Backseat birth

This is a lovely story about an unexpected birth in the backseat of a car. Back Seat Birth  and so quick!

What shits me about this article is the language used. Take this for example:

''I was in the front seat and I had to get into the back seat. The most important thing was that my back was flat.''

What the heck? Who on earth told her that your back has to be flat during birth? Actually It makes things harder since you're technically pushing that baby uphill to get it out of the pelvis!

" I knew that Ryan could see the head and he told me to push. Once I did that it was all over with pretty quickly."

It's pretty clear that this was an unassisted birth since it was in the back of a car so WHY did she need to be told when to push? I know I didn't need telling when to push, in fact they tried getting me to NOT push because I had a lip of cervix left. It's kind of obvious that the woman in this story didn't have that. 

Why oh why are these attitudes so prevalent? She birthed her baby, her husband didn't deliver it.

At least there's nothing in the article about shoelaces.

My stance

Ok, I cant quite find the balls to call myself a Natural Childbirth Advocate/Activist so I'll stick with Supporter. You want to know why? Check out this website *Click me* and some of the bullshit that comes out of the mouths of medical professionals who are supposed to keep us safe and supported during pregnancy, childbirth and the times soon after.

THIS is why I support the Natural Childbirth movement.

Rhyme and Reason

The other day I touched on the fact that I am a Natural Childbirth supporter. I thought I would expand on why.

As I said, I was reading up on everything about pregnancy and birth that I could get my hands on. I wanted to know what to look forward to. Drugs and medications never really sounded that appealing to me, though the Entonox always did. In one of the pregnancy and childbirth books I found a list of all the painkilling medications that are commonly given during labour and birth and it included a list of side effects for both mother and child. I lapped it up! I now wish I knew what book that it was in so I could read the list over again. The best of the bunch sounded like the Entonox. Only downside to it is it doesn't work for everyone and some people feel really spaced out while using it.
Well, I know for a fact that it works for me! And very well too. 3 puffs and I'm not feeling any pain at all. Any more than that though and I feel nauseous.

So, while I'm all for the Entonox, WHY else am I natural childbirth supporter? Well, pretty much I have no choice. See, either I go as naturally as possible or I can do it like in the "good" old days and get knocked out and sliced open. See, due to some surgery on my spine to fix my scoliosis, it's now impossible for me to have an Epidural or Spinal block. Thus if I have a cesarean, it's lights out for me. Sound appealing to me? HELL NO!

Also, reading all the natural childbirth books that I could get my hands on, and later all the websites and blogs that I could find, I found out that doing it the medical way isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Now, in saying that things like cesareans and other obstetric procedures have a very good and very important place. It's when they're OVERused that I have an objection to them.

I myself was born via cesarean. I was a stubborn breech and with the 50/50 chance of OI no-one wanted to take the risk that I would break something on the way out. As it was I was born with a broken femur (thigh bone) but it healed quickly after birth. My mum has no bad words to share about her experience. It wasn't easy for her to establish breastfeeding due to a dodgy latch (I would get the nipple under my tongue every single time) but she was determined! After 12 days in the hospital she had it down pat and she breastfed me for 13 months. The only reason she stopped when she did was because I bit her and almost detached her nipple. Oops...

Whoopsie, kind of went a little off track there.

So, I have a very good reason for wanting to avoid a cesarean seeing as I want to be "Present" for the birth of my child/ren and if I'm knocked out then the man thing wouldn't have the opportunity to be present either! That's not an acceptable situation for me so I've looked at the alternatives.

Ultimately, if I wasn't classed as high risk for any reason then my dream birth would be at home. Because I'm high risk that simply isn't possible because I doubt I could find a midwife who would support me and going unassisted really isn't my cup of tea.

Now of course if there is some sort of emergency where having a cesarean would save my life or the babies life then I'm all for it, I'm just not going to be signing up for an elective cesarean anytime soon.

Coming out

So I don't even know why I decided to avoid this on my own blog *shrug* but I'm going to come out and say it.

I'm a natural childbirth supporter.

Yeah, I bet that's a bit of an anticlimax LOL.
So what's the big deal about me being a natural childbirth supporter anyway? Well first off in all my travels around cyberspace in search of information about childbirth I kept finding things about "natural" childbirth. I read all sorts of books during my first pregnancy, up to and including Pregnancy for Dummies. Yes, there is a book called Pregnancy for Dummies.
I SCOURED my local library, picking up every book about pregnancy and childbirth I could find. I read them all. I soaked up all the new information and all the new opinions like a sponge. Some of the opinions and information I mentally put question marks beside but still, I read it all. I already had a few opinions myself on childbirth and whatnot but nothing solid.

Then I found the eye opening book "Pushed" by Jennifer Block. After reading that I just couldn't look at childbirth the same. I was horrified by the atrocities I was reading about that seemed to be the "norm" in American childbirth. Sure, I had read about a majority of them in all the other books but those books didn't paint anywhere near the same picture as "Pushed" did.

My eyes were opened. I couldn't look at routine interventions in childbirth the same again. Thus, I went looking into the alternatives to the "hospital norm" that I kept reading about (bear in mind that a lot of the books I was reading were written in the USA and more geared towards the maternity system in that country, the maternity system in New Zealand is completely different, it's like comparing apples and pumpkins). I read about a woman in "Pushed", Ina May Gaskin, who was hailed as the mother of American Midwifery and went looking for the book she had written called "Spiritual Midwifery". A spark was flaring into a blaze, I had to find out more about Natural childbirth! I read the book and though some of the concepts in it sounded a bit out there even for my extremely open mind, I took it all in. It clicked with me. It just sounded so RIGHT to me.

Thus began my foray into Natural childbirth. I haven't stopped reading about it since. Luckily here in New Zealand we have a much more midwifery model of care rather than the American Obstetric model. Obstetricians are required, just like any other branch of medicine is required, the USA has just pushed that to the extreme.

I for one am very glad we have Obstetricians and I am seeing one myself, simply because my pregnancy is classed as high risk first due to my Osteogenesis Imperfecta and second because of my incompetent cervix (which could possibly be linked in to the OI) so I'm glad that I have the professional backup there if and when I need it. That being said, at my prenatal appointments and everything I see a midwife (all of my prenatal care is through the hospital) which I certainly think is better than seeing the OB at every appointment. My OB is a busy woman who certainly has better things to be doing than seeing me for the basic antenatal appointments where I pee on a stick and have my blood pressure taken.

I'm currently seeing my OB fortnightly (due to my dodgy cervix lol) and I'm glad that I have her on board. Would I much rather that I didn't need to see her at all? Definitely. She's lovely and all and I like her but she's proof that I'm screwed up and sometimes I could do without the reminder *wink*.

Ok so this ended up going on a bit of a tangent, oops, lol.

I'm a natural childbirth supporter because I agree with other natural childbirth supporters that birth has been medicalised to the point where more women and children are harmed than lives are saved. Whether it be physical or mental trauma. I'm a natural childbirth supporter because I believe that women (and their families) should have options available for their care. A one size fits all birthing policy can be detrimental to the health of either mother, child or both.
I, like many of the other natural childbirth supporters that I have come across in my cyber-travels, thoroughly dislike (and some even hate) the phrase "All that matters is a healthy baby" because there is much more at stake than just a healthy baby.