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Title: Midwife's Story by Penny Armstrong ISBN: 0-8041-0178-7 Publisher: Ivy Books Pub. Date: 12 January, 1988 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $5.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.71 (7 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Beautiful book. A must read!
Comment: This beautifully written book takes us behind the scenes for an insider's look at day to day Amish life. Midwife Penny Armstrong's moving vignettes let us see the real Amish way of life. This isn't the usual, often inaccurate, overview of Amish life that's sold to tourists. It's also not a scholarly work. This book is written in a James Herriotesque style that enables us to really know and appreciate the Amish.
The book starts off with Penny's training at a Glasgow hospital that cared more for procedure than it did for its patients. Then we're off to Philadelphia to a more patient friendly hospital where Penny got her American certification. Finally, we reach Amish country. The minute Penny sees the picturesque landscape and feels the tranquillity of the slow paced life she knows this is the place for her.
The Amish take to Penny because she respects and admires them. She doesn't just deliver their babies, she becomes their friend. She laughs with them and cries with them. She prays with them and plays with them. She celebrates with them and mourns with them. She's invited to their homes for canning frolics. Her husband, Richard, helps them fill their silos by driving a team of mules. They become part of the community.
The reader is treated to an intimate look at the Amish. We're literally in their bedrooms! We see the affectionate bond between husbands & wives. We see their staunch faith exhibited by a young wife, 8 months pregnant, who loses her husband in an accident. We see the community rally around a young couple that needs assistance. We also see the love parents have for a sick, helpless child. I can't say more. I don't want to spoil things.
This book is sensitive, entertaining and informative. It is a must read for anyone fascinated by the Amish.
Rating: 5
Summary: All this? In our world of impersonal, clinical medicine?
Comment: Imagine studying midwifery in Scotland, then going among the Amish of Pennsylvania to practice your trade. That's what Armstrong did and her stories about her adventures are riveting. She writes with charm and sensitivity of the joys and pains of birthing, living, dying among the quiet and unassuming ways of a community of simple, God-fearing folk who come to return and appreciate her love and care.
As she strives to be accepted by local doctors and the local hospital she struggles with her own doubts about institutional births as opposed to home ones.
A moving, lovely and loving book that respects and cherishes a people and a way of life, A MIDWIFE'S STORY will make you laugh and cry. Best of all, you can find a new understanding and respect for America's Pennsylvania Dutch Amish if you look for it. I do hope you don't miss this one.
Rating: 5
Summary: 2 for the price of 1: both enjoyable & educational!
Comment: reads like fiction, but it's all true! (sometimes those books are the best kind.) very well written -- compared the harsh, cold, uncaring environment of hospital care & delivery & contrasted it with the warm, caring, personalized care & delivery that you can expect from a midwife like penny. also gave a charming portrait of the amish & insights into their way of life. someone sent me this book as a gift &, although it took me a long time to get around to reading it, once i picked it up, i had a hard time putting it down!
(it's hard to believe that anyone would want to level harsh criticism toward a community of people as stable & caring as the amish -- as another reviewer has suggested! i've visited the amish (very SHORT visits, i'll admit) & saw nothing that would even suggest the harsh & brutal treatment of women that one has come to expect of a community, say, like the taliban, for instance. but the review in question was written before 9/11, so maybe the reviewer was unaware of how good we women here in america have it, INCLUDING the amish? even so, can the reviewer point out another group amongst the godless, familyless, communityless, materialistic, selfish & self-centered, believe-in-nothing-&-stand-for-nothing-but-one's-own-selfish-&-self-centered-self "english" that fares better overall than the amish? it's not like they aren't free to leave any time they want & live another way (unlike the way conditions were under the taliban!) like yeah, who in their right mind would want to live in a beautiful rural community, be constantly surrounded by people who love you & who are really there to help you, including a HUSBAND (fancy that!) & still have the natural strength to create beautiful surroundings (& delicious food -- yummy!) while at the same time creating a new life to share this beautiful world with? duh. as for me, i could easily skip a few more boring years of grade school for this. & college? that's where you get your values, beliefs, strength & character ripped away by dishonest, liberal, left-wing professors & that entire rotten-to-the-core establishment. but i digress.)
the amish rock & so does this book.
if you think you want to have your baby in a hospital, read this book. (did you know that maternity wards were originally established to give homeless women a place to give birth? it was meant to be a poor substitute for what homeless women didn't have -- namely, a loving HOME to give birth in!)
if you think you want to have your baby at home, read this book. (it'll just make you feel better about what you already know & arm you with some more ammo to lob toward the people who think that you're crazy!)
if you think you want to be a midwife, read this book. (you'll be glad you did!) :)
& that's all i have to say about that.
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Title: Diary of a Midwife by Juliana van Olphen-Fehr ISBN: 0897895886 Publisher: Bergin & Garvey Pub. Date: 01 October, 1998 List Price(USD): $26.95 |
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Title: Ina May's Guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskin ISBN: 0553381156 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 04 March, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Baby Catcher: Chronicles of a Modern Midwife by Peggy Vincent ISBN: 0743219341 Publisher: Scribner Pub. Date: 15 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Spiritual Midwifery by Ina May Gaskin ISBN: 1570671044 Publisher: Book Pub Co Pub. Date: April, 2002 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Wise Woman Herbal for the Childbearing Year (Wise Woman Herbal Series, Book 1) by Susun S. Weed, Janice Novet ISBN: 0961462000 Publisher: Ash Tree Pub Pub. Date: June, 1985 List Price(USD): $9.95 |
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