On today’s show we will be discussing how birth has changed over the last 25 years.

Our guest today is Ananda Lowe, a long-time birth doula in Massachusetts who will share what she has seen and heard.  Ananda has been part of the Boston/New England and even national birth scene for a long time--since 1995.  She is co-author of The Doula Guide to Birth: Secrets Every Pregnant Woman Should Know, she’s a Lamaze-trained childbirth educator, as well as a Certified Lactation Counselor, and former Licensed Massage Therapist specializing in pregnancy.  After many years of supporting families, she became a new mother in 2010.  

During this episode, we discuss the following:

• how Ananda came to become a birth doula 
• the history of informed consent and informed refusal in birth and a better way for care providers to offer informed consent and informed refusal
• having her first baby at the age of 40
• being vulnerable and the concept of coercion during birth
• taking ownership of anger about one’s birth experience
• how for decades we have known there are health disparities and that racism is responsible
• the importance of listening to and reading birth stories
• the rise of inductions and Cesarean births over the last 25 years and why this isn’t a good thing
• how “intervention begets intervention” and our obsession with technology
• COVID restrictions and why having even a virtual doula is helpful

Resources:

https://www.bostondoulacircle.com/

https://www.wbur.org/news/2018/05/11/doula-culture-of-consent

https://www.yougoodsis.co/