From War to the Womb

This is an excerpt from a new film out about my favorite midwifery organization's efforts to bring Palestine and Israeli midwives together. It's unbelievable to think that a Palestinian woman has to wait 3-4 hours to reach her midwife because of checkpoints. I wonder why there are not more home births that happen there. I've blogged about these efforts before, but I think this clip is comprehensive in detailing the problems of the two countries midwives, how they are similar and how they differ.


COHI Coexistence Project
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In other midwifery inspirations, I wanted to include this quote that was recently posted at the Citizens for Midwifery blog. I think it is a testament to the beauty of midwifery care, home birth, etc... Shouldn't we be striving for this beauty in our lives, even in birth?



While shopping [one] day, I noticed hand-dipped chocolates, homegrown vegetables, hand-spun wool, homemade preserves, cottage-industry soaps—all at premium prices, since they were made with care, individually, by hand, at home. I reflected, too, on how "old-fashioned" doctors, famous for house calls and compassion, are remembered fondly as part of the "good old days" and praised for their one-on-one caring. I mused how our society honors unique, special, one-of-a-kind items and services.

Yet when it comes to maternity care, it seems the bigger and busier, the better: high-tech procedures, standardized treatment, massive patient loads, in-and-out, assembly-line-style facilities. We are urged to leave the clean peace and quiet of home and go, instead, to a large, centralized center and entrust ourselves to a system of detached and often distracted institutional workers whom we've never met and may never see again. I find it hard to believe that anyone would consider hospital care preferable, if they really thought about it.

High-tech or hands-on? The choice is not new. In many cases, of course, mechanical and technological advances have been just that: improvements. Other advances, as we all know too well, have resulted in lasting harm.

— Judy Edmunds, excerpted from "A Grand Triumph," Midwifery Today Issue 37