Ina May's Guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskin
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Book Reviews of Ina May's Guide to Childbirth
Book Review: Hospital, or home, natural or with pain relief - this book is a must read!
Summary: 5 Stars
When you are pregnant, you are bombarded with information, much of it very frightening. While it's important to get that information, and to be aware of risks, it's also important to be reminded that most children are born without major complications. I found this book extremely reassuring after reading so many worst-case scenarios.
The first part of the book consists of first persons accounts of births. Most of the births took place at the Farm between 1970s and the 2000s. Some do take place in a hospital setting. For me, these stories were extremely reassuring.
Following that, there is some history of birth and birthing practices. This was interesting, particularly the sections on midwives. She reviews several studies, and this part of the book does criticise some usual medical practices, such as fetal monitoring et cetera. It's useful to have, if only to contrast with information in other books and to ensure you're getting a full picture of the options out there for births.
Anyway, this is not a traditional pregnancy book with guidelines on what to eat, or how your baby is growing. But as birth approaches, it's a very useful resource for looking at what options you might want for your birth. Even if you are not considering a natural birth, this is a nice resource for making you feel like it's possible to have a normal birth - maybe to even enjoy it!
Book Review: Wonderful book for anyone interested in Midwifery.
Summary: 5 Stars
I am an EMT-basic who plans on becoming a homebirth/birth center based Certified Nurse Midwife in the future. I am also considering becoming a doula, and this book was one of the ones on the reading list, so I decided to pick it up. It is a great book. I loved reading all the birth stories in the first half of the book. It was nice to see some personal touches instead of just cold statistics. I thought that the last half of the book was interesting from a medical standpoint.She explains the pros and cons of several tests/interventions, and shows why the rate of c-section and maternal death in the US are so unnecessarily high. It's obvious that Ina May knows what she is talking about.
Contrary to what some others have said, I do not believe that Ina May is completely anti medicine. In the book,she speaks highly of several doctors and acknowledges that intervention is necessary in some cases. What she is concerned about(and rightly so) is intervention when it is not needed. She does not critize women who have had c-sections(or other interventions) for legitimate medical reasons(as my mom did).
Through this book, Ina May shows the true power that women have. I do not have children right now, but I hope to someday. This book has shown me that I do not need to be afraid of childbirth.
In short, I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in natural childbirth.
Book Review: GREAT book to prepare for childbirth
Summary: 5 Stars
I only wish I had started reading this book earlier. I was trying to hurry up and get to the end, and my son came a few days early and I didn't get to finish, I was so bummed!
I loved this book, it was very informative, but I also loved reading the other women's birth stories. It was great, and I even remembered to remember something I read in the book during my very fast, very intense labor- the throat sphincter. I'm SO glad I read about this- I remembered to relax my throat and not tense up and try to blast the baby out as fast and hard as you can. I think we grow up seeing people in movies and on TV doing this, and having people screaming "PUSH!" at them, and this is NOT what the birth experience needs to be.
Ina May is a gift to women and the world of pregnancy and childbirth. I'm so glad she is sharing her knowledge and experience with the rest of us. I totally get why people would move to The Farm just to have her as their midwife! We were lucky enough to have AMAZING midwives in Los Angeles, and had a wonderful home birth, free of interventions and full of love and intimacy.
This book was a part of our wonderful pregnancy and amazingly beautiful and empowering birth experience, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who is expecting, no matter what kind of "birth plan" you have. I'd just recommend you start reading it much earlier than I did so you have time to finish it!
Book Review: A must read for any pregnant woman.
Summary: 5 Stars
As a first time mom preparing for natural childbirth (that's drug free, not just vaginal) I found this book to be very inspiring and it helped me to have confidence in my body. These days women are taught that they aren't capable of having a baby without all of the latest medical interventions and drugs available. I have always felt that childbirth is a natural process but doctors treat pregnant women like they are sick and childbirth is treated as a dangerous event in which the mother and child need to be rescued from one another. The first half of this book has great natural childbirth stories written by mothers and it has given me invaluable information to use for my own impending birth. I am reading it a second time now and hi-lighting passages that I want to remember. The second half of the book is about the medical procedures that are commonly used in the United States and how much more dangerous they are than what we are led to believe. How can The United States of America have one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the industrialized world? While all of these birth stories happen outside of a hospital there is still a great deal of information and confidence to be had if you are going to be giving birth in a hospital with a doctor. Take control of your birth experience because it is a miracle whether it is treated as such in the hospital or not.Book Review: this book grows on you
Summary: 5 Stars
When I first read through this book (about seven months into my pregnancy), I thought it was full of interesting and helpful information, but it seemed a bit touchy-feely for me. Honestly, I couldn't understand why everyone loved it so much. But I have noticed, as my delivery date approaches, that I keep thinking about the birth stories that make up this book's first half--so much so that I actually re-checked this book out at the library.
I have to say that reading through the natural birth stories of other women has really helped me feel more confident in my ability to give birth naturally and has made me feel more relaxed and centered in general. We shall see if these calm feelings translate into a pleasant and serene delivery (ha ha), but for now I am thankful that something has been able to make me feel less anxious about labor.
UPDATE: I gave birth to my son two weeks ago and was able to do it without pain medication--even though I had to be induced with Pitocin. This book did end up helping me believe in myself and my ability to go through labor without medication. The birth stories from this book helped, but what helped me more was using some of the visual imagery exercises that Ina May suggests. (I really liked using her term "rush" instead of "contraction.") At any rate, this book helped me manage my labor pain better.