Green Options

Stylish, practical babywearing with a message, and a real contribution to mother-friendly childbirth advocacy.

Moby Wraps, one of the most popular stretchy wraps for babywearing, is currently selling a custom-designed model sporting a “Born Free” butterfly logo, from the makers of The Business of Being Born (that’s Ricki Lake in the promo photo, along with the film’s director Abby Epstein).

A portion of the proceeds from sales of this wrap will go to support the Coalition for Improving Maternity Services, an organization now in its second decade.  CIMS seeks to promote evidence-based maternity care, and states their mission as follows:

The Coalition for Improving Maternity Services (CIMS) is a coalition of individuals and national organizations with concern for the care and wellbeing of mothers, babies, and families.  Our mission is to promote a wellness model of maternity care that will improve birth outcomes and substantially reduce costs. This evidence-based mother-, baby-, and family-friendly model focuses on prevention and wellness as the alternatives to high-cost screening, diagnosis, and treatment programs.

Today my baby boy turns 1.  Of course, as his mama, I cannot believe he’s a year old. I still remember the gallons of Ben & Jerry’s that Daddy and I went through, the sciatica, the feet poking from the side of my belly, the worries of his pregnancy.

I’ve heard before that those who give birth naturally are just trying to make women feel more pain, when in reality we can all have painless births with the help of medicine. We don’t “have” to suffer. Really, the people who spout this nonsense are about as logical as Limbaugh.

I’ve had two quick natural labors with healthy little guys. The two pregnancies were so vastly different, however, that I’m lucky to have squeaked out Baby E without medical “help”.

Here is my birth story. Happy Birthday to Us.