How to birth a baby - Lamaze Jamestown, North Dakota

There always seems to be a new story popping up about a woman breastfeeding her baby in public and someone asking her to cover up. A recent story out of Moorhead for example. Reading this story it sounds like the issue is resolved and the employees at the pool where the incident occurred have been reeducated and now know it is a woman's right to breastfeed her baby in public. I LOVE the response that nursing mothers have to these types of incidents. A NURSE-IN! I can just hear the conversations. "Ladies, I was at the pool yesterday and they told me to cover up. Let's show them we are a force! Everyone bring your hungry baby to the pool tomorrow and prepare to sit and breastfeed that baby and DARE them to make us all cover up." These types of active protests make me wish I was still nursing my kid. I would love to have participated in a nurse-in full force. Breastfeeding is an amazing experience and I encourage any mom I meet to do it. Granted it is a lot of hard ...

NPR has had a series of childbirth related stories recently. And this one is great: Should More Women Give Birth Outside The Hospital? There is an excellent quote by Dr. Neel Shah that I believe really sums up the care in the U.S.: "We're taking excellent care of high-risk women," he says, "and leaving low-risk, normal women behind. We're the only country on Earth with a rising maternal mortality rate." Can you believe that?! A rising maternal mortality rate in the U.S.? And yet it is true with our intervention heavy birth process and high cesarean rates, which average 33 percent in the U.S. compared with 26 percent in the U.K. They interview another obstetrician and he reveals his arrogance. And that is what I have come to believe is the root of the criticism of alternative care sought by pregnant women in the U.S. We have been conditioned to think that we should seek an obstetrician care giver for the best care. When in reality, these doctors are tr...

I gave "The Official Lamaze Guide: Giving Birth With Confidence" to a friend of mine. This friend is a labor and delivery nurse at my local hospital. She is good at her job, she attended the birth of my second baby and I value her opinions. She told me frankly that she was offended with certain parts of the book and the fact that it didn't recognize the work of nurses and doctors who are trying to change the hospital birth experience to fit the needs of women in labor. I know that she values the birth experience and genuinely wants every mom that comes in there to have a great experience. I agree. On some level there is a need to challenge the hospital protocols for laboring women. To question certain practices like no solid food and continuous electronic fetal monitoring. But there are doctors, nurses and hospitals that are recognizing the power a woman's body has to give birth and trusting in that process and not managing it with medical interventions unless neces...

The one key piece of advice I give pregnant women is when you go into labor, MOVE! Move to find comfort and move to keep labor progressing. Gravity is your friend when birthing a baby. Movement helps your baby descend into the birth canal and turn into the correct birthing position. Restricting a laboring woman to a back lying position inhibits all the processes that need to take place for the baby to come out. I labored for a while at home with both of my babies. Throughout my labor I rocked on an exercise ball and walked around the room. I spent a lot of time on my hands and knees and leaning on the bed. It all worked in my favor because my labors progressed quickly and my babies came out successfully.  So be insistent that you need to move. Have a yoga mat with you to lay on the floor so you can use it to get into positions on the floor that help you. Don't let anyone insist that you lay down. And screw that electronic fetal monitoring. I hear a bath is great for relieving t...

My name is Jennifer and I have decided to become a childbirth educator. I am starting my journey by reading and self study and will take an instruction class in November. Why have I decided to start this venture? I think childbirth is fascinating and when I was pregnant I knew I wanted to give birth without drugs, but I didn't know how. Childbirth is one of those things a body just knows how to do. Although, every woman may not know how to help their body do it. I found that in my smallish community there were no resources to help me learn how to do this. So I turned to books and yoga which helped a lot and gave me the tools to successfully birth two babies without medication (aside from that antibiotic I needed because I was group B strep positive). I know not every woman is able to read and do the education on her own, so I want to be an instrument of change in my community and help women who are seeking knowledge on how to have an unmedicated birth. I want to help them gain kn...