EmPOWERment Birthing

 Salli Gonzalez, LM, CPM  Providing Prenatal Care

Services provided in San Antonio, Seguin, San Marcos, New Braunfels, Schertz, Cibolo, Universal City and surrounding areas.

salli@empowermentbirthing.com    (830) 556-3404

1. What is a Midwife?

Midwives are independent practitioners referring to O.B.s only if there is a medical problem involving mother/child safety. Midwives provide care for women during pre-conceptual, prenatal, labor and postpartum periods. Their work involves caring for newborns, providing health, exercise and nutritional counseling, and providing education and parenting support.

2. Is Midwifery safe? 

There have been many studies done to compare safety rates of home birth to that of hospital birth.  According Marsden Wagner, MD, evidence suggests "home birth is a safe alternative for women".  (Born in the USA, c. 2006) One defining difference is the limited use of intervention in home and birth center births.  This researcher likes to call the midwifery model of care "humanized birth" which means focusing on the normalcy of birth, putting the needs of the woman first: giving her autonomy in the decisions for her baby. http://marsdenwagner.com/fishall.html

• FREE initial consultation
• Prenatal Care throughout your pregnancy including necessary lab work
• Nutritional Counseling to maintain a healthy pregnancy
• Natural Alternatives to the Medical Model 
• Childbirth classes, 4 weeks in duration
• 24 hour availability by phone pre-natal and post-partum up to 6 weeks.
• Helping you during labor with methods to cope (birth ball, laboring  in water, water- birth, relaxation techniques, affirmations, visualization) 
• Providing safe and effective means of pain relief through labor support   in homebirth or at the Birth Center
• Maintaining a calm and peaceful birth atmosphere
• Providing clinical assessment throughout labor and birth with fetal heart tones, blood pressure readings and temperature readings
• Catching your baby or assisting the father or family member to catch! 
• Providing support to the birthing family and children, grandparents, etc. 
• Providing breastfeeding support, connection with La Leche League, referrals if necessary to lactation consultants
• Extensive reading lists, books and articles 
• Community Support and Resources 
• Providing parenting and general newborn information 
• Specializing in care of families in every realm of the birth process, parenting and beyond
• 3 or more Postpartum Visits to assess newborn well being and mother's healing and adjustment to parenting and breastfeeding.
      

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Look into the best possible start for your precious baby. 

I remember Salli being excited about my baby’s birth and even calling to make sure she didn’t miss anything when my pregnancy went past the estimated due date. She was empathetic when I voiced my complaints about “still being pregnant” and gave me good information about my options as well as her genuine complete support of my choices.

When we decided to help move things along (through AROM) because I wanted to avoid medical intervention (a post date sonogram), Salli explained everything we would do and came well prepared. I had an awesome birth! My 9lb 5oz baby boy was born with his hand on his face making it an extra tight fit, but I would not have ever known there was any concern had I not been told. Salli never voiced any concern or panic and even Amber’s quick action did not come off as alarming to anyone.

I truly have grown to love Salli as a friend and revere her as a Midwife. I hope to have her present the next time we are so blessed to be expecting.

Thank you Salli, for nine months of incredible bonding and prenatal care as well as your calm and reassuring work during the birth!  ~ Shara Pierce

The goal of modern midwifery care is to return the value of women and babies to the hands of the family by providing education and counseling in nutrition, exercise and making informed choices based on evidenced based research. 

A Historical Perspective of Midwifery

18th century midwife delivering baby with mother on birthing chair

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Since women have been birthing children, midwifery has existed in various forms since the emergence of the human race. Evidence of midwifery exists in records from ancient Egypt, Biblical scrolls, and the imperial Roman Empire. 

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A “good” midwife, as described by 2nd century physician Soranus in his work, Gynecology, states “a suitable person will be literate... possessed of a good memory, loving work, respectable... sound of limb, robust, and...endowed with long slim fingers and short nails..." Soranus also recommends the midwife sympathetic (although she need not have borne a child herself) and that she keep her hands soft for the comfort of both mother and child.

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In the 18th century, Medical men began to assert their "modern" methods to be superior to those of midwives. Whether this claim is valid or not is explored in Court Midwife by Justine Siegmund, reknowned 17th century midwife and the first female author of the German medical text.       

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At the outset of the 18th century in England most babies were caught by a midwife. By the onset of the 19th century the majority of babies born to persons of means had a physician involved. For more information about this historical shift and its effects on infants and mothers, see the "Fish Can't see Water" article by Marsden Wagner, MD. 

http://marsdenwagner.com/fishall.html

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