Physiological labor and birth are not only safe, but healthy and beneficial to baby and mother, and few labors actually require medical intervention. A woman’s comfort, fetal well-being, an intact perineum and progress are the guiding principles of physiologic labor.

The goals of physiologic birth include a fully involved and emotionally satisfied mother, an intact perineum, as well as a vigorously healthy baby, and a mother and baby with full physical and psychological capabilities to breastfeed and interact with each other.

There are many things that medical science does not yet know about labor and birth. It may be that interfering with the normal progression of labor may be like helping a chick hatch from its egg or a butterfly struggle free of its cocoon. It is possible that unrecognized damage is done to mothers and infants by not trusting the process. 

Unrestricted physiologic labor is dependent on a flow of hormones that cause contractions to begin and to which a woman may respond in a number of ways. When contractions are mild, she may continue in her activities and begin to prepare for harder labor and birth. As the contractions intensify, the pain guides her to get into positions of greater comfort that, by no accident, also facilitate the movement and descent of the baby into the pelvis and cause an increase in labor hormones that will move her deeper into labor.

A mother who is free of fear can respond to her body’s cues and will often spontaneously choose positions that are favorable to the birth process. The laboring woman may find her voice during contractions in a variety of ways such as, humming, moaning, chanting, groaning or grunting.

A woman who labors with total, unristricted freedom is likely to be uninhibited in making sounds during her contractions. She may find that a rhythmic sound coupled with rocking or swaying her body may help her cope with the intensity of deep labor. The people around her support her in whatever way she needs.

As her labor progresses and she feels the pressure of her baby’s head stretching her internal skin and muscles deep within her pelvis, she can maintain an upright position and relax her pelvic muscles, further facilitating baby’s descent and emergence. Pushing is spontaneous and consists of short pushes as the mother experiences surges of desire to bear down.

The baby emerges slowly, stretching the perineum gradually. At the moment the baby’s head crowns the stretching can cause an intense burning sensation that signals the mother to refrain from forceful pushing. The mother may place her hand on her baby’s head to ease out and guide its emergence, or the attendant can use this time as an opportunity to apply warm compresses to the woman’s perineum. Both of these actions greatly reduce the possibility of damage to the perineum. The baby is born into its mother’s hands and she guides it to her belly, usually exclaiming loudly throughout these last birth moments.