The Big Book of Birth

This week I greatly enjoyed reading The Big Book of Birth. It is by Erica Lyon of Realbirth, who I first heard of when I read her awesome quotes in Pushed. Anyway, this was a basic "guide to birth" type of book, so I didn't necessarily learn anything new from it, but I hope that lots of pregnant women pick this one up to read instead of What to Expect. The emphasis of this book was on giving birth, not on pregnancy. The author's writing style was great--very engaging and *real* seeming. It is written in a sassy, lively, conversational sort of style that really made the book very readable and good. There were a variety of birth stories shared (broken up into the "right" chapters, which made it a little hard to follow them sometimes). I did feel sad reading some of them because the mothers didn't seem to *get* in hindsight what had really happened--i.e. "the doctor said the baby was 10 pounds and so a cesarean would make sense" and then baby is born and is 8.5 pounds and there was no further "analysis" about the cesarean being unwarranted.

I have a lot of quotes marked to share on my birthy blogs. Here's a quick one though: "You do not have to be a particularly strong or brave or relaxed woman to get through labor. You just need to be a woman." And then one from one of the birth stories: [in response to someone telling her that she got an epidural because it made the birth so much more peaceful] "I asked myself, Is birth meant to be peaceful? the feeling that I got after my birth was of pure triumph. I felt strong and able..."

I also zoomed through some "dessert"--Janet Evanovich's Twelve Sharp. Funny. Enjoyed it. Felt like a treat.

And on an unrelated note, I've mentioned before that we have cool big rocks on our land (behind our house). Today was a nice day and we went out to visit them!

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