The Positive Birth Book: The Guide to Pregnancy, Birth and the Early Weeks

It’s so difficult to find all the right info without an overwhelm or superfluous & biased stuff.If you’re a first timer or even just need a brush-up, and you don’t want to have to sift through YouTube & TikTok videos and pages and pages of websites and hours of Google searches, this book is PERFECT for a starting point. I’m not sure you’d need much else!Its main goal is to inspire confidence, and boy does it! I’m recommending it to all my pregnant friends, and I recommend it to you! At least place it on your baby registry.

My wife's FAVORITE birth book. Milli has always been amazing, but her book is pretty genius. She loves the graphics and organization. The content is perfect. Everyone deserves a positive birth and this book explains how! Good job.

I had no idea where to start when I found out I was pregnant but I knew that I wanted to go in to pregnancy and childbirth with a positive outlook. I came across the Positive Birth Movement on Facebook and immediately pre-ordered Millie's book. It was so comprehensive. It walks through each step of childbirth, all possible variations to birth plans and how to formulate a plan that makes you as comfortable as possible. It's the only birth book I've read and I feel excited and prepared to tackle childbirth as naturally and positively as possible!

Not the most helpful book if you're not located in the U.K., as it details many laws, customs, and procedures that do not apply to the U.S., but definitely empowering for first time mothers (and second and third, I'm sure). Much less anti-hospital and anti-doctor than Ina May's book (which, frankly, turned me off due to its desperate need to be updated and toned down), and much more realistic. Birth doesn't have to smell like patchouli if you have a midwife, but it also doesn't have to be ultra-sterile if you go to a hospital. What we decide for ourselves matters more than what others may think of our choices.

I’m 7th months pregnant, I loved the book, and feel a lot more clear about everything. I really understood a lot more about how important it will be to work and plan for a positive birth experience: how to be in tune with doctor, partner, doula or midwife, pediatrician, etc. At least many of my doubts and fears went away importantly, so I’m sure that some of the oxytocin that I will release on my child birth will be worth a lot more than what this book cost. :)

i plowed through this book. the author is naturally humorous, and the UK centric manner of speech just makes it so much more entertaining as an american. everything still pretty much applies to the US health system. a great quick easy read introduction to the many things to consider before giving birth, with trustworthy science based references. loved it

I love this book because she does a fantastic job of going over ALL of your options no matter how you decide to give birth. If you could only read one book, I'd absolutely pick this one.

Love how it’s broken down- great examples especially for birth plans

I read this to prep for the birth of my first baby. It has helpful visualization tools and talks positively about every type of birth experience, and how to prep for any event even when things don't go your way. I found all of this reassuring and helpful.However a majority of the book is dedicated to the idea of home birth without pain relief. For example she dedicates almost 15 pages in chapter 8 about having a home birth, and only 2 pages about having a hospital birth. On page 206 she writes rather disdainfully, "If you are sure you want an epidural" and "If you are planning a hospital birth...I urge you to reconsider ." As someone planning a hospital birth, this made me uncomfortable.Despite this the book still offers good advice and helped me think about birth in a different way, and made me ask questions I hadn't thought of.

The book is very informative, written in simple language with a great sense of humor. Definitely a must read for a child birth with confidence.

If you want to gain knowledge of labour and birth in a non-judgemental, non-clinical, inclusive and nurturing way, then this book is for you. I genuinely do not understand the bad reviews of this book; I can only imagine they come from a place of defensiveness and say more about the context of the reviewers than of the author. I cannot understand how people can take issue with someone championing women, and presenting factual, evidenced based information with the sole purpose of supporting women through what can be a scary and daunting time. Who wouldn't want to be well informed about such a big event in their lives?I bought Milli's book after hearing her podcast with Deliciously Ella in October 2019, right at the start of my pregnancy. I've since read this book three times at different stages of pregnancy, and have dipped into specific sections when writing my birth plan and as I get closer to the birth. I found this book empowering and factual - everything Milli advocates for is so important in the birth room (wherever that room may be) and throughout she makes it abundantly clear that whatever birth you want, the most important aspect is that you are well informed about it and that your choices are guided by accurate, evidence-based information, rather than fear, pressure from others or hospital policy. I didn't feel at any stage that there was a preference for home birth over other types, but moreso that in more medicalised births, there is less to talk about / less choice and agency for women simply because that is the reality of these types of births (a woman can't perform her own c section, or decide what dose of medication she needs based on her body weight for example), which means there is less to discuss (and less time devoted to this in the book).I write this as someone who had worked in the NHS for over a decade and is all too aware of how broken the system is, and whilst not for one minute do I think midwives, obstetricians etc wish to harm women in labour or deny them certain rights, I absolutely know that the pressure to be efficient, save money / resources and "get patients through the system quickly" is often at the forefront of decision making. Milli reminds us that there is another way; we have human rights and choices, and the evidence base at times shows something very different to what is routinely practised in a lot of hospitals and birthing centres up and down the country. This is something we need to wake up about, and ask questions about!Lastly I review this book with the knowledge that our soon to be born baby will have birth defects, which were picked up at the 20 week scan. I think it is important for potential purchasers to recognise that it is impossible for any author to cover all eventualities and nuances of individual circumstances, and it would be naive to try. My own individual circumstances have not diminished what this book provides; instead it means I can choose to do an extra bit of reading around aspects of my birth, feeding etc that are specific to me, and of course this means there are some small sections of the Positive Birth Book which won't be relevant to me. This does not make it a bad book!Overall, if you have an open mind, are willing to learn about labour and birth, and want to make the best choices for you and your baby then buy this book. It is easy to read, is non-alarmist about birth and seeks to help women feel calm, confident and flexible in the options available to them, no matter how unpredictable or far from an "ideal" birth their journey takes them. Personally I found it impossible not to be fascinated by some of the long held assumptions of birth and labour I didn't realise I had, and have been paying more attention than ever to the type of language I and others use when discussing labour and birth. Having read the book several times, I feel confident that NO MATTER WHAT TYPE OF BIRTH I END UP HAVING, I will approach it with more knowledge than I did before, including the realisation that I have choice, whether I exercise those choices or not. For me that is invaluable and I am so thankful to this book for giving me this.

I really liked the tone and style of this book. It truly is about focusing on a positive experience during and right after birth and learning about your rights as a woman during birth. Helps women to prepare for different eventualities (natural birth, home birth, C-section, etc.) and dissolves a lot of pregnancy worries.

This is such an empowering book for women who are about to give birth. It offers so many scenarios and talks about how each birth that women choose to have or do have can be positive as long as you focus on what is important to you. I appreciate this book doesn't villify c-section deliveries or birth that use drugs to manage pain. Very factual and also a great guide for what kinds of questions to think about when you're considering the kind of birth you'd like to have. The 'positive' approach of this book makes it great for first time moms who are worried or afraid about how their birth will go, and yet it also adds useful information for more than first time moms who might need a reminder about what to expect or what to think about before giving birth.