Why include your child in the birth of a new sibling?

• Witnessing a gentle home or hospital birth helps children to form a healthy concept of birth as a normal, human, family-centric process
• Inclusion in this process offers your child the opportunity to develop an accurate understanding of the physiology of birth, of the body, where babies come from
• Understanding the physiology of birth means no mysteries, ambiguities or confusion
• Being present in any capacity gives your child the chance to be in an empowering helping role to you and the baby, which reaffirms her emerging sense of independence, pride, and empathy as a big sister
• Welcoming your child into this process and the broad range of emotions that accompany it will help  to normalize any big feelings she might be experiencing around the arrival of a new sibling

Recommended Reading:

For siblings attending home birth:

Mama, Talk About When Max Was Born by Toni Olson

Our Water Baby by Amy Maclean and Jan Nesbitt

Before You Were Born  by Jennifer Davis

Runa’s Birth by Uwe Spillmann and Inga Kamiett

Hello Baby by Jenni Overend

Stars of the Sky by TR Tuller

I Watched My Brother Being Born by Anne Vondruska and Katarina Vondruska

Mama Midwife by Christy Tyner

Born at Home by Maria Iorillo & Melanyann Garvin

For the transition into a big sibling role:

On Mother’s Lap by Ann Herbet Scott

Oonga Boonga by Freida Wishinsky

Mama, Talk About Our New Baby by Toni Olson

About the body and sex education:

What Makes A Baby by Cory Silverber

A Child Is Born by Lennart Nilsson

It’s So Amazing! By Robie H. Harris