AIBU to really hate the term "birth rape"

[laumiere]

It's from this story where a woman is allegedly put under a GA under her will and given an emergency C section. All very unpleasant (although it does throw up the question as to how much we really expect to control a process which at a basic level is still capable of killing us and our babies) but commentators are starting to term it 'birth rape'. As a rape survivor and someone who has supported rape victims as part of my job I am so sick of this term being overused and devalued! (This goes double for the moronic "draping" on FaceBook).

She says that she is still waiting to read her hospital notes, she could have had a drop in bp, a bleed anything could have happened. I doubt they just decided to put her under ga and perform a cs for no reason.

She can't remember holding her baby for the first time, how can she be sure what happened in the moments leading up to the birth. Having a Ga doesn't make you forget holding your baby for the first time. She was probably taking other pain relief as well

She said that no lawyer would take her on as the case is "unwinable", she has also contacted the ACLU and the State Medical Board, neither of whom got back to her. Her statement that only permanent physical damage would result in a significant payout is incorrect. Even if it were true, she would have a case due to scarring which is classed as permanent physical damage.

moomins if you continue to read the coments then she gets her notes and it still does not explain why they performed the c section.

she was labouring fine with no pain relief and planning on using hte pool, you cant do that if you have other drugs and they dont routinely use gas and air in the usa, infact i dont think its allowed in some hospitals! so she hadn had other meds, that is covered later in the comments as well i think.

My ga made me very weird afterwards. I have vague memories when the paed came to see me but bit many. That was a while after I 'came round' so yes ga could prevent her remembering

She had an ifhm due to deceleration of the babys heart so was not labouring fine

Exactly moomin.

YABU as well as misogynistic and sociopathic unless you would also think it was fine for a man to be gassed and given a vasectomy without consent. Which I know you wouldn't, so you're arguing that it's ok for medical professionals to assault women because they are women. Get a fucking grip.

Fucking stupid comparison

Emphatic - thank you.

noone sorry for your loss, I lost a baby at 20 weeks in sept after having an emergancy stitch placed due to ic. Do you mind me asking which stitch you had x

A few things about this story puzzle me. Do we know how long ago it happened? IANAD but I thought GA was now done by intravenous drugs, not the archetypal (and v old fashioned) mask over the face?

Also, as others have pointed out, this apparently happened in the USA. Doctors there would be INSANE to operate in this manner without consent. Juries, not judges, award damages in cases like this (at least that's my understanding), so the medical provider could be on the hook for millions, as well as probably being struck off. Why would they risk it?

It happened last year.

decels on standard FHM can be because the machine is not working right, or not a cause for concer.

her notes do not state that this was why the c/s was called.

as already mentioned, doctors get sued for not doing c/s, not for doing them.

and scalp clips are used much more frequently in the USA - not necessarily a sign it was going wrong.

Endless of course they get sued for doing them. It may be less frequent, but it does happen.

I haven't read the whole thread but I can't believe anyone thinks this woman's experience can be likened to rape.

However unpleasant it must have been for her, ultimately the medical staff wanted to send her home with a healthy baby.

This is ever so slightly different from the intentions of the man who grabbed me in the street, dragged me into a shop doorway, beat the crap out of me and then raped me.

Utterly ridiculous use of the word "rape".

i quote again from Action bias: Doctors and judges exhibit an action-bias towards cesareans. Surgery is considered by the courts to be heroic and the ultimate effort, regardless of the outcome?even death. No one gets sued for doing a cesarean, only for not doing one.(6)

how do you know the intention wasn't just to go home on time?

Meador vs Stahler & Gheridian. In 1993 a woman who consented to CS in the event of an emergency successfully sued on the grounds the CS was unnecessary and caused PTSD. This case is quite famous in the US and is the precedent for the rights of women demanding a VBAC and suing for psychological distress following a unnecessary CS.

obviously not all that influential, given since 1993 it has got even harder for women wanting VBAC and not finding it a supported choice.

and there was the counter case of a woman refusing consent and having her child removed. (her child wasn't in imminent danger at the time this consent was requested IIRC) - more recent too.

shift change is a documented factor in EMCS.

google it.

and in this country only 8% of clus have consultants on-ward for more than 60 hours. far from 24 hour cover - except on-call.

The baby's heart was allready decelerating which is why they used ifhm