What is a spiritual midwife?
Spiritual midwife is an approach to midwifery that has been popularized in the 1975 book by spiritual midwives . Practicing spiritual midwifery believes that work and childbirth can be approached holistic and integrate the care of the spirit of the working mother except her physical body. There are many angles from which spiritual midwifery can be approached, and some midwives refer to themselves as "spiritual midwives", while others integrate this approach into their practices. In 1971 Gaskin founded a farm, a team in Tennessee, and began to participate in domestic birth on a farm, train midwives and develop a holistic approach to care for women during pregnancy, work and supply. Her 1975 has become a classic and has been revised and updated on many occasions to integrate new information and the idea of new stories about birth from women who gave birth on a farm or worked with a midwife trained on a farm.The farm continues to offer prenatal care and services of midwifery.
The focus of spiritual midwifery is to maintain the most natural birth and restrictions on intervention as well as to protect the safety of mother and child. Many spiritual midwives offer their clients home services, although it is also possible to get care in the birth center or hospital. Spiritual midwives cooperate with their patients during pregnancy to monitor the development of pregnancy and prepare the mother for delivery, visited the mother during childbirth, and usually perform several subsequent visits to check the health of the newborn and emotional and physical health of the mother.
practicing spiritual midwifery of the birth of birth as a sacrament and cooperate with their clients to develop a positive birth, which integrates all the required elements. Focus on natural birth encourages women, abY have allowed the laboratory to develop naturally and encourage women to do what they feel natural during work and birth. Support from family, friends and community is also an important aspect of spiritual midwifery. Rather than “manage” pain, it focuses on working with pain associated with work and meditation on the spiritual nature of pain and the process of balance of new life.
With the help of a practicing spiritual midwifery, a pregnant mother can develop a birth plan that works for her. Women who are interested in spirituality tend to benefit from this form of midwifery most, as well as women who are interested in natural birth. However, a competent spiritual midwife will never risk the life of the mother and the child to achieve natural birth; If a mother or child gets in an emergency, the midwife will recommend a transfer to hospital care.