My thoughts on childbirth

 I've been doing a lot of reading on childbirth lately. A LOT. Mostly in books but some blogs and websites too. I am a huge proponent of natural childbirth and I am going to attempt to dive into this subject on my blog. There's so many things to talk about- the history of childbirth, (unne)cessarian sections, medical and doctor intervention, etc. This is obviously going to have to be broken down into multiple posts. I hope it's not an overload of information, but rather is highly informative. I have several friends that are pregnant right now and I really wish I could sit down with each one of them and go over this stuff!

If I could really break it down, I would say that in general, most people are uniformed about childbirth and what is really going on. Women have been lied to about their bodies. How has the US's national C-section rate gone from under 5% to over 30% in about 20 years time? Are that many women's bodies all of a sudden malfunctioning? Not hardly. It is a very rare case that a woman's body cannot naturally give birth. One of the most common reasons nowadays for C-sections is "failure to progress." Either that or "fetal distress." The first- failure to progress is more often than not the Dr. essentially saying without saying one of the following- "It's getting late/I don't want to be here all night/ my shift is almost over/hospitals are a business, we need ot turn these beds over/there's other women I need to attend to/this is boring...." That is the simple truth. The woman's body is not working fast enough in that doctor's mind, when in reality most first-time births take on average from 8-24 hours. That's normal and average.

 The second reason for C-sections is fetal distress. Guess what this is usually caused by- medication given to the mother. Doctors, and mothers, these days aren't hardly even willing to wait until a mother reaches 40 weeks gestation. That is full term. Now, many women are having scheduled inductions at 38 or 39 weeks. This is dangerous because it often leads to a C-section. Not only that, but due dates are AN ESTIMATE. They aren't always accurate. In fact they are very often inaccurate- for a number of reasons. So what a doctor thinks is 39 weeks could actually be 37 which makes a huge difference in development. Every week counts. My philosophy is this- a woman's body and her baby know when it's time to come out. Why are we interfering? Intervention is what is causing the higher C-section rate in our country. What is truly considered overdue is 41.5-42 weeks gestation. Less than 5% of women make it to 42 weeks. It is very normal for a baby to be born past its due date.

It's not always that simple though- there are other reasons for fetal distress. If a mother is significantly stressed out or fearful, her body will tense up, often causing labor to stall, and make it harder for the baby to come. This can turn into fetal distress when the mother's body is freaking out. In this case, medication can help to take some of the edge off and calm the mother enough to stabilize the baby. I would argue however, that education and information is key. I believe for a good majority of women that if the mother is properly educated in advanced and has properly prepared for the birth, knows what is going on with her body, what to expect, how to get through the labor without stress and tension, then she can do that naturally. Just like so many other things in life- a lot of it is about one's perspective. If a woman expects that labor is going to hurt and will be hard and difficult and unbearable, well that's probably the kind of labor she will have. One of the books I have not read but have heard stories about is called "Childbirth Without Fear" by Dr. Grantley Dick-Read. I heard a story from that book of when he was serving as a Doctor in the military. One day when he was overseas, a woman walked up to him told him she was having a baby, and proceeded to have the baby right then and there. Then she went on with her day. He started questioning women like her who seemed to experience no pain in their childbirth. He had never seen this in his practice before. What was her response? "Well, I didn't know it was supposed to hurt!"

 I've known/met a couple women who fully intended to have a natural childbirth beforehand, but they didn't put enough preparation into the birth in advance and when the time came, they were not prepared for the sensations, pressure, and other feelings and ended up not coming out with the birth they thought they would have. Obviously there must be a degree of flexibility. You can prepare as much as possible, but you have to be prepared for unexpected circumstances to arise. But I honestly believe the more prepared you are in advance, the better the birth outcome will be. And that is what we are going for.

For my pregnant (or otherwise just curious friends): here is a link to some great childbirth books.
 http://wonderfullymadebelliesandbabies.blogspot.com/2009/09/what-not-to-read_4036.html
 It's called "What Not to Read." (and includes what to read instead). Go inform yourselves!