Natural,Orgasmic Childbirth
Ina May Gaskin is the most famous midwife in the United States. As one of of the founding members of the intentional community the Farm, Ina May and the Farm Midwives have thirty years of statistics that demonstrate the safety and benefits of natural childbirth. For example, only 1.4% of births attended by the Farm Midwives have required a Cesarean section compared to the national average of about 25%. Ina May has long been respected for advocating women’s rights, as well as changing people’s perceptions about natural childbirth. Instead of an agonizing ordeal, Ina May believes that childbirth can be an orgasmic experience.
When I first became pregnant 16 years ago, a pregnancy that ended in a miscarriage, I read Ina May’s first book Spiritual Midwifery. Not only was this book full of information on natural pregnancy and childbirth, but it was packed with images and stories of labor, in which the parents saw psychedelic colors and experienced orgasms. I thought that these hippies had done too many drugs and were just having flashbacks, but by the time I read her second book Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth before the birth of my second child, I decided to try out some of the visualizations described in the birth stories.
