Mairin Schuman’s Reviews > Childbirth without Fear: The Principles and Practice of Natural Childbirth > Status Update

“…the call for anaesthetic is not necessarily a cry to be relieved of physical agony, but a demand to escape from some impending horror that her imagination has formulated in the absence of truthful instruction.” p112

“As her child grows older she sees upon the canvas of the past the tiny hands and outstretched arms appearing from the vault of her own body - she hears again the sound that brought tears and laughter to her joy. She reverences this monument of motherhood as a shrine at which to worship in her daydreams whilst the infant sleeps upon her knee.” p.71

“Fear is the strongest weapon in the hand of the enemy of motherhood” (59).

“I have witnessed this so often, and been profoundly impressed by the inexplicable transfiguration of women at the moment of their baby's birth, that I have been led…to ask: why this? It is not sentimentality; it is not relief from suffering; it is not simply satisfaction of accomplishment... Can it be that the Creator intended to draw mothers nearest to Himself at the moment of love's fulfilment?” (25).

“If there is one characteristic more desirable to be maintained in communal life, it is the dignity of motherhood. Those of us who have known it from personal experience in our own homes, or from professional associations, visualise it in those calm, competent, and companionable women who live to a great age, acutely sensitive to, but unshakeable by either the cruelties or the rewards of having lived” (8).

The sordid melancholy of prospective motherhood has been replaced by fearless and impatient longing for the moment of life's most satisfying achievement. No longer do the trembling hands of women stretch out to seek deliverance from the sorrows of death that compassed them.. Motherhood offers all women who have the will and the courage to accept the holiest and happiest estate that can be attained by human beings. P7