When it comes to plus size pregnancy there are three key things a woman can do to become empowered and have a healthy pregnancy: eat healthy, exercise, and work with a supportive healthcare team (including a doula).  Below are supportive resources and be sure to join a community of plus size women on Facebook.  Remember to laugh a lot, cry a little, and enjoy the journey!

Helpful Links

• Baby Fit  Helpful tools for nutrition and exercise during pregnancy.
• Birth Without Fear  “It is my hope that all women can learn there is no need to fear birth. Fear is what can cause pain and lead to interventions during labor and birth!”
• Bring Birth Home “Empowering and educating women about the choice to birth at home.”
• Childbirth Connection “Your source for trustworthy up-to-date evidence-based information and resources on planning for pregnancy, labor and birth, and the postpartum period.”
• ICAN  “To improve maternal-child health by preventing unnecessary cesareans through education, providing support for cesarean recovery, and promoting Vaginal Birth After Cesarean (VBAC).”
• Midwife Thinking Blog  “My aim is to use this blog to stimulate thinking and share knowledge, evidence and views on birth and midwifery.”  
• Natural Childbirth World “Everything you need to know about natural childbirth in one place.”
• Plus Size Doula Connections  “Connecting plus size pregnant women to experienced doulas.“
• Plus Size Mommy Memoirs Facebook Page  “Plus Size Mommy Memoirs Facebook page is a community of plus size women supporting one another before, during, and after pregnancy.”
• Plus Size Pregnancy  Pam Vireday is the creator of Plus Size Pregnancy and writes the Well Rounded Mama blog.  Her website and blog were of great comfort and information to me when I was pregnant.  “The purpose of this website is to discuss “obesity” and pregnancy, address questions and concerns about pregnancy and birth in women of size, and to help women of size have more empowered pregnancies and births.  This website also contains general pregnancy information useful to women of all sizes.”
• Shape of a Mother “It is my dream, then, to create this website where women of all ages, shapes, sizes and nationalities can share images of their bodies so it will no longer be secret.”
• Spinning Babies  “Easier childbirth through fetal positioning”
• The Unnecesarean  “Pulling back the curtain on the unnecessary cesarean epidemic.”
• Well Rounded Mama Blog  “The purpose of this blog is to create an intersection of the fat-acceptance and birth worlds, two realms that rarely interact.”

Books

• Baby Catcher
• Birthing From Within
• The Bradley Method
• The Greatest Pregnancy Ever
• HypnoBirthing
• Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth
• The Pregnancy Book
• Orgasmic Birth

Movies

• The Business of Being Born
• Born at Home
• Pregnant in America
• One World Birth
• Orgasmic Birth
• You Have a Choice

Articles

• Are You a Size-Friendly Midwife? by, Pamela Vireday
• Creating a Safe Space for Healing Antepartum Care in Women with Trauma History, Maryl Smith
• The Fat Vigina Theory, by Pamela Vireday
• Letting Go & Embracing My Body by, Jen McLellan
• Plus Size Maternity Clothes – How to Look Cute Without Going Broke by, Jen McLellan
• Plus Size Stigma by, Jen McLellan
• What do you feel is the most valuable advice you could give a plus size woman who just found out she’s pregnant?   Words of wisdom from Plus Size Mommy Memoirs ladies
• Where’s My Bump? by, Jen McLellan
• Why Women Shouldn’t Fear Home Birth by, Myim Bialik
• Women of Size and Cesarean Sections: Tips for Avoiding Unnecessary Surgery by, Pamela Vireday 
  

“There is a secret in our culture and it is not that birth is painful but that women are strong”, Laura Stavoe Harm