Author, journalist and women's rights campaigner. CEO of human rights in childbirth charity Birthrights and sometime doula.
With so many myths and confusion around what you "can and can't" eat and drink in pregnancy, I turned to dietician Adele Hug to cut the crap and tell it like it is in Your No Guilt Pregnancy Plan. In this interview she talks about her approach to diet, her own long and difficult journey to pregnancy and shares some easy recipes full of stuff to help pregnant women feel as strong and well as they can.
Read MoreIn the first in a new series of guest blogs, Clinical Psychologist and Psychosexologist Dr Karen Gurney talks about sex after kids.
Read MoreAn extract on Australian women's birth rights this International Women's Day.
Read MoreThis International Women's Day it's #notmyjob to protect myself from assualt and discrimination at work so I'm giving it the middle finger.
Read MoreYour No Guilt Pregnancy Plan, coming soon!
Read More
Letters to my fanny
(not for the squeamish)
When Cherry Healey and I talked all things motherhood, birth, sex, doula, human rights (etc. etc.) it got gritty pretty fast. If you want a sweary introduction to the work of this fanny warrior (sorry) check out Cherry's brilliant podcast and grab a copy of her book (and mine!) while you're at it.
And if you need persuading here's what lovely Cherry says about it all:
"In light of the backlash against Kate Hudson's comment (which I'm sure was entirely a joke but the reaction is definitely interesting) that the laziest thing she's ever done is to have a c-section, I chat to the brilliant CEO of Birthrights, Rebecca Schiller.
She has a MA in war studies. Yeah. Her passion for human rights and, after years of being a doula, she realised that there were some series issues around women, birth and human rights. After too many stories of women feeling a lack of power or respect she decided to do something about it. I highly recommend reading the articles on www.birthrights.org.uk.
We also move, somehow, onto the subject of women being pigeon holed. The working mum, the organic mum, the stay at home mum. And how we get pitted against each other. And wouldn't it be fun if we could just be women, 360 degree women that change and are layered and are not defined by whether we have children or not, whether we bottle or breastfeed, or if we decide we want to give birth through the love tunnel or the sun roof. Perhaps we can be a chardonnay drinking, homework nailing, organic pie making, sex fiend woman and break all the stereotypes. And I realised I was an organic cucumber, cesarean sex fiend. And we might even do t-shirts. We cannot be defined as simply as society would like. But we do deserve all the information and the respect that we can make strong decisions.
She's also written an absolutely brilliant book called Why Human Rights in Childbirth Matter, that the Chief Executive of the Royal College of Midwives said 'should become essential reading for all maternity professionals'.
I can't wait to read Rebecca's new book coming out in April. I promise to do another interview with her, partly so she'll bring me more duck eggs from her home, and also because I think she is so wonderfully balanced, informed, highly respectful and compassionate.
In a sea of layered, complicated, important and sometimes angry debate around childbirth, she is a mast to hold onto."
