Why Water?

- Increases comfort and eases pain for mom during labor and birth
- Speeds labor
- Improves mom's ability to assume helpful positions to facilitate the baby's passage
-Increases mom's feeling of being in control
- Reduces perineal tears
- Provides a gentler passage for baby

The advantages of waterbirth are many, both for the laboring mother and for her baby. A physically easier labor improves a woman's ability to calmly concentrate, allowing her to focus inward on the birth process. As mama’s muscles relax in the water, stress hormones, including adrenaline, are decreased. The result is usually a smoother, faster labor. There is often no need for pain medication when the laboring mother experiences the water’s relaxing benefits. Babies receive more oxygen from the water’s buoyancy, which facilitates better blood circulation in their mother. The weightlessness that babies experience moving from the fluid-filled womb into the warm waters of the birthing tub creates fewer traumas and an easier transition during birth. A baby who experiences this very gentle transition into the world enhances her ability to bond with her parents and learn the new task of breastfeeding.