Answering Questions about Childbirth

So, since I have had an unmedicated childbirth, people ask me a lot about it and want to know how I learned about. So, if you're interested in that type of thing, this is what I studied.

**But first, please know that I am not promoting this or advertising it - this is totally a decision each woman has to make on her own. I have had an induced/epidural childbirth and an uninduced/unmedicated one. Both were great experiences. Epidurals are such a gift and c-sections are great too when they are needed! But I would suggest that women who are going to give birth learn about the options so that they are knowledgable and not fearful about the whole process! I have no judgment on how a baby gets here, I'm just so excited he/she arrived!**

I had always kind of been interested in unmedicated childbirth, but thought there was no way I would ever try it because I'm a big wimp when it comes to pain. But tons of folks at the seminary have unmedicated births and they all seemed to think it was ok. So, once I was pregnant with EJ I watched The Business of Being Born, it was on Netflix Instant. This is what helped nudge me to being serious about giving unmedicated birth a shot. It was very informative.

At my first OB appointment with Elizabeth Joy, I told my doctor I was interested in natural childbirth. He said that was great and he suggested that I learn the Bradley Method and get a doula.

Getting a doula ended up being easy. I randomly was talking about childbirth with a preggo friend at the seminary when Kelley walked up and joined the conversation. All three of us discussed our love for Auburn and moved on to having babies and then she said, "I'm a doula!" and I said, "Want to be mine?!" We said War Eagle and shook on it. The she suggested that I read the following two books:

Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way by Susan McCutcheon. This is a husband-coached method of laboring that has a very high success rate of women not getting medicated. Dr. Bradley even suggests that the husband should be more tired than the wife after a delivery (because the wife is supposed to be very relaxed during the process). I read this book on my own and then talked to David about it. He then read all the "To the Coach" parts and skimmed the rest. He wanted to read more, but it was during the semester for him, so he had too much to read already!

Ina May's Guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskins. This book is full of birth stories. A lot of them are kind of hokey, but it definitely gave me lots of stories for me to think "if they can do it, I can do it". It built up my confidence for unmedicated childbirth, which is what I needed most.

Then, I just asked all the women I knew that had unmedicated births about it, prayed about it and David and I got pumped up and ready for it. It went very well, I was very blessed!

I'm pretty much an open book when it comes to my childbirth experiences, so let me know if you have any questions.