HOMEBIRTH a personal HISTORY @hbirth - Tumblr Blog

Introduction

The 30th National Homebirth Conference of Homebirth Australia [HBA] was held in Melbourne Town Hall in May 2015 titled Icons of Homebirth- Pearls of Wisdom.

...................................art work by Chrissy Butler

If time and energy permit I hope one day to expand the story even further.

My spoken presentation by its nature was a bit different to this written one and any comments or corrections would be most welcome.

[email protected]

Trudie de Keijzer MW: Jilly Lynch CE: Carolyn Noble CA: Henny Ligtermoet CA: Belinda Clissold CA:

Betty Campbell CE: Terri Stockdale MW: DrJohn Stevenson: Dr Peter Lucas: Carol Eliott LMW:

Pat Brodie MW: Joie van Renen LMW : Maggie Lecky Thompson MW: Mary Murphy MW: Jo Hunter MW

Geneth Frame MW: Joan Brandt MW: Edith Gosling MW: Joy Argent LMW: Jessie McCloud MW;

[MW=midwife: CE=Childbirth Educator: CA=Consumer Activist: LMW=LayMV]

Firstly a big thank you to these activists and the many hundreds of others who I could not fit in this photo; all laboured so hard to keep homebirth on the agenda.

I am sure my fellow consumers, independent midwives and Aboriginal sisters would all recall our history with variations and I hope all their stories are told one day.

Some of the Sydney Midwives of the1970’s+ Sue Sagewood, Janine Issa, Akal Kaur Khalsa, Jeanine Stevenson,.?..Maggie Lecky-Thompson

Women from Utopia, Darwin Conference 1992 .

This is a thumbnail sketch and spans over 40 years but I hope it gives some idea of our triumphs, struggles wins and losses.

The struggles wins and losses are still very fresh for me but for most of you who are reading this it was a generation or two ago but I hope it still has some relevance.

Looking back there is much to celebrate as well as regret.

I leave the learning and judgements to the reader my activist days are numbered, marching and waving banners are in the past, now for me it is down to the power of the net.

This is a personal story intertwined with the many consumer activists movements of the era.

This memoir starts in 1969 with the birth of our first daughter and rounds off in 2008 with the birth of last grandchild.

We have 3 children and 4 grandchildren all seen here with a little red wooden cube which now sits on my desk, an ever reminder of their births and so many wonderful years.

I tend to photograph everything that moves and collect any document that interests me.

My friends often comment that I’m a hoarder but that trait comes in handy at times like this.

This shot was taken in 1984. I’m filing some of that hoard or as I prefer to name it, the home birth archive, an invaluable resource given my ageing memory and new pacemaker. My childbirth journey started as my travel years ended. Our treks over 5 years in a VW Kombi included crossing North Africa and the marathon of Overland London to Bombay.

[ the later trip is now in blog form titled Overland 1966 London Bombay]

http://our-elaine.tumblr.com/

1962 near Nice France just weeks after buying the Kombi and before it was fully fitted out.

Our children describe us as original hippies but we were really earnest students studying the art and architecture of wonderful exotic places.

Back in Australia we resumed teaching and readied for parenthood. I was in no way prepared for how the birth of our first child would affect the rest of my life.

I like most of my peers had never seen a baby born and was innocent of birth practices. In those days it was all a bit ‘hush-hush’.

Like a newborn I had no idea what to expect.

I only knew the birth would be in our large very new Bankstown District Hospital with my GP Dr Abromovich.

Thirty years before, my Mum birthed me in a tiny ‘cottage hospital’ in Lakemba with the owner midwife Euphema Murphy.

and 25 years before that my grandmother had birthed her twins on the kitchen table in their Sydney suburban home in Rockdale with the family doctor who was attending his first birth!

Bruce & Florence Hord with Edna [my mum] and twins Norman & Keith.

Being used to study I was keen to prepare for this new experience but self-help Childbirth books were almost non existent.

The New Childbirth was based on the earlier work of Grantley Dick-Read and Lamaze and declared “easier childbearing through control of fear and pain” known as Pschoprophylaxis.

I thought, odd name but I’d give it a go.

The New Childbirth by Erna Wright UK 1964 Tandem Press is still in print !

The illustrated labour positions seen here are of no surprise to those of you who have birthed in the past few decades but in 1969 there was a routine and expectations about how you would give birth the hospital system was in control and the likelihood of you being able to sit up during labour or get out of bed let alone lift your newborn baby up onto your chest was remote.

As fortune would have it, my local physiotherapist Betty Campbell was conducting childbirth classes based on this book, hospital classes only prepared you for their medical routines, whereas we were learning skills to help ourselves with the aim of minimum or no unnecessary intervention.

Betty and Hunter Campbell at the CEA [childbirth Education Association] 25th anniversary in 9.9.1998 Sydney.

During the very hands on classes new mothers would come and tell their birth stories. I found it very fascinating and ultimately empowering.

Hospital Expectations

At this point I think it is worth describing a typical hospital birth it may give you an idea of why we wanted change.

Arriving at hospital your husband was shoed away to the often smoke filled waiting room or sent home. [partners or friends were not even on the agenda]

You were left with strangers who did not even introduce themselves and could change shift without warning.

A hospital gown replaced you're clothing and no personal items were allowed.

An enema and complete pubic shave were performed, all under the guise of asepsis. [these days women seem less protective of their pubic hair !]

You laboured alone often in a large ward with minimum ‘help’.

You were expected to remain in bed, no getting up to go to the toilet or have a shower.

When the head was on view you were hurriedly moved to the delivery suite.

The Doctor was called, if he was delayed you ran the risk of having your legs crossed to hold the baby back.

An episiotomy was likely.

The Dr announced the sex of the child.

You were given a quick glimpse of the baby, no touching.

The baby was whisked away to the central nursery.

The expectation was it would be on 4 hourly bottle feeds and that was the only time you could hold your baby.

Boys were routinely circumcised without anaesthetic.

During the strict visiting hours fathers and visitors could see the baby via a glass viewing window in the central nursery which at other times was curtained off.

Siblings were barred visitor numbers restricted.

An average hospital stay was one week and it was mostly spent in bed.

I’m upset just thinking about it ! and how powerless it made me feel.

Support & Information

I had joined the recently formed consumer group Childbirth and Family Education Association [CAFE] a break away from the Melbourne based Childbirth Education Association [CEA] Down the track we became Parents Centres Australia [PCA] in keeping with the New Zealanders.

Our aim was to provide support and information about birth and parenting our newsletters contained birth stories and it was becoming evident that not everyone was happy with their experience.

Many felt like me that we had been ‘confined’ and ‘delivered’ rather than given birth.

By comparison to some my complaints were minor but I did feel upset and cheated even angry.

My husband had not been allowed by hospital staff to enter the birthing room, he was threatened with police involvement if he did, even though our GP had given the OK.

This newspaper article is 15 years after the event and advocates homebirth.

Back to my 1st birth, I was not allowed any choice of birthing position. Pillows were denied me even though they would have helped. A mask was held on my face even though I said I didn’t want it and my baby was whisked away after a brief glimpse. No real help was given with breastfeeding as the policy was “bottles were best” as a consequence I left hospital with free samples of baby formula and cried all the way home.

Needless to say I became an active PCA member.

Looking back over those years I marvel at what we achieved given communications were slow compared to todays internet. There was ‘snail mail’ usually handwritten which took days so telephone trees were created for speedier contact. We met regularly and produced a regular newsletter.

The early newsletters were typed onto stencils, then hand printed on messy roneo machines the layout was all cut and paste. We co-opted the children to staple fold and put them in envelopes.

Tedious by todays standards but techniques improved over time as did our newsletters.

Our aims were simple, we wanted Doctor and hospital routines reviewed and changed,so that Fathers could be present during labour and birth and that mothers and babies could have ‘rooming in’ that is remain together day and night and that Breastfeeding be ‘on demand’ rather than 4 hourly.

We were also determined that birth education be available to all women.

It was all about wanting change within hospital, homebirths were rare.

It was a long and bumpy journey but we did achieve these goals by becoming a well informed pressure group, we never let an opportunity pass us by or let our focus waver. We were relentless and used all means to achieve our goals. We had public meetings, screened films demonstrated, lobbied, wrote 1000’s of letters and marched.

My daughters Beth and Meg say they have been marching since they were in utero.

Discontent & Protest

The problem in the 70’s as we saw it, was that many practitioners along with hospital routines hindered rather than helped birth.

When 95% of births are considered normal why was there such a rush to intervene?

Could it be due to the fact that every intervention added to your bill, remember these are pre medicare days. Was it “birth for profit”?

Obstetricians with their surgical skills and new technologies were taking over from GP’s.

It is therefore no surprise that inductions, foetal monitors, and epidurals became common place and later the big money spinners of ultrasound and IVF and then the “surgical goldmine” hysterectomies.

One procedure often led to another, labelled a “cascade of intervention” which too often resulted in a dramatic increase in the use of drugs; none having been proven safe for mother or baby and an increase in episiotomies, forceps and caesarean sections resulting in too many infants needing intensive care.

Inductions were of course more convenient for staff and doctors than for mothers and babies.

I recall entire induction wards being set up in the big city hospitals.

The era is known as “Just in Case Daylight Obstetrics”

The jokes were all about Doctors and their golf days.

King George V 2 bed Labour ward with lots of visible equipment 1983.

The Doctors Reform Society declared Medicine Was Out of Control and we agreed wholeheartedly.

Women were rightfully rebelling, there was a mood for change, some described their hospital experience as degrading even as “clinical rape”

This is all happening when women probably for the first time in history are privileged with the benefits of education and affluence. Pre and post natal care, the contraceptive pill, better housing, nutrition, sanitation, mass vaccinations, antibiotics, sulphur drugs and improved surgical techniques plus life expectancy was 20 years longer than had been the case at the turn of the century.

We expected along with our babies to survive childbirth, a luxury not known to our ancestors and we wanted our births to be personally fulfilling and celebratory.

As Dylon sang, change was “Blowin in the wind”

Women’s rights were on the agenda; birth, child care, abortion, adoption, safety, equal pay and so much more……

It was a time of great social and economic change.

The Sexual Revolution, Civil Rights, Anti War, Women’s Liberation…..

I felt like I marched and demonstrate for decades.

Birth was just one of the many social norms being challenged.

The counter culture experimented with alternate life styles, religions, rituals, and the ITS TIME political campaign promised much and captured a nation with ‘its time for change, time to stand up a time to shout it'.

And shout it we did

We became very well informed consumers and put up proposals for alternatives to current birth practices.

Our membership grew and our lobbying skills improved. Our newsletters increased in size and content we published pamphlets and books and sought out all forms of media.

We were often quite strategic in attracting attention. It was incredibly empowering!

I fondly recall one very successful National Breastfeeding Week campaign with the use of breast balloons and the caption.

‘Not so much the container but what it contents’

It certainly captured the interest of passersby as well as newspaper reporters and TV presenters and provided a unique opportunity to highlight our support for the world-wide boycott of Nestles products. Their formula promotions were having a devastating impact particularly in developing countries.

t took years for my children to understand why they could no longer have Milo!

Alternatives

n 1972 we had our second daughter in a different hospital with a different Doctor, many promises were broken and I was again left feeling let down and cheated.

Many of us were now putting our energy into finding alternative places to birth, we advocated the introduction of Birth Centres.

The medical profession was feeling the heat and in a desperate attempt to keep women institutionalised took up the Birth Centre idea but it was too little too late for many of us.

Fancy blinds, colourful curtains & bedcovers ‘does not a home make'.

Paddington birthing unit 1970’s

and later their Birth Centre.

Control however remained with the medicos rather than the mother.

Our trust and hopes too often shattered, birth at home became a reasonable alternative.

In 1975 PCA presented a submission to the groundbreaking Whitlam Royal Commission on Human Relationships. This gave us a public forum in which to express experiences and concerns.

and in those pre internet days the opportunity to link with likeminded individuals and groups around Australia.

Notable figures emerged, Sydney midwife Edith Gosling founder of the Organisation of Australian Midwives and natural childbirth advocate and WA based consumer activist Henny Ligtermoet founder of the W.A. Midwifery Contact Centre.

It was heady times, Homebirth was a hot topic Doctors and Hospitals were being pressured to justify their practices and as PCA president my phone never seemed to stop ringing. Activism is hard on your family.

In 1976 PCA announced a new Homebirth Branch, I was prepared for a mixed reaction, but the media seemed only too willing to join the Home vs Hospital debate and lots of mostly positive coverage followed.

We organised many public events during these years. I remember co-ordinating The Great Homebirth Debate in ‘77, with Representatives from the Health Commission, the Nurses’s Registration Board and the Doctors Reform Society. It turned into a very fiery evening with a vocal 120 strong audience firing questions but few solutions were reached on either side.

The media were finding we made great ‘copy’ and no longer needed persuasion to cover our events and within a week of that big event I was flown to Adelaide to appear on Monday Conference a forerunner of the current ABC TV show Q&A.

The program was titled ‘Childbirth in Australia’ chaired by Robert Moore with a two person panel Professor Cox from the University of Adelaide the Royal College etc …….and myself as PCA President.

I didn’t know any one in the audience, but they turned out to be a very vocal crowd. A range of birth options were discussed and given positive nationwide coverage.

Homebirth groups were springing up all around the country as were their newsletters some had close links with registered midwives others with lay practitioners.

In '78 Henny and husband Pom travelled around Australia visiting homebirth groups and midwives, these connections played a significant role in the establishment of the national organisation, Homebirth Australia, which first met in Canberra on Nov 11, 1978 with 70 enthusiastic participants from 10 different groups.

Their Recommendations: and I quote were … “Conduct surveys, collect data, lobby medical and political hierarchies for recognition and support”.

30 conference later I look back over those years each conference had a different feel some relaxed events in campsites whilst others have been more formal affairs and held in Universities or Conference centres but the agendas continue to explore homebirth through people power and politics.

Those early conferences were gatherings of families with a scattering of professionals over the years the balance has reversed and at the ‘30th’ only 6 participants out of the 180 described themselves as consumers with no aim to practice as doula or midwife. In many ways this is a great loss to the movement as the consumer is “the voice that cannot loose its job”.

6th National Conference Sawtell 1985

10th National Conference Dee Why Sydney 1989

30th National Conference Melbourne Town Hall 2015

Advocates

During the 70’s and 80’s Western countries were experiencing similar birth technologies and practices to ours. Individuals, pressure groups and some professionals attempted to make institutionalised birth more acceptable. There was a plethora of ideas and exponents, too many to name them all.

Books about birth, bonding and childcare rolled off the press many authors became International speakers many visited Australia.

In the same year as Henny travelled OZ lay midwife Ina May Gaskin arrived on our eastern shores from the USA with a few copies of her soon to be published ground-breaking book ‘Spiritual Midwifery’.

I treasure my signed 1st edition and her inspirational presentations.

British author and anthropologist Sheila Kitzinger also made many trips to Australia and our conferences. I first saw her unforgettable demonstration of second stage labour with the use of a sponge vagina in Melbourne at the CEA Birth and Being Conference in 1979.

Sheila recently died at home aged 86 leaving an immeasurable legacy of 25 books her last an autobiography A Passion for Birth.

"Just as she believed in thinking about what you would want while giving birth, she also believed in the value of thinking in advance about dying - and making plans.”

I honour her life and work as I am sure we all do.

Michel Odent author of Birth Reborn advocated out-of-bed Active Birth and Waterbirth whilst Frederick Leboyer another French obstetrician suggested darkened rooms and warm baths for a gentle and more humane welcome to the newborn in his book ‘Birth Without Violence’

Film added another dimension to the debate with powerful interviews and graphic images:

At one time our archive had 27 films including a birth in Nimbin with lay midwife Carol Eliot and another with Dr John’ Stevenson in Melbourne. This historic treasure trove was donated to the Australian Sound and Film Archive who sadly seem to have ‘lost’ them !

You can however still see Helen Brew’s confronting film BIRTH with RD LANG on line, it portrays birth as “one of the disaster areas of our culture.”

I was at the Sydney Film Festival in 1977 when it was screened to a hushed and sometimes shocked audience.

Reclaiming our Heritage

In the midst of so many events I somehow found time and energy to have a 3rd baby.

No he didn’t arrive in a HAS T-shirt.

He was however born at home because my second birth had only confirmed my belief that regardless of your preparation, and hospital assurances, the system could not be trusted.

Owen was born at 3.33am on 12. 12.1979 with sisters Beth [10] and Meg [7] so pleased with events they wanted to take their brother to school that morning !

Staying at home however was a significant act of resistance against both the medical profession and social expectations in 1979.

I was also acutely aware that if I needed to transfer to hospital I could only expect a hostile reception and my birth attendant would be barred or very unwelcome.

As many of you know, I’m never one to miss an opportunity, and as we seemed to be making some gains, I had sent a questionnaire to all Sydney maternity wards asking if they would ‘allow’ me a range of requests should I birth at their facility.

The press published the results, and soon after some hospitals began to allow siblings at birth and partners present at caesareans, a combination of public exposure and persistent challenge had paid off. Not all requests were granted and it took a few more years before we could view or request a copy of our medical records.

At the time I also contacted my Teachers Health Fund arguing how much cheaper a refund for homebirth was compared to a hospital birth, and won the case. I believe that was a first, and it was soon followed by NIB after strong lobbying by independent midwife Trudie de Keijzer.

TRUDIE de KEIJZER midwife CAROLYN NOBLE Phd activist

It was still early days in the homebirth movement and Independent Midwives were often under pressure due to their lack of official status but when the issue was raised with the NSW Nurses Registration Board they responded with “midwives are free to practice in any setting”

Nonetheless, as Carolyn Noble HAS’s first co-ordinator later pointed out in her PhD thesis [1997] “Hospital training in midwifery had not equipped Australian midwives for independent practice. In response to the demand for their services at homebirths NSW midwives, from the earliest days, met with each other in order to retrain themselves in traditional midwifery skills, not available in they're training as doctor’s handmaidens.”

Indeed many retreats and workshops were held and midwife Pat Brodie and I organising this 1 day workshop with a supportive Doctor who gave instruction and hands on experience with IV and suturing skills. Midwife Akal Khalsa cheerfully volunteering an arm.

Childbirth education was also changing. It had always been the domain of physiotherapists who mostly worked with hospital birth in mind.

Consumers were now seeking greater choice and PCA responded by establishing its own training program and these new educators began running ante-natal classes and assisting at home and hospital births.

PCA’s first graduates Shona Moore Carol Flanagan

The Childbirth Education program expanded and flourished with increased demand.

Women as the 2nd International Homebirth Conference in 1992 reflected were Reclaiming our Heritage and Creating our Future’

Organisations

These were very busy years we were finding our feet groups were forming or regrouping.

I designed a number of logos posters and T-shirts as we rebranded. Even some silver ear rings with the 2nd International Homebirth Conference logo.

We tend to know our groups by their initials HAS. PCA. CEA. HBA. tracing their origins gives a glimpse of the times and how each was 'birthed’ CEA was Melbourne based and when a Sydney faction formed it was named, Childbirth and Family Education Association CAFE which after a few years rebranded itself as Parents Centres Australia PCA which later split into Homebirth Association Sydney HAS and Homebirth Information Service HIS the latter changing to Homebirth Access HA. They combined and became Homebirth Access Sydney thus keeping the original initials ‘HAS’.

I am a proud HASbeen and as its 1st founding and life member I and am especially thrilled to see it continuing to this day.

As groups grew so did the number of birth attendants by 1982 there were 64 Doctors 78 midwives and a scatter of lay practitioners catching babies at home in Australia.

At one point up to 17% of all births in Darwin and the ACT were at home.

Our National Conferences continued this is the 5th National Conference held in the NSW Blue Mountains in 1984 at Springwood, there were 250 adults, and 100 children in attendance.

Not all conferences are plain sailing and at this one we relaunched Homebirth Australia.

The structure was changed from an informal group to a formal organisation with a management committee. This change was not made without passionate and heated debate, and I recall this time as one in which internal conflict was developing within the movement as different aims and philosophies emerged.

Hilda Bastian presented her idea for a Homebirth Constitution but the group rejected the proposal by consensus.

As Carolyn notes in her thesis; “Prior to this time it had been crucial for us all to present publicly with a united front, but as with any reform movement, once some of the objectives were being publicly achieved, the ‘critical eye’ was being turned inward.”

Sydney activists responded by establishing a Homebirth Mediation and Conciliation group in an attempt to provide an independent forum for midwives and consumers to air their grievances and achieve resolution.

Sydney Midwives Mediation Group 1996

In the same year Jan Pilgrim helped craft the Homebirth Bill of Rights and Responsibilities into a formal document.

Conflict

Many contributors brought their talents to the ‘cause’ there were writers, researchers, public speakers, layout designers, publishers and filmmakers.

There were many publications, videos and tape recordings produced over the years.

Jilly Lynch another HASbeen, recently re-screened some of those videos, they are treasures. Keeping up with technology they are being transferred to digital forms so as to be more accessible.

We used all forms of media to ‘promote the cause’ coverage remained mixed and at times sensationalist, celebrity births fanned the debate.

Prime Minister Bob Hawke’s grandchildren were born at home. ABC TV presenters George Negus and Jonny Young and writer Richard Neville and actors Noni Hazelhurst, Rebecca Gibney and comedian Sue Ingleton all had children at home.

In ’87 the National Health & Medical Research Council released a report openly supporting homebirth whilst the Royal College of Obstetricians policy remained and stated “homebirth exposes the mother and child to unacceptable risks”

But soon after issued another statement recommending the development of Homebirth Guidelines!

HBA was supportive of guidelines but the decision was met with ‘strong resistance from a section of the movement that refused to be beholden to the state in any form’ (Noble, 1997, p. 334).

Within the movement conflicting expectations mounted. The Statistics collection became a major sticking point and in 1992 I endeavoured to flesh out the issues in a paper I was to give to the New Zealand College of Midwives 2nd National Conference in Wellington. Illness prevented my appearance but The Australian Homebirth Statistics Debacle was published in an endeavour to find a way “to create an ongoing data collection and publication service that produces credible and complete Homebirth Statistics”

Another area that caused internal division was that of consumer support for midwives seeking professionalisation.

Midwives argued their professionalisation would ultimately reward consumers, and would increase their own chances of having influence in mainstream maternity care.

Homebirth was under threat both here and overseas, newspaper articles warned against it.

Mothers birthing at home were within the law and hard to challenge whereas their birth practitioners could easily be identified and ran the risk of litigation.

Cases against practitioners increased over the decades resulting in the de-registration of many, including our high profile practitioners Edith Gosling, Maggie Lecky Thompson and Dr John Stevenson, others had terms of suspension and fines, sadly the list is rather extensive.

Practitioners were usually well supported by their clients but often to no avail.

Sydney 1996

Insurance

Lay midwives were also vulnerable. In NSW in 1992 the Nurses Act was introduced into parliament, which effectively outlawed the practice of lay midwifery.

Lay midwives were threatened with a $5000 fine and/or 1 year imprisonment. Understandably many stopped practicing or went ‘underground’.

Nimbin Protest 1985

Some registered homebirth midwives were in agreement with the Act as they considered it an important step towards the professionalisation of independent midwifery, others saw it as reducing women’s birthing choices, particularly for those women in rural and remote areas where only traditional homebirth attendants were available.

Despite the tensions between the midwives and consumers, reconciliation was now necessary as the midwives became under increasing external attack, and resuming a united front became a priority (Noble, 1997).

These volatile years were to say the least, for many, including myself, a time of stress and emotional upheaval.

Insurance for independent midwives as we all know remains a big issue.

Two of my grandchildren had wonderful births at home but when my last grandchild was born in the NT in 2008 my daughter legally unable to obtain an independent midwife was flown into Darwin Hospital gave birth and was the next day offered a bus ticket back to her home many hours drive away!

So much for ‘continuity of care’, so much for safety.

We had fought so hard for births of our choice, had we lost ?

I think not. We undoubtably have been an effective national force over the past four decades.

Collectively we changed the course of obstetric care in Australia and will continue to do so.

I guess all activists look back and ask “what did we achieve, was it worth the struggle”

Being at the births of my grandchildren I say ‘yes it was’ but I could never have foreseen the struggle would span 3 generations.

This is myself, daughters and grandson we are all still “marching” in the hope that place of birth remains a legal choice for generations to come.

I am sure my Fathers birth at home in 1911 and my son’s homebirth in 1979 have little in common with the politics of todays homebirths.

At the beginning of the 1900’s place of birth and quality of the experience were not even part of a debate whereas some 70 years later the agenda was all about choice and birth as celebration.

Questions that might be worth pondering…..…

What are your birth expectations……your dreams….your birth choices?

If they are out of reach how can they be achieved?

I have taken our eldest daughter Beth’s illustration from the book So That’s Where I Came From, to scribe my dream for all, sadly after all these years it is still a dream rather than a reality.

I returned from the conference with a broken arm, all is now repaired but as ever I am reminded of how wonderful yet unpredictable life and birth can be.

I do however hope your births are as celebratory as this and life is full and rich.

========================================================= I would appreciate any comments or corrections you may have regarding this Sydney centred view of our Homebirth History.

30th National Homebirth Conference Closing Ceremony Melbourne 2015

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