To think free birthing should be entirely banned

Yes. Which is why it probably needs controlling - but I have no idea how you do it without interfering in people's freedom. Education, I suppose.

Well lucky you. Your experience is not a reason to assume that everyone else will be ok should they not choose the interventions.

It's almost like a badge of pride 🙄.
Childbirth in humans is a dangerous thing. Full stop. Always was and always will be.

My grandson was still born and it was entirely preventable. But the FB movement skewed my DIL'd mind beyond rational thought. If she had been on this forum 13 months ago she would have read posts such as yours which would have affirmed her conspiracy theories.

We don't have bodily autonomy. We are humans in a web of relationships and our acts do not affect us alone. We are not islands. But the point is that women who are pregnant need to know the options and that things can go wrong so that they can give informed consent. Some will withhold consent and some of those will have poor outcomes and it's sad - and mainly because they are not aware of the options they have, what is likely to happen, what might happen etc.
I suppose I am against the women who preach natural childbirth and no intervention and lead others into situations that are terrible and life-threatening. They have caused others to err and are therefore culpable and I would like women to be informed enough to recognise when they are being fed dangerous 'information' such as that you can easily deliver a breech baby without intervention. This always needs intervention and midwives are trained in how to manage the event, to say they are unnecessary is a lie.

Yes of course explain it all but what if the woman has been literally brainwashed into believing everyone on the maternity unit at her local hospital is in an Anti Free birth conspiracy against her?
Most ratiomal women will listen.
Those down the FB rabbit hole won't.
Thats why it's described as a Cult.

edit typos

Absolutely not. Where draw the line? Banning home births?! Banning elective c-sections?

Also, not all medical interventions which we supposedly have to give up bodily autonomy for are immediate life and death risks, often it's about balancing risks. An example could be that a baby is known to be breech just before due date. The vaginal breech birth death rate is approximately 2 per 1,000 births (0.2%), a planned C-section death rate is approximately 0.5 per 1,000 births (0.05%). If a mother is properly informed of the risks, she might still choose to attempt vaginal birth, because she has bodily autonomy.

As someone else has pointed out, we need informed consent. So the woman must understand what her choices are and what they mean. Which means explaining childbirth and what can go right and what might go wrong before labour starts. If you know that placenta previa can kill your child or cause serious harm then you won't refuse a caesarian - that's informed consent. No-one is talking of forcing procedures on women. We are talking of explaining why they may be needed and that uninformed 'free birthers' etc are dangerous.

And yet I am alive now because a doctor without my consent (because I was unconscious, which, I think, explains my extreme danger) removed the feotus and placenta from my body whilst I was miscarrying. I woke up during it and it was painful - but I stood a good chance of dying from bleeding out or from septicaemia had he not acted so and had I been conscious I would have consented.

But needing intervention and consenting to it is not ‘giving up your autonomy’ the key bit is you have to give your permission for others to do it, even if it’s a situation you didn’t really want to be in and feel like you ‘have to’ do it to save your own life, you still have to agree and consent, and that’s having autonomy.

Well, that doesn't happen to the vast, vast majority of women because most of them accept intervention if needed (like I did).

It's just pointless (and dangerous) saying women don't have autonomy (they do) and that intervention is sometimes needed (which is obvious). If you wouldn't hold women down and force them, then you are admitting that they do have bodily autonomy because they cannot be forced against their will.

Bodily autonomy is a good thing! In the vast majority of situations women will consent to intervention if needed. In a tiny minority of cases they won't which can (not always) lead to some horrible outcomes but the human right of bodily autonomy is not something that can be sacrificed.

The burning building example is just silly. Only an actively suicidal or psychotic person would refuse to be rescued from a burning building, at which point they wouldn't have capacity to consent. It's not even comparable to the idea of expecting pregnant women to 'get over' the idea of bodily autonomy because she has been told she must have medical intervention even if she wouldn't consent to it.

The rate of stillbirth used to be around 4%, it is now 0.4%.

I say that as someone who refused several medical procedures during my 2 births.

But it doesn't work when you are talking about choices around childbirth which have implications for both mother and child and which may result in one of them dying unnecessarily. Informed consent is needed, but choice is a bit of a luxury

what on earth are you talking about??!
What does informed
consent mean to you, if you want to remove a woman's right to make decisions about her medical care ?

I wholeheartedly agree. It is education that is needed (and in the US proper, free at point of access healthcare instead of the for profit model) and this would help many. Certainly no-one should advocate forcing caesarians, forcepts etc and I do not. Explanation - before the need arises, probably - so that uninformed 'doulas' such as the one mentioned are shown for what they are: ill-informed and ignorant and peddling dangerous nonsense.

On a slightly different note, I saw Gloucester hospital has stopped doing home births as the midwives don’t want to experience a situation like the case a few weeks ago in Manchester where the mum and baby both had totally avoidable deaths.

So really you hold two opposing views at thr same time.

If the mother wants the baby then the baby is another human life and should be protected by law at the expense of the mothers views of how the birth should go.
I.e. the state knows best

If she doesn't then another human life is not involved and the mother can do what she wants regardless of the viability of the foetus. I.e. the mother knows best

It just seems incoherent to me.

No, of course not. That is taking the argument to a ridiculous extreme which no-one would accept. But if you are in protracted labour and won't have forceps or a caesar what is anyone going to do? Do you want to die, have your baby die because you want to exercise your (non-existent at this point) bodily autonomy and not have forceps? How will you feel when you have exercised this right and your baby is either dead or damaged and you also are damaged? You can't sue because it was your choice - and other people had to watch the awful outcome when they could help if you would let them. Sometimes we have to give up this idea we have bodily autonomy for the sake of having a good outcome. Do I refuse to be carried out of a burning building because it infringes my bodily autonomy? No, I do not.

and that is what the focus needs to be on. Not taking away body autonomy, not taking away a woman's right to consent to or decline interventions but warnings about those kinds of doulas and education.

Lets also not forget that yes, whilst forcing someone to be induced or have a c-section or whatever it may be against their will would save a baby in some cases, it's not all necessarly going to be hunky dory afterwards. The woman may feel violated, develop PPD etc holding a woman down against her will and performing a c-section on her can cause a whole load of issues too which shouldn't be minimised.

Alright.

This is my opinion:
When women stop getting elective abortions (where a healthy pregnancy that will carry to term with minimal medical/clinical concern is ended) then I might have a very detailed opinion on the subject of free birthing (it sounds bloody terrible, but c'est la vie (What happened to B*Witched?)/fais ce que tu veux).

Closing statement:
Bring the pile-on if anyone wants, you won't get a response and I will say no more on the matter.

returns to her normal happy demeanor sipping a cuppa

Have a lovely evening!

"We don't have bodily autonomy." 😱Awful. I mean, at a very basic level, if we don't have bodily autonomy, we don't have anything.

@Grammarnut OK, if a woman completely denies the use of forceps, episiotomy, caesarean, induction etc and medics think her baby's life is at risk, what are you actually suggesting? Pin her down and cut her / do it anyway? Is that really what you're saying? What about if the baby's life is only at increased (but not immediate) risk? Say a woman has gone to 42 weeks pregnancy - still pin her down and force her? Don't you think this would actually increase the risk of concealed pregnancies and freebirths?

Two people are involved in a pregnancy. The legal idea that a feotus has not the same rights as the mother works where we are looking at saving the mother's life. Obviously you save the mother. But it doesn't work when you are talking about choices around childbirth which have implications for both mother and child and which may result in one of them dying unnecessarily. Informed consent is needed, but choice is a bit of a luxury when you are in obstructed labour and the choice is life (and a caesarian) or death.
We don't have bodily autonomy. We are humans, linked to other humans and our choices do not just affect ourselves.

One of the examples above, where a woman risked a highly desired baby's life because she became enmeshed in 'free birthing' and would listen to neither her own mother, nor her obstretrician nor midwives, but only to an ill-informed doula is a case in point. She exercised her right to bodily autonomy and no-one could prevent her. The regret that woman must feel and those around her must feel can only be torture - and they are regrets which need not have been brought about had she listened to others and informed herself about the dangers of childbirth - it's natural, yes, but one of its natural outcomes is death of mother or child or both, in some circumstances. Sometimes I wish women would read a bit of social history round childbearing, it might make them understand why we have interventions and how we know they are needed.

Without medical intervention me and and my last DC would probably be dead. Before that I had a birth that was very straightforward, I'm sure we would've been fine without medical intervention. So, I would've continued my family line, preventing extinction, but I'd much rather my older child didn't have to go through the loss of a sibling and growing up without a mother.
On the basis of not needing medical intervention to prevent extinction, would you refuse any medical treatment? Antibiotics, surgery, cancer treatment?

I have a 9 week old DD and did hynobirthing for the (whole 26 hour labour), it was absolutely amazing and I really think it made what could have been a traumatic and scary experience empowering and almost enjoyable. I was in hospital.

However, free birthing is insane to me and borderline neglectful.

True - but when this extends to doing fuck all to help babies who are out of the uterus and failing to breathe on the grounds that they'll work it out for themselves/it'll harm them to try and help, it goes more towards to the intentionally killing entirely separate human beings.

Of course we do.
And as I posted my experience up thread, my DIL DID have the dangers spelt out to her but was so far down the free birth cult mantra (of body autonomy, medical conspiracy theories etc etc) that she walked out of the hospital. Baby died inside her within the following 48 hours.

The point of the article was how it affects those who lose all rational thought (and that can come from fear) and get caught up in a belief system that peddles untruths and false woo woo ideology.
That was my experience and that's how my healthy grandson died.

The Free Birthing Doula wasn't about candles and breathing, she was into hospital conspiracy theories and that natural birth meant zero intervention at any point. And she had the 'power' to persuade my DIL that anything medical was a threat to her safety, her body and her baby.

It’s what I’ve noticed from having a baby. Beforehand it’s all positivity and empowerment with the occasional horror story usually involving a premature baby (who is now fine) or a bit of blood loss , and a glib haha it’s called labour for a reason.
afterwards it’s like you’ve been inducted to a secret club, full of stitches and prolapse and incontinence and indignity, that had you known existed you might have thought twice about wanting to join ,( even if you do now have a whole human who you have some mind bending attachment to )

@puppymaddness we don't have it anyway , we can't really chose a x section without fuss.

And the greatest choice of all ,how we die is also denied to us