DOWNSTATE / UPSTATE CHALLENGE!!
Want to support your favorite midwife but don't want to drive to Chicago for a wine tasting?
We have just the thing for you!
DONATE TO CFIM NOW AND YOUR DONATION WILL BE DOUBLED
Yes, doubled - and you'll have the chance to show everyone who rules - Illinois upstaters (Chicago) or Illinois downstaters (everyone else).
On November 20th, Chicago area midwifery supporters will attend an Elegant Evening of wine tasting, appetizers and desserts hosted by the Illinois Council of Certified Professional Midwives. There will be a silent auction as well. The evening will be hosted by the Illinois Council of Certified Professional Midwives and proceeds will go toward lobbying expenses for SB3712 - the Home Birth Safety Act. The last time this group did fundraising they brought in several thousand dollars.
Knowing that downstate supporters cannot easily attend the event, an anonymous donor has offered a challenge grant. If downstate supporters can collectively raise $500, the donor will match it. This will be just the beginning because rumor has it we will have another matching donor later this month! The last time the Coalition had a matching donor drive like this several thousand dollars were brought in!
With thousands coming in from each group last time, this looks like an excellent opportunity for a little bit of friendly intrastate competition! We are inviting downstate Illinoisans to try to beat the Chicago women in their fundraising game. Between now and November 20th, all donations to the Coalition from anywhere outside Chicago proper will be tallied as downstate donations.
After the November 20th Chicago event is over and the proceeds are tallied, we will see which group Chicago or Downstate will be featured as the RULING FUNDRAISING GROUP on the Coalition website.
So join us please - a little friendly competition never hurt anyone. And it could help home birth mothers, babies and midwives have safer and healthier home births in Illinois. Any sized donation, big or small, counts. Remember, whatever you give will be doubled.
Let the race begin! You can donate by paypal at www.illinoismidwifery.org or you can mail a check to CFIM c/o Vicki Johnson, 6092 Torchlite Trail, Loves Park, IL 61111.
If you are mailing a donation, in order to be sure you'll be counted in the challenge, you must postmark your donation by by November 19th. If you mail it after that date, please send Vicki an email letting her know what's coming in the mail. Vicki is at Babylady55@aol.com
BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!! As extra incentive, donors who give $100 or more will not only see their donation matched, they will also receive a free copy of the Ten Year Anniversary Edition of the Illinois Midwives Calendar produced by the Illinois Council of Certified Professional Midwives. This beautiful Black and White calendar juxtaposes photographs showing the beauty of homebirth with words describing the hard realities of being a home birth attendant in Illinois. Calendars are in production and will be released in December, though an advance batch will be sold at the wine tasting. Additional calendars may be purchased for $20 each plus $2 postage. All proceeds from sales will go to ICCPM for expenses related to the Home Birth Safety Act. Calendar Purchase requests for other than $100 donors (who will automatically receive them) should be directed to ICCPM CALENDAR c/o Vicki Johnson, 6092 Torchlite Trail, Loves Park, IL 61111.
Showing posts with label Homebirth. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Homebirth. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Home Birth Demand on the Rise
Reflecting trends we wee in Illinois, several articles have been published around the country, documenting the rise in the demand for home birth services. Here are a few.
New York Times, November 12, 2008
Baby You're Home
Midwives Say Home Births Are Up, Despite Warnings
by JULIE SCELFO
...local midwives say they have been swamped with calls and requests in recent months, in some cases increasing their workload from two, three or four deliveries a month to as many as 10. (New York health department statistics for this year will not be available until 2010.) Several certified nurse midwives who have home-birth-only practices said they had gotten so many more requests in recent months that they have begun referring pregnant women to midwives in Rockland County, Long Island and New Jersey.
Erica Lyon, the founder of Realbirth, a five-year-old childbirth education center with three locations in the city, said 20 percent of the 160 couples who take her classes each month are planning home births, twice as many as six months ago. YourWaterBirth.com, one of the biggest online purveyors of birthing pools — deep inflatable tubs with a specially designed built-in seat and handles — said its sales have doubled since last year, with more than 20 percent of its customers in New York City; Waterbirth.org, another outlet, said it has sold more than twice as many pools this year as last, 25 percent of them to New Yorkers and Long Islanders.
Home birth professionals in New York City have been struck, several said, by the fact that the increase is coming not so much from the dyed-in-the-wool back-to-nature types as from professionals like lawyers and bankers. “People who wouldn’t naturally self-select for home birth are coming in and getting very open-minded,” said Cara Muhlhahn, a certified nurse midwife who has had a home-birth practice for 17 years and is now fully booked six months in advance.
One reason for the change, it seems, is “The Business of Being Born,” a documentary produced by the actress and former talk show host Ricki Lake, which ran in only a few theaters during its theatrical release in January but has become an underground hit among expectant parents since coming out on DVD. (Rentrak, a company that monitors DVD rentals, said that instead of dropping off, as typically happens with new releases, the film is being rented at consistent rates.)
To read the entire article, visit
Colette's comments: These so-called "warnings" are unfounded dire predictions made by organized medicine that ignore all reliable evidence that home birth is an equally safe option to hospital birth for healthy women and their babies.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Education in childbirth
Contra Costa Times, California, November 4, 2006
Education in childbirth
Research turns up answers and questions
By Ann Tatko-Peterson
IN TWO YEARS, Tina Cassidy has become the nation's resident expert on birthing babies. The first-time author spent considerable time in hospitals, birth centers and a HypnoBirthing class. She interviewed midwives, doulas, health educators and parents. She watched births -- in homes and in hospitals, natural and cesarean, twins to triplets.
Yet when the research was done and her book was written, Cassidy found she still couldn't answer the most-asked question:
What's the best way to give birth?
Cassidy laughs as she sits near the pool at the Claremont Resort & Spa in Berkeley. "Not to be cute," she says, "it's really whatever way the woman feels comfortable."
"You can't advocate home birth if the woman's going to be freaked out by having the baby at home. By the same token, someone could go blindly to the hospital without really thinking about it and when they get there, their labor stalls because they're scared."
Colette's comment: This is promoting a new book. While I'd hardly call Tina Cassiday our "nation's expert" in birth, she does seem to have a sensible attitude about why the mother should be the one to choose the type of birth she wants. Disclosure: I have not read the book.
Women told to give birth at home
BBC on-line, UK, November , 2006
Mothers-to-be in Bridlington will be encouraged to opt for home births
Mothers-to-be in Bridlington will be encouraged to opt for home births
A maternity unit in Bridlington is to close as an NHS trust attempts to claw back £7m of overspending.
Hospital bosses say mothers-to-be in the town will be encouraged to opt for home births.
The move is part of a raft of measures announced by Scarborough and North East Yorkshire Healthcare Trust on Friday, in a bid to save £4.5m a year.
The trust also announced a recruitment freeze, but said it did not plan any compulsory redundancies.
While I love the idea that the U.K. is officially promoting home birth, I don't think anyone should tell a woman where to give birth.
Home birth a family affair (New Zeland)
Hawkes Bay Today, Hawkes Bay, New Zealand, October 27, 2006
KATE NEWTON
Alex Cameron has never liked hospitals, not even when he worked in one, so when his wife Ruth decided to have their first son at home he was rapt.
"It meant I could be more involved. In a hospital I wouldn't have been able to do anything - just sit there and hold her hand," the former army medic said.
When Jack was born 20 months ago and then Isaac eight months ago Alex was on hand to run the baths, lay down the tarpaulin and sheets in the lounge and serve coffee on demand.
Read the rest of the article at http://www.hbtoday.co.nz/localnews/storydisplay.cfm?storyid=3707238&thesection=localnews&thesubsection=&thesecondsubsection=
Colette's comment: typical feel-good homebirth story
KATE NEWTON
Alex Cameron has never liked hospitals, not even when he worked in one, so when his wife Ruth decided to have their first son at home he was rapt.
"It meant I could be more involved. In a hospital I wouldn't have been able to do anything - just sit there and hold her hand," the former army medic said.
When Jack was born 20 months ago and then Isaac eight months ago Alex was on hand to run the baths, lay down the tarpaulin and sheets in the lounge and serve coffee on demand.
Read the rest of the article at http://www.hbtoday.co.nz/localnews/storydisplay.cfm?storyid=3707238&thesection=localnews&thesubsection=&thesecondsubsection=
Colette's comment: typical feel-good homebirth story
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