I recently gave birth to my first little baby. Prior to this I had written for The Huffington Post UK about the possibilities of a pain free, empowering natural birth. I questioned whether a painful birth was all in the mind. I set my stall out with full positive intention as to how my baby would come into the world. I didn't doubt for a second that it would be as I envisioned it. I foresaw a peaceful, painless, chemical free birth, proceeded by a bouncing happy little girl. I got only one of those things.
How naive of me! I was so focused on the birth of my fantasies I didn't plan or prepare for any other option. This is where me and the power of positive thinking fall apart. I am relentlessly positive, but in my experience this does not always bring about our minds desires. Sometimes the cosmos has its own plans, for it's own reasons and to which we must adjust. No matter how strongly I visualised a drug free water birth of great beauty, I was, it seems, always destined to have a whole other kind of birth. No matter how much I fought with the health services whilst I was In their care for a week, their protocols were always meant to prevail.
So what was my plan and what was the actuality? I planned to hypnobirth baby calmly and painlessly into the world. It was my intention to wait till baby was ready, even if this meant going over 42 weeks of pregnancy. It was going to be all deep breathing, aromatherapy and blissful background music. But an attendance at the local hospital for a routine check up saw this plan shot to smithereens.
First up they wanted to forcefully induce baby. I refused when I learned I had started to dilate. I went home and sat waiting for labour to commence. I went back to hospital the next day for another routine monitoring. I expected to be there an hour. I didn't get out for four days. There was a concern with baby's heartbeat, I was given a scary talk by a doctor and I started the process of becoming drawn into the medical world of birthing. The rights and wrongs of this are all now just a blur. I know I felt caught between my hippy desires to just let baby be, and the modern mentality of relying on what the graph says. As a diplomatic Libran I spent several days trying to balance these accounts, to no avail. In the end the establishment won out.
My natural birthing was transformed into a litany of chemical induction techniques. None of which worked. The final attempt saw me hooked up to machinery, a drip in my arm with a dial being turned up to create my contractions and force my body into pushing baby out. Nothing natural about it. I couldn't even stand, change position or move around. I was catheterised, injected, poked and prodded often. I took to all this as I do anything, cheerfully. Every event is a new adventure even if the voyage is by tank rather than by foot.
As the chemicals stormed my body I attempted to utilise my natural birthing learnings. I coped nicely for several hours on meditations and mantras, but then the chemical dial was switched up and the pain it brought was astounding. Bye bye any aspects of breathing the baby out, hello vile gas and air followed by epidural, followed much later by episiotomy and forceps delivery.
And so my natural birth was made chemical, forceful, medical and surgical. The most important question here though is... Am I bothered? Well if you'd told me in advance this was how things might go, then I would have thought I'd be devastated. But in reality I'm happy. The birth was not how I planned, but my baby came out perfect. Despite being dragged into the world with great metal spoons she was alert, happy and did not cry all day long, not even following her "traumatic" birth. Maybe she knew some thing I didn't... Maybe she was cool with it. And if she is cool with it, so am I.
Indeed I've now had a birth people can relate to, which as a writer is all I could ask for. Whilst it would have been lovely to sit and squat whilst humming mantras and envisioning my lady bits opening like a flower, it wasn't the way things went. Such a birth, as romantic as it sounds, is out of reach for the vast majority of people, and so to make the most of what we do get, is an equally powerful way of birthing.
My natural birth education had told me to be wary of the medical brigade, and I had been. I started off the week convinced I was being dragged into some kind of medical conspiracy to drug me and remove my baby by force. Now this did happen, but was it a conspiracy? Or was it simply a bunch of professionals acting to their protocols? I had not liked being subjected to procedure, but who is to say that I did not need to be? Given my babies stubbornness to launch into the world, perhaps I did. I've learned since that my mum and grandma's children were all delivered by forceps. Our families women carry well, but apparently we need a little help at the end... No shame in that.
In spite of my reservations about the medical model I learned too that it is staffed by lovely people. They are far from wishing to harm me or anyone. A medical birth challenged my jaded view and the midwives came up smelling of roses. A natural birthing in a darkened room would have missed out on their cheery smiles, helpful advice and heartfelt encouragement.
I have read many women's tales of guilt and woe at not having their picture perfect birth. Even years after birth some gals torture themselves on how it all went wrong and the apparent disservice they did their child. But the thing is, we are a medically altered peoples living in unnatural times. I could mourn the loss of my ideal birth, but then I may as well grieve the fact I am writing this on a computer as opposed to using chalk and blood on my cave wall.
Things did not go to plan but I had an amazing birth. It was gritty, drawn out, painful and emotional. It was hardwork and it tested myself and my husband far beyond what we ever expected. There was a great deal of blood and tears and everything, literally everything I planned went out the window. Yet it was perfect. It was how it should of been. I'm so happy it happened as it did and I know all i can do is respect life's greater plan. Perhaps what my soul and spirit really wanted was not the lightness of a pretty birth but the challenge of something real, something fleshy, messy and hardcore.
A perfect childbirth is all in the mind. Relinquishing control and letting life be as it inevitably will be is an act of powerful contrition. My childbirth has been a life lesson. We may think we know what we want, we can plan and wish and cosmically order it. But if it's not right for us, life intervenes. We can choose to rail against that intervention, or we can accept it, thank it and be at peace. I choose to be at peace. I have a beautiful healthy baby, and any injury to myself was well worth that outcome. A perfect birth, like a perfect anything in life... Is all in the mind.
Follow Alice Grist on Twitter: www.twitter.com/AliceGrist
Childbirth - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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If it wasn't for the apparently needed induction, you might very well have not needed to vary from what you had planned. Lots of women do. You educated yourself, and in the end, you did great under the circumstances. And ,you didn't need a c/s, so there's always that, too.
I just want to say, wait until your next labour and birth. The likelihood it will go very quickly (though shorter, probably more intensely for a little while) is really great! So, well done, and congratulations.
As for your comments about any injury to yourself being worth a healthy baby and her "traumatic" birth - you are lucky to have someone who only did forceps and an episiotomy, who didn't force you into a c-section that would forever change your future reproductive health options and lucky that you are so far mentally okay, because it can be and is so much worse, especially when one is on the freight train cascade of interventions.
Just because someone has their baby at home doesn't mean they aren't safe. It's their home, not a field in the middle of nowhere. They are attended by skilled midwives who can handle complications INCLUDING postpartum hemorrhage, an unresponsive baby, cord prolapse, and shoulder dystocia to name a few. They bring the same medications available in the hospital. They bring oxygen. They bring resuscitation equipment for mom and baby. All that's missing is an OR for a c-section. Women who birth at home are also low risk, and there are very few complications that are missed before birth.
The "if i wouldnt have been in the hospital i would have died" statement is inaccurate. Many complications are caused by technological intervention and impatience. That being said, many women like the hospital, feel safe there, want to be there, and go on to have great births. And thank goodness doctors are around when there are emergencies.
Don't judge anyone else's choices. Everyone does what they believe is best for their child. It's no one's business whether or not they push that kid out at home or at the hospital, as long as they feel good about it, and mom and baby turn out fine.
The thing I wish people were more aware of is how often the interventions they or we manage to initiate lead to the very problems that they are then miraculously saved from by said doctors/hospitals. It is wearying to know how many women/couples contribute to this unknowingly.
It's up to pregnant people to do their research, choose their birthplace, and stick to their guns as best they can. Very often, unless there clearly is a dire emergency about to develop, just speaking up and being assertive will cause the medics to back off and be more flexible. Sometimes that's all it takes for a successful outcome for everyone.
Induction of labor spawns many such problems. The precise mechanism is through injuries to pelvic nerves and their subsequent re-growth.
Neither women nor most of their attendants are aware of these serious problems when making such decisions.
About half of mums do not often even entertain the idea they can avoid drugs, and the other half come in with no real idea of what labour entails and are then shocked at how difficult it can be. They're possibly not as healthy as mums were 10 years ago (that's fairly proven). They rarely take classes, or change their diet and social habits upon finding out they're pregnant now.
So what if it 'went pear shaped' for NoSandwiches or anyone having a 'natural' childbirth? If at home, she'd be transferred in. If in hospital, she'd receive anaesthesia and an instrumental or c/s birth. Why be angry at her for saying she did well without drugs? Every woman ought to build her own plans for labour, and best stays flexible as things develop.
As for history, most of the reasons women died in childbirth a hundred years ago do not often occur now in first world countries, even at home births, so that is fairly irrelevant.
As for your comment that the reasons women died a hundred years ago don't occur now, I find totally silly. Women are a poor design for giving birth, unlike many animals and it can still be a dangerous experience for mother and child. Advances in obstetrics and birth management are the reasons why it is now safer and without giving too much away I DO know what I am talking about. You are obviously entitled to your opinion but it was a poor and rather idealistic argument. Nothing further to add.
Here's a great film to watch before going the natural route:
http://www.birthintobeing.com/index.php/birth-as-we-know-it
So much of what hospitals urge is about their convenience and expenses. If you've not seen the documentary, "The Business of Being Born," it's quite good.
I'm glad things are well. I miss seeing you about the Interwebz, but I know you are loving a totally new life. I'm happy things are well!
Congratulations on the baby!
"The most important thing is a healthy baby" is the only truth I find here. That is absolutely correct - but to discount anything else - do ignore EVERYTHING else - is a sad message on the state of humanity. It implies that to go against the medical establishment would assuredly NOT result in a healthy baby. There was almost certainly not any 'conspiracy' to force your child to be born via medical intervention, but the biggest problem with modern man is our inability to say 'No, that's not what I want' - and stick with it. There can be risks with that approach, as there can be risks by crossing a street or flying in a plane. There are true medical emergencies, but (statistically) most of our medical interventions with respect to birth are caused not by CONDITIONS, but by other medical interventions.
And those don't come without their own risks.
Congratulations on having a healthy baby, though. It's a joy.
This isn't the 50's or 60's anymore. Most physicians nowadays give a lot of credence to pain managment, and not to mention it makes their jobs easier if the patient isn't writhing in pain on the table, cussing them out.
She wanted to give birth naturally more than anything.
The first baby had the cord wrapped around his head and leg. C section...
With the second,, she had a condition (too hard to spell here), where the cord is embedded into the wall of the placenta, causing the cord to be way too short for a vaginal birth. The docs didn't know until after the C section which only took place because of the first C section two years earlier.
Two close calls. Two healthy baby boys.
Thank goodness she was in a hospital.
As for the second birth, that emergency with the cord/placenta adhering dangerously to the uterine muscle is one of the well-known direct complications of a previous C/S. And the more C/S's a woman has, the higher the incidence of abnormal adherence and embedding. This increases the risk of an emergency hysterectomy following the baby's birth.
Not to say she didn't need a C/S the first time, but this is just one of the reasons we must never allow the thinking to persist that a C/S is just a fine and dandy way to have our babies for no imperative medical reason.
Her first C/S was decided after many hours of labor with out getting anywhere. She pushed an hour longer than the doctor wanted before she agreed to go with a C/S.
Thanks for your input.