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Laboring with Lamaze

Childbirth on Your Own Terms

By Shel Franco

Pages: 1 2 3

mom with new baby Jana McCarthy, of southern California, could never forget her Lamaze birth. She felt prepared and empowered. She coped with her discomfort using support from her husband, patterned breathing and concentration on focal points. As a result, McCarthy had the birth she planned for – one that happened on her own terms without the use of any drugs.

In the early 1950s, a French obstetrician, Dr. Ferdinand Lamaze, developed his own system of painless childbirth after watching women give birth in Russia. Later that same decade, Marjorie Karmel was instructed in the Lamaze method and used the techniques to give birth. Her resulting book introduced the Lamaze method of childbirth to the United States in 1957.

At its conception, the Lamaze organization was known as the American Society of Psychoprophylaxis in Obstetrics. The word "psychoprophylaxis" referred to the laboring woman using the power of her mind to decrease the discomfort of childbirth. Eventually, the name was shortened to ASPO/Lamaze, which it is sometimes called today, although the organization is now formally known as Lamaze International, Inc.

According to organizational literature, the Lamaze childbirth philosophy maintains:

Birth is normal.
The experience of birth profoundly affects women and their families.
Women's confidence and ability to give birth is either enhanced or diminished by the care provider and place of birth.
Women have the right to give birth free from routine medical interventions.
Birth can safely take place in birth centers and homes.

Pages: 1 2 3

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