Barbara Harper - Meeting the Legend of Waterbirth

Back in 2017, I was participating in the development of the doula profession in Russia. At that time, my colleagues and I had just founded the APD (Association of Professional Doulas), and as one of the few people fluent in English, I translated everything I could into Russian. Among other things, I enjoyed participating in online Birth Summits, where international experts in gentle childbirth spoke live for several days in a row, and I simply listened and transcribed their words like a typewriter, then compiled these transcripts into articles in Russian for my colleagues and the Russian-speaking audience.

One such interview was with Barbara Harper — founder of the entire water birth movement or phenomenon in the U.S., and later around the world!

That article went viral online under my old last name, and by the time this seminar came around my friend who was organizing it asked me “Is that article yours, and can we use it to promote the seminar?”)

Ten years later, I met Barbara in the lobby of Lapino-2 and told her how I’d still remembered the classification of bleeding that she so succinctly compares to wine:

if you see the bottom of the pool and the color of the blood is like rosé or even sangría - everything is fine. If you don't see the floor of the pool and blood is like merlót - get the woman out.

She was thrilled) This time, not only did she repeat these invaluable and easy-to-apply life hacks, but she also immersed us in a wealth of structured, evidence-based information, complete with figures, statistics, and basic facts about physiology.

Barbara taught me two new terms related to the rebozo: wet rebozo/dry rebozo, depending on where you use it, in or out of the water

While listening to her, I was convinced once again: gentle birth is not some “esoteric” concept, nor is it merely an intuitive process. It is a profound science. And what Barbara is teaching the whole world is equally important both for us as professionals and for every woman who is expecting a child.

What does this knowledge mean in the context of water births?

• For pregnant women: Water birth is an amazing, scientifically proven tool. Water acts as a natural, gentle anaesthetic. It relieves the effects of gravity, helps the body relax and gently regulates the hormone levels by reducing stress. This is about nature and physiology working together in perfect harmony, helping the baby be born gently and allowing the mother to feel safe and in control.

• For doulas and birth workers: This training provided a solid foundation in perinatal psychology, stress management during childbirth and physical techniques. Our main goal is to create the safest possible space for a woman, where her hormones work for her, not against her. And it doesn’t matter whether she ultimately chooses water or not —understanding these mechanisms helps us provide precise support at every stage.

Water Births Bring the World Together (and My Journey from Georgia to Spain)

Just as childbirth is universal in every corner of the world, these gentle methods are also completely universal and have no boundaries. For the past few years I’ve been living in Georgia, where I’ve helped implement this knowledge by providing a kind of medical consulting — adapting the best international practices for local maternity hospitals and specialists to increase the number of gentle births. Barbara has been doing this for 40 years, and immediately after our seminar she flew on to educate and transform maternity hospitals in Dubai, then in Spain (in Barcelona and other cities).

Barbara Harper's website waterbirth.org

And I'm hosting a webinar following up on the training, where I'll address the 8 most common counterarguments doctors raise when women come to them with plans for a gentle birth.

How do I know them? I’ve been hearing them firsthand for 10 years now, and every time my clients and I have to go through all sorts of hoops and loops in communication with the doctors just to get “permission” to have a natural birth!! Sometimes we negotiate, sometimes we inform them about the intention to do so and so without discussion, and sometimes, even during labor, we have to distract the doctor to buy time — or just hide in the bathroom. And sometimes the issue is simply resolved by switching doctors or the maternity hospital.

This creates unnecessary stress and mistrust, and I’m always encouraging the woman and the obstetrician to be on the same page and to have complete trust in each other. To achieve this the labouring mother must fully understand what the doctor is afraid of, how to communicate with him, what is happening physiologically at each stage — and trust her own body and her baby.

I invite you to explore this through the lens of water birth and 40 years of research that you can confidently rely on as you prepare for your delivery.

Register here