Pregnancy and Birth
Empowered Birth: sterile water injections
I have recently been asked to research (and potentially implement) a technique in which the midwife injects four small quantities of sterile water into the lower back of the labouring mother. This is something I was unfamiliar with and I was set on a path of discovery. I have learned that the practice is known and offered to women in labour by midwives all over the globe. Units from Australia, New Zealand, California, Scandinavia, as well as some from the UK, have responded to my query to say that this is part of their practice. Sterile water injections (SWI), administered by midwives, are a simple and well-established method of managing labour pain. This intervention was first used to alleviate pain associated with kidney stones and was introduced to obstetrics in the 1970s. Using a syringe, small amounts of sterile water are deposited intradermally near the sacral area. The sterile water...
Empowered Birth: sterile water injections
I have recently been asked to research (and potentially implement) a technique in which the midwife injects four small quantities of sterile water into the lower back of the labouring...
A doula reflects on the primal experience of birth
Farts were always funny in my household. Much to my mother’s irritation, my dad, my brother and I took great delight in all toilet-based humour. This dubious tradition has carried on into my own home, with my husband and our two sons under five all enjoying anything rude. Fortunately this has stood me in good stead in my role as a birth doula! Birth is not glamorous. Birth is messy, primal, animalistic and very ‘real’. For me, this is part of the reason why I love being a doula. I am not involved in crunching numbers or marketing strategies. I do not spend days in a tidy office worrying about ‘blue sky thinking’ and sales figures. I am instead frequently vomited on, have my shoes covered in a sudden gush of amniotic fluid, am blood spattered, or am covered in tar-like baby poo. I am clung to by sweaty, heavily...
A doula reflects on the primal experience of birth
Farts were always funny in my household. Much to my mother’s irritation, my dad, my brother and I took great delight in all toilet-based humour. This dubious tradition has carried...
Empowered Birth: reflections on the history of ...
I have recently read the book Midwifery from Tudors to the 21st Century: History, Politics and Safe Practice in England. The author is a retired midwife teacher, Dr Julia Allison, whose research influenced government policy through the publication the Changing Childbirth report in 1993.1 Its goal then was to review policy of NHS maternity care and childbirth, and to make recommendations. In previous decades, midwives had all but lost their roles and had become obstetric nurses. Parts of the report are as relevant today as they were then: Care is provided “with the pregnant woman at its centre.” She can make choices “after hearing all of the available options and having procedures and interventions carefully discussed and explained… Gone, or going, are the days of doctors’ paternalism (or maternalism, for that matter). As professionals we owe it to our patients to develop our skills in providing them with information clearly...
Empowered Birth: reflections on the history of midwifery
I have recently read the book Midwifery from Tudors to the 21st Century: History, Politics and Safe Practice in England. The author is a retired midwife teacher, Dr Julia Allison,...
Empowered Birth: water birth
Last month, my colleague Sarah and I delivered a presentation on water birth as part of the mandatory update training that all midwives undertake annually. We felt unhappy that in previous years training around water births had focused on risks and potential problems. We observed a bias being taught that created anxiety, raised doubts and diminished our colleagues’ confidence. There was no balance, and certainly no attention given to physiology or what a smooth birth might look like where mum and baby are healthy and well. We proposed a session on updating water birth skills as we had witnessed some apprehension and lack of intention in facilitating births in water. In the birth centre, we find them magical, and we learn so much about the physiology of both mum and baby when they are immersed in warm water. Through the training, we wanted to reduce overcaution in promoting the use...
Empowered Birth: water birth
Last month, my colleague Sarah and I delivered a presentation on water birth as part of the mandatory update training that all midwives undertake annually. We felt unhappy that in...
A natural approach to improving and preserving ...
There has been much in the media about fertility. Television presenter Kirstie Allsopp warned women in their twenties of the heartache of dwindling fertility, encouraging them to have children early and save university for later. Facebook and Apple announced that to encourage longevity in their female employees’ careers and commitment, they would pay for egg freezing. Both are drastic options and would certainly not suit every woman. There is however another option: making the choice to take a natural approach to optimising and preserving fertility. In today’s ‘full on’ society it has never been more relevant than it is now to consider your fertility and do everything you can naturally to grow your family. It is widely believed that a woman is born with her full supply of eggs, millions of them, that these naturally decline and we lose many each month, and that, unlike men, who manufacture sperm on...
A natural approach to improving and preserving your fertility
There has been much in the media about fertility. Television presenter Kirstie Allsopp warned women in their twenties of the heartache of dwindling fertility, encouraging them to have children early...
Empowered Birth: the media and birth
Birth has been back in the media recently with several prominent headlines as the BBC promoted the dramatisation of Adam Kay’s autobiography This Is Going to Hurt. I have read many of the reactions from the public and from midwives and, as usual, opinion is divided. An episode of Panorama aired in February on the failings in some NHS trusts called ‘Maternity Scandal: Fighting for the Truth’. Following the programme, the BBC reported that the NHS in England is to drop the limit on caesarean births. The problems and catastrophes described in such portrayals of birth in the media mean that balance and context is absent and confidence in birth is lost. I am familiar with this fallout having worked in the birth sector for 29 years. I have no control over how women manage their pregnancies and what support they seek. If they find information from the valuable resources...
Empowered Birth: the media and birth
Birth has been back in the media recently with several prominent headlines as the BBC promoted the dramatisation of Adam Kay’s autobiography This Is Going to Hurt. I have read...
Empowered Birth: feeling empowered in your jour...
As a therapist in private practice, my focus is on supporting the women I meet to reach their highest potential. This can be in an emotional, physical or psychological way. Being empowered is not about being stroppy or argumentative, or submissive and passive, but about celebrating our uniqueness and strength. I use my skills and knowledge to support and assist women so that they feel empowered to ask for what they need clearly and confidently during pregnancy and birth. Each woman who comes and works with me chooses to commit to this without knowing what the birth will feel like, how long it will take, how she will cope and recover, and how she will parent her new baby. She is willing to lean on her partner or family for love and support, but she knows that ultimately this is her journey. In birth this is how it has always...
Empowered Birth: feeling empowered in your journey to birth
As a therapist in private practice, my focus is on supporting the women I meet to reach their highest potential. This can be in an emotional, physical or psychological way....
Birth stories: active labour and the birth of a...
Active birth was the doorway to more than a positive birth experience: it changed my understanding of womanhood and my family’s birth story, writes Caroline Brewser It’s the birth experiences of our mothers that are most likely to shape our image of what birth will be like. And for those of us born from the 1960s onwards, the story tends to involve a woman in a hospital, subject to control by those around her, undergoing a ‘procedure’ to extract a baby as a means to an end. And the pain is recounted as the badge of honour. My mother’s story does at least have a hint of ‘feminist backlash’. One wintry Sunday night in the late 1960s, my father having been sent home an hour before with the assurance “Nothing is going to happen tonight”, she was told that if I didn’t emerge in the next minute they would cut...
Birth stories: active labour and the birth of a mother
Active birth was the doorway to more than a positive birth experience: it changed my understanding of womanhood and my family’s birth story, writes Caroline Brewser It’s the birth experiences...
Empowered Birth: using a rebozo during pregnancy
A large, handwoven piece of fabric and symbol of Mexican identity, the rebozo ̶ a word meaning shawl ̶ is multifunctional: it can be a fashionable item of clothing, a baby sling, a shade from the sun and can also be used to carry things. It is a woman’s companion during her whole life and how she lives with it is based on oral tradition and ancient wisdom passed down through the generations. Frida Kahlo popularised the rebozo and those she was photographed in or was depicted wearing in paintings have been displayed all over the world, representing the intersection where art, culture and fashion collide. However, their oldest use has been in support of pregnancy and in the past eighteen months I have been using the rebozo as a midwifery tool aimed to gently move the womb for increased comfort and control. Every time I use it, I learn...
Empowered Birth: using a rebozo during pregnancy
A large, handwoven piece of fabric and symbol of Mexican identity, the rebozo ̶ a word meaning shawl ̶ is multifunctional: it can be a fashionable item of clothing, a...
Happy Hormones: plant-based recipes that promot...
Hormones control more than most people think; they act as the master switches for growth, reproduction, mood, metabolism, weight, energy, brain function, libido, and the appearance of your skin, hair and nails. And they can make your life downright miserable if they aren’t fluctuating with optimal ratios. The belief that hormones can only be tamed through medication is false, and these ideas are severely outdated. If we provide young girls with the tools, resources, and education to understand the ride to womanhood – fluctuating hormones and all – it would encourage a more positive connection to their bodies from the beginning. My mission is to combat hormone imbalance and promote women’s health. Through my recipes I encourage women to eat cyclically for the monthly cycle. Every vegetable, fruit, legume, nut, and seed offers unique vitamins and minerals that can help the body flow through each phase with fewer symptoms and...
Happy Hormones: plant-based recipes that promote energy and balance
Hormones control more than most people think; they act as the master switches for growth, reproduction, mood, metabolism, weight, energy, brain function, libido, and the appearance of your skin, hair...