NatureBACK is a philosophical approach to pregnancy as well as a tool that optimizes a woman's chance of having a vaginal delivery. It represents the cumulative knowledge of Dr. Abdelhak's career in obstetrics that has spanned several decades. A career dedicated to providing women guidance to their desired birth outcome.

NatureBACK stresses that the process that leads to natural birth needs to start early in the pregnancy. It incorporates the important criteria for selecting the right OB/GYN or midwife provider. It's a return-to-nature approach in regards to diet and activity. NatureBACK guides you to the 'Mother Nature Train' so that you optimize your chance of avoiding a C-section.

The analogy of getting on a train. It would be silly to go to Penn station jump on a random train and then start planning where you want to go. Yet that is what many do when approaching vaginal birth. They research and plan for their delivery in the third trimester. Many have no idea they have been on the cesarean section train for months with little chance of reversing course.

There's a tendency to believe, actually more than believe, to have faith in Mother Nature. To be balanced, women have been birthing vaginally for millennia and we have no reason to suspect a parturient would grow a baby that cannot physiologically pass through her birth canal. It's more than common sense, It's history. All mammals birth as humans do. There is practically no cesarean section in the animal kingdom nor was there in human history shy 100 years ago. Historically pregnancy was always associated with morbidity and occasional maternal. Historically 1-3% of women would not survive labor. A high er percent of babies would sustain permanent birth trauma. Yet, there is absolutely no historical indication that 30% of mothers and or babies would have perished or sustained long term morbidity before the advent of c-sections. Further, we do not see this in the animal kingdom. Both domesticated and wild animals birth unassisted and it is rare for mother to die in childbirth. So in light of these obvious facts, why has nature let us down? How could this time-tested, proven, physiological, fine-tuned process be blamed for contributing to today's cesarean sections epidemic?

There has been a C-section epidemic in the last 50 years. Today, cesarean sections represent over 30% of all deliveries. This is a dramatic increase from the mere 5% of babies delivered via C-section in 1970. The explanations for the multiple fold increase in cesarean delivery are familiar. Fingers often point at the bias of over-worked obstetricians, the increase of counterproductive medical interventions such as induction of labor, and the widespread use of the external fetal monitor contributing further to the anxiety of litigious weary obstetricians. Some of these usual suspects have earned their nefarious reputation while others are surprisingly completely innocent of said charge. Most surprising is the culprit, possibly making the largest contribution to the explosion in cesarean births, has managed to sleuth under the radar and is rarely, if at all, recognized. This monster in the shadows is.... babies are way too big! So large they often don't fit through their mother's pelvices.

Research confirms this explosion in baby size. Today the median size of a baby is 1 lb 5 oz larger than it was in 1920. The number of babies that are classified as extremely large (over nine pounds) has increased even more dramatically. It is possibly 10 times as prevalent as it was in 1920. True, mothers are taller and healthier than ever before and can birth larger babies than their great-grandmothers. However this sorely falls short to allow the birthed to accommodate the spectacular increase in today's birth weights. We have deviated from nature and mightily so. Our diets, our lifestyle, and our expectations have all evolved or possibly devolved. For most of us, modern society represents a sedentary lifestyle. It is synonymous with processed food and we are consuming carbohydrate consumption on a scale never seen before. Babies are bigger than ever and growing them is turning out to be much easier than delivering them. The irony is the deviation from nature should have been obvious to us yet was masked by cesarean sections. Imagine the same modern society we have today without the option of C-section delivery. The maternal and fetal mortality rate would increase so dramatically that there would be an immediate recognition of the problem. Women would be much more careful about getting exercise and eating correctly. If there was no such invention as the modern Cesarean section we would have recognized this phenomenon long ago. NatureBACK is the expression of this philosophy. A goal oriented pregnancy method that can mitigate or possibly eliminate this seed of cesarean sections. It incorporates recognizing the factors that lead to cesarean section are initiated and are progressing from the beginning of pregnancy. NatureBack advocates for carbohydrate restriction, regular exercise and the criteria for selecting the right provider. When a woman goes into labor her risk of cesarean section is set long before any medical intervention.

Dr. Abdelhak is working on a book which elaborates on all the aspects of each part of pregnancy and delivery from the NatureBACK perspective. In order to get on our email subscription list and never miss a book update, sign up at www.truebirthpodcast.com

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