All I Want for Christmas...

...is to the see the maternity care system in our country experience wide reform. I also want women everywhere to have the choice of a midwife-attended birth if they want it. And, I want women to have access to good quality information about their options and choices in birth. And, I want women, babies, and families to be treated with respect and tenderness in the birth environment, wherever and however the birth happens to be.

With regard to my first Christmas want, I wanted to share a link to the statement from Childbirth Connection about Health Care Reform Priorities for Maternity Care.

And, with regard to my second and third Christmas wants I would like to share links to some excellent blog posts at the Independent Childbirth blog. The first is Happy New Year ACOG and the other two are about How We Are Born Matters and The Home Birth Experience.

Finally, with regard to my final Christmas want, I want to share a link I received today to a segment on a local television station about homebirth and midwifery in Missouri. It was a two-part story. The news anchors do make a comment about needing collaborative practice with physicians and at the end about "if the situation was to become life-threatening..." but overall it is an extremely positive piece and a really moving one (I cried when the baby was born!). The first clip and transcript can be found here and the second here.

Happy Holidays!