She also said to my face that "women like me" cause fear and put people off natural childbirth.
And where does she get this enlightened information from? Which study into fear of childbirth would she like to quote here? What evidence does she have to support her claim? I ask because despite the fact I have been following the subject for a number of years and have heard many a person say this, I've never once found any evidence to actually support this opinion.
What I have seen are studies exploring tokophobia which seem to support a pattern; women with primary tokophobia and women with secondary tokophobia have slightly different patterns as collective groups, but there are clear patterns in terms of their health and experiences.
If it was the case that other women were influenced by other women, then surely there would be these patterns as it would be across the board?
What she is in essence saying is that despite the fact that women who have had traumatic birth previously are more likely to request a CS than when who had a straightforward uncomplicated birth but the reason they do is because other women have put them off natural childbirth. They were incapable of making that decision themselves or drawing on their own first hand experience.
And she is saying that women who have never had a baby before are put off natural childbirth by other women; its not the case that other experiences in life are likely to have affected how they feel about childbirth. Can she explain why they more likely to have experienced sexual abuse, been raped or have a history of mental health issues such as anxiety and depression? Or is this just some odd and strange coincidence?
Instead we have been fed this ideological lie by the pro-natural birth lobby that women are asking for ELCS because of a cultural preference and because we are influenced by the media and other women. We are told to ignore the fact that perhaps these women have been advised by a doctor that, given their feelings and extent to which it is affecting their life and mental wellbeing, that perhaps it would be in their best interests to ELCS, even if they did manage a VB first time round. We are told that they would be empowered by having a successful VB without intervention instead; except of course they can not guarantee how a planned VB will progress as birth is unpredictable however you give birth (this is also true of an ELCS however there are slightly more certainties with an ELCS even if it is a certain intervention).
Its an amazingly patronising and ignorant view to have. Your friend isn't a friend. She a judgmental bitch who is so absorbed by her own ideology that she hasn't a clue how damaging HER views might be to others in denting their self esteem, confidence and well being. Which is somewhat ironic.
Women are all different, and should be supportive of others who are going through what is perhaps the most risky and potentially traumatic event in their lives. We all have different coping strategies and there is no 'right' answer; just the best one for each individual. The people best placed to decide that are the woman themselves and the doctor who knows their full medical history in each case. Judgment and ideology has no place in the good practise of medicine.
Tell her, how ignorant, ironic and damaging her views are to a lot of women, then kick her firmly into touch. You don't need someone like this in your life telling you, you are wrong.