Trust Birth is an all volunteer advocacy and support group. It was founded by Carla Hartley in 2005 and is being re-energized as you read this.

We stand on the belief that we are born to trust birth; but have been taught not to. Women are obviously designed to give birth and therefore must have been born to Trust Birth. We have been taught that birth is scary and must be left to the experts. We have been taught a pack of lies.

Trust Birth exists for the sole purpose of telling the Truth about birth. We want to help women discover they already trust birth. It is natural and logical to trust birth. It is unnatural and illogical not to. We will help them rediscover that innate trust and nurture it.

Trust Birth Facilitators around the world are holding meetings in their homes and other meeting spaces, supporting women, and telling the truth about birth: "Birth is Safe; Interference is Risky!"

The decisions that women make concerning their birth should be based on the truth rather than fears/misconceptions.

Every woman deserves the right to hear the truth about birth.

Women know how to give birth. They may not realize that they do, but they do.

Birth is a natural function of life.

Our bodies were designed to give birth just as they were designed to conceive and grow a baby. Our bodies know how to finish what they began.

Birth should not be a time in a woman’s life when she has to FIGHT for anything. Birth should not be a battlefield.

Birth is not normally a medical event and rarely needs any medical interference.

Birth belongs to women and not to their birth attendant.

We don’t promote any birth attendant as being more essential to the process than the woman giving birth.

We don’t promote any place as being safer for birth than the woman’s home.

We don’t lie to women about what may or may not happen if they follow a formula or a plan.

We tell the truth about the limitation of a womans choice once she enters a hospital.

We tell the truth: Interference with birth starts the minute a woman leaves her home. The minute she is in the hospital, she is no longer in charge.

Hospitals offer no measure of safety for birth for the average woman and, in fact, increase the chances of many potential complications.

The Trust Birth Initiative is not ANTI-hospital as much as we are pro-TRUTH.

Interfering with birth increases risks regardless of where the birth takes place.

Women and their babies are being abused in the name of “safety.” There are too many surgical births, too many epidurals, too many episiotomies, too many inductions, too much monitoring, managing and meddling.

Women are being scared and bullied and manipulated.

Women are being robbed of the experience of giving birth; babies are being robbed of a peaceful environment in which to be born.

We support a woman’s right to choose to birth at home with any attendant or no attendant.

Trust Birth Facilitators are not concerned with being politically correct; there is no middle of the road rhetoric. We only tell the truth.

Natural and normal is not the same as easy and painless and we acknowledge that there is pain for almost every woman, but we know that women live through the pain.

The pain of childbirth is not without purpose and chemical means of avoiding the pain of childbirth holds many potential risks for the baby and the birth process.

We also acknowledge that birth is not always without risk, but we believe that life is not without risk. There are a lot of things more risky than birth.

Birth is not the act of rescuing a baby or a mother from death or danger.

Mothers are not the enemy of their babies and babies are not going to destroy their mothers in birth.

Mothers and babies are symbiotic units, and if left alone, would know what to do.

Parents are qualified to become informed about their choices and can make the decision to make all the decisions.

We encourage women to stop giving their authority away and recognize that they are their own authority -- Midwives, doulas, doctors, childbirth educators are paid consultants.

Too many women have been told too many lies.

Too many women have lost something they don’t even know they had.

We want to tell the truth and tell the truth and tell the truth until women find it in themselves again.