The practice known as “free birth” — giving birth at home without a midwife — carries severe risks. But social media influencers are bringing attention and followers to the practice.
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SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Giving birth at home without medical assistance is gaining attention with social media influencers who are boosting what’s being called free birth. But experts say it carries a lot of risks. Bek Shackelford-Nwanganga of the Midwest Newsroom reports.
BEK SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA, BYLINE: In a small town in northeast Nebraska, Natalie Krueger holds her third child, Aurora, in her living room, the room where she was born in April. Krueger gave birth the first time in a hospital, but had her last two children at home without medical assistance – what she calls a free birth. No nurse, no midwife. She says her first unassisted birth was perfect.
NATALIE KRUEGER: If I could give birth and I knew that it was going to go like that every time, I would have 10 kids.
SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA: Krueger’s county doesn’t have a birthing facility. For her first birth, she and her husband drove to a hospital 45 minutes away. Krueger says it went smoothly, but the hospital was uncomfortable, and she felt pressured to get an epidural.
KRUEGER: There was no part of it that really felt traumatic.
(SOUNDBITE OF BABY COOING)
KRUEGER: It was just that I had hoped for an unmedicated experience.
SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA: Nebraska laws make it hard for midwives to attend home births. So for her second birth, Krueger chose to go without a midwife. Krueger, who works as a doula attending other women’s births, says she and her husband learned what to do for certain emergencies. Then in April, Aurora’s umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck, a scenario they had prepared for. For other emergencies, their plan was to go to a hospital. But experts say, despite planning, birth can be unpredictable.
CAITLIN LINSCHEID: It doesn’t always go smoothly. It doesn’t always go well.
SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA: That’s Dr. Caitlin Linscheid, an OB-GYN in the Kansas City area.
LINSCHEID: And when an obstetric emergency happens, it happens incredibly quickly. The stakes are very, very high, and immediate intervention is needed.
SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA: She says common childbirth emergencies include the baby’s shoulder getting stuck behind its mother’s pubic bone, fetal distress and postpartum hemorrhage.
LINSCHEID: And if you don’t have access to, you know, a physician or a medically trained midwife who can intervene emergently, then that can be a life-threatening situation.
SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA: Linscheid says it’s possible to have an empowering low intervention birth in a hospital setting if OB-GYNs support it. But OB-GYNs have room to improve when it comes to patient trust.
LINSCHEID: Historically, we haven’t listened to our patients, and we haven’t given them the space and the respect that they deserve, and we need to own that.
SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA: According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of home births across the country nearly tripled between 2004 and 2024. However, the agency doesn’t track whether those births were attended by someone with medical training. Anecdotally, though, Melissa Cheyney, a medical anthropologist at Oregon State University and former midwife, says she’s seen more people choose unassisted birth after seeing people promote it on social media and talk about unnecessary medical interventions during labor.
Chale Turner watches her children play in a park in Topeka, Kansas. She gave birth to four of them unassisted at home. Turner is Black and Indigenous. She says free birth feels like a reclamation.
CHALE TURNER: For me, a free birth is a woman taking that ultimate control and, you know, like, autonomy over her birth and saying, whatever happens, I’m handling it.
SHACKELFORD-NWANGANGA: Turner, who works as a breastfeeding specialist, says she used to advocate for free birth. But after hearing about dangerous situations, she’s realized that free birth, just like hospital or home birth, isn’t for everyone. For NPR News, I’m Bek Shackelford-Nwanganga in Kansas City.
(SOUNDBITE OF NAS SONG, “2ND CHILDHOOD”)
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