Tales of a Traveling Midwife

“Birth is a process that I trust, and I work hard to help women trust it.”This is my story and I hope you'll join me. The life of a traveling midwife. It's amazing. As midwives, we facilitate, we educate, we motivate, we shepherd new humans into the world. Birth is a process that I trust and I work hard to help women trust it too so they can have confidence as they deliver their babies. I love it. I love the women. I love the spontaneity and uncertainty. I've adored the babies. Birth is my spiritual orgasm. I'm addicted to bringing forth new life and I love it all. Midwives lead a committed life. We love our calling. And most of us have committed our lives, hours, days, minutes to serve birthing families. I remember wanting to stop serving several times. Yet, as thoughts of retirement came, I wanted more adventures. I thought I could do some traveling further afield and find a way to serve. I expected maybe I would get one birth a year. I had no idea how wrong I was about that. Whether I traveled two days or two hours to help them, the women who hired me to facilitate their births were universally courageous. As a traveling midwife, you don't get to just see the world, you get to participate in changing it. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Gail Johnson is a certified midwife, women’s health advocate, and mother. For more than 35 years, Gail has travelled the globe catching babies. She has received countless invitations to private homes in more than 22 countries and has safely delivered over 1600 babies for some amazing families. Contrary to modern hospital birth philosophy, Gail’s belief is that birth is a normal, natural process - not an illness! Her unique skills and perspective has allowed her to not only empower women to experience birth on their terms but has also opened doors for her to experience and influence other cultures along the way. In short, she is an activist that advocates a kinder, gentler method of childbirth and maternity care. Now the renowned lecturer and former president of North Texas Association of Midwives works tirelessly to bring birth back where it belongs - safe at home, no matter what corner of the world home happens to be.