birthing

5 Truly Terrifying Things About Birth in the UK

| Rohana Aisha Dewfall

As the theme changes from spooky to sparkles, I am jumping on this trend with a quick note today, because honestly, while everyone sharing their fabulous decorations, costumes, and pumpkins – almost all of which have a HUGE impact on the environment and carry their own horror story, there’s also a 365 day crisis in perintal care that’s far scarier than Halloween.

5 truely spooky things, going on every single day within birth, because the system is build to conveyor belt families from pregnancy through to postpartum as conveniently as possible. This is  not because those working in it want to, but because that’s the way policies and systems have been built.

Scary stuff!

So, heres just 5, of the many terrifying things going on in the birth world … all year round.

The lies in antenatal care from professionals in the system – I know I said above that it’s not those working in the system, and most of the time, it isn’t. But the truth is, sometimes it is. Sometimes it is professionals ticking boxes, sometimes it’s disregarding evidence based care, sometimes it’s policy and sometimes it’s someone who’s burnt out and exhausted. But the lies come. And the ripples they create are immense.

Induction rates are incredibly high. When there’s a medical need, induction can be an incredibly useful life-saving tool, and thank goodness for that. However for the majority of women and birthing people induction is often a result of lack of confidence,  misinformation, scarmongering and guidance about ‘big babies’ or  being ‘overdue’. It isn’t based on the latest evidence and induction – in its various forms – ends up being the first step in a sliding scale of interventions which often perpetuate trauam for all those involved.

Lack of trauma informed, neruodivergent aware, autonomy based care is in part related to the point above: induction. However, it goes well beyond that. A lack of well rounded training and resources means that a majority of healthcare professionals, while well intentioned, often don’t have the correct language or experience to be able to support the different women and birthing people that they are seeing. The lack of neurodiverse not knowledge means that a lot of the time, families are treated in ways that cause more harm, coerce all violate their rates to autonomy. The reality of this is that once again, women, birthing people, partners and the babies involved are coming away from birthing within the system with experiences they need to heal from right at the start of this new journey together.

When we have a lack of support and we feel out of control or in danger. Physiological birth is halted, and our bodies go into shut down. This means that a majority of families are starting their journey together with this new baby,  and also having to recover from the experience of pregnancy and birth.

The maternal mortality rate for non white bodies is another incredibly scary aspect of birth in not just the UK but around the Western world. The reality is that biases exist, unconscious ones often doing more harm than we realise. Although most people don’t believe themselves to be racist, these are socialised biases that have informed everything we do, so of course, it is unsurprising that we see them unfold in preintal care too. 


Lastly, the bullying, coercion, and violation that women and birthing are experiencing every day. Unfortunately, almost everyone who has been through the system will have an experience where they have been treated in a less than ideal way. However, the scariest part of this is that they leave, and I, myself have done this too, grateful for the fact that they have come out not as damaged as they could be, and that their baby is there, not damaged or as damaged as could have been.


Halloween is one day.
One commercialised day adulterated from ancient traditions.


The crisis in perinatal care is all year round.

If you’re planning a baby or pregnant – get informed. You and your baby deserve better than what is currently happening.

Where You Birth Matters

| Rohana Aisha Dewfall

The way a baby is born impacts them on some level for their whole life.

The way they are born. The people around them. The environment they enter this world into.

Baby’s born into war carry that, (if they survive) into the life they live and it physically alters the DNA of their decendants. This has been heavily weighing on my mind this week, as we watch the events in the middle East unfold- with little to no voice given to the reality birthing women and babies are facing.

Baby’s born into immense privilege carry it too… though not always in the ways we might assume. Privilege often equates to a certain amount of resources over and above others. In the birth world, it’s a little more nuanced than that.

Assuming that you’re birthing outside of a war zone then; what impact does the environment of birth really have? It matters deeply, not just for babies but for mothers and partners too.

We cannot prepare for the future without embracing the meaning and the relevance of the baby’s perspective on life.

-Michel Odent

We know that mothers birthing in supported environments where they feel safe and nurtured pass this information on to their babies. The same is true for mothers who birth in conditions of big T and little t trauma. From hospitals to birthing centers to home births, the space you birth will shape everything from the medical interventions used to the emotional atmosphere surrounding your birth. After numerous conversations about why thinking about this as early on as possible matters, I thought I’d write a little on it.

Choosing where to give birth is a deeply personal decision. The assumption that everyone has the information and resources to choose the way they want is one I just cannot make. Socio-economic factors come into play, race, ethnicity and culture too. In the UK (at least at the time of writing in 2024), you can legally choose where you birth, and that choice can absolutely impact the way your birth story plays out.

Ultimately, its your choice, so get informed! There are far too many women told they can only birth in hospital when truly they do have other options. Equally, if the idea of birthing anywhere outside a hospital gives you shudders, then planning that ahead matters.

I want to preface the next few passages by highlighting that ultimately I believe every single baby comes earthside in the way they need to, with their unique birth resourcing them in various ways. 

What are your options?

Hospital, Birth Centre, Home. I won’t chat freebirth, that’s for another day.

Hospitals are the high tech options, sold to us as high safety, but also the space where the highest levels of birth trauma exist. Hopstials are supposed to be safe – and when they work, they are a blessing. More and more though, especially for women who have no or low ‘risk’ factors the hosptial birth story isn’t a happy one.

Hospitals represent the standard choice for childbirth, they are normalised in the media we consume right from childhood, and other spaces are considered ‘alternative’ or even a little radical. There are an array of medical interventions and expertise available, with health care professionals and a full range of technology on hand to monitor baby and mother throughout labour. There’s access to all sorts of interventions and pain relief options, and of course surgery.

While a cesarean birth can be lifesaving; for many of us in the birth world, we can see that it is the interventions prior that snowballed a healthy birth into an emergency. The conveyor belt system of induction and cesarean births is all a bit too neatly boxed up; and it takes away from the rite of passage birth physiologically is.

Hospital births are often a ticket to the trauma train because procedure trumps real life experience, and women are often gaslit, ignored, or violated. Circling back to babies, this also means babies are being ignored, assaulted and sent the information that the world is scary and unsafe.

Birth is nearly never an emergency, but sometimes it is. If you need to prioritise safety with medical resources, then a hospital birth is a blessing.

If you don’t… Read on.

A birth centre/midwife unit:

Birth centres are often described as kind of like the middle ground between hospital and home. They’re quieter, often offer a pool, can have the lights dimmed and try to be as warm and cosy as possible. Most birth centers will try to encourage birth to be as intervention free as possible, and I’ve heard of some beautiful birth stories with supportive staff in them.

However, with the ever increasing agenda to streamline birth (and yes this is the agenda), more birth centres are being closed or told they can’t operate fully because of staffing levels. Midwife units cannot support birthing women if they aren’t supported themselves; which means being able to access these is getting harder. Added to this is the fact most of them are for babies being born physiologically with little / no risk, and will turn away women who don’t their box.

This isn’t without reason, birth centres aren’t equipped to navigate emergencies or complications, and so err on the slide of caution. Birth centres can be some of the most beautiful, supportive and nurturing spaces, and midwives often go above and beyond to make them so… but they need to be given the resources for that to happen.

Home births:

For a healthy woman, the first intervention in birth and labour is leaving home. This is something I learned only after my 2nd child, and having had both hospital and home births myself, it is something I wholly believe to be true. As a woman, I know my homebirths were far more positive than my hospital ones, and I only got here through research and experience.

As a doula who wholeheartedly supports informed choices, I will never tell a potential client where to birth, but I will absolutely encourage you to really think about what that means to you.

Homebirths are growing in popularity, becoming something many mothers return to. I don’t see this as a a coincidence, it is a remembering. A remembering that sovereign birth is something we all have the right to. A return to reclaim the power of birth. Homebirths are in the comfort of your own space, so autonomy comes more naturally. You aren’t entering someone else’s space, they are visiting yours as a support system for you.

You can choose the environment, the lights the music etc, and if you decide you want to transfer, then that’s okay. It’s a choice you make. For first time mothers, there’s evidence to say that home births are far less traumatic, bonding feels easier and healing is quicker. Because in your space, generally speaking you feel safer, therefore all these processes don’t need to be big and hard, they can flow with ease. You can take breaks, chill out, zone out, and rest without interruption or inspection. There’s a reason mammals find/create dark quiet spaces for birthing, it is a primal instinct to do so. Humans like to think we are different, but hardly so.

Before I sign off, I have a question for you. Did you birth in more than one of these settings? What were your experiences of thr difference ? If you feel called to and safe to share, get in touch. I’d be honoured to hear from you.

With love, until next time,

Rohana x

Why I became a birth photographer?

| Rohana Aisha Dewfall

When I had my first child over 7 years ago, I had never heard of birth photography. I had the idea that I wanted to see my baby being born, and I asked if I could have a camera set up. I didn’t really understand why I wanted to, all I knew was it felt deeply important to me.

The hospital I was birthing at said no. I didn’t argue. I didn’t know how.

That birth, my first child, was traumatic in a number of ways and I’ve worked hard to heal my memories surrounding it. Still, I wish I had photos of it. I wish I could see the woman I was in those moments.

Alas, I cannot.

But I learned my lesson. When I fell pregnant again, I spoke to my partner about wanting to hire a photographer, and so we did.

I looked for a local photographer because at that time, nearly 5 years ago, birth photography wasn’t as popular as it is today. We found one who I trusted and got on with, and she agreed to venture out of her normal photography niche and capture my birth. Those photos are some of the most profound ones I have from that time. Unfortunately, my daughter was ready before anyone else, and the moment I craved capture of, was missed.

Still, having the details like the song she was born to, the pictures of me holding her as I stood up, blood dripped down my legs, cord still attached. They are frozen in time, ready to transport me back. They are a gift from my past self, and they are a gift to my future self too. Moments I have to hold forever.

When I got those images I knew that I wanted to give this to other families. I wanted to capture the rawness of these moments, and the intimacy of saying hello for the first time.

We say that you never forget the birth of your baby, and yes in part it’s true. But memories do fade. Time robs us of details. The haze of motherhood buries the deeply vulnerable early hours postpartum.

Documenting them feels like being able to save a sliver of one of life’s most powerful periods. Giving that to others is a privilege and honour.

When I had my 3rd baby, I hired another birth photographer. We planned a homebirth but ended up freebirthing. She documented the minutes I worried I wouldn’t be able to birth my baby, and she captured the moment where he was between worlds, head here, body not yet earthside, me, a portal.

In the months afterwards where I felt like I was drowning, the photographs she gave us reminded me that I could do the hardest things and survive.

Birth photography isn’t a trend, or just a photo to post on Instagram. It’s powerful, and healing far beyond what we may realise at the time.

Would I recommend it? A big YES! Not only because I do it, but because so many women I’ve spoken to have said, nomatter how their births have gone, they would have loved more images. Those who have them, treasure them deeply.

Baby’s are only born once after all, and no two births are the same.

With love,

Rohana x

The Conditioning of Birth

| Rohana Aisha Dewfall

We are conditioned by everything in life.

From the moment of your conception right until the moment you are reading this, you have been absorbing and filtering information. You’re doing it right now too. Every second of every single day.

It’s actually really fucking amazing – and, it means, we have a LOT of conditioning to work through whenever we try to break a cycle or move through some shit.

In terms of birth, what does this mean? We’re not constantly thinking about birth (unless you work in the field) or about how babies come into the world. We don’t actively consider the sacred period of postpartum days. We don’t consciously create a negative or traumatic birth. Why would we?

And yet, the percentage of women who experience birth trauma is rising. It is scary and getting scarier. The maternity services in this country (the UK) are deeply overwhelmed, understaffed, and failing. Arguably this is because of funding and politics and a lack of knowledge etc etc. However, I’ll go a step in a different direction here and say it’s also because we are so deeply conditioned in this society to think about birth a medical problem, a painful experience, and something that we have to survive.

We are conditioned from the moment our parents find out we exist; their thoughts and fears and joys about our birth will transmit information to us, in utero, about what birth is like. Then, our actual entrance into this world either confirms these beliefs that have begun to form, or it challenges them. Either way, beliefs are created- often in the last few generations they were not positive ones.

It might sound a little weird but if you get it, you really do get it. These imprints are the first of many foundational layers of our whole belief system. Every single second. Every single day. It’s all absorbed and filtered.

So then, we hear about birth, we hear screams of labour on the tv, or family and friends talking about the pain and trauma. We grow up with messages that birth isn’t beautiful, that it is bloody and breaks us, and so we fear it.

Generations have birthed under the controlled “guidance” of professionals reinforcing these views that birth isn’t safe or joyful or sacred. 

Granted there are exceptions, and someone will say that it’s “not all” but it doesn’t have to be all. It’s some. It’s a majority. And if you have any other racial or economic cards stacked against you, its even more.

Like I said earlier, we don’t consciously create a negative or traumatic birth. However we often do consciously create (also referred to as manifesting) a positive birth experience.  How? By filtering out the noise. By deconditioning our expectations of birth.

There are some radical revolutionaries out here doing this work. Deconditioning birth and postpartum, and inviting as many families as we can do the same. Those of us who have seen, heard and sometimes even felt the trauma that can be associated with birthing babies into this world; taking our experience and expertise and molding it into something we share. We are here, and we want better for our collective decendants.

We are here breaking the cycle. Saying no more, doing this sacred work of holding these spaces. Saying enough. Saying the conditioning stops here.

I invite you, regardless of where you are in the experience of birth – having had babies or wanting them, not interested in kids or somewhere in between – what are your beliefs about birth? Where have you been conditioned and where have you consciously created these views?

I’d love to hear.

With love,

Rohana x

Day 30 – 3am Thought Spiral

| Rohana Aisha Dewfall

Last night I thought I’d missed something, when I checked and realised I’d already written for the day. It felt like a big win, becauee I had been organised. The reality was I seized the moment, and I’m so glad I did.

I’m half doing the same now, it’s very early hours, and I’m listening to babies snore; I got up for a wee and have been tossing around, so thought, “what’s the time?” and landed here.

In many ways I suppose I’m already intimately familiar with the early hours, 3 and 4am particularly. I’m not exactly getting reacquainted since my kids are often up needed cuddles or to change position, go toilet or even have a snack – though this is rarely. However, I know in the coming weeks I’ll be far more likely to see these hours with leaky breasts and nappy changing… and I’ll be experiencing the darkness of not quite morning in whole new ways.

It’s day 30 now, and I’m genuinely considering joining a container where for 7 weeks there’ll be daily prompts, knowing full well I cannot 100% guarantee I’ll even have 2 of those 7… but also knowing that I might have nearly all, and it’s something I’ve been looking at for over a year. If I do, I’ll have the last 10 days of this 40 day practice, alongside packing and new writing prompts… and I keep thinking how exciting it is. Other voices (who I deeply respect, value and have asked opinions of) have concerns that I’m not resting enough. I probably am not, but that’s more based on having 3 kids under 7 and a 10 month old labrador so I am still gallivanting on adventures regularly through the week.

I don’t want to open the door of relying on technology to fill gaps just yet, because I know in the early days of new baby, I will lean on tablets and TV more; something I’m entirely at home with, becauee honouring a restful period of postpartum means I want to spend many of my first days with baby in bed, and that also means cuddles, books, screens and space to hold my older ones.

For the first time preparing for a baby, I feel wholly content; I feel confident, and I am calling in seamless transitions. This past year of practices has changed so much for me, I cannot put into words just how much has shifted.

Last year, in early 2023 the thought of having another baby terrified me to the point of desperation. Now, 18 months later, it feels like doors have opened wide, I’ve cried more and shed many many layers in healthy ways, and I’m new.

An incredible creator I follow called Rebecca Oakiah says pregnancy is the gestation of the mother and it feels so absolutely true. I’ve learning so much from her and various other birthkeepers since K was born. I’m inspired by them all, and more confident in my own work and sharing than I could have imagined I’d be.

Truthfully I didn’t do my Doula training because I wanted to work in birth. I did it because I wanted to be empowered after Ps birth, so that when I had A, I wasn’t left processing trauma and trying to figure out life with a newborn. I knew Hs job would demand a lot, and I was resourcing myself in the way I knew how – learning from people who’d been there before me.

Now I look back and see these life events were catalysing me towards a deeper calling. I was turning to the wise women, and looking further than my village because I knew that in order to learn and heal and hold others, I needed to be held myself. I found wisdom in spaces and I have for the last 5 years inhaled it all…

Before P I thought learning looked a certain way, through the trajectory of school and uni, I planned a masters and career and all the ‘normal’ path kind of things. I thought that’s what I should do, and ought to do.

Even after he was born it was still my plan… though I’d begun to spiral away a little. Meeting other women in a retreat while I held him in my womb, and hearing their wisdoms. That was one the transitionary stages for me. Those women, my beautiful mother included, held a blessing for me, crested a web of well wishes and sat in circle with me.

I long for the day where I can sit in circle with women again. It is healing.

Tracking these experiences back I’m so aware of how blessed I’ve been, and I can see, though P was a surprise baby, his entrance to the world was the most powerful thing. I didn’t understand manifestation or anything back then, but I manifested him … just as, in other ways, I have all my children. I have in each circumstance send out some energy into the universe, not even consciously at the time, calling in these babies, these experiences, these path changes.

Now, at 4am, as I spiral into the memories of it all, I feel like there is an unfolding and awakening.

I am meant to be here, holding this baby. I am meant to be on this path, working with others who want to do the same. I may not be ready to support a birth and capture it (though I am in my heart) becauee my capacity is filled with the abundance and attendance to my own children right now, but I am able to offer support in every ripple I create.

It isn’t about fighting the system, which it felt like with K.

It isn’t about being seen and heard loudly like it felt with A.

It isn’t about being quiet and submissive or apologetic like it felt with P.

It is about standing with my feet on the earth, rooting down and being supported by the land. Land that I stand on where ancestors have moved across, land that I cannot reach, where my ancestors were rooted. It isn’t about anyone else… its me, my body, my baby, my family.

H and I said when I turned 27 that every year I step into my identity as a witch a little more. Witch meaning wise woman. Witch meaning skilled medicine woman. Witch meaning someone connected to the energy around her. The word Witch holds so much energy… it was used for so much harm, but truly, I love the saying that we are the granddaughters of the witches they couldn’t burn. I know it’s more complicated but this sentiment resonates. I am more confident in my radicalness every year… and I have little concern that it turns people away.

It also brings people here.

Anyway, it’s 5am, the kids aren’t going to let me sleep in and we’ve got adventuring planned for the day. So, for now, I’m signing off. This has been the most interesting few hours to write.

If you’ve stuck with me through it all, and foe the past 30 days, I’m honoured. If you’re just joining, welcome.

Thank you for reading,

With love, Rohana x

Day 24 – Democracy is Dead

| Rohana Aisha Dewfall

What the fuck is the point in pretending anymore? I am so tired of this “democracy” and “free the hostages” narrative spat out by the media… and yes I’m getting political tonight.

Actually every single day I am political… not only in the news I share and consume, but more so in the way I raise my kids.

No, I don’t tell them the excruciating information about the atrocities in the Democratic Republic of Congo, or Yemmen, or Palestine, or Sudan. I don’t share with them the images, and work hard to avoid them catching glimpses… because they are too much. I can’t talk to them about violence against women yet… because right now, I’m laying foundations that do not need to be layered with fear and horror, and I am acutely aware that this in itself is privilege.

I have however shared that in some places, there are people eating grasshoppers because there is no food. That we don’t go to McDonald’s because big companies like them (and the list is LONG) are spending money on bombs that kill people like us. That there are people who control others  and that sometimes, people do horrible things because they are greedy for power. Power is absolutely a topical word in our home recently.

When the ICJ trial was on between South Africa and Isreal, I played pokemon court with my oldest child. My partner and I have different opinions about how involved our kids should get… and his concerns are valid, so through play and story, we have conversations about equity, life and how we can do our part in the ways that we can.

This morning as I watched them, I saw just how deeply political this life is. How I am raising future custodians of our planet, and I thought about how this means teaching them by being aligned myself.

Tonight, I feel like the pendulum has swung the other way, and I want to scream. I want to howl and grieve the losses of every single child that has been murdered.

I want to dance in celebration and solidarity with the students protesting.

I want to shake the world… and make sense of it… and in feeling this feeling, I know 2 things; once my children sleep I need to roll out my yoga mat and center myself, AND there are tides changing in the collective consciousness. I might be called radical because of many choices … but seeing just how messed up this is isn’t radical. It’s the only sane response to the madness of the last 8 months.

Palestine has been a calayst to the world waking.

Randomly today, P asked me to explain the word “dismantle” to him. I asked for context (something we’ve been practicing) and we worked out what it meant. All the while I was thinking… if we dismantle the systems of oppression and violence in birth, and within a generation, the effects will ripple outwards catalysing mass change. Not quite the explanation he was after, but it’s been rattling around in my brain since.

There is so much violence in birth.

There is so much violence in parenting.

Is it really surprising that the world, controlled by traumatised (mostly) men is really as fucked up as it is right now ?

If we had a whole generation of children born, in supported, empowered environment, with parents who felt safe and supported in the formative years, the ripple of these children, feeling understood, seen and held regardless of their day, would be immense.

It brings me hope… and also rage. Because change is so possible… BUT systemic change is required… and until more people rebel, change won’t come. We don’t have to riot… but we do have to wake up… and this society is built on a majority of the population sleepwalking through their life… not asking questions, paying the bills, and being silent.

I’m tired of pretending… of living my life and washing my dishes and taking my kids to the park while children just like mine are blown apart or starved.

My kids may not understand all of it, and I hope when they’re older they’ll see why I try to protect their innocence, in part because I know my ancestors had children aware of so much pain so young… but regardless I know I’ll be able to say I did my best.

Parenting is the most political role I think there is… and screw the pretences of democracy – one thing I’m sure of is that democracy the way its marketed to us is dead. Right now, all we can do is figure out how to play the game of this society without selling our souls in the process.

If you have any thoughts, I’d love to hear them.

Thanks for reading, with love,

Rohana x

Day 2

| Rohana Aisha Dewfall

I’m back. Today I did a yoga practice, took the kids to the park, and have spent the last couple of hours working on sublimation t-shirt prints that I am making to fundraise for Gaza. It’s been a good day and I am exhausted in a joyful way.

The eclipse yesterday sparked a few conversations which felt authentic from a home ed point of view, and today things have felt calmer. The wind was strong but the sun came out and my kids played for hours outside. Then we came home and they played here, before tuning in to a new programme so I could rest. My body, at 31 weeks of growing another human, has reminded me today, that I am not actually capable of as much as I used to be. My body, in it’s wisdom, asking me to honour the need for a slower pace, and to rest; because it knows, as changes come, rest will look very different soon.

Tonight I’m thinking about rest, and about yoga, breathwork, and Palestine. I am thinking about how my body, growing our baby dragon is able to ask for rest, to ask for nourishment, to be held safely. I am privileged, and as in every pregnancy, acutely aware of it. This time, far more resourced, far more ready, and far more willing to listen; while also being aware that women, just like me in many ways, are carrying babies through stress, heartbreak, displacement, famine, and phycological warfare as well as genocide. I have learned, more deeply in these past months than ever before; how to hold solidarity in my body, bare witness and look away when needed, coming back, and trying to create ripples of healing.

The past 6 months I have delved into learning more deeply about pregnancy, our experiences in the womb and how we are in fact so much more aware and impacted even before life earthside begins; and as I have learned, I have grown in my knowledge, and in my belly; and in my capacity to practice compassion while NOT jumping into overwhelm. I have tried to protect my baby from the stress, while not disappearing into a bubble (a previous, very effective strategy of mine).

As I type, I think of the women who don’t have the choices I do; who are birthing to the sound of drones, who are carrying through loss and change more tumultuous than I can cognitively comprehend; and I feel a sense of understanding… I know in my bones, from lives before this one, that these experiences will not break them; because the resilience passed on is just as strong as the trauma. I have a sense of real solidarity, compassion and also rage. I am burning… and that fire has led to these t-shirts that sit before me; a way for me to fundraise a little, a way for me to contribute more than contaminate. That fire has led to something bigger too; a project I worked on for weeks, pulling in different people to help, and creating resources. Small, and still, ripples… ripples that I can see and ripples that I can’t.

I hope that this baby feels those ripples; the burning inside me, to do more and also to honour rest. It isn’t something I have gifted my other babies, already earthside teaching me daily. I didn’t know how to then; but now, I am doing what I can, with different tools in my toolbox… I can feel them wriggling inside me, dancing in my belly (and making me need a wee!); and I am beyond grateful for the lessons.

Until tomorrow,

With love,

Rohana x