When approaching the time of birth a family will start to design their Plan of Birth and their desired birth experience.
A Plan of Birth will include all the desires, needs and expectations a mother has for the moment of giving birth.
Where is her preferred place to give birth, who will be the people that will be present ( partner, family members, birth team, midwife...),
what kind of atmosphere she will like to recreate;
if she wishes the intervention of some external substance to deal with the intensity of the experience or not at all,
what is her tool kit to navigate labor,
how and when the umbilical cord will be cut ( lotus birth, cut with obsidian, burn..) ,
what does she wishes to do with her placenta (( eat a little bit of it for recovery, prepare a mother tincture from it, bury it accordingly to her cultural customs etc)( this is specially important part for labor that are planned in hospitals as is not a common practice in the institutions to keep the placentas for the families )),
how she wishes it to be in the moment her newborn comes out of her (if she wishes preferably that no one touches the baby as he/she comes out unless necessary, how she wishes to have direct skin contact as soon as the baby is out..)
This document will be handed to the doctors in case she is giving birth at a hospital prior to the moment of labor, or to the midwife in case she is having a home birth or to any person that will be present in case she wishes to have a free birth.
The practice of designing our birth experiences help us envision and connect emotionally with the way that we will like to feel while we give birth.
Pre visualization experiences can have a very positive impact as we are creating energetic imprints into the field so that whatever happens at birth time ( because literally anything could happen) we can have a reference point that guides us through because we have previously worked on it and connected emotionally with the experience.
Since diversity makes harmony, as humans we have very different cultural backgrounds and systems of beliefs therefore health cannot be standardized, institutionalized or globalized.
Although we share a common biological human body, health is a delicate equation, and what is health for one person may be out of balance for another.
Whatever we design for our labor experience, may it be at a hospital, at a birth house, in nature or at home, information is power , so the standards we set are those of human rights.
It is of vital importance we make informed decisions and know our rights.
Humanized birth is a modality that encompasses the rights of the parents as well as of the child at the moment of birth. It takes into consideration the value system and feelings of the woman, respecting her dignity and autonomy within the context of labor.
In the medical practice as a consequence of the institutionalization of the health system we haven seen in repeated occasions in the birth assistance "how the dignity and needs of a woman are placed below the logic of the administration of the health system" as in words of the blog of MaternarSer the institute in Colombia that initiated me into the doula work.
This institute in turn has provided the definition of a new category to refer to in our birth contexts, which is, "respected birth", and is also the first time that I have heard this distinction be made. "Respected birth implies the keeping of opinions and lifestyles as part of the dignity and freedom of whomever is exposing them" " So respected birth recognizes autonomy as a part a birth experience "and makes that a group of people in front of the institutionalized health system take responsibility for their preferences and makes that in the actual practice they are respected.
This distinction is made because it has been proved that in many institutional health contexts what is called "humanized birth " is not respecting or validating the system of beliefs or the experience of families , and that makes that under the umbrella of what today is called "humanized birth" we are still perpetuating structures that dehumanize individuals and their experiences.
Also from the wonderful reflections that the midwife Alejandra Montes brings to our tables and our ears are the concepts of "Conscious Birth" and "Free Birth".
To approach this philosophical concept of freedom which is very wide, we will narrow it on behalf of arriving to her proposal to say that in her words " freedom is related with choosing and acting under the criteria , reason and will of each individual ", also another face of this semantic prism of freedom is that of " accepting that we do not have control over everything " , from this perspective " freedom is about realizing the learnings that are for us in each experience and live that with joy and grace ".
Therefore lying this conceptual ground "a Free Birth can be resolved in an institution, at home or in a cesarean. What makes free a birth process is how the woman lives the experience and how she processes it on the light of her own history and her own decisions, wishes and realities."
"A Free Birth is a part of a puzzle on the path of walking the Way of Consciousness as human beings. "
From here another of her innovative definitions where Alejandra speaks on "Consciouss Birth", " is how a family , a mother, recognizes the seed and her lineage and makes a commitment with the origin of that seed."
Understanding the Birth Portal in our human culture and its implications on our collective story, its also understanding that at the hearth of culture live our practices of care ,which need all of us for their rewilding.