Birth Education Center blog

A Birth Plan for Your Baby
When you are preparing to give birth, it’s easy to forget a basic fact that is at once obvious yet often overlooked: This is your baby’s birth. They will only get to experience their first moments out of the womb ONCE. How do you want…

Get a Therapist Early
If you’re currently pregnant, you’ve probably already heard about postpartum depression. It’s a widely talked about mood disorder that affects birthing people in the days and weeks following giving birth to their baby. After you have your baby, your care provider will normally ask you…

Early Labor: Please Listen to Your Midwife!
You have probably read about the way labor normally starts, at least most of the time. Normally you notice that the painless Braxton-Hicks contractions you’ve been experiencing in the last few weeks of pregnancy have begun to be accompanied by a sensation similar to menstrual…

Creating a Postpartum “No Judgment Zone”
The first days and weeks of postpartum can be a rollercoaster. From the moment you give birth, your body begins to gradually transition back to its pre-pregnancy version of itself, albeit with some significant changes like lactating breasts and perhaps a stretch mark or two. …

What You Should Know About Advanced Maternal Age
I recently watched a webinar offered by Rebecca Dekker from Evidence Based Birth (EBB). If you’ve never checked out her website before, you should. It’s chock full of data about childbirth that’s, you guessed it, evidence-based. The subject of the webinar was Advanced Maternal Age,…

I’m Pregnant and Scared to Give Birth
You’re sitting in an old-timey wooden rocking chair wearing a fuzzy yellow robe that weirdly looks just like the one you had when you were 11. In your arms, you’re holding the sweetest, most adorable tiny baby you’ve ever laid eyes on. She’s looking up…

Postpartum Traditions from Around the World: India
In our two previous blogs, we learned about the postpartum traditions of Latin America and China that are still in practice today. What’s been interesting to observe so far is how similar these traditions are to one another despite the geographic and cultural divides of…

Postpartum Traditions from Around the World: China
We are taking some time to learn about how other cultures from around the world handle the period of postpartum in contrast to what we do here in the United States. Or, perhaps more accurately, what we don’t do here in the United States. As…

Postpartum Traditions from Around the World: Latin America
The postpartum period, aka the fourth trimester, is a critically important transitional time that should focus exclusively on bonding with your baby, healing your body, and adjusting to parenthood. Unfortunately in the United States, the postpartum period is often rushed through or ignored entirely; birthing…

Setting Boundaries with Family After Baby Arrives
Pregnancy brings so many new things into our lives that are both exciting yet often overwhelming because they’re happening to us all at once. While it’s normal and reasonable for us to focus most of our attention on our ever changing bodies and preparations for…