Dag, I wish I had read this before. I would have definitely gone down this road. I never had any fear because I married a fearless loving man. It was the doctors that put fear in me and I didn't know any better. How different my experience would have been, how much closer would I have been to my babies, had it not been for the interference of nurses, doctors and other hospital staff relentlessly harassing me with unwelcomed advice and information that I could care less about. Living a life allows you to reflect on the roads that you choose, the wrong roads. Having my babies in a hospital was right up there with the worst mistakes ever made by me.
My baby nearly died at the hands of hospital personnel. I produced no milk so he was put on soy formula that nearly killed him. Home for 6 hours and had to take him back where he suffered thru a spinal tap and another 2 week hospital stay. Then they nicked his testicles which blew up like balloons during a circumcision that I would never have consented to had I known there was no anesthesia nor numbing agent given. How can you cut a new born baby and let him scream into voiceless shock?Then he went back to removed the testicular fluid and the doctor cut his van deferens.
I've been around too long doctor, to believe the medical industry has your health foremost in mind. It is profit driven regardless the outcome to damaged humans. Have we not seen that thru a billion people now dead from the Covid vaccines? You come a little bit late to the party doctor. I will do my own research before I put any trust in an allopaths advice, way the hazards, and come to my own decisions thank you.
Yoho - No, it is not nonsense. You are wrong. This is a wonderful post that should be taught to young teenagers before the medical industry brainwashes them with false propaganda and fear.
However natural, normal and attractive all this may sound, there are certain aspects which need to be addressed before plunging blindfold into this experience. The most important, in my view, is the mental and emotional background of the child-mother-father triangle.
People who are inherently optimistic, future-oriented and self-aware tend to have “easier” life. If they are self-responsible in life, and they do not blame others for anything, good or bad, their rates skyrocket. If they have strong visions of what they want to do with their life, along with plans B, C or “we’ll see, there is always a way”, they will be very successful in everything, and the birth of their child will be just another miracle in their life. People with these characteristics tend to read their environments before entering an unknown ground, so they will naturally meet others, read books, view videos and talk to doctors about their plan. This secondary knowledge is crucial because the childbirth event is completely new to everyone involved. Being aware of the stages and basic needs (for natural, physiological processes) and the preparation of the place will help them eliminate unnecessary worries, hastiness or “where did I put this” stuff.
The central figure of the event is the mother. Her being in control of her own body will determine the final outcome. This means being aware of what is happening, mastering breathwork and following natural instincts of the body at the moment, however weird they may seem at the time. The presence of the father is equally important, despite the growing autonomy and accented “independence” of women.
But the team will only be successful if they are in harmony - resolving any latent or delayed emotional problems long before the birth time is a must. The moment the child appears in this world, the father/man/husband/partner is naturally sliding into the background of the relationship, the process which few men can handle with understanding and without any negative feelings triggered against the woman or the child.
These are not small things. Plus, different countries may have different legal regulations concerning premeditated natural childbirth without the presence of medical personnel. So, there are many angles to it other than the process itself.
I have been blessed to experience this turning point event myself. My view is that every man should have this chance. Once a man is the active part of the childbirth, from the early stage of the relationship, and is doing what typically nurses or doctors do, and is aware of the miracle that is happening, the transformation. This is the time when boys turn into men. No other experience in life will provide this opportunity.
For some reason, medical research won’t look into its own key hazards: the rising incidence of health destruction on many levels, from the alarming autism rates, to the iatrogenicide, or to the nicely reported alarming increase in neurodevelopmental disorders (see the study published a month ago: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laneur/article/PIIS1474-4422(24)00038-3/fulltext).
These hazards are present 24/7 in plain sight and affect practically everybody, from patients to their families and neighbors. Except for denial and avoidance, the healthcare system appears to do nothing about these aspects…
Add the silent approval of the destruction of the nutrition value of food and refusal to regulate health- and life-threatening food adulteration. Potable water contamination, including fluoride - the impact known for one hundred years. GMOs. Many more real hazards are there, neglected, understudied, covered up, omitted.
These are all aspects of human life which are accessible for literally every medical practitioner, regardless of their fields of specialization. Which means that any doctor or nurse could dramatically improve health of inhabitants of local communities with just a few simple recommendations - but there is nobody to tell them to do this. And they are not interested in doing it themselves. Let’s first start with this hazard, because it affects the whole nation.
I don’t think we should prescribe a one-size-fits-all birth environment. If, when you say “the presence of the father is equally important” you just mean that he is somewhere nearby in the home to be available, that’s one thing, but the actual birthing is the mother’s. I birthed 3 children, the second two at home, and the home births went smoothly as I wandered my home on my own going inwards with the deep contractions. I didn’t want anyone (father, midwife) entering my space. Once baby was arriving, I wanted the father and midwives there to welcome him, but I note the author chose to be solo for later briths, so again, no “rules”. I remember Dr. Michel Odent saying he observed the best midwifery practice was to be unobtrusively in a corner (maybe knitting) only “assisting” if wanted, so the mother retained her inward focus on what her body was telling her.
What you are writing about is the perfect approach (I guess), provided that the mother is a highly self-aware person. Then, you are feeling what is needed in the now and I bet the result will be perfect. These days, a 20-year-old of that readiness may be an exception, not the rule, though. Especially with the first child which is more of a social rite of passage into being regarded as a woman on equal terms.
No, I don’t mean throwing the man out there to stroll and wait clueless what is happening. Just the opposite - I mean getting him involved as much as it is possible, and having him being physically very close - if this is agreed between the parents. After WW2, the military was baffled with numerous AWOLs by otherwise obedient and “perfect” soldiers. When they engaged psychologists and did the stats, it turned out that these hardened and trained professionals had pregnant wives. And they were experiencing this period of life in their own way, which was visible in deregulated routines, anxiety, up to leaving their units while on duty (and going back home). After further investigation, psychologists concluded that this cannot be avoided because of the natural and scientifically unexplainable hypersensitivity and intuitive feelings reported in these men. So the military came to know from experience that the pregnancy is not only the mother’s thing - some 70 years ago.
By the way, the medical personnel (in general) love to disrupt family ties and push family members around in order to isolate them from the person who is being attended to. Even for simple wound care. With childbirth they tend to be even more militant, in particular women “protecting” the feminine world from those bad men. A lot of psychology work is needed there. But that’s a slightly different issue.
Personal responsibility where has it gone? Life’s gift usurped by fabricated fear designed by mad men who temporarily placate their fear with ravenous greed when my friend and i were preparing for the birth of our first child in 1969 we consulted with a very nice fellow. A doctor from england who was partnered with a midwife and between them they had experienced over ten thousand births. He had lost one woman to haemorrhage and it had so moved him that he was still dumbstruck. He kept trying to convince us to have the baby in the hospital. When i tried to point out that he couldn’t save that woman’s life even though she was delivering in a hospital he would nod but he never could acknowledge the fact. We are alone and it is beautiful. I only assisted passively and it was beautiful. By our third child, we had the birth scene all cleaned and tidy in two hours and welcomed the grand parents to bring the children to meet their new born brother
Though modern childbirth has been medicalized to the point of lunacy, childbirth is NOT always the sublime experience, free of danger as your idealized picture purports. The terrible things that can and do happen to mothers and babies during childbirth is just a fact. Some births are easy. Some are not. And 19th century graveyards are full of young mothers and their infants to show for it. Signed- a veteran L and D nurse.
I'd want at least a trained Midwife. Uterine tears happen when being alone will not help, the cord, the baby not breathing, or breach. My #2 just slipped into the nurse's hands, he was just over 4 lbs, and she thought he was a preemie. #3 was too big for the birth canal. And each of the two natural deliveries had different times. Different weight gains too. Mom of 4 boys.
Your article seems to have hit a raw nerve with some of your readers. Too bad for I think unassisted birth opportunities can be a great gift for many, especially mother and child. I'm guessing that many who are awake to vaccine harms, as one example, still remain brainwashed and led by fear concerning the overrated merits of a hospital birth.
outstanding work as usual. Thank you. Please take a look at Grant Genereux at ggenereux.blog. He is a civil engineer who realized that vitamin A is fraudulent science and making us all sick when he was sent home to die by his docs.
Also Garrett Smith nutritiondetective.com is a naturopathic doctor in Arizona doing excellent clinical work helping us detox from and avoid further vitamin A poisoning. Amazingly helpful. Garrett is @nutritdetect on twitter and has great threads that explain it easily. Garrett also has a weekly livestream on yotuube on Tuesdays at noon CST. Insightful and genius. A pleasure to get question answered. https://www.youtube.com/@NutritionDetective/streams
LOOK I admire your work but this one is dead wrong. Any student of medical history knows that the greatest improvement in human mortality ever produced by doctor interventions came in obstetrics in the 1950s. We have all benefitted.
So many other “healthcare” treatments admittedly cause more deaths than they prevent or are mistakenly credited with trends they had nothing to do with. Yes, this specialty has gone wrong again and again. They do 3x more c sections and hysterectomies more than the “sweet spot” of the least mortality.
BUT you are throwing the baby out with the bathwater here. This woman should never be given credibility by an interview like this w you. As lame as it is, modern OB care is MUCH safer than these crazy ideas.
The mothers’ spiritual experience during childbirth should never be prioritized over her and her baby’s life and death.
Exactly. I have a niece who INSISTED she not have a cesarean. It “violated” her “birth plan.” The baby arrived vaginally alright, just as she wanted it to- and she’s brain-damaged and will never walk, talk, or participate in any way like a normal child would do, had she allowed her silly doctor to section her. That baby NEEDED help and the medical staff should have been adamant that she be taken by cesarean. Just awful. Thank you, doc, for speaking up. It can be lonely out here.
I agree. There are a lot of false dichotomies in these comments as well. This isn't simply a choice between preposterous, idealistic fluff like "I believe that the knowledge of how to birth babies is within each woman", OR placing your baby's birth completely in the hands of hospitalists. Even if this claimed knowledge of how to birth babies was ever there, it's now been bred out of our cultural lives along with so many other "intuitive" health ideas that were previously passed down through the generations. Most births were mostly fine throughout the millennia, but "mostly fine" includes cases like my father's mother, who was mostly fine with her seven deliveries until she died in the last one because the doctor, who could have saved her, couldn't get his horse and sleigh through the snow to her house in time.
Great post, Childbirth is a natural human instinct that only requires faith in the Creator to offset the poisonous fear that the MD's use to scare people out of their money.
As a layman, it seems the body is a highly complex self-regulating self-healing vital body-mind-spirit entity. It does 99% on automatic pilot (breathing, digesting, temp control, etc). However, giving birth is not an everyday event like breathing - even though one may be free of fear (quite an achievement, but which I'm sure helps reduce pain). Having been at the birth of my two children (in the 1980s), the second was certainly easier than the first, and I was glad an experiened mid-wife was there on both occasions (2nd one a homebirth). Perhaps the presence of a sympathetic under-no-time-pressure professional helped mother & father relax into the process and made it all easier.
To suggest a kind of 'anyone can do this' is a bit like saying 'anyone can play the piano'. Well, some are gifted and have it easy, and others (like myself) struggle for years and plateau out at grade-3.
Without the proper knowledge, even if you were eager for a first baby, you only knew babies were born in hospitals. Yet women have had babies delivered by Firemen, Taxi, Bus drivers, and Police Officers who are barely trained. I read a story about a woman who was so far into labor, that she delivered on her front porch, with a neighbor's assistance. We are not taught the basics of an 'emergency' delivery. Just how they are created. I never feared labor, it was being unprepared. I knew enough to have cord ties, scissors, towels, a blanket, and warm water, but not what to do about the position, cord wrapped around the neck, or a Breach birth. I was not prepared for the 3-day labor, which I suspect was caused by the hospital setting. And finding my mom bleeding out from her third miscarriage.
A lot of it the scare factor comes from the medical schools and communities. As my DIL is 3 weeks from delivery, the Doctor is pushing for a sooner C-Section. She has had hormone issues the whole pregnancy. Some of it is stress-related due to financial issues. I mentioned getting her tubes tied. She said it would mess up my hormones more. She had 2 years of nursing school. I informed her it was only when your ovaries are removed that that happens. The wise course is for her to have her tubes tied. She wants my son to have a vasectomy and added financial issues. Life is uncertain, and rapes happen. This is #2 C-Section.
Women still give unassisted births to this day. And I'm sorry to say some of it is to dispose of the baby. I doubt you can't 'not know' you are pregnant just because you are overweight, babies move a lot, kick, and stretch out too.
And idiot failed nursing student, doesn't comprehend getting her tubes tied just keeps her from getting pregnant again. Most insurance pays for it. It won't mess with her hormones. And if she got raped, not having her tubes tied becomes an issue. VS my son, she is married to getting a Vasectomy, which is an extra bill, they are too poor to pay, and both work low-wage jobs. And live with her dad, in a bad neighborhood. More poor choices. The Pill didn't agree with her, or they couldn't afford it. Give up the Starbucks lifestyle.
On that statement, I agree. I've been through it. My first C was done by my older General Practioner, who was also a surgeon, No issues with it, the OBG on #2 sewed the opening up badly. Causing over 30 years of health issues.
I will be forever grateful that I had a skilled midwife by my side at each of my home births. In both cases, she protected and supported my perineum so I didn't tear, and no stitches were ever needed. She also literally saved my son's life during my second home birth.
From the very beginning, I was deeply committed to natural childbirth. My philosophy had always been to "follow my intuition", "trust the process", and allow the birth to unfold naturally ~ which is exactly why we chose home birth for both of our children in the first place. I did *not* want any invasive medical interventions that would interrupt or interfere with either the birth process or the bonding/breastfeeding process afterward.
However, I knew the birth process could be potentially dangerous, so we chose the most experienced lay midwife we could find (who also had an ob/gyn on standby in case of an emergency) ~ and I'm extremely glad we did.
Both of my births turned out to be excruciatingly painful: each child presented face up (instead of face down), which meant the child's spine was against my spine (instead of my belly) each time the contractions occurred. (This is called "back labor".)
In addition, my second labor lasted 56 hours (from Wednesday morning until late Saturday afternoon) with contractions starting and then stopping again and again. It is important to note this was full labor, with my cervix gradually opening (not merely "false labor" with "Braxton Hicks" contractions), and my midwife regularly checked the fetal heartbeat to make sure my baby was not in distress.
It wasn't until near the very end of this long and belaboured process that my waters finally broke, at which point my midwife immediately reached in and discovered the cord was wrapped around my son's neck.
Without saying a word to either me or my husband about the grave danger my child was in, she put her finger *between* his neck and the cord to protect him, and then whispered to me I had to start pushing HARD ~ no more "going with the flow" or simply "trusting the natural process".
Only after my son was born, did I realize what had happened: he would not be with us today, if she had *not* been there, by my side, to intervene and protect my precious (now brilliant) son during his life-threatening birthing process.
What is missing in this article is the vitally important distinction between:
> the tremendous value of natural childbirth, at home, with appropriately skilled assistance and support and
> unassisted birth, which throws all caution to the wind and risks potentially horrendous consequences for both mother and child.
Dag, I wish I had read this before. I would have definitely gone down this road. I never had any fear because I married a fearless loving man. It was the doctors that put fear in me and I didn't know any better. How different my experience would have been, how much closer would I have been to my babies, had it not been for the interference of nurses, doctors and other hospital staff relentlessly harassing me with unwelcomed advice and information that I could care less about. Living a life allows you to reflect on the roads that you choose, the wrong roads. Having my babies in a hospital was right up there with the worst mistakes ever made by me.
Read my comments and do more research. This post is nonsense
My baby nearly died at the hands of hospital personnel. I produced no milk so he was put on soy formula that nearly killed him. Home for 6 hours and had to take him back where he suffered thru a spinal tap and another 2 week hospital stay. Then they nicked his testicles which blew up like balloons during a circumcision that I would never have consented to had I known there was no anesthesia nor numbing agent given. How can you cut a new born baby and let him scream into voiceless shock?Then he went back to removed the testicular fluid and the doctor cut his van deferens.
I've been around too long doctor, to believe the medical industry has your health foremost in mind. It is profit driven regardless the outcome to damaged humans. Have we not seen that thru a billion people now dead from the Covid vaccines? You come a little bit late to the party doctor. I will do my own research before I put any trust in an allopaths advice, way the hazards, and come to my own decisions thank you.
Yoho - No, it is not nonsense. You are wrong. This is a wonderful post that should be taught to young teenagers before the medical industry brainwashes them with false propaganda and fear.
However natural, normal and attractive all this may sound, there are certain aspects which need to be addressed before plunging blindfold into this experience. The most important, in my view, is the mental and emotional background of the child-mother-father triangle.
People who are inherently optimistic, future-oriented and self-aware tend to have “easier” life. If they are self-responsible in life, and they do not blame others for anything, good or bad, their rates skyrocket. If they have strong visions of what they want to do with their life, along with plans B, C or “we’ll see, there is always a way”, they will be very successful in everything, and the birth of their child will be just another miracle in their life. People with these characteristics tend to read their environments before entering an unknown ground, so they will naturally meet others, read books, view videos and talk to doctors about their plan. This secondary knowledge is crucial because the childbirth event is completely new to everyone involved. Being aware of the stages and basic needs (for natural, physiological processes) and the preparation of the place will help them eliminate unnecessary worries, hastiness or “where did I put this” stuff.
The central figure of the event is the mother. Her being in control of her own body will determine the final outcome. This means being aware of what is happening, mastering breathwork and following natural instincts of the body at the moment, however weird they may seem at the time. The presence of the father is equally important, despite the growing autonomy and accented “independence” of women.
But the team will only be successful if they are in harmony - resolving any latent or delayed emotional problems long before the birth time is a must. The moment the child appears in this world, the father/man/husband/partner is naturally sliding into the background of the relationship, the process which few men can handle with understanding and without any negative feelings triggered against the woman or the child.
These are not small things. Plus, different countries may have different legal regulations concerning premeditated natural childbirth without the presence of medical personnel. So, there are many angles to it other than the process itself.
I have been blessed to experience this turning point event myself. My view is that every man should have this chance. Once a man is the active part of the childbirth, from the early stage of the relationship, and is doing what typically nurses or doctors do, and is aware of the miracle that is happening, the transformation. This is the time when boys turn into men. No other experience in life will provide this opportunity.
This is nonsense against the objective hazards
For some reason, medical research won’t look into its own key hazards: the rising incidence of health destruction on many levels, from the alarming autism rates, to the iatrogenicide, or to the nicely reported alarming increase in neurodevelopmental disorders (see the study published a month ago: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laneur/article/PIIS1474-4422(24)00038-3/fulltext).
These hazards are present 24/7 in plain sight and affect practically everybody, from patients to their families and neighbors. Except for denial and avoidance, the healthcare system appears to do nothing about these aspects…
Add the silent approval of the destruction of the nutrition value of food and refusal to regulate health- and life-threatening food adulteration. Potable water contamination, including fluoride - the impact known for one hundred years. GMOs. Many more real hazards are there, neglected, understudied, covered up, omitted.
These are all aspects of human life which are accessible for literally every medical practitioner, regardless of their fields of specialization. Which means that any doctor or nurse could dramatically improve health of inhabitants of local communities with just a few simple recommendations - but there is nobody to tell them to do this. And they are not interested in doing it themselves. Let’s first start with this hazard, because it affects the whole nation.
I don’t think we should prescribe a one-size-fits-all birth environment. If, when you say “the presence of the father is equally important” you just mean that he is somewhere nearby in the home to be available, that’s one thing, but the actual birthing is the mother’s. I birthed 3 children, the second two at home, and the home births went smoothly as I wandered my home on my own going inwards with the deep contractions. I didn’t want anyone (father, midwife) entering my space. Once baby was arriving, I wanted the father and midwives there to welcome him, but I note the author chose to be solo for later briths, so again, no “rules”. I remember Dr. Michel Odent saying he observed the best midwifery practice was to be unobtrusively in a corner (maybe knitting) only “assisting” if wanted, so the mother retained her inward focus on what her body was telling her.
What you are writing about is the perfect approach (I guess), provided that the mother is a highly self-aware person. Then, you are feeling what is needed in the now and I bet the result will be perfect. These days, a 20-year-old of that readiness may be an exception, not the rule, though. Especially with the first child which is more of a social rite of passage into being regarded as a woman on equal terms.
No, I don’t mean throwing the man out there to stroll and wait clueless what is happening. Just the opposite - I mean getting him involved as much as it is possible, and having him being physically very close - if this is agreed between the parents. After WW2, the military was baffled with numerous AWOLs by otherwise obedient and “perfect” soldiers. When they engaged psychologists and did the stats, it turned out that these hardened and trained professionals had pregnant wives. And they were experiencing this period of life in their own way, which was visible in deregulated routines, anxiety, up to leaving their units while on duty (and going back home). After further investigation, psychologists concluded that this cannot be avoided because of the natural and scientifically unexplainable hypersensitivity and intuitive feelings reported in these men. So the military came to know from experience that the pregnancy is not only the mother’s thing - some 70 years ago.
By the way, the medical personnel (in general) love to disrupt family ties and push family members around in order to isolate them from the person who is being attended to. Even for simple wound care. With childbirth they tend to be even more militant, in particular women “protecting” the feminine world from those bad men. A lot of psychology work is needed there. But that’s a slightly different issue.
Personal responsibility where has it gone? Life’s gift usurped by fabricated fear designed by mad men who temporarily placate their fear with ravenous greed when my friend and i were preparing for the birth of our first child in 1969 we consulted with a very nice fellow. A doctor from england who was partnered with a midwife and between them they had experienced over ten thousand births. He had lost one woman to haemorrhage and it had so moved him that he was still dumbstruck. He kept trying to convince us to have the baby in the hospital. When i tried to point out that he couldn’t save that woman’s life even though she was delivering in a hospital he would nod but he never could acknowledge the fact. We are alone and it is beautiful. I only assisted passively and it was beautiful. By our third child, we had the birth scene all cleaned and tidy in two hours and welcomed the grand parents to bring the children to meet their new born brother
Though modern childbirth has been medicalized to the point of lunacy, childbirth is NOT always the sublime experience, free of danger as your idealized picture purports. The terrible things that can and do happen to mothers and babies during childbirth is just a fact. Some births are easy. Some are not. And 19th century graveyards are full of young mothers and their infants to show for it. Signed- a veteran L and D nurse.
I'd want at least a trained Midwife. Uterine tears happen when being alone will not help, the cord, the baby not breathing, or breach. My #2 just slipped into the nurse's hands, he was just over 4 lbs, and she thought he was a preemie. #3 was too big for the birth canal. And each of the two natural deliveries had different times. Different weight gains too. Mom of 4 boys.
Exactly see my comment below.
Your article seems to have hit a raw nerve with some of your readers. Too bad for I think unassisted birth opportunities can be a great gift for many, especially mother and child. I'm guessing that many who are awake to vaccine harms, as one example, still remain brainwashed and led by fear concerning the overrated merits of a hospital birth.
Great article. Please keep them coming.
I am surprised by the resistance in the comments.
outstanding work as usual. Thank you. Please take a look at Grant Genereux at ggenereux.blog. He is a civil engineer who realized that vitamin A is fraudulent science and making us all sick when he was sent home to die by his docs.
Also Garrett Smith nutritiondetective.com is a naturopathic doctor in Arizona doing excellent clinical work helping us detox from and avoid further vitamin A poisoning. Amazingly helpful. Garrett is @nutritdetect on twitter and has great threads that explain it easily. Garrett also has a weekly livestream on yotuube on Tuesdays at noon CST. Insightful and genius. A pleasure to get question answered. https://www.youtube.com/@NutritionDetective/streams
thank you
great interview. Thank you!
LOOK I admire your work but this one is dead wrong. Any student of medical history knows that the greatest improvement in human mortality ever produced by doctor interventions came in obstetrics in the 1950s. We have all benefitted.
So many other “healthcare” treatments admittedly cause more deaths than they prevent or are mistakenly credited with trends they had nothing to do with. Yes, this specialty has gone wrong again and again. They do 3x more c sections and hysterectomies more than the “sweet spot” of the least mortality.
BUT you are throwing the baby out with the bathwater here. This woman should never be given credibility by an interview like this w you. As lame as it is, modern OB care is MUCH safer than these crazy ideas.
The mothers’ spiritual experience during childbirth should never be prioritized over her and her baby’s life and death.
Exactly. I have a niece who INSISTED she not have a cesarean. It “violated” her “birth plan.” The baby arrived vaginally alright, just as she wanted it to- and she’s brain-damaged and will never walk, talk, or participate in any way like a normal child would do, had she allowed her silly doctor to section her. That baby NEEDED help and the medical staff should have been adamant that she be taken by cesarean. Just awful. Thank you, doc, for speaking up. It can be lonely out here.
I agree. There are a lot of false dichotomies in these comments as well. This isn't simply a choice between preposterous, idealistic fluff like "I believe that the knowledge of how to birth babies is within each woman", OR placing your baby's birth completely in the hands of hospitalists. Even if this claimed knowledge of how to birth babies was ever there, it's now been bred out of our cultural lives along with so many other "intuitive" health ideas that were previously passed down through the generations. Most births were mostly fine throughout the millennia, but "mostly fine" includes cases like my father's mother, who was mostly fine with her seven deliveries until she died in the last one because the doctor, who could have saved her, couldn't get his horse and sleigh through the snow to her house in time.
Great post, Childbirth is a natural human instinct that only requires faith in the Creator to offset the poisonous fear that the MD's use to scare people out of their money.
As a layman, it seems the body is a highly complex self-regulating self-healing vital body-mind-spirit entity. It does 99% on automatic pilot (breathing, digesting, temp control, etc). However, giving birth is not an everyday event like breathing - even though one may be free of fear (quite an achievement, but which I'm sure helps reduce pain). Having been at the birth of my two children (in the 1980s), the second was certainly easier than the first, and I was glad an experiened mid-wife was there on both occasions (2nd one a homebirth). Perhaps the presence of a sympathetic under-no-time-pressure professional helped mother & father relax into the process and made it all easier.
To suggest a kind of 'anyone can do this' is a bit like saying 'anyone can play the piano'. Well, some are gifted and have it easy, and others (like myself) struggle for years and plateau out at grade-3.
Without the proper knowledge, even if you were eager for a first baby, you only knew babies were born in hospitals. Yet women have had babies delivered by Firemen, Taxi, Bus drivers, and Police Officers who are barely trained. I read a story about a woman who was so far into labor, that she delivered on her front porch, with a neighbor's assistance. We are not taught the basics of an 'emergency' delivery. Just how they are created. I never feared labor, it was being unprepared. I knew enough to have cord ties, scissors, towels, a blanket, and warm water, but not what to do about the position, cord wrapped around the neck, or a Breach birth. I was not prepared for the 3-day labor, which I suspect was caused by the hospital setting. And finding my mom bleeding out from her third miscarriage.
A lot of it the scare factor comes from the medical schools and communities. As my DIL is 3 weeks from delivery, the Doctor is pushing for a sooner C-Section. She has had hormone issues the whole pregnancy. Some of it is stress-related due to financial issues. I mentioned getting her tubes tied. She said it would mess up my hormones more. She had 2 years of nursing school. I informed her it was only when your ovaries are removed that that happens. The wise course is for her to have her tubes tied. She wants my son to have a vasectomy and added financial issues. Life is uncertain, and rapes happen. This is #2 C-Section.
Women still give unassisted births to this day. And I'm sorry to say some of it is to dispose of the baby. I doubt you can't 'not know' you are pregnant just because you are overweight, babies move a lot, kick, and stretch out too.
OBGs make so many errors and cause so many issues BUT they are far better at what they do than any commentator here.
And idiot failed nursing student, doesn't comprehend getting her tubes tied just keeps her from getting pregnant again. Most insurance pays for it. It won't mess with her hormones. And if she got raped, not having her tubes tied becomes an issue. VS my son, she is married to getting a Vasectomy, which is an extra bill, they are too poor to pay, and both work low-wage jobs. And live with her dad, in a bad neighborhood. More poor choices. The Pill didn't agree with her, or they couldn't afford it. Give up the Starbucks lifestyle.
On that statement, I agree. I've been through it. My first C was done by my older General Practioner, who was also a surgeon, No issues with it, the OBG on #2 sewed the opening up badly. Causing over 30 years of health issues.
I will be forever grateful that I had a skilled midwife by my side at each of my home births. In both cases, she protected and supported my perineum so I didn't tear, and no stitches were ever needed. She also literally saved my son's life during my second home birth.
From the very beginning, I was deeply committed to natural childbirth. My philosophy had always been to "follow my intuition", "trust the process", and allow the birth to unfold naturally ~ which is exactly why we chose home birth for both of our children in the first place. I did *not* want any invasive medical interventions that would interrupt or interfere with either the birth process or the bonding/breastfeeding process afterward.
However, I knew the birth process could be potentially dangerous, so we chose the most experienced lay midwife we could find (who also had an ob/gyn on standby in case of an emergency) ~ and I'm extremely glad we did.
Both of my births turned out to be excruciatingly painful: each child presented face up (instead of face down), which meant the child's spine was against my spine (instead of my belly) each time the contractions occurred. (This is called "back labor".)
In addition, my second labor lasted 56 hours (from Wednesday morning until late Saturday afternoon) with contractions starting and then stopping again and again. It is important to note this was full labor, with my cervix gradually opening (not merely "false labor" with "Braxton Hicks" contractions), and my midwife regularly checked the fetal heartbeat to make sure my baby was not in distress.
It wasn't until near the very end of this long and belaboured process that my waters finally broke, at which point my midwife immediately reached in and discovered the cord was wrapped around my son's neck.
Without saying a word to either me or my husband about the grave danger my child was in, she put her finger *between* his neck and the cord to protect him, and then whispered to me I had to start pushing HARD ~ no more "going with the flow" or simply "trusting the natural process".
Only after my son was born, did I realize what had happened: he would not be with us today, if she had *not* been there, by my side, to intervene and protect my precious (now brilliant) son during his life-threatening birthing process.
What is missing in this article is the vitally important distinction between:
> the tremendous value of natural childbirth, at home, with appropriately skilled assistance and support and
> unassisted birth, which throws all caution to the wind and risks potentially horrendous consequences for both mother and child.
A lovely and sane approach. I am impressed.