As a childfree/childless adult, giving birth is not something that I think about a lot on a personal level, but it is something that most of my clients, many of my friends and family will at some point do, if they have not already.
In college, my friends and I watched The Business of Being Born one night (a wild college rager!) and it made a really big impression. Birth outcomes in the United States are not great. Other countries, with robust cultures of midwives, have much better birth outcomes. What is the relationship there?
I think this video from Vox does a great job showing the racist roots of the decline of midwifery practice in the United States. If you want to learn more – I suggest Barbara Ehrenreich and Dierdre English’s text Witches, Midwives and Nurses: a History of Women Healers (link to PDF), to see how culture has shaped the way women’s health is practiced.
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