I chose to freebirth my son True, my 6th babe, for a multitude of reasons. See, I found this place in my heart and soul where birth lives. I had seen it in my mind a million times and believed it too; that women are made to birth and that babies know how to be born. But True came in, with a purpose to show me what is TRUE about birth- in a place inside me I haven’t uncovered for a while.

I’m a midwife. It’s in my blood to witness the birth process, and I know it has been this way for me for lifetimes. In the last year, a familiar theme has played again. That of fear-the outside, of the world variety-that tried to draw me in. An echo from the past, this song has tried to woo me in the last year with ideas of power and money and control. We live in a time in history when birth is viewed as dangerous, something that women need to be protected against. The word “midwife” is being torn apart, rendered unrecognizable-now a trademarked title meaning slave to the government and not women. “Walking with women”….a thing of the past. We need a new word now.

And so in response(my own, intimate and personal response):
True’s pregnancy, labor and birth.

A complete taking of responsibility, for myself. For my babe. For the very first time. Facing my fears, working through my issues and knowing the Knowing you get when you do that. Relinquishing all thoughts, all desire of anyone saving me from anything. Birth isn’t something you’re “saved” from anyway-maybe rescued-but tell that to the general public.

I wanted to feel, I wanted to know, I wanted to experience that everything I Know about birth is true. And I wanted to have a sincere, loving response for the world that does not believe:

“We don’t believe you. We don’t need or want the regulation of birth, we won’t be told what to do or how or where to birth or with whom. We each have everything we need here, right inside of ourselves. Your system is failing; the time is upon us when women will choose otherwise. We will find our true power and not give any of it up to you. Try as you might with rules and regulations and licenses and money and power, birth IS NOT and will never be those things. THIS is what birth is. Pure, unbridled LOVE and power that brings another, on so many levels, into this world.”

Hasn’t love always won over fear?

True is 5 days old now; in the days since his entrance earthside he has shown literally thousands of people, all over the world, what birth can be. What birth IS. I am astonished at the comments and thoughts that people have shared; thousands expressing, in many different languages, that a light has been on the possibilities of birth for them, and their families and communities. All over the world. I thank this soul, this wise old soul, for bringing things together in a way I never thought possible and could have never really planned. All I did was follow my heart; and allow my body to do what it has always been meant to do.