Fact Sheet for Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth

For years Our Bodies, Ourselves has provided readers with indispensable information on women's health and sexuality. Our single-topic book, Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth, brings the same knowledge and perspective to readers. Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth addresses the questions and needs of women during pregnancy, childbirth, and the “fourth trimester” of early motherhood. It presents the most up-to-date and accurate information on pregnancy and childbirth.

Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth addresses a wide range of topics, including: 

• Choosing a provider and birth setting.
   
  
• Making decisions about prenatal testing.
  
  
• Arranging for continuous labor support.
  
  
• Exploring options for pain relief.
  
  
• Recovering from birth.
  
  
• Adjusting to life as a new mother.

The book also provides an overview of maternity care practices in the United States and examines why some aspects of the care most women receive are not based on the most reliable research on what is safe and effective.

The widespread routine use of medical interventions during labor and birth has failed to improve the safety of childbirth for women who are at low risk for medical complications. Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth dispels many common misconceptions about maternity care and provides women with the information they need to make wise decisions and approach birth with confidence.

Our Bodies, Ourselves: Pregnancy and Birth has drawn praise from both mothers and physicians:

“The trusted Boston Women’s Health Book Collective has written a comprehensive, accessible, and up-to-date book for expectant mothers. It balances important facts, scientific data, and evidence with the voice of the ‘wise woman’; and it provides questions to ask, issues to think about, and options to consider and discuss. This is the #1 book I am going to recommend to my patients.”
-- Timothy RB Johnson, MD FACOG, Bates Professor and Chair of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Professor of Women’s Studies at the University of Michigan.

"As a new mother myself, I appreciated all the scientific evidence that was used to back up recommendations or to question standard practices. And yet this book manages to be a smart, readable guide that is not preachy -- a rarity for pregnancy books."
-- Tina Cassidy, author of Birth: The Surprising History of How We Are Born: