Considerations For Pregnancy, Birth and Early Mothering
The more we understand about the human microbiome, the more fundamental it seems. Pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding seed a child’s microbiome, and therefore have long-term effects on his or her health. More research is needed to explore h...
Role of the Microbiome in Infant Development
The human microbiome plays a vital role in overall health, and new information about it is discovered nearly every day. Defined as “the sum of all microbial life living in or on the human body,” the microbiome is a vibrant...
Fearless Birth
Changing fear, tension, and pain into faith, relaxation, and pleasure.Giving birth in a culture that continually depicts labor as painful and dangerous is a feat in itself these days. Everywhere we look, we see images of women...
The Nurtured Womb
Gone are the days when we could consider pregnancy a nine-month grace period before the job of parenting begins. Mounting research tells us that lifelong well-being, including mental health, begins in the womb, and everything parents do—beginning e...
The Environment of the Womb
The environment of your womb is rich with sounds and sensations, and your impressions of the world continually filter through to your baby. Each sensation—pleasurable or uncomfortable, imaginary or real—releases chemicals through your body...
Healing Birth
During our first home birth, I can remember reaching a state I had never been in before. In spite of the many intense experiences I’d had in my life up to that time, this experience brought me to a new edge. I looked over to my husband, Tom, for...
Oxytocin: Finding the Love of Birth
Perhaps the best-known birth hormone is oxytocin, the hormone of love, which is secreted during sexual activity, male and female orgasm, birth, and breastfeeding. Oxytocin engenders feelings of love and altruism; as Michel Odent says, “Whatever the...
A Father's Perspective: The Journey from Hospital to Home
Many women have questions about how to approach their partner about natural birth, and especially an out-of-hospital/home birth. I don’t ever remember being worried about convincing my husband, David—but then again, my feisty side comes out pretty...
10 Personalities of Dads at Birth
Just like women, men all have their own ways of being present for a birth. They have varying comfort levels with the process, which, though we all have to push our comfort zones in birth, should be respected. Here are the 10 birth personalities of...
Dads and Birth Trauma
Dads have birth stories, too—and some of them are pretty rough. Maureen Campion unpacks the birth trauma no one else is talking about.
Why Infants Need Chiropractic Care
It is common to get strange looks from people I talk to about taking infants to the chiropractor. I know what is going through their heads: Is it safe? Babies don’t have back pain. Do babies get adjusted the same way I do? These are legitimate...
Molecules of Love
Oxytocin, the hormone of love, stimulates cells in the heart muscle to release a chemical messenger called “atrial natriuretic peptide.” In other words, oxytocin affects the heart! Oxytocin molecules are molecules of love, the neurotransmitters of...
Why Are We Asking Doctors if Women Should Have Midwives?
New pro-midwife guidelines have recently been issued in the United Kingdom. But in the United States, doctors are all too often the gatekeepers for women’s birth care.A few months ago, I was bumped from a national radio show. The c...
The Birth Pause
If a “pregnant pause” is a breath held in a story, a moment’s stillness where we linger between what has been told and what is yet to be told, then what we are calling a “birth pause” might be thought of as a breath at the moment of birth: a...
Master Controls
How chiropractic enhances life by removing obstructions to the nervous system’s communication with the body. Have you ever considered how you were made? Let’s take a moment to expand on this question: Have you con...
If You Lay Down, The Baby Will Never Come Out
An Overview of Traditional Native American Birth PracticesAs I celebrated Thanksgiving this year, I couldn’t help but remember the culture and heritage of America’s indigenous people, a culture mostly lost because of the establishment of...
Siblings at Birth: A Rite of Passage into the Family
We birthed all six of our children at home. Although the first four were what are now called “unattended” births (meaning no official birth practitioner was present), all but our first were attended by their siblings. For my husband and me, the...
Seeking a Balance
The Biomedical and Systems Approaches to Labor and Birth“My pregnancy was normal and I went to the hospital to give birth. They kept offering me pain relief, and I ended up with an epidural and complications that led to a cesarean that...
A Letter to a Midwife’s Mamas
Dear Mama,I actually hope you don’t remember my name. I was your midwife and I’ve always thought that if I did my job well, you would only remember how amazing you were when it was time to birth your baby. Birth is hard work, and I hat...
Birthing in Peace
A Conversation with Ina May Gaskin on the Forces Surrounding Birth Interview conducted by Michael Mendizza
