"Deliver Me" is a reality show on Discovery Health channel featuring the practice of three young women OB/GYNs in California. The show has a catchy theme song; the docs are attractive and articulate - what's not to like?
Well, I have seen episodes where, without even a trial of labor, the doc pushed moms to elective C-sections because they thought the baby was too big. This was a normal pregnancy, not one with disorders such as gestational diabetes where the babies are larger than normal. I've seen the doctors discourage unmedicated labors in women who expressed the desire for them. In other words, these docs are going to give you what the medical establishment hands out, not any kind of normal/natural birth experience.
Every single laboring mom is on her back like an upside-down turtle with the legs in the air to deliver; very convenient for the doc, but the worst possible position for pushing a baby out.
I feel like the attractiveness and personability of the doctors helps sell the idea that birth is too painful to be endured, and that IVs, epidurals, and elective c-sections are necessary.
I would like to see these doctors overcome their medical training and put the women first, not the technology. These doctors perpetuate the belief system that women's bodies are defective, and fundamentally unable to birth normally, without all the hospital interventions.
It would do these doctors a lot of good to observe midwife-attended births in order to learn what normal birth looks like.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
Web Sites and Magazines
It's going to take me a while to complete this post because there are many web sites to include. There are personal ones like mine, web sites of birth centers, midwife and doula organization web sites.
One site I visit often is: www.mothering.com. They have recently revamped it. It addresses family life in general, not just pregnancy and newborns. It is sponsored by Mothering Magazine. I started reading Mothering several years before I got pregnant because my chiropractor had it in her waiting room. I subscribed to it as soon as I was pregnant, and kept my subscription going for over 15 years. It's the only magazine I know whose editorial content is not dictated by advertisers. The articles are well-written and always include a list of references.
The forums at Mothering are fantastic too. New moms can get almost instant answers to questions because there is such an active online community.
As of 2011, there is no more print edition of Mothering, though there are still some back issues floating around.
One site I visit often is: www.mothering.com. They have recently revamped it. It addresses family life in general, not just pregnancy and newborns. It is sponsored by Mothering Magazine. I started reading Mothering several years before I got pregnant because my chiropractor had it in her waiting room. I subscribed to it as soon as I was pregnant, and kept my subscription going for over 15 years. It's the only magazine I know whose editorial content is not dictated by advertisers. The articles are well-written and always include a list of references.
The forums at Mothering are fantastic too. New moms can get almost instant answers to questions because there is such an active online community.
As of 2011, there is no more print edition of Mothering, though there are still some back issues floating around.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Birth Movies to Watch
I got to meet Penny Simkin at the Lafayette, LA screening of "Orgasmic Birth." The event coincided with Downtown Alive and other music venues, so the crowd consisted of the hard-core midwifery crowd. It was a very good movie, very powerful. My teenaged daughter had solid plans with friends so she didn't go, but I wish she had seen it. It's possible to buy it, so one of these days I might pony up the $35 it would take for a DVD.
Another one we saw lately was "The Business of Being Born." I took my teenager to that one.
I highly recommend both of these to anyone who's pregnant or thinking about it.
Another one we saw lately was "The Business of Being Born." I took my teenager to that one.
I highly recommend both of these to anyone who's pregnant or thinking about it.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Birth Story
My birth story is almost 5,000 words. It was written when my baby was just a few weeks old. I am trying to decide whether to post the whole thing or to edit it for length. Check back here to see what I decided.
OK, here it is. We will now test the maximum size of a single post.
Birth Story - Amy, Ray & Stephanie Brassieur
July 14-16, 1992
We had a planned homebirth, because after listening to all my friends’ and sister’s hospital birth stories over the years, I decided I wanted to opt out of all unnecessary interventions, and avoid the seemingly constant mean nurse story. My friends always had a complaint to make about their birth, and it always seemed to concern either a staff member’s discouraging or mean comment, or some painful or uncomfortable hospital procedure that really didn’t help the birth. Ray’s parents had both been born way out in the country at home, attended by the local granny midwife, so he was OK with the idea. My mother had unmedicated childbirth in the1950’s after reading Dick-Read’s book. She is such a little delicate unathletic magnolia flower that I thought if she could do it with 3 babies each over 8 pounds, I could for sure do it.
I read all the pregnancy and childbirth books in both Lafayette and Columbia, Missouri public libraries because I had 7 years of trying to get pregnant to do my research. A couple of years before I got pregnant, a freestanding birth center opened in Columbia, Missouri and I was all set!
Monday, July 13
Routine visit with Sharon (Sharon Lee, midwife) - conscious of full moon the next day - I was due on the 29th, and scheduled to work through the 17th. She said I’d probably have a new moon baby around the 29th. She felt the baby’s position in my stomach but I didn’t have any internal exams at this point. I asked Sharon if she saw any correlation between labor onset and the moon phases in her practice, but she hadn’t. My mother-in-law predicted I would have the baby on the full moon. I didn’t think it was important enough to share this bit of clairvoyance with Sharon.
Tuesday, July 14 - Full Moon
My water started leaking at a client’s office. Nothing that he could tell – but I had a feeling that I’d better finish up and get out of there. I looked for a restroom in the building, couldn’t find one. I was furiously holding my muscles in while I went down the stairs to leave the building. I put a shopping bag on the seat of the car before sitting, and sure enough, my water broke when I sat down. No contractions started right away, so I went home, surprising my mother who had arrived the day before, changed clothes and went back to the office to get the classroom ready for the next day. Before I went back, my mom insisted I call Sharon, and she said to do whatever I wanted and keep her posted. I think she also told me at that time to take my temperature every 2 hours and not put anything “up there.” Or she might have told me that the next morning. While I was at the office, my boss’s husband came down looking for snacks and I told him in a matter-of-fact way that my water had broken, and to please tell my boss I wouldn’t be at work the next day. She was on a business trip out of town, but coming back that night. He has no children, so he reacted very matter-of-factly. He didn’t tell her until later on that evening - she got excited and called me to see what was going on. At that point, nothing much was. Ray stopped by the store on the way home, and had to turn around and go right back out to get the list of stuff I couldn’t do without. I wanted to make some Jello with fruit in it, and I wanted a variety of fruit juices and I can’t remember what else.
Wednesday, July 15 - at home
It was nice to sit in my own living room or outside on the deck and listen to monotonous space music or ocean or Brazilian rainforest cassette tapes in early labor. I would move somewhere else whenever I’d get bored. Music with a beat got on my nerves but the space music and ocean tapes were very relaxing. I kept turning them over and listening to them again and again. We were having the 3rd coolest summer on record, so it wasn’t hot outside. I’d even feel chilly when the wind blew, and had to go in when a little sprinkle of rain came up.
I had a variety of easy and tough contractions all day long, with breaks long enough to take naps in between. I wasn’t hung up on time, but my labor didn’t follow the textbook pattern of light to progressively harder contractions. I’d have some light ones, a tough one, a light one, a medium one. They never did get down to regular time intervals either in the first stage. The baby would wiggle afterwards, and that was more uncomfortable than the contraction. I could just breathe through the light ones, but the harder ones I vocalized on exhaling and they made me pop a sweat. I was a putterer for the first stage, with a couple hours or so of break between full dilation and second stage. I judge the labor in hindsight by emotional signposts and strength of contractions rather than objective knowledge of dilation, because I didn’t have internal exams till after I was pushing. It’s hard to write a coherent account of what went on. I have visual images of what I was doing at each stage, and feelings of where the baby was, but it’s hard to put down on paper. I want to do a thorough job and keep a copy of this for Stephanie’s baby book.
Timetable:
Tues, July 14
3:45 p.m. Membrane rupture at client’s office; top leak. Went home, changed clothes, spoke to Sharon, back to office to set up classroom.
6:15 p.m. Back at home, visit with Mom, eat supper, sent Ray back to grocery store for labor goodies. Watched TV, visited, fixed bed for delivery (bottom layer: nice sheets, then rubber sheet, then ratty sheets), went to sleep 10 pm or so. Mom went home to the house in town where she was house-sitting while she was in Columbia – our house was so small that there was no privacy. I only wanted Ray, Sharon, and Sharon’s assistant Kim at the birth.
Wed., July 15
3:00 a.m. Light contractions woke me up, dozed & woke for contractions for several hours.
8:00 a.m. Called Sharon to check in and describe progress.
9:00 a.m. Called office to tie up loose ends
10:00 a.m. Sharon’s assistant, Kim James, called to say she’d come over and give me support or massage if I needed it. It was nice she called, but I really didn’t need anything. I was doing OK; just sitting around the house or in the yard. I was also getting a growly stomach every now and then – ate Jello with fruit in it. Maybe a little sandwich – I liked to eat something with flavor but not much at one time. I got less inclined to eat the longer I was in labor. Ray was puttering around, doing I don’t know what.
afternoon Got sleepy; took a nap.
3:00 p.m. Ray got me up because Sharon told him not to let me get too comfortable. He wanted me to help him make a birthday cake. It was not comfortable to stand and mix the cake so I sat in a chair (on a pillow) and supervised him between contractions. He had never made a cake before. I was feeling pressure so that I wanted to sit on something cushy at this point. I was starting to get a new knowledge of my pelvis from the inside out as the baby dropped farther down. I went to the bathroom a lot all day. I drank lots of juice and water on purpose.
Our stupid dog ducked under the fence into my neighbor’s yard and she came over to see if he would hurt the kids (she has a home day care). Ray had to go try to fix the fence. He was outside a long time, and by this point, I wanted him within voice distance every minute. When he came back in, I told him he couldn’t go anywhere without telling me where he was. I wasn’t scared, just didn’t want to be alone.
4:30 p.m. Contractions slowed down again; called Mom to come over and visit. Expected her at 5:00 or 5:30 so went back to take a short nap but contractions picked up by the time she arrived and I didn’t feel like visiting. She started to cook supper and I had to send Ray to tell her to stop the blender and turn off the music. I couldn’t take any noise by this time. This went on till it was dark; then I got up and watched TV some. The Democratic national convention was on, and I remember being able to listen to most of Gore’s speech, but I lost my ability to listen before Clinton had spoken for very long, and had to go lie down again. My head was in a labor zone by this time – I was focusing on the strange pressures I was feeling. I was definitely vocalizing with a low Oooohhhhh during the strong contractions so I could hear my breathing, and consciously relax if the pitch started to go high.
9:00 p.m. When I went back to bed, Ray had to come with me to rub the base of my back during each contraction. This went on for a while. After a couple of hours of heavy ones (Ray’s signal to start rubbing was my vocalizing – he fell asleep at one point and I had to reach back and poke him to get him going again), they slowed down again, and the baby was so low I couldn’t pee any more. (The contractions were so strong that I would pop a sweat and be hot, then the air conditioning would make me cold and I’d put the covers right on again. It got to be a pattern.) I had Ray call Sharon to come over. She tried several tricks (including getting in the bathtub to relax enough to pee – the bathtub felt great!) but finally just catheterized me (not the kind that stays in – just till my bladder was empty). She stayed till about 10:30, but I was having very few contractions, and because I was feeling discouraged and emotionally sick & tired of the whole thing, she thought I was wimping out. I declined an internal exam because of infection danger, and my lack of strong contractions while she was there made her think it was still early in labor.
She made me eat some carrot soup my mother had made because I was spilling ketones (she thought I was losing energy from not eating enough), and she said I could go to the hospital for pitocin and an epidural. I turned that down; it sounded like it would hurt. She said I could drink a glass of wine, get some rest, and start labor up in the morning if I was tired of it. That sounded good to me; we had a nice local Seyval chilling to celebrate with, so Ray poured us each some. As Sharon left, I heard her telling Ray that the same way babies got in was sometimes a good way to stimulate their coming out. Ray reported this to me, but I was not in the mood at this point. He probably wasn’t either!! I guess he might have been scared I’d want to go for it at that stage. My stomach felt tight even between contractions, and the baby wiggling was more uncomfortable than the contractions. She’d burrow her head into my cervix and kick her feet on my ribs after each contraction. I felt a lot better with my bladder empty again, compared to when it was full and I couldn’t pee.
11:00 pm. Drank glass of wine. Contractions had slowly started back up again after Sharon left, but not as intense as before. About 11:45, a thunderstorm came up, and Ray went to let the cat & dog in. The cat got spooked by something, and ran off. Ray got me out of bed to go to the front and back doors to call the cat. He remembered Sharon telling him not to let me get too comfortable. I started having some strong contractions when walking around so I wanted to go back to bed and to hell with the cat. I was leaning over and waddling at this point – couldn’t stand up straight. I had to hold on to Ray’s arm to steady myself. I must have been nearly or fully dilated at this point.
Thurs July 16
12:00 a.m. I started having trembling legs a little after contractions, and more heat and chill cycles. The wine and food I ate came back up (very smoothly and without any trauma – very different from when you barf from a stomach virus), and my stomach started visibly heading south at the end of each contraction (surreal!), and I had to grunt during them. Relaxation techniques that had worked so well before were not doing it now. The urge to push! But it wasn’t an urge that could be resisted; my stomach was pushing no matter what I did. The baby’s head dropped down some and felt like it was coming through the cervix (I felt pressure on my tailbone area), and I told Ray to call Sharon about 12:15. He said, “Let’s work with these awhile.” I was in no mood to argue-too busy working. I decided to push and see if it felt good. It did, so I kept on. The contractions were shorter now, with more time in between – the pushing was a new phase and it was gearing up gradually just like the first contractions had. About 20 minutes later I told him to call her NOW and get right back to me. She was at our house in about 10 minutes, and was real surprised. She popped a glove on, put her hand in, and said, “I can feel the baby’s head right there.” I never saw anybody lay out instruments so fast. It was funny. She called her assistant, Kim James, to get over on the double. Kim got to our house, and told Sharon that she ran out of gas as she turned into the driveway. I told her not to worry, our brand new gas can was full, and she and Sharon looked surprised that I would think of that. I had had another break with contractions slowing down to almost nothing when Sharon and Kim got there. I guess I’m like the mama cat we had when I was a kid – she’d stop her labor whenever we checked on her. Things gradually started up again.
1:30 a.m. Everybody was there, and I was pushing in all different positions. Sharon had me get on the bed supported by pillows and pull back my legs. My stomach wouldn’t even have a contraction when I was like that. It felt hard to get a deep breath like that too. I had to be more upright, then the pushing contractions kicked in well. I made good progress squatting on the floor at the foot of the bed while supporting myself on the bed. I tended to get tired calf muscles, though. When that happened, I’d stand up between contractions (Ray would support me) and Sharon and Kim would put a juice glass in my face to drink, then go to work massaging my legs. I felt like a boxer between rounds. It was like getting a refrigerator up a flight of stairs, alone. I lost track of time; I’d just push and rest. Sharon checked the heartbeat with the Doptone after every big push and would remind me to breathe deeply when they were over so the baby would get a new hit of oxygen. She kept holding the doptone while I breathed so I could hear the baby’s heart rate speed back up when I did a deep breath. I bellowed like a moose in heat or an Olympic weight lifter with each push. After a while I started feeling foolish at all the noise, so I tried to be quiet for a couple of pushes. I felt like I wasn’t making as much progress when I was quiet – I didn’t feel as strong as when I was roaring so I kept on roaring. My birth attendants were very quiet. Nobody did that obnoxious counting like I’ve seen on TV. They might have said, “good one” or something but I think I was the only one making noise. At one contraction, Sharon told me I could quit pushing but my stomach was doing an unusually long contraction and I said, “It still wants to push” and she felt my stomach and saw it was doing it on its own. She just said, “OK, take another breath.” I pushed for a while standing up hanging on Ray; he said I pulled on him with my arms as well. My arms were sore the next day, and Ray was more tired than I was.
I was on the floor at the foot of the bed, on my knees with my hands grasping the bed covers when the baby was born because my calves just couldn’t do it anymore. Her head was way down when I moved from squatting to kneeling, and I felt it slide back up some when I got on my knees. But I was on a roll and it didn’t take much to get her down again. At one point, they said I could reach down and feel her head. I didn’t want to shift my balance at that moment to do that, so I said, “Oh, I can feel exactly where that head is!” and everybody laughed.
Sharon and Kim kept warm cloths on me (warmed in the crock-pot on my dresser), and massaged me with oil, and supported me as she crowned so I didn’t have any tears or stitches. There was a moment where I thought I would split in two but they told me to take my time and it got better quickly; it only lasted a second. However, when they said to blow and not push, I was thinking “You betcha I’m not pushing; I’ll just stay right here like this forever. I’ll be damned if I ever push again.” But when I stretched some that splitting feeling went away. I think Sharon and Kim both had their hands on me right before crowning. I remember the effort not to push made me writhe a little because my stomach was pushing like a freight train. I appreciated that they didn’t hurry me.
They suctioned her before she was all the way out. I could hear the nose sucker thing. They might have said, “Here’s her head.” Then Sharon got her arms out; it felt like I was a sweater her arms were coming out of. My bottom didn’t hurt at all at that point. Then she slipped out fast, kicking the little feet as she went, and gave a little yelp when she landed in Sharon’s lap. I had an all-over rush, and leaned down to look through my legs at her. Sharon suctioned her again, wrapped her in a warm towel and gave her to me. I had to lift my leg over the cord and turn around to sit on the Chux on the floor. The baby didn’t cry; she just looked at us. Kim and Sharon were saying, “Hello, Stephanie!” but I was ambivalent about that because I thought I’d want to get to know her a little before deciding for sure about her name. My vision narrowed down in a vignette effect; although Sharon was sitting right next to me, probably touching me, I didn’t see her.
Everything except Stephanie’s face was dark (the room was lit only by bedside lamps and the light coming in from the hall and bathroom – Sharon had a flashlight she used towards the end). She had already pinked up nicely. I could see her fingernails were nice and pink. Her hair was still wet, and she looked tired. Her face was the spitting image of Ray’s mom. She wasn’t a little stranger like I had thought she might be – she was somebody I recognized. When Ray got his hands on her, she looked at him and poked out her lower lip. He thought she was beautiful, even with the vernix. Most of that came off when her original towel was changed out for a dry one, right after Ray cut the cord. While we were waiting for the placenta, he took her to the guest bedroom, tucked her in his arm, and they both got a nap. I could hear him snoring. When Stephanie was born, and Sharon asked for the time to write it down, I was shocked to find out it was 3:20 a.m. It felt like I pushed for about 15 or 20 minutes. I was in an altered state of consciousness for sure.
4:30or 5:00 Ray made coffee and served coffee and cake on a tray in our room to Sharon and Kim; they were impressed. We were still waiting around for the placenta to finish coming out. I was holding the baby. They got busy cleaning stuff up and doing laundry, and made me some real strong raspberry tea to drink, but nothing worked. Tried nursing Steph – she latched on and munched like a trouper, but my uterus had closed up shop for the night. No more even tiny cramps, much less contractions. The placenta not coming out all the way had blocked me so I couldn’t pee again. This was bad because they were out of catheter kits – Kim even went back to the birth center to look for some and came back without any. After a while, they weighed Stephanie and found out she was only 6 lbs 5 oz, not the 7 pounder we expected. Sharon put some erythromycin goo in her eyes, but we all got to look each other over before that happened. I was offered a Vitamin K shot for Steph, but turned it down. Didn’t see the benefit of sticking a healthy baby who had just come out.
7:00 a.m. Called the Dr. - Betsy - who came over to do a manual removal of the placenta. She brought one little syringe of Demerol. After hearing the procedure described, I preferred to go to the hospital where they have unlimited Demerol. I couldn’t see what was going to hurt, because the inside of the uterus doesn’t have pain receptors, and the vagina not too many, but if they thought I needed Demerol I thought the procedure must be pretty bad. We called Mom to come over to babysit while we went in. She was so excited that she got lost on the way and took an unbelievable amount of time to get to our house. Kim and Betsy went with us to the hospital – Kim rode with us. I started to cry when we were leaving the subdivision because I felt sorry for myself over having to leave the baby. Just the first of the postpartum spontaneous tear-fests. Ray and Kim were reassuring me that I’d be home before long and they were so nice that I was able to stop sniffling.
8:00 a.m. Arrived at hospital; I was terrified I’d see someone I knew. I had done lots of computer class teaching to the hospital’s personnel and I was getting there when a new shift was coming on. I hadn’t showered since Wednesday and hadn’t even combed my hair before going in. (I even had to be prompted to put on clothes and shoes before leaving the house!) Luckily, didn’t see anyone. I though I would die from my bladder exploding but got situated with a Foley catheter just in time (the nurse had hands like Freddy Krueger - Sharon catheterized me once before the baby was born and once after and it never hurt when she did it). After the Demerol IM injection, they were standing around waiting for me to fall asleep but I was so pumped that I wanted to get on the phone and start calling people. I hadn’t been able to do that when she was first born because it was the middle of the night. They told me to hush and go to sleep but had to give me a little more Demerol IV. The manual procedure wasn’t as bad as I thought. I didn’t need the Demerol as much as I thought I would. The Dr. moved very slowly. I did slow breathing and except for a moment when I felt a suction, it was good. I tightened my muscles at that point, she stopped what she was doing, encouraged me to relax, then it felt OK when she started again. After it was over, I fell asleep for a couple hours after calling some people and ate lunch, and was home in the early afternoon. Ray had left after the removal, and they called him after I ate to come and get me. I was bummed to have missed the first morning of my baby’s life, but I was happy that she was with family while I was gone. If I did it again, I wouldn’t have gone to the hospital, but had the manual removal at home. I don’t know why they made such a big deal out of it. Anyway, I got my mean nurse story in spite of myself.
It was great to be home; my mother made all kinds of tasty stuff to eat and nobody came to bother me like they do in hospitals. I could sleep with the baby, and eat my supper in the bathtub (hot water soaks feel great afterwards) if I wanted to. Stephanie was never out of someone’s arms till she was about 3 days old. We were into intensive cuddling; there were me, Mom, and Ray in the house all the time so we took turns eating and holding her.
Sharon and Kim came Friday to check me and Stephanie again, and Sharon came again on Saturday with paperwork and footprint certificate. And she called me and told me to get Echinacea drops from the health food store to speed healing, and to make sitz baths or warm compresses from comfrey tea. Both of these seemed to help. I healed up pretty fast. The first trip out of the house we made was to the chiropractor when Steph was six days old; my bones felt loose and my back hurt some. The chiropractor fixed me right up.
However, after being immersed in baby stuff for a week, it was amazing to watch traffic in the road, and see people go about their business just like there wasn’t a new baby in the world. I mean, they could just make left turns, right turns, and change lanes in a completely unconcerned manner. It made such a difference to me that it was hard to accept that it didn’t affect the whole world.
We were very happy to have a home birth; because of my age and labor pattern, a hospital labor would probably have been full of uncomfortable and unnecessary interventions, maybe even a Cesarean. And I was very pleased (and conceited) about not tearing. I had done some of the perineal massage in the last weeks that Sharon recommended, and it might have helped.
Ray and I think that we received a higher level of attention, support, and education from Cherchez La Femme staff than we would have received from conventional OB/GYN’s, and if we could do it again, we wouldn’t change a thing. I especially liked the reading list, and the fact there was some required reading, including Gayle Peterson’s book, An Easier Childbirth.
I liked Ina May Gaskin’s birth stories in Spiritual Midwifery, and my favorite was one that wasn’t on the reading list, Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way, by Susan McCutcheon-Rosegg. I bought that one in 1987 for my sister. It is not as single-minded method oriented as the title suggests. It’s got great illustrations and photos, and its philosophy of childbirth is very similar to the birth center’s. Its idea of “emotional signposts” really were true in my labor. It’s the book that gave me the confidence to choose home birth.
OK, here it is. We will now test the maximum size of a single post.
Birth Story - Amy, Ray & Stephanie Brassieur
July 14-16, 1992
We had a planned homebirth, because after listening to all my friends’ and sister’s hospital birth stories over the years, I decided I wanted to opt out of all unnecessary interventions, and avoid the seemingly constant mean nurse story. My friends always had a complaint to make about their birth, and it always seemed to concern either a staff member’s discouraging or mean comment, or some painful or uncomfortable hospital procedure that really didn’t help the birth. Ray’s parents had both been born way out in the country at home, attended by the local granny midwife, so he was OK with the idea. My mother had unmedicated childbirth in the1950’s after reading Dick-Read’s book. She is such a little delicate unathletic magnolia flower that I thought if she could do it with 3 babies each over 8 pounds, I could for sure do it.
I read all the pregnancy and childbirth books in both Lafayette and Columbia, Missouri public libraries because I had 7 years of trying to get pregnant to do my research. A couple of years before I got pregnant, a freestanding birth center opened in Columbia, Missouri and I was all set!
Monday, July 13
Routine visit with Sharon (Sharon Lee, midwife) - conscious of full moon the next day - I was due on the 29th, and scheduled to work through the 17th. She said I’d probably have a new moon baby around the 29th. She felt the baby’s position in my stomach but I didn’t have any internal exams at this point. I asked Sharon if she saw any correlation between labor onset and the moon phases in her practice, but she hadn’t. My mother-in-law predicted I would have the baby on the full moon. I didn’t think it was important enough to share this bit of clairvoyance with Sharon.
Tuesday, July 14 - Full Moon
My water started leaking at a client’s office. Nothing that he could tell – but I had a feeling that I’d better finish up and get out of there. I looked for a restroom in the building, couldn’t find one. I was furiously holding my muscles in while I went down the stairs to leave the building. I put a shopping bag on the seat of the car before sitting, and sure enough, my water broke when I sat down. No contractions started right away, so I went home, surprising my mother who had arrived the day before, changed clothes and went back to the office to get the classroom ready for the next day. Before I went back, my mom insisted I call Sharon, and she said to do whatever I wanted and keep her posted. I think she also told me at that time to take my temperature every 2 hours and not put anything “up there.” Or she might have told me that the next morning. While I was at the office, my boss’s husband came down looking for snacks and I told him in a matter-of-fact way that my water had broken, and to please tell my boss I wouldn’t be at work the next day. She was on a business trip out of town, but coming back that night. He has no children, so he reacted very matter-of-factly. He didn’t tell her until later on that evening - she got excited and called me to see what was going on. At that point, nothing much was. Ray stopped by the store on the way home, and had to turn around and go right back out to get the list of stuff I couldn’t do without. I wanted to make some Jello with fruit in it, and I wanted a variety of fruit juices and I can’t remember what else.
Wednesday, July 15 - at home
It was nice to sit in my own living room or outside on the deck and listen to monotonous space music or ocean or Brazilian rainforest cassette tapes in early labor. I would move somewhere else whenever I’d get bored. Music with a beat got on my nerves but the space music and ocean tapes were very relaxing. I kept turning them over and listening to them again and again. We were having the 3rd coolest summer on record, so it wasn’t hot outside. I’d even feel chilly when the wind blew, and had to go in when a little sprinkle of rain came up.
I had a variety of easy and tough contractions all day long, with breaks long enough to take naps in between. I wasn’t hung up on time, but my labor didn’t follow the textbook pattern of light to progressively harder contractions. I’d have some light ones, a tough one, a light one, a medium one. They never did get down to regular time intervals either in the first stage. The baby would wiggle afterwards, and that was more uncomfortable than the contraction. I could just breathe through the light ones, but the harder ones I vocalized on exhaling and they made me pop a sweat. I was a putterer for the first stage, with a couple hours or so of break between full dilation and second stage. I judge the labor in hindsight by emotional signposts and strength of contractions rather than objective knowledge of dilation, because I didn’t have internal exams till after I was pushing. It’s hard to write a coherent account of what went on. I have visual images of what I was doing at each stage, and feelings of where the baby was, but it’s hard to put down on paper. I want to do a thorough job and keep a copy of this for Stephanie’s baby book.
Timetable:
Tues, July 14
3:45 p.m. Membrane rupture at client’s office; top leak. Went home, changed clothes, spoke to Sharon, back to office to set up classroom.
6:15 p.m. Back at home, visit with Mom, eat supper, sent Ray back to grocery store for labor goodies. Watched TV, visited, fixed bed for delivery (bottom layer: nice sheets, then rubber sheet, then ratty sheets), went to sleep 10 pm or so. Mom went home to the house in town where she was house-sitting while she was in Columbia – our house was so small that there was no privacy. I only wanted Ray, Sharon, and Sharon’s assistant Kim at the birth.
Wed., July 15
3:00 a.m. Light contractions woke me up, dozed & woke for contractions for several hours.
8:00 a.m. Called Sharon to check in and describe progress.
9:00 a.m. Called office to tie up loose ends
10:00 a.m. Sharon’s assistant, Kim James, called to say she’d come over and give me support or massage if I needed it. It was nice she called, but I really didn’t need anything. I was doing OK; just sitting around the house or in the yard. I was also getting a growly stomach every now and then – ate Jello with fruit in it. Maybe a little sandwich – I liked to eat something with flavor but not much at one time. I got less inclined to eat the longer I was in labor. Ray was puttering around, doing I don’t know what.
afternoon Got sleepy; took a nap.
3:00 p.m. Ray got me up because Sharon told him not to let me get too comfortable. He wanted me to help him make a birthday cake. It was not comfortable to stand and mix the cake so I sat in a chair (on a pillow) and supervised him between contractions. He had never made a cake before. I was feeling pressure so that I wanted to sit on something cushy at this point. I was starting to get a new knowledge of my pelvis from the inside out as the baby dropped farther down. I went to the bathroom a lot all day. I drank lots of juice and water on purpose.
Our stupid dog ducked under the fence into my neighbor’s yard and she came over to see if he would hurt the kids (she has a home day care). Ray had to go try to fix the fence. He was outside a long time, and by this point, I wanted him within voice distance every minute. When he came back in, I told him he couldn’t go anywhere without telling me where he was. I wasn’t scared, just didn’t want to be alone.
4:30 p.m. Contractions slowed down again; called Mom to come over and visit. Expected her at 5:00 or 5:30 so went back to take a short nap but contractions picked up by the time she arrived and I didn’t feel like visiting. She started to cook supper and I had to send Ray to tell her to stop the blender and turn off the music. I couldn’t take any noise by this time. This went on till it was dark; then I got up and watched TV some. The Democratic national convention was on, and I remember being able to listen to most of Gore’s speech, but I lost my ability to listen before Clinton had spoken for very long, and had to go lie down again. My head was in a labor zone by this time – I was focusing on the strange pressures I was feeling. I was definitely vocalizing with a low Oooohhhhh during the strong contractions so I could hear my breathing, and consciously relax if the pitch started to go high.
9:00 p.m. When I went back to bed, Ray had to come with me to rub the base of my back during each contraction. This went on for a while. After a couple of hours of heavy ones (Ray’s signal to start rubbing was my vocalizing – he fell asleep at one point and I had to reach back and poke him to get him going again), they slowed down again, and the baby was so low I couldn’t pee any more. (The contractions were so strong that I would pop a sweat and be hot, then the air conditioning would make me cold and I’d put the covers right on again. It got to be a pattern.) I had Ray call Sharon to come over. She tried several tricks (including getting in the bathtub to relax enough to pee – the bathtub felt great!) but finally just catheterized me (not the kind that stays in – just till my bladder was empty). She stayed till about 10:30, but I was having very few contractions, and because I was feeling discouraged and emotionally sick & tired of the whole thing, she thought I was wimping out. I declined an internal exam because of infection danger, and my lack of strong contractions while she was there made her think it was still early in labor.
She made me eat some carrot soup my mother had made because I was spilling ketones (she thought I was losing energy from not eating enough), and she said I could go to the hospital for pitocin and an epidural. I turned that down; it sounded like it would hurt. She said I could drink a glass of wine, get some rest, and start labor up in the morning if I was tired of it. That sounded good to me; we had a nice local Seyval chilling to celebrate with, so Ray poured us each some. As Sharon left, I heard her telling Ray that the same way babies got in was sometimes a good way to stimulate their coming out. Ray reported this to me, but I was not in the mood at this point. He probably wasn’t either!! I guess he might have been scared I’d want to go for it at that stage. My stomach felt tight even between contractions, and the baby wiggling was more uncomfortable than the contractions. She’d burrow her head into my cervix and kick her feet on my ribs after each contraction. I felt a lot better with my bladder empty again, compared to when it was full and I couldn’t pee.
11:00 pm. Drank glass of wine. Contractions had slowly started back up again after Sharon left, but not as intense as before. About 11:45, a thunderstorm came up, and Ray went to let the cat & dog in. The cat got spooked by something, and ran off. Ray got me out of bed to go to the front and back doors to call the cat. He remembered Sharon telling him not to let me get too comfortable. I started having some strong contractions when walking around so I wanted to go back to bed and to hell with the cat. I was leaning over and waddling at this point – couldn’t stand up straight. I had to hold on to Ray’s arm to steady myself. I must have been nearly or fully dilated at this point.
Thurs July 16
12:00 a.m. I started having trembling legs a little after contractions, and more heat and chill cycles. The wine and food I ate came back up (very smoothly and without any trauma – very different from when you barf from a stomach virus), and my stomach started visibly heading south at the end of each contraction (surreal!), and I had to grunt during them. Relaxation techniques that had worked so well before were not doing it now. The urge to push! But it wasn’t an urge that could be resisted; my stomach was pushing no matter what I did. The baby’s head dropped down some and felt like it was coming through the cervix (I felt pressure on my tailbone area), and I told Ray to call Sharon about 12:15. He said, “Let’s work with these awhile.” I was in no mood to argue-too busy working. I decided to push and see if it felt good. It did, so I kept on. The contractions were shorter now, with more time in between – the pushing was a new phase and it was gearing up gradually just like the first contractions had. About 20 minutes later I told him to call her NOW and get right back to me. She was at our house in about 10 minutes, and was real surprised. She popped a glove on, put her hand in, and said, “I can feel the baby’s head right there.” I never saw anybody lay out instruments so fast. It was funny. She called her assistant, Kim James, to get over on the double. Kim got to our house, and told Sharon that she ran out of gas as she turned into the driveway. I told her not to worry, our brand new gas can was full, and she and Sharon looked surprised that I would think of that. I had had another break with contractions slowing down to almost nothing when Sharon and Kim got there. I guess I’m like the mama cat we had when I was a kid – she’d stop her labor whenever we checked on her. Things gradually started up again.
1:30 a.m. Everybody was there, and I was pushing in all different positions. Sharon had me get on the bed supported by pillows and pull back my legs. My stomach wouldn’t even have a contraction when I was like that. It felt hard to get a deep breath like that too. I had to be more upright, then the pushing contractions kicked in well. I made good progress squatting on the floor at the foot of the bed while supporting myself on the bed. I tended to get tired calf muscles, though. When that happened, I’d stand up between contractions (Ray would support me) and Sharon and Kim would put a juice glass in my face to drink, then go to work massaging my legs. I felt like a boxer between rounds. It was like getting a refrigerator up a flight of stairs, alone. I lost track of time; I’d just push and rest. Sharon checked the heartbeat with the Doptone after every big push and would remind me to breathe deeply when they were over so the baby would get a new hit of oxygen. She kept holding the doptone while I breathed so I could hear the baby’s heart rate speed back up when I did a deep breath. I bellowed like a moose in heat or an Olympic weight lifter with each push. After a while I started feeling foolish at all the noise, so I tried to be quiet for a couple of pushes. I felt like I wasn’t making as much progress when I was quiet – I didn’t feel as strong as when I was roaring so I kept on roaring. My birth attendants were very quiet. Nobody did that obnoxious counting like I’ve seen on TV. They might have said, “good one” or something but I think I was the only one making noise. At one contraction, Sharon told me I could quit pushing but my stomach was doing an unusually long contraction and I said, “It still wants to push” and she felt my stomach and saw it was doing it on its own. She just said, “OK, take another breath.” I pushed for a while standing up hanging on Ray; he said I pulled on him with my arms as well. My arms were sore the next day, and Ray was more tired than I was.
I was on the floor at the foot of the bed, on my knees with my hands grasping the bed covers when the baby was born because my calves just couldn’t do it anymore. Her head was way down when I moved from squatting to kneeling, and I felt it slide back up some when I got on my knees. But I was on a roll and it didn’t take much to get her down again. At one point, they said I could reach down and feel her head. I didn’t want to shift my balance at that moment to do that, so I said, “Oh, I can feel exactly where that head is!” and everybody laughed.
Sharon and Kim kept warm cloths on me (warmed in the crock-pot on my dresser), and massaged me with oil, and supported me as she crowned so I didn’t have any tears or stitches. There was a moment where I thought I would split in two but they told me to take my time and it got better quickly; it only lasted a second. However, when they said to blow and not push, I was thinking “You betcha I’m not pushing; I’ll just stay right here like this forever. I’ll be damned if I ever push again.” But when I stretched some that splitting feeling went away. I think Sharon and Kim both had their hands on me right before crowning. I remember the effort not to push made me writhe a little because my stomach was pushing like a freight train. I appreciated that they didn’t hurry me.
They suctioned her before she was all the way out. I could hear the nose sucker thing. They might have said, “Here’s her head.” Then Sharon got her arms out; it felt like I was a sweater her arms were coming out of. My bottom didn’t hurt at all at that point. Then she slipped out fast, kicking the little feet as she went, and gave a little yelp when she landed in Sharon’s lap. I had an all-over rush, and leaned down to look through my legs at her. Sharon suctioned her again, wrapped her in a warm towel and gave her to me. I had to lift my leg over the cord and turn around to sit on the Chux on the floor. The baby didn’t cry; she just looked at us. Kim and Sharon were saying, “Hello, Stephanie!” but I was ambivalent about that because I thought I’d want to get to know her a little before deciding for sure about her name. My vision narrowed down in a vignette effect; although Sharon was sitting right next to me, probably touching me, I didn’t see her.
Everything except Stephanie’s face was dark (the room was lit only by bedside lamps and the light coming in from the hall and bathroom – Sharon had a flashlight she used towards the end). She had already pinked up nicely. I could see her fingernails were nice and pink. Her hair was still wet, and she looked tired. Her face was the spitting image of Ray’s mom. She wasn’t a little stranger like I had thought she might be – she was somebody I recognized. When Ray got his hands on her, she looked at him and poked out her lower lip. He thought she was beautiful, even with the vernix. Most of that came off when her original towel was changed out for a dry one, right after Ray cut the cord. While we were waiting for the placenta, he took her to the guest bedroom, tucked her in his arm, and they both got a nap. I could hear him snoring. When Stephanie was born, and Sharon asked for the time to write it down, I was shocked to find out it was 3:20 a.m. It felt like I pushed for about 15 or 20 minutes. I was in an altered state of consciousness for sure.
4:30or 5:00 Ray made coffee and served coffee and cake on a tray in our room to Sharon and Kim; they were impressed. We were still waiting around for the placenta to finish coming out. I was holding the baby. They got busy cleaning stuff up and doing laundry, and made me some real strong raspberry tea to drink, but nothing worked. Tried nursing Steph – she latched on and munched like a trouper, but my uterus had closed up shop for the night. No more even tiny cramps, much less contractions. The placenta not coming out all the way had blocked me so I couldn’t pee again. This was bad because they were out of catheter kits – Kim even went back to the birth center to look for some and came back without any. After a while, they weighed Stephanie and found out she was only 6 lbs 5 oz, not the 7 pounder we expected. Sharon put some erythromycin goo in her eyes, but we all got to look each other over before that happened. I was offered a Vitamin K shot for Steph, but turned it down. Didn’t see the benefit of sticking a healthy baby who had just come out.
7:00 a.m. Called the Dr. - Betsy - who came over to do a manual removal of the placenta. She brought one little syringe of Demerol. After hearing the procedure described, I preferred to go to the hospital where they have unlimited Demerol. I couldn’t see what was going to hurt, because the inside of the uterus doesn’t have pain receptors, and the vagina not too many, but if they thought I needed Demerol I thought the procedure must be pretty bad. We called Mom to come over to babysit while we went in. She was so excited that she got lost on the way and took an unbelievable amount of time to get to our house. Kim and Betsy went with us to the hospital – Kim rode with us. I started to cry when we were leaving the subdivision because I felt sorry for myself over having to leave the baby. Just the first of the postpartum spontaneous tear-fests. Ray and Kim were reassuring me that I’d be home before long and they were so nice that I was able to stop sniffling.
8:00 a.m. Arrived at hospital; I was terrified I’d see someone I knew. I had done lots of computer class teaching to the hospital’s personnel and I was getting there when a new shift was coming on. I hadn’t showered since Wednesday and hadn’t even combed my hair before going in. (I even had to be prompted to put on clothes and shoes before leaving the house!) Luckily, didn’t see anyone. I though I would die from my bladder exploding but got situated with a Foley catheter just in time (the nurse had hands like Freddy Krueger - Sharon catheterized me once before the baby was born and once after and it never hurt when she did it). After the Demerol IM injection, they were standing around waiting for me to fall asleep but I was so pumped that I wanted to get on the phone and start calling people. I hadn’t been able to do that when she was first born because it was the middle of the night. They told me to hush and go to sleep but had to give me a little more Demerol IV. The manual procedure wasn’t as bad as I thought. I didn’t need the Demerol as much as I thought I would. The Dr. moved very slowly. I did slow breathing and except for a moment when I felt a suction, it was good. I tightened my muscles at that point, she stopped what she was doing, encouraged me to relax, then it felt OK when she started again. After it was over, I fell asleep for a couple hours after calling some people and ate lunch, and was home in the early afternoon. Ray had left after the removal, and they called him after I ate to come and get me. I was bummed to have missed the first morning of my baby’s life, but I was happy that she was with family while I was gone. If I did it again, I wouldn’t have gone to the hospital, but had the manual removal at home. I don’t know why they made such a big deal out of it. Anyway, I got my mean nurse story in spite of myself.
It was great to be home; my mother made all kinds of tasty stuff to eat and nobody came to bother me like they do in hospitals. I could sleep with the baby, and eat my supper in the bathtub (hot water soaks feel great afterwards) if I wanted to. Stephanie was never out of someone’s arms till she was about 3 days old. We were into intensive cuddling; there were me, Mom, and Ray in the house all the time so we took turns eating and holding her.
Sharon and Kim came Friday to check me and Stephanie again, and Sharon came again on Saturday with paperwork and footprint certificate. And she called me and told me to get Echinacea drops from the health food store to speed healing, and to make sitz baths or warm compresses from comfrey tea. Both of these seemed to help. I healed up pretty fast. The first trip out of the house we made was to the chiropractor when Steph was six days old; my bones felt loose and my back hurt some. The chiropractor fixed me right up.
However, after being immersed in baby stuff for a week, it was amazing to watch traffic in the road, and see people go about their business just like there wasn’t a new baby in the world. I mean, they could just make left turns, right turns, and change lanes in a completely unconcerned manner. It made such a difference to me that it was hard to accept that it didn’t affect the whole world.
We were very happy to have a home birth; because of my age and labor pattern, a hospital labor would probably have been full of uncomfortable and unnecessary interventions, maybe even a Cesarean. And I was very pleased (and conceited) about not tearing. I had done some of the perineal massage in the last weeks that Sharon recommended, and it might have helped.
Ray and I think that we received a higher level of attention, support, and education from Cherchez La Femme staff than we would have received from conventional OB/GYN’s, and if we could do it again, we wouldn’t change a thing. I especially liked the reading list, and the fact there was some required reading, including Gayle Peterson’s book, An Easier Childbirth.
I liked Ina May Gaskin’s birth stories in Spiritual Midwifery, and my favorite was one that wasn’t on the reading list, Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way, by Susan McCutcheon-Rosegg. I bought that one in 1987 for my sister. It is not as single-minded method oriented as the title suggests. It’s got great illustrations and photos, and its philosophy of childbirth is very similar to the birth center’s. Its idea of “emotional signposts” really were true in my labor. It’s the book that gave me the confidence to choose home birth.
Helpful Birth Books
One book that started me thinking was "The Silent Knife" by Nancy Cohen and Lois Estner. Women were hustled into surgery for stupid reasons, often with poor results. I don't recommend that pregnant women read this; the scenarios of the book were more common in the 1970s. This was first published in 1983. I listened to many friends' birth stories in the 1980s, and many of them had to tolerate obtrusive and ineffective interventions during their labors. There had to be a better way. The books listed below show what that way is.
Ina May Gaskin writes some of the most readable books around. I read "Spiritual Midwifery" while pregnant - it was in the library of my birth center. This book has many birth stories, and also a technical section on birthing. The birth stories date back to the 1970s, and also include more recent births by the second generation at The Farm. The birth stories run the gamut of experience, which was very educational for me. The mainstream "just listen to your doctor" birth books do not describe the variety of experiences that labor can be.
Her newest book, "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth" has a combination of birth stories, history of childbirth care, and Ina May's theories of the needs of laboring women. If there's only one birth book you read, this should be it. I found everything in it to be true in my experience.
My other favorite, tied with "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth" is "Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way" by Susan McCutcheon-Rosegg. I bought this book when my sister was pregnant in 1987, and her childbirth prep classes turned out to be nothing more than cesarean prep classes. There were no Bradley classes at the time in her town. She used it as a manual, and took it to the hospital with her to serve as a guide for her husband. She wrote in hers, and gave it back to me when I was pregnant. I added my notes, and have passed it around till the binding wore out. Now it's a family heirloom, held together with string. I have purchased new copies and added our annotations for other new mothers I've known. The pictures in the book were very useful visualizations for me during the hardest part of labor. Also, it was the first time I had seen pictures of birth in positions other than flat on back, legs in air. Dr. Bradley also wrote his own book. I read it about 20 years ago, found the tone a little patronizing so I like Susan McCutcheon's book better.
If you have doubts of your ability to give birth,
An Easier Childbirth: A Mother's Guide for Birthing Normally by Gayle Peterson was one of the required reading books at the birth center we used. It is a workbook that asks many questions for the pregnant woman to think about and answer. It brings hidden fears and conflicts to the surface where they can be resolved. Its aim is to address emotional issues ahead of time so they do not surface in labor and hinder the birth. It's excellent.
*Update June 21, 2009*
I just read another book - by Mayer Eisenstein, M.D., "The Home Birth Advantage: A Time-Honored Tradition for the New Millennium." It is fantastic. In very easily read terms, it explains exactly what I think about the hospital and surgically centered birthways found in the United States. Even if you are NOT considering home birth, you should read it.
*Update June 23, 2009*
Just finished "Your Best Birth" by Ricki Lake and Abby Epstein. This is the same team that made the documentary "The Business of Being Born." It is excellent as an overview of what to expect from different kinds of birth services in the U.S.
*Update June 29, 2009*
Another one just finished: "Gentle Birth Choices" by Barbara Harper. After doing a Google search on that title, also found reference to a video by the same author. Bet that would be good. This book describes the history of birth practices in this country, talks about international birth safety statistics, and describes the typical experiences of the home, birth center, and hospital birth. It has a lot of information on water birth. I highly recommend it.
Ina May Gaskin writes some of the most readable books around. I read "Spiritual Midwifery" while pregnant - it was in the library of my birth center. This book has many birth stories, and also a technical section on birthing. The birth stories date back to the 1970s, and also include more recent births by the second generation at The Farm. The birth stories run the gamut of experience, which was very educational for me. The mainstream "just listen to your doctor" birth books do not describe the variety of experiences that labor can be.
Her newest book, "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth" has a combination of birth stories, history of childbirth care, and Ina May's theories of the needs of laboring women. If there's only one birth book you read, this should be it. I found everything in it to be true in my experience.
My other favorite, tied with "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth" is "Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way" by Susan McCutcheon-Rosegg. I bought this book when my sister was pregnant in 1987, and her childbirth prep classes turned out to be nothing more than cesarean prep classes. There were no Bradley classes at the time in her town. She used it as a manual, and took it to the hospital with her to serve as a guide for her husband. She wrote in hers, and gave it back to me when I was pregnant. I added my notes, and have passed it around till the binding wore out. Now it's a family heirloom, held together with string. I have purchased new copies and added our annotations for other new mothers I've known. The pictures in the book were very useful visualizations for me during the hardest part of labor. Also, it was the first time I had seen pictures of birth in positions other than flat on back, legs in air. Dr. Bradley also wrote his own book. I read it about 20 years ago, found the tone a little patronizing so I like Susan McCutcheon's book better.
If you have doubts of your ability to give birth,
An Easier Childbirth: A Mother's Guide for Birthing Normally by Gayle Peterson was one of the required reading books at the birth center we used. It is a workbook that asks many questions for the pregnant woman to think about and answer. It brings hidden fears and conflicts to the surface where they can be resolved. Its aim is to address emotional issues ahead of time so they do not surface in labor and hinder the birth. It's excellent.
*Update June 21, 2009*
I just read another book - by Mayer Eisenstein, M.D., "The Home Birth Advantage: A Time-Honored Tradition for the New Millennium." It is fantastic. In very easily read terms, it explains exactly what I think about the hospital and surgically centered birthways found in the United States. Even if you are NOT considering home birth, you should read it.
*Update June 23, 2009*
Just finished "Your Best Birth" by Ricki Lake and Abby Epstein. This is the same team that made the documentary "The Business of Being Born." It is excellent as an overview of what to expect from different kinds of birth services in the U.S.
*Update June 29, 2009*
Another one just finished: "Gentle Birth Choices" by Barbara Harper. After doing a Google search on that title, also found reference to a video by the same author. Bet that would be good. This book describes the history of birth practices in this country, talks about international birth safety statistics, and describes the typical experiences of the home, birth center, and hospital birth. It has a lot of information on water birth. I highly recommend it.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Why Write This Blog?
I meet too many young women who think that they have to be saved from the agony of birth by the technology, drugs, and interventions found in the average hospital birth.
I will relate my personal experiences, and that of other women I know, that influenced me to choose another route.
I believe that the interventions that are used today will be found in the future to be as harmful to mother and baby as the routine X-rays performed on pregnant women in earlier decades.
The U.S. morbidity and mortality rate of infants and mothers has not improved in many years, and is much worse than many other industrialized countries.
I will provide resources that back up my opinions in the hope it will help someone have a better experience of birth.
I will relate my personal experiences, and that of other women I know, that influenced me to choose another route.
I believe that the interventions that are used today will be found in the future to be as harmful to mother and baby as the routine X-rays performed on pregnant women in earlier decades.
The U.S. morbidity and mortality rate of infants and mothers has not improved in many years, and is much worse than many other industrialized countries.
I will provide resources that back up my opinions in the hope it will help someone have a better experience of birth.
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