Articles
Passover As A Birthing Story
I have to admit I’ve avoided writing this for a long time. Not because I didn’t want to write about it and not because I don’t love the topic – as a long-time meditator, longer-time Jew, Jewish Meditation Center Board member and sit leader in my local community, I’m pretty involved. It’s just that when [...]
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The Touch Of Health For Mom And Baby
Benefits of Massage for Pregnancy and During Childbirth Aside from the fact that it just plain feels great, why would a woman invest her time and money in prenatal massage or hire a massage therapist–birth doula to attend her birth? As a licensed massage therapist and certified birth doula, I see firsthand the many benefits [...]
Shmaya Mikveh Hosts A Pre-Birth Immersion
At the newly-revived religiously and socially progressive Kibbutz Hannaton in Lower Galilee, a tradition has evolved to hold a women’s circle at our mikveh (ritual bath) for each woman a few weeks before she is due to give birth. Thankfully, we have located on our kibbutz a unique mikveh in the Israeli scene: Shmaya: A [...]
חוק שעומד בכנסת מאיים על לידות בית בישראל: סיפור אישי
אישה עם סוג דם שלילי לא תוכל ללדת בבית לפני כעשר שנים השתלמתי בקורס דולות. דולה, למי שאינו יודע, היא “מלווה לידה”, אישה (או גבר, אבל יש מעטים כאלו) הנמצאת עם האישה מתחילת הלידה עד סופה לא כפונקציה רפואית אלא כתומכת אישית צמודה. היא יכולה לעסות את גבה הכואב, ללחוץ על נקודות המזרזות לידה, או [...]
Present At My Baby’s Birth
Arwen Kuttner with her newborn baby, Naomi, on December 6, 2006. HAPPY 5th BIRTHDAY NAOMI!! My mother’s story of my birth was a sad story that included one chapter on countless fertility treatments, and another on being heavily sedated during the birthing process and forgetting that she was in labor. She tells me the nuns [...]
God Was My Midwife
It was when Rixa Freeze was in graduate school, studying for a PhD in American Studies at the University of Iowa, that she first heard about unassisted birth. She had become interested in homebirth and midwifery through her academic work–she did not yet have children of her own–when one of the midwives with whom she [...]
Video: The Solution
What is your birth vision: for yourself? Your wife? Your partner? Your daughter? Your friend? How can we make birth a meaningful, joyful, enriching and empowering experience for women? This video, from One World Birth, features various midwives, doctors and birth professionals discussing their vision for the future of birth. It was originally posted here. [...]
Not A Jewish Birth Story
The hardest part of my son’s birth wasn’t laboring at home for a day, or even delivering my child without medication after being stuck in transition for a few painful hours. Those things were hard, sure, but as a Jewish woman, the hardest moment came at what should have been a happy time–when I was [...]
Happy 5th Birthday to My Daughter Leilani
Nancy Salgueiro, a 32-year-old mother of two, is a professional birth coach and founder of the site, Your Birth Coach where this post was originally published. She will be live streaming her upcoming home birth from Ottawa, Canada where she currently resides. Sign up on her website to be alerted when she goes into labor and [...]
Return To Who You Are
Teshuvah. It mean ‘return’ or ‘repentance’ in Hebrew. As the afternoon turns to dusk and the Jewish people head into Yom Kippur, the word teshivah hangs heavy in the air. Who are we at are very core? Where did we come from? What do we strive to return to within ourselves? Perhaps our birth is [...]
Why I Love The Mikveh
There are so many reasons to love the mikveh (Jewish ritual bath). My love for mikveh inspired me to keep kosher, observe the Jewish Sabbath, and cover my hair as a married woman. Here are a few of my personal favorite things about the mikveh: 1. Immersing into the Earth’s waters Mikveh water must meet [...]
