The way we give birth is important to all of us because it has a great deal to do with the kind of society we want to live in, the significance of the coming to birth of a new person and a new society.
~Sheila Kitzinger
Birth matters. It matters because it is the way we all begin our lives outside of our source, our mother's bodies. It's the means through which we enter and feel our first impression of the wider world. For each mother, that shakes and shapes her to her innermost core. Women's perceptions about their bodies and their babies' capabilities will be deeply influenced by the care they receive around the time of birth.
No matter how much pressure our society may bring upon us to pretend otherwise, pregnancy, labor, and birth produce very powerful changes in women's bodies, phyches, and lives, no matter which exit route - natural or surgical - babies are born. It follows then that the way that birth care is organized and carried out will have a powerful effect on any human society.
A society that places a low value on its mothers and the process of birth will suffer an array of negative repercussions for doing so. Good beginnings make a positive difference in the world, so it is worth our while to provide the best possible care for mother and babies throughout this extraordinarily influential part of life.
Birth matters because the journey through pregnancy and birth offers and irreplaceable way for women to explore their deepest selves - their minds, bodies and nature. Such a journey of self discovery can help them prepare for the hard and underappreciated job of motherhood in a world now full of historically unique ad complex challenges.
There is sacred power in the innately feminine capacity of giving birth. It is one of the elemental, continuing processes of nature that women have the chance to experience, and it is the one act of human creation that is not shared by men. Why would we not want to explore this territory?
The word sacred implies that birth is an event important enough to warrant special consideration from those who are involved in the care of women during this time of life. It indicates that disrespect of the power of giving birth creates profound disharmony and ignorance in the world.
~ Ina May Gaskin
Birth Matters
A greater involvement of women in the formulation of maternity care policy and in the education of young women and men about birth is fundamental in order to take birth back to its rightful place: birth belongs to women. Giving birth is something that women actively do and exult in.
Women who are fully informed about the capacities of women's bodies should lead the way, and all women who care about social justice and human rights should be involved.
The way a culture treats women in birth is a good indicator of how well women and their contributions to society are valued and honored. Of course, fathers, husbands, brothers, and all other men who care about the women in their lives need to be involved as well.
This should happen in every country, but is particularly important that the involvement of a partnership of mothers and midwifes be increased in those countries in which there are either too few interventions that are sometimes needed during the process of birth or too many of these interventions, because both kinds of system errors cost women their lives.
It is not an intention to persuade those women who want to avoid pregnancy to change their minds-far from it. It is about to convince even women with no interest in motherhood that the right to a positive and safe birth is just as important as the right to choose whether or not to have a child. There is a great value in taking a deeper look at motherhood and trying to discover what might have to do with women's empowerment. We need to deepen our understanding of where we have been as women in the past and how the past has shaped and often distorted our knowledge of our bodies and ourselves, especially in the realm of pregnancy and birth.
~Ina May Gaskin
