To hate it when midwives say "good girl" when women are giving birth

[thing1andthing2]

I hear it all the time on OBEM and more recently The Midwives. Women are giving it their all, pushing out their babies, and the midwives say "good girl". I know it's supposed to be encouraging, but still, can you imagine a man enduring an invasive procedure and the doctor or nurse reassuring him by saying "good boy, just relax, good boy, you're doing really well"?

I can't.

And if it's not OK to patronise a man this way, how come it's ok to be so patronising to women?

Rant over.

I had a DS in the US and they kept saying 'good job'.

If the midwife were a lot older than me I wouldn't mind called 'good girl'

One called me a 'mighty woman' - I felt great tbh and still remember it 6 years in.. The good girl business is a pile of shit really. Imagine: 'Good boy, lovely vasectomy there'.

Really? You would hate that?

I wouldn't give it a seconds thought.

Strange.

It's funny, I would hate 'mighty woman' with a passion! I'd probably laugh in their face.

thing1andthing2, I have been having the lady v woman debate with my DS (12). I can't explain why I would find someone describing me as 'That woman' more offensive than 'That lady', but I would. I describe myself as a woman rather than a lady though

I wouldn't have minded 'Good girl', there was obviously a very difficult situation going on in the delivery suite next door and the midwife was distracted, she hardly spoke. I still wonder about the poor lady in there, and if everything turned out ok.

Better than 'keeppushingkeeppushingkeeppushingkeeppushingkeeppushingkeeppudhingkeeppushingkeeppushingkeeppushing....andagainandagain'. I get mad just typing it. I should have told her to justfuckoff.

YANBU This is a pet hate of mine. Its very patronising and can be triggering

Also can't stand 'go on, go on, go on' in Mrs Doyle style. Awful.

I agree good girl is patronising, but silly girl is worse.

After stoically, (not too much fuss or pain relief) giving birth when I was 20, I found I couldn't stop crying with relief when DS was born. The midwife said 'Silly girl that was the easy bit - wait till you get him home.'

I wanted to say - 'there is nothing 'girlish' about what my body has just managed to do and definitely nothing 'silly' in crying with absolute relief that it is over and I have a healthy baby - so shut the patronising f..k up' - but obviously I just blubbed loads more instead.

I was in fecking agony, they could have called me anything they wanted as long as they got dd out, quickly!

'disenpowering'

For gods sake not everything is a feminist argument.

Midwife took one look at me with DC1 (I was 20) said, go home you silly girl, you're not having that baby for two weeks. It was great fun walking past her two days later with said baby!

I hate hearing midwives and nurses talk like that and it's very common. It's hard to take them seriously as professionals when they do so - they ought to adopt a more formal way of communicating imo.

OP you should have had my midwife. After one especially painful contraction my DH said 'good girl!' to which I replied f#%k off! Midwife said that she was glad I had said that because if I hadn't she would have

Frances - the job of a midwife is to make a woman comfortable. Whilst I don't like good girl, formal isn't the way to go either. Depends on the woman!

I would have preferred some semblance of niceness as opposed to the cunt I got as a MW.

I really would have rather the midwife didn't say a word during the pushing stage, the whole "push, push, push....." got right on my wick. TBF the midwife was generally great apart from that.

All I can remember was lots of soothing, positive encouragement. I was very grateful.

the MW never had time to put gloves on never mind say anything :)

being called a good girl would of had me in fits of laughter. ( family joke)

I don't really remember them saying much - just 'stop shouting!'. To which I replied 'It's helping!!!!'.

Couldn't give a shit as long as they're good at their job

I put it in my birth plan that I didn't want to be called good girl, and to be fair, none of them did. They probably called me far worse out of earshot

I really never cared if they say things like that, I'm sure they don't mean to annoy you and its intended to be encouraging so I would just take it in the spirit its intended - some people get offended over anything!

I have no idea what was said to me while I was giving birth. I was focusing in DH as everyone else was irritating the hell out of me. If they were rude or dismissive towards me, I'm pretty sure I gave as good as I got...

the doctor said this to me when stitching me up after DS2's birth. DH thought he had said 'you have a girl' and said 'what, it's a girl?' when we knew DS2 was going to be a boy

I liked it, it felt very caring and not the least patronising esp after a quick ventouse labour.