Ina May Gaskin

How would I describe Ina May? Fearless, discerning, intuitive, wise, and honest to a fault. By stepping outside of the mold of modern medicine and being free to ask the hard questions, like, “Why have we been doing birth this way, when it is clear it isn’t working as well as we know it could?” she has led a brilliant movement of women (and men) toward the truth that the Creator has given us, a power to know and act as we were meant to, from birth onward.

What follows are some of my favorite quotes by Ina May Gaskin, many from the 2013 movie, Birth Story: Ina May Gaskin and The Farm Midwives. The movie spotlights a spirited group of women who taught themselves to deliver babies in the 1970s while living on what some would call a hippie commune. Through research and trying different approaches to birthing, they learned and have been teaching others to respect the natural ability of women to birth without drugs that can harm the mother and the baby and other interventions. Today, even though C-section rates continue to be too high, Ina May and midwives everywhere are slowly getting through to the medical community.

 

· “Remember this, for it is as true as true gets: Your body is not a lemon. You are not a machine. The Creator is not a careless mechanic. Human female bodies have the same potential to give birth as well as aardvarks, lions, rhinoceri, elephants, moose, and water buffalo. Even if it has not been your habit throughout your life so far, I recommend that you learn to think positively about your body.” 

· “It is important to keep in mind that our bodies must work pretty well, or there wouldn’t be so many humans on the planet.”

· “Many of our problems in U.S. maternity care stem from the fact that we leave no room for recognizing when nature is smarter than we are.”

· “Whenever and however you give birth, your experience will impact your emotions, your mind, your body, and your spirit for the rest of your life.”

· “If a woman doesn’t look like a goddess during labor, then someone isn’t treating her right.”

· “Good beginnings make a positive difference in the world, so it is worth our while to provide the best possible care for mothers and babies throughout this extraordinarily influential part of life.”

· “Asking a woman to give birth while hooked up to a bunch of machines is like asking a man to have an erection on command while strapped to a hospital gurney.”