More Thoughts on Birth, Again

I've been thinking a lot about birth lately, mostly because of Oliver's birthday recently and the telling and re-telling of his nothing short of amazing birth story, but also because there are a lot of women in my life who recently had or will be having a baby(ies) soon.
I hope I will always be a birth-junky (any other good word out there to describe birthy folks - birth junky is not my favorite), even when I move away from birthing age my peers stop having children. I want to believe I will still feel this passion years from now, because I believe how important it is for a woman to have a positive and empowering birth experience. I've talked recently about how I have made more room in my belief of the way in which birth occurs in this country, and despite this space that I've made I still hold onto the belief that we live in a society where the system of childbirth is broken, that women's bodies are hyper-medicalized, and fear, real, unrelenting fear is deeply imbedded in our birth culture. Women and our babies bear the unfortunate burden of these systemic failings. I don't blame individual women for these issues surrounding birth, but rather the complete break down of the system of birth, the culture of fear, the over-use (hyper-use?) of medical interventions for the sake of: profit, litigation, and special interests. This all tears women away from the wisdom, strength, and belief in their bodies, and the reality that birth can be wonderful, full of emotions (and body fluids), but wonderful!
So, I will leave you, my faithful readers, with some birth related links and a good book to keep you in the know (if you are so inclined).

This article - the topic deserves a very well deserved "Duh!"
This interview with Jennifer Block
News about Hero of the Year - Robin Lim
A different way to look at the way in which this culture celebrates heroes (from afar)
This book Home/Birth: a poemic by Arielle Greenberg and Rachel Zucker, which has basically changed my life and confirmed all that I believe about birth.
This great resource about the accuracy of Estimated Due Dates

And last by not least, a photo of my beautiful Oliver Carmino Monta Lino* a short while after his birth. He still makes this face when he cries - it's incredible.

*Oliver holds both of our last names as a part of his identity - Montalino is a combination of my last name (the Monta part) and Ron's (the Lino part) - all of which I don't publish for privacy.