By Moran Liviani,
Lately, headlines have taken aim at women who choose freebirth, most recently labelling it a “culty” movement. It’s an easy narrative to sell: women rejecting hospitals, turning to Instagram for knowledge, giving birth without medical professionals.
Some even seek out “birth workers” to guide them on their journey, not as medical replacements, but as trusted companions when the system has lost their trust. But this portrayal is more than lazy, it’s dangerous. It erases the real reasons women are walking away from the system in the first place.
Freebirth is not a trend. It’s not a rebellion. For many women, it’s a decision rooted in survival.
I know, because I made that choice when I birthed my second baby. It wasn’t planned. It wasn’t glamorous. It was a decision rooted in instinct, shaped by a traumatic hospital birth and a deep knowing that I couldn’t surrender to birth in an environment where I didn’t feel safe.
It’s important to acknowledge that freebirth is not the same as home birth attended by a skilled, registered midwife. Yet increasingly, these different choices are being lumped together, as if any birth outside a hospital is automatically risky or extreme.
That kind of conflation doesn’t serve women. It fuels fear. It shuts down nuanced conversations. And it distracts from the real issue: why so many women no longer trust the system to hold them safely through one of life’s most powerful and vulnerable experiences.
The truth is, many women who choose freebirth do so not because they reject medical care, but because they’ve been failed by it. Because they weren’t heard. Because they were coerced. Because they were traumatised. Because they were told their bodies were problems to be managed instead of powerful forces to be supported.
Freebirth Isn’t a Cult, It’s a Consequence of a System That Isn’t Listening
When women make the choice to freebirth, it’s often after deep thought, research, and reflection, not because of TikTok trends or echo chambers. These are deeply personal decisions, made with a sense of ownership and a desire to feel safe and in control.
And while we must talk openly about safety, we also need to acknowledge the weight of responsibility that comes with choosing to birth outside the system.That doesn’t mean blame, especially in cases of loss or trauma but it does mean recognising that this path, like all birth choices, carries risk.
It’s not fair to place the burden on the birth workers who may give emotional support, nor on friends or social media communities.
Ultimately, the decision and its complexity belongs to the woman and the families that choose this path.
We can have conversations about safety, risk, and emergency care access. We should have parameters and back-up plans in place. But what we can’t do is strip women of their right to choose how and where they give birth, especially when taking that choice away only reinforces the same power imbalances that led many to freebirth in the first place.
In the midst of this, doulas are also being pulled into the firing line, framed as dangerous or fringe simply for supporting women outside the medical model.
But doulas aren’t all the same, just as not all midwives or obstetricians are the same.
The vast majority of doulas work well within their scope, offering informational, emotional, and physical support, not clinical care.
They’re not replacing doctors or midwives; they’re walking alongside women in a system where compassionate, continuous care is often lacking.
Taking away women’s access to doula support doesn’t solve the problem, it deepens it.
Limiting choices doesn’t make birth safer. Listening to women does.
Dismissing doulas, much like dismissing women’s reasons for choosing freebirth, reflects a deeper issue: a system uncomfortable with models of care it doesn’t control.
Because freebirth isn’t the root of the problem, it’s a response to it. One in three Australian women report experiencing birth trauma. One in ten say they’ve faced obstetric violence. These aren’t fringe numbers, they point to a system that’s hurting the very people it’s meant to protect.
If we want fewer women birthing alone, the answer isn’t shame or restrictions, it’s respect. It’s better care. It’s rebuilding trust. Because when women feel safe, they don’t walk away from support. But when they don’t, when they feel surveilled, dismissed, or outright harmed, they’ll do whatever it takes to reclaim that safety. Even if that means birthing alone.
If the system wants women back, it needs to stop asking “Why are they leaving?” and start asking, What have we done to make them feel like they had no other choice?
Moran Liviani is Birth Doula, Birth Boot Camp Class Facilitator, Lamaze Childbirth Educator, HypnoBirthing Practitioner and author of Birthing With Trauma and Fear
