In the 1960’s childbirth without medication was not done. A drug called “Twilight” was given to mothers in labor, and all mothers labored at the nearest hospital. A majority of those babies were born blue due to stress from the drug and lack of response of the mother pushing.
It was considered indecent to breastfeed an infant. Only backwards, uninformed people would think of such a thing. One nurse related to me that it was a vulgar thing to place a baby to the breast to feed. Doctors told new mothers that it was impossible to know the baby was receiving adequate nourishment because breastmilk couldn’t be measured. ‘Since you cannot measure breast milk, it is dangerous to nurse.’ ‘People who breastfeed are letting their babies go hungry!’
In order to assure proper nutrition, these same doctors said you needed to feed babies according to their proven medical recommendations. Following doctors’ orders, mothers fattened their babies with homemade formulas of pasteurized milk flavored with Karo syrup. These things occurred before the advent of manufactured artificial baby formula and disposable diapers.
Nature and medicine had parted ways. Thinking mothers began to question their doctors.
In 1973, I was one of those young women trying to find the path back to God’s way of motherhood. I began to seek out answers. My questions were rebuffed by a doctor. His manner indicated that he thought I was dumb, and I almost believed him. But something inside of me, an instinct as old as motherhood, raised itself and gave me confidence. I informed that doctor that there was nothing he could do to stop me from having my baby at home, including calling Child Protection Workers. If I had to, I would hide to have my baby, AND I would nurse her no matter what he thought.
My solitary experience did not turn the course of birthing options for women. It takes a collective voice. Rather than accept the latest recommendations, women in the 60’s started writing books about how to give birth naturally, how to breastfeed effectively and how to bond with your baby rather than allow your little one to be carted off to a nursery. From those seeds grew the homeschooling movement. While many volumes on these topics have been written since then, the debt is owed to those first outspoken, even rebellious women who wrote passionately of their fight to restore a natural order to the process of welcoming babies into families. Their passion caused young mothers everywhere to confidently proclaim “I CAN do this! I WILL do this!”
Now because a few courageous authors used their voices and their pens, blue babies and twilight births are a thing of the past. A doctor that claimed breastfeeding was vulgar or unsafe would lose all credibility. Today, the first generation of naturally birthed, homeschooled children are educated, successful parents homeschooling their own healthy, happy offspring. The results speak for themselves: A mother knows what is best for her baby.
Those books — while not always written by believers — were a valuable reference for mothers who desired to rediscover nature’s way, like myself. I was able to benefit from their willingness to share their knowledge and experiences.
In writing The Vision by Debi Pearl, I hope to carry on their fine tradition. It is my desire to see those who come after me benefit from my writing just as I benefitted from those writers from the 1960’s.
by:Ancient Wisdom in Birth and Mothering