Midwifery

Hanna Neumann


I was very interested in learning more about midwifery. I have always been extremely excited about having children, but I have always been fearful of the birthing process. In all honesty, I wasn't even aware that midwifes still were in practice. I never EVER hear about them. I think that the problem is that we only hear about hospitals, and most people aren't even aware that there are other alternatives. The movie, The Business of Being Born, that we watched in class really showed me how much midwifery can benefit a pregnancy. I find myself wanting to look more into it, especially once I start having children. A natural birth is absolutely a path that I would like to take. I am very uninterested in the use of drugs and the rushing of the birthing process that comes within a hospital setting. Even referring back to the reading that we did for class Wednesday, Exorcising the Midwives, Ehrenreich and English talked about the stereotype for midwifes as being "dirty and ignorant". I feel like the media definitely wanted these midwifes to have this negative stigma on them because they wanted to attract people toward hospitals, which, in fact, it worked. I am very glad that I have been able to view different, more beneficial alternatives, and I feel a lot less fearful of the birthing process.