The baby’s bathtub should be near at hand for sometimes babies do not breathe quite satisfactorily at first and are helped to do so by being held in a tub of warm water. There should be, also, a box, basket or crib, in readiness to receive the baby, furnished with a clean blanket and hot water bottle with a flannel cover. These are the preparations which may be made during the first stage—that period when the cervix is being slowly but steadily dilated by the bag of waters as it is forced downward by the uterine contractions. You feel these as pains beginning in the back, and finally in the lower abdomen and thighs, gradually growing stronger and more frequent. =Second Stage.= The first stage is ended, and the second stage begins, when the cervix is wide enough for the baby to pass through. From this time on you should stay in bed and if neither the doctor nor the nurse has arrived, your cool-headed friend must stand by and not leave you alone. The bag of waters usually, though not always, breaks at this time, and there is a rush of fluid. But the character of the pains changes even though the membranes do not rupture. They come about every two minutes, now, from the beginning of one pain to the one following, each pain lasting about a minute. They are stronger and more forcible and you begin to have an uncontrollable desire to strain or bear down. If the doctor or nurse is with you, they will tell you how to use your pains to advantage, but if they are not there you would better avoid bearing down since you want to retard the baby’s birth, if possible, until one or the other arrives. In such a case, you may delay matters by opening your mouth and breathing deeply during pains and by lying on your side. We all know that in spite of the most careful planning, babies are sometimes born before the arrival of doctor or nurse and that the mother and her cool-headed friend, who is standing by, meet the emergency together. Fortunately, births occurring under such circumstances are not the ones that are likely to be associated with trouble for either mother or baby, so there is little or no cause for concern. Most doctors feel that the wisest course for the cool-headed friend to follow at such a time is to do nothing at all. So if the baby arrives in advance of the doctor, why, he is here, and that is about all there is to it! The moment you have been longing for, for nine long months, has come; your anxiety and waiting are all over, and with much less trouble than you expected. =Third Stage.= After the baby is born, your pains will subside for a few moments and then the uterus will begin again to contract and gradually detach the placenta from its inner surface, forcing it out just as the baby was expelled.