Colleen Bak, MA, CD (DONA), has a BA in anthropology from NYU. She also earned her Masters in their Gallatin program, concentrating on modern birth politics in the US with a focus on the homebirth movement and the legality of midwifery. She currently works as a doula and a birth assistant with a homebirth midwifery practice. She was a founding member of the board of directors of Friends of the Birth Center, a nonprofit organization dedicated to aiding in the establishment of an independent birth center in Manhattan. She is the mother of three daughters, lovingly born at home into the hands of midwives. For more information on Colleen please visit www.fullmoonbelly.com.
The message in this article in our Phase II series is respect for the motherbaby dyad and embracing the unknowns of birth. Read more…. Midwifery Model of Care—Phase II: Embracing the Unknowns of Birth
Photo by Nabil Saleh
If the message sent to the public continues to portray birth as a frightening medical procedure, how will women come to trust their bodies and resist interventions? If birth with drugs in hospitals continues to be normalized in the media, how will women understand the benefits of midwifery in out-of-hospital settings?
Read more…. Cultural Lack of Birth Experience Empowers Media Representations, Not Women
The once natural event of female-centered birth has effectively been medicalized. Power and control have been removed from midwives and women and shifted to science and the surgical specialization within medicine, today known as obstetrics. Read more…. The Role of Fear in the U.S. Birthing Process
Photo by Patti Ramos
Birth is inherently a female activity. The choice, the ability, the power to give birth is innately female. Historically women were the sole possessors of birthing knowledge and technique, and in certain cultures and time periods men feared them as a result of this.
