What does it really mean to "trust birth"?

If you spend any time at all in "natural" birthing communities someone will inevitably tell you that you can "trust birth".

Usually, what they're saying is that you can trust the process, the physiology of birth; you can trust that all of human evolution has brought us to a place where birth actually works quite well.

So you don't need to be afraid. You can just trust birth.

And there is truth to that. Evolution is wise. As human mammals, we have evolved to birth well.

The vast majority of people who give birth, especially when provided with an emotionally safe, intimate, and connected birthing space, will give birth without complication or need for medical intervention.

Image description: a newborn baby asleep.

There is value in trusting in birth. Learning about the birthing process, understanding how it works, the dance of your hormones, the slowing of your brain waves, the dropping down down down into the most ancient parts of your mammal brain - learning about all of this helps decrease your fear and increase your trust in the process.

(Want to learn more? You can take private birth prep classes with me. I work with one expectant family a month)

And also, sometimes, birth does something unexpected, unwanted, unbidden. Sometimes, birth takes a left turn.

So trusting birth also means trusting when birth is telling us that it needs a bit of help - that for this birth and this baby, it's time to make wise and compassionate use of the medical tools available to you.

This is sometimes the hardest time to trust birth because it may mean giving up the birth you had planned and hoped for. Sometimes it means re-writing the story of what a good birth is or what a good birthing person does. Sometimes it means telling a truer story about birth.

Can you still trust birth when birth is asking you to do the thing you don't want to do?

It's a big ask and your doulas can help you navigate the emotional waters of trusting birth when birth is asking for all you have to give.

They can remind you that it's an and - you are grateful for the medical support available to you AND you hate that it's necessary to use it.

You are so thankful that your baby is here and healthy AND you are grieving the birth you didn't have.

Your doulas can hold space for all your feelings, all the contradictions and the paradoxes, for the hot mess of emotion that arises when you are asked to trust birth fully and completely.

If that's the kind of support you want for your birth, we're here for it.