by Cindy Hansen
Today’s call with Cindy Hansen is a great opportunity for new moms to get some great advice and insight into what options there are available to you. Cindy is a doula and qualified lactation counselor who will be covering as much information as she can in half an hour!! Here is an idea of what subjects to expect.
If you have any questions please email them to info@rawmom.com. Connect with you later on the call - or if you can’t make it - it will recorded and available to listen to online.
♥ Educate your self… read a good book, listen to teleseminars 
women make better choices when they are informed.
♥ How to choose a qualified childbirth educator.
Hire a doula….
♥ One of the best ways to ensure you have a positive birth experience is to hire a doula, especially if you don’t have access to a midwife.
♥ With a doula you get one to one continuous support. Nurses change shifts become too busy to be with you in the room during lab our all the time. Doctors do not come until you are ready to push, and many times don’t even make it for that. Most doctors now belong to maternity groups where you see mainly one during prenatal visits and then who ever is on call when you got into labor is who will be attending your birth.
Make a birth plan
I can not stress enough how important doing a birth plan is. As a doula I spend a lot of time working and talking about birth plans with clients.
Birth plans also help you to clearly see what you want and don’t want and to give you strength to find your voice and say “this is the way I want the birth to happen” Being your own advocate is extremely empowering but you are also advocating for your unborn baby as well!
Breastfeeding support
This is huge!!! If you are going to breastfeed, and I hope all women at least try to do this, then you need to do as much research into this as anything else. There are tons of web sites committed to helping mom’s have a positive experience with breastfeeding. As a lactation counselor it is part of my prenatal education I do with my clients and then follow up with the postpartum as well. It is very important that moms nurse as soon as possible after babe is born.
Great Links
http://www.drjacknewman.com/proddetails.asp?ID=1
http://www.nbci.ca/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=6&Itemid=13
http://www.childbirthconnection.org/article.asp?ck=10174
http://www.kellymom.com/
http://www.spinningbabies.com/
http://www.givingbirthnaturally.com/newborn-baby-care.html
Books To Read
♥ Anything by Michel Odent!
♥ Birth Reborn - Michael Odent - 2nd edition
Michel Odent’s experience as head of the maternity unit in Pithiviers, France, brings sanity to a world where birth has become one of chemical and technological interventions. Using a plain, common sense approach of helping women to trust and believe in their own ability to give birth, he achieves safer and more positive birthing experiences than the western world. Using very simple means, he and the staff work to humanize and feminize birth. There have been few milestones in the worldwide movement to reform and humanize the birth experience. Birth Reborn is one of them.
♥ Pregnancy Childbirth and the Newborn - Penny Simkin
♥ Myth Magic and Birth - Suzanne Arms
♥ Sheila Kitzinger’s work.
