Babies Part 2 - Pregnancy and Birth

I’ve noticed something about pregnancy books, which is that being mainstream or natural will affect what they talk about. The mainstream camp will spend a lot more time on the pregnancy, what to eat and wear, dealing with relatives and heartburn. For labor, they’ll talk about the three stages, and tell you that modern birth is safe and to do what your doctor says. The natural camp will of course tell you what to avoid during pregnancy, but basically tell you to pay attention to what your body needs. They will spend the bulk of the time on labor and birth – preparing for it physically and emotionally, what it feels like from your perspective, the side effects and risks of common medical interventions and well as the effectiveness of various non-medical pain relief techniques, various labor and birth positions and their benefits. Both because no medical intervention is risk-free and because I’ve known people who decided in advance on an epidural and then had it not work for them, I recommend that everyone read about birth from the natural perspective whatever their plans for labor. I’m also including books for fathers and soon-to-be older siblings, for hopefully obvious reasons. [Edited 2/13/09]: because more of my friends are having second or more children now, who need their own books, as do fathers. Links are to my original reviews, where available.

( lots of books, with pretty pictures )