Reply #22: My neighbor gave birth at home earlier this year. She is far from

[Ilsa]

being a nutcase, and she is in her forties. She and her husband are very progressive democrats who have lived all over the US. They both have liberal arts majors and she had two other quite successful homebirths. She is turned off by the over-medicalization and corporatism of birth.

Alot of OBs still try to "run the delivery" according to what shows up as monitoring on computer screens, not giving the mother or baby any say in what is going on.

I suggest watching The Business of Being Born, if you want more information. I saw it on HBO recently, and I bet there are dvds of it somewhere.

I suspect about half of the homebirths are families like in the OP, and the other half are independent women who don't care for the current medical approach to childbirth. I don't like it either, but as a high risk mom, I didn't have a choice.