeying towards better birth
I came to the birth world through psychology. After my third child was born happily at home, I decided to write a home birth book and also to do some research into mothers’ experience of birth at home and in hospital. I couldn’t believe home birth was as dangerous...