Clinical Connections: Ann Ledbetter, MSN, CNM

You can have the best of science, compassion and control with your birth. You just have to know where to find it. Ann does a great job of showing what that looks like.

Our Clinical Connections is a curated series highlighting lifestage posts from terrific health writers on Substack you may have missed—a way to find out more about their expertise so you can consider following or subscribing to them. We do!

I don’t know which made me sadder to post in yesterday’s Sunday Snippets: that the US again has been rated D+ grade in maternity care, or a story that never should have needed to be published: “I cover women’s health. Here’s my plan to ensure hospital staff listen when I’m in labor.”

But what bothers me the most is so few women know there’s an easy way to take control of your pregnancy—and how well you and your baby do—right from the start. As this study in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology shows, moms who choose care from midwives have better experiences than even women in the same hospital cared for exclusively by doctors. They also tend to have shorter labors, fewer cesareans and prematures, and have much greater freedom of choice and support on how their births take place.

Another reason women love midwifery care? The one thing women can do that men can’t is a hotbed of competition, myths, and judgment from every woman who’s ever even thought about having a baby. Midwives like Ann manage to balance logic and love, helping moms and parents stay sane.

Ann Lederer is a CNM in who somehow balances being a wife, mom of three, CNM, and writing her very active Substack, A Moderate Midwife, as well. She’s walked the walk, which—for a CNM—includes being with moms during labor and sticking with them in early motherhood, not just showing up for delivery. Whether you’re thinking about having a baby, pregnant, getting through parenting while keeping your sanity—or a grandmother trying to keep up—here are four of Ann’s recent posts. Take a peek at her Notes as well; she’s in a community of terrific writers about this emotionally-fraught but ultimate incredibly-rewarding lifestage.

Some things don’t change about birth and mothering—but fortunately, others do, and Ann keeps it all in great perspective. Enjoy!

This will surprise many: The case for evidence-based birth and why midwifery matters, with important, very real data that you may not hear from anyone else.

You May Want To Give Birth With A Midwife

Before epidurals, the battle was over Twilight Sleep, and before that, it was ether and chloroform—and I’d bet this fight was over thousands of other ideas eons before that. This is one of the great all-time maternal battles, often more resplendent with judgement and righteousness than data. Here’s a nicely balanced perspective, combining evidence, experience, and empathy.

You May Want To Give Birth Without An Epidural

Every mom of a baby boy feels like she’s the first ever to face the Circumcision-or-Not Dilemma—and for her, she is. This is not a minor decision, and it easily becomes the only battle that can get more heated than the My Birth Was Far Harder/Easier Than Yours competition. Data—scant anyway—usually takes a very back seat to “What does dad look like?” and every other strongly held and voiced emotional theory in the family, the neighborhood, the grocery store, childbirth classes, church—everywhere a mom turns. And everyone’s an expert...except her.

Should You Circumcise Your Baby Boy?

And once women escape the I Birthed Better Than You Battle, lurking in wait to make at least the next two decades crazed is the I’m a Better Mother Than You Prize Fight—never worse than when your child just. won’t. sleep, leaving mom exhausted and vulnerable to everyone with an N of 1 who believes they know better.

OK, But My Kids Are Harder Than Yours