36 Obvious Reasons You Are Capable of Natural Birth

We hear so much negativity about birth these days that it sometimes gets lost in the shuffle that women are divinely designed to birth babies. This is a miracle, but it is also so totally normal and a simple bodily function. Here are a few reminders (yes, many of them obvious) of the truth that we have forgotten about our bodies.

1. You are a woman
2. Your mother was a woman and she gave birth to you.
3. As was your grandmother and all of their mothers before them.
4. Women have literally for 1000's of years been doing this and surviving. The proof is that we are all HERE.
5. Medical doctors stepped into birth only about 100 years ago, and yet people were breeding successfully all that time before.
6. You have a vagina.
7. You got pregnant.
8. You are gestating beautifully.
9. All the discomforts and aches and pains, though possibly annoying, prove that your body is DOING its job.
10. You have breasts.
11. Those breasts exist in large part for one reason: to feed your offspring.
12. Your monthly cycle.
13. Many natural urges exist in part to bring about this child.
14. Your growing abdomen.
15. Your extra weight gain.
16. Your full breasts.
17. Your food cravings.
18. Your pre-labor or Braxton-Hicks contractions show that your body is preparing to birth.
19. Stretch marks indicate growth and fertility.
20. The epidural= new invention.
21. The episiotomy= also, new (and unnecessary).
22. The c-section= again new, and yet, women most often survived birth during all those years.
23. Your bones and ligaments are moving and softening to open for the baby.
24. You have hips.
25. You have a pelvis, and it is very different than that of a man.
26. Your pelvis, though bony is movable.
27. Have a big butt? Embrace it- it is a sign of your fertility.
28. Small butt? That's OK too- you will just fit in your skinny jeans faster. Your pelvis still moves.
29. Your ancestors for 1000's of years gave birth with no medical intervention, and they must have survived, because, here you are! (I know, a repeat- it is important!)
30. Birth is the natural end and climax of the act of making love.
31. Worried about birth pain? Don't be. Contractions are natures way of letting you know that your baby is coming. Without this warning system, we could drop our babies ANYWHERE, safe or not. The birth process is necessary preparation for a safe arrival.
32. Your baby moves- he or she is preparing you to love them.
33. Your babies movement also shows how good you are (without even trying I might add) at feeding and growing a baby.
34. All prenatal tests are new inventions. Your ancestors also gave birth without these.
35. Even 50 years ago the c-section rate was around 4%. This "need" for constant surgery is a new occurrence.
36. Worried about motherhood? The birth process and all its stages are also helping prepare you to mother with confidence. The lessons you learn in labor (faith, excitement, hard work, pain, joy, giving up, euphoria) will all be repeated over and over as you raise your children. It is natures preparation for mothering.