to wonder, where the move towards 'epidurals are wimping out' ideas come from?

[Thurlow]

I very strongly believe that every woman should be encouraged and supported to have the birth that they want, whatever they want to do.

But I've noticed over the past few years - anecdotally, on places like MN - that there is this background belief from some women that other women who have an epidural are somehow 'giving up' or 'not woman enough to cope' or 'not embracing a natural pain'.

Now I really don't care how people give birth, as long as they've been supported by their healthcare professionals to achieve what they want, because all that matters is that the mum and baby are both well. I understand the cascade of intervention that an epidural may bring, and that a pain relief free vaginal birth is probably, on the balance of things, better for both the mum and the baby as long as everything is going well.

But I can't help but wonder how or where the natural birth push has morphed into some people being so anti-epidural for other women, into the sort of judgement that someone women seem to embrace at the moment?

No-one wants needless interventions The thing is Oxford, it used to be that if you were not very determined you would get needless interventions. When I had my first baby in the 80s, things were just beginning to change.

From the 50s onwards women had to contend with just in case obstetrics. Women, who could have coped perfectly well without intervention were routinely forced into having various procedures that they didn't need. It was partly because of this that organisations like the NCT, AIMS and SSHC came in to being. Individuals like Sheila Kitzinger and Janet Balaskas were influential, too.

The pendulum may have swung back too far the other way. It shouldn't be a badge of honour to not have pain relief; it should just be one of the options in the range according to the individual's needs and / or inclinations.

That's really interesting, sonia. Yes, perhaps we're starting to see the pendulum swing too far. The over medicalisolation was too much, and perhaps the great achievement of the natural birth lobby is now going a little away from encouraging an educated choice for women

everyone needs to lobby for THEIR OWN birth experience whatever that is.

if a woman wants to give birth in a wood surrounded by nature while another wants to be given an epidural and watch TV until the pushing stage that should be her choice and noone else's fucking business.

personally I tried 4 times to get a fucking epidural and amazingly each time the doctor was 'busy in casualty'

thing is as a trained nurse I knew that was crap. 😄

You can't possibly fail at giving birth!!! it just happens how it happens.

I know interventions were pushed on women, Sonia, my Mum had them pushed on her when she had us lot. I am so glad that there was a massive Natural Birth Movement, as it has really empowered women and opened the scope for choice (or theoretical choice, as things can go awry, as most of us know too well).

And CHOICE is the operative word. Being forced into an episiotomy just to make things auicker for the staff attending you is bad. But so is being refused an epidural, as thebody just testified.

I think that some people will always feel like they have failed or done things wrong/not as well as others, most of us will be like that over something at some stage in our lives. It could well be that in the past, some women who laboured at home, delivered without problems and didn't have any new-fangled help felt like they'd 'done birth wrong' in similar ways to which some women now feel they have failed if they have drugs or something.

We women are taught to compare and judge ourselves and reach for bullshit invisible standards all the time - I wish we'd stop doing it when it came to giving birth. IMHO, stressing over labour matching up to some ideal you've built up in your head will only make the whole shebang worse, not better. It really is a go with the flow thing, even if that flow means a shitload of drugs and an eventual cs.

I gave birth in the water pool twice and it doesnt hurt much if your in the water. I personally wouldnt have an epidural as I know 2 people who have had them who have had long lasting back problems.

The empowering thing though...don't people think giving birth calmly and without pain is pretty empowering too?

I am waiting for baby no 2 atm. My friend recently told me that her second birth was "empowering" precisely because she had no pain. She had a very traumatic first birth, denied epidural, long labour, no pain relief for stitches either. I know, because I saw her, that she was a mess in the first week after the birth, physically and emotionally wrung-out.

After her second, for which they went private (solely to guarantee an epidural - isn't that an absolute disgrace?) she went home smiling and tells everyone her second birth was brilliant. Calm, reassured, no pain, lots of pressure still felt when it came to pushing and a lovely easy time bfing because she wasn't weeping and shaking with ptsd in the post-natal ward.

I know which I'd find more "empowering".

Agree 100% with soniagluck's post. Being expected to give birth in a certain manner (and yes, my mother had to give birth flat on her back, she had to have certain things foisted on her) is denying people choice.

It should be possible to have choice without being judged for it. And actually, saying 'what's the point of going without pain relief - there are no medals' or that old chestnut 'you wouldn't have a tooth out without pain relief' IS just as judgemental.

I went without epidural not because I enjoy pain but because to me, having a baby is not on a par with medical processes like having a tooth extraction or gallstones removed. It just isn't. And many other women feel the same. I didn't want invasive pain relief for something which to my thinking was not a 'medical event' or an illness.

Now, if other women don't agree, and choose to have an epidural because thats empowering for them, then that's fine. I don't judge them. But it has to work both ways- there needs to be respect for women who go without pain relief. I'm not some sort of masochist and I would choose to be anaesthetised for surgery and other painful medical processes- but I didn't want to for having a baby. And that's okay.

period yes I agree with you totally but still if another woman wants to feel every twang in a woodland setting with a midwife then that's great too.😄

"It really is a go with the flow thing, even if that flow means a shitload of drugs and an eventual cs."

Well - if you're willing to accept that interventions are always unavoidable, you're going to be listened to, and that the care you're going to get is always going to be directed towards giving you the healthiest and easiest to cope with birth. Good luck with that.

"That's really interesting, sonia. Yes, perhaps we're starting to see the pendulum swing too far"

Oh yes - way too far. In the 1950's the c/s rate was 2%. It's now nearly 1 in 3 births, and only a minority of uk mothers have a birth which doesn't involve instruments, episiotomy, augmentation or surgery. 95% of babies nationally are born in obstetric led units. Only 2.7% at home. I wouldn't call that the pendulum swinging too far towards natural birth.

"Anytime I mentioned it to midwives or the NCT lady they weren't against it per se just giving me lots of reasons why it wasn't as brilliant as it sounds and how long my laboutr would be etc etc"

It's their job to tell you of the risks of the treatment. You already knew about the benefit of an epidural: that it takes away pain in labour.

"Without interventions, half of us wouldn't be here, either because we or our own mothers would have died during or after labour, or we'd have died ourselves giving birth."

Even when the c/s rate was 2% in the UK in the 1950's the vast majority of mothers and babies made it through labour in good health.

"I totally agree with the poster who referred to partners/husbands who send emails or FB updates out after the baby is born in which they comment on the mother's lack of drugs as being commendable."

If they believe their wife has gone through 10 types of unpleasantness in labour with the same intention as she had in pregnancy - to avoid exposing her baby to things she believes will harm it (which is most people's motivation for avoiding pain relief - they feel it's better for the baby) then why the hell shouldn't they feel proud of her?

"Can you imagine a woman posting on FB: poor DH has passed a huge gall-stone, took 18 hrs but he didn't take a single aspirin - was beautiful experience, am so proud of him! #herohusbands"

Having pain relief makes no difference to your ability to pass your gallstones, or to the gallstones themselves, as, unlike babies, they're not actually ALIVE. Having pain relief in labour on the other hand CAN make a difference to your ability to get your baby out without needing to have them PULLED or CUT out of you, and CAN make a difference to your baby's condition at birth.

(and before anyone comes on and says epidurals can sometimes resolve a situation where a birth isn't progressing - yes this is true. But usually they hamper the normal physiology of birth, rather than not affecting it at all, or actually improving it. That's not to say they aren't worthwhile or a blessing for some women in some situations).

Sorry to point out the obvious, but that's what it is, the bleeding obvious. Which everyone chooses to ignore with their bandying about of analogies about rotten teeth and operations.

it's not a competition. noone really should care how any one else gives birth but we should all care that every woman gets safe choices for her birth.

Mini, I had to have an epi in the end, even though I had already stated I wanted one, because I had raging pre-eclampsia and had not had any sleep for nearly 3 days when I went into labour, and I couldn't have coped with the pain or given birth without intervention, so yes, it helped, it bloody helped. Giving birth without intervention could have killed me and/or DS, who went into distress in the womb.

Minifingers, are you a midwife? Or an NCT teacher? Why do you seem so aggressively invested in this matter?

It was really horribly unkind of you to use and capitalise the words pulled and cut in your last post. My baby was born by forceps after getting stuck following an agonising and interminable first labour. The suggestion that I did not give birth to him, rather lay passively while he was pulled out has actually brought tears to my eyes.

That's never happened to me on mumsnet before.

I'm too bloody cared to have an epidural!! The whole needles thing freaks me out...

But them I've had it the other way

"Oh that was very dangerous having your baby at home"
" I guess you weighed up the risks?" Worried face
"Omg I cannot believe you did not go to hospital homes births are stupid"

There is no winning the only time I am against an epidural is when people are begging at 1/2cm for one when the hospital would not even admit them as in labour at that stage (only from what I've seen on one born)

I had a friend who had big issues after an epidural and that has also put me off.

Minifingers, I'm also interested if you work in midwifery or teach hypnotherapy or something along those lines?

I couldn't help but notice that you used the word "easiest". Do you realise how critical that work is, that your phrasing implies women shouldn't chose an "easy" way to give birth, that that it copping out somehow?

As I've said many times, I didn't want this to be a simple competition, but a discussion of why and how birth has become so competitive. That would undoubtedly have been a better title for this thread.

Yes, the human body is designed to give birth. Yes, it is a natural process. But that doesn't automatically mean that women should then have no choice when it comes to whether or not they want pain relief. Accepting pain relief when they are, as posters have said, hallucinating with the pain or so exhausted that they know they will have no reserve to push with is a choice women should individually be allowed to make.

In an ideal world, it would be great if there was the money for all women to have a decent and thorough explanation of all the risks involved in using the various forms of pain relief available, and the risks involved in a pain-free birth, and the risks involved in a home birth. Knowing every mother had been well educated should then mean that midwives listen to the mother when they ask for pain relief, knowing that the woman knew the pros and cons of what they were asking for.

And on the caesarian front, does it not occur to you that an increase in emcs's probably has a hell of a lot more to do with improved monitoring of the baby when it is in the womb, allowing healthcare professionals to make a decision about the baby's health that wasn't available to them before, than the use of epidurals? My emcs came about purely because of that. And I'm very relieved about it, because improved monitoring meant that my baby was delivered before she had a chance to become even iller than she already was.

Having had 2 babies 'pulled' out of me with ventouse first time and forceps the second time with only a few puffs of gas and air I would certainly say my body is not designed to give birth. I have never had any desire to push. Stumped the midwives! Thankfully my only goal in labour was not to die or be seriously injured, something which I thankfully managed, unlike my DH's friends' wife who is now braindamaged after suffering a seizure in labour. I think a bit of perspective is needed with birth. Birth is dangerous for humans. Whatever gets you through in one piece, is all that matters. No way is better than another.

Minifingers - it's people like you and attitudes like yours which make me feel like I failed.

I agree, fred, as someone who has had my baby CUT out of me (silly me, I'm sure that it was the epidural that caused DD's bacterial infection to rage out of control, not the long, slow, dehydrated early labour that gave it the time to grow...)

We don't have to justify the decision to have pain relief during delivery. We just don't.

Oh for goodness sake - stop being so over sensitive.

I had my baby 'pulled out' of me following an epidural and it was fucking brutal. That's why I didn't want to risk having it happen again hence not wanting another epidural.

I'm not any sort of birth professional btw, though I have worked as a doula and an MSW and sat as a lay person on an MSLC. I have seen a good number of births, though not as many as a midwife, which is why I haven't yet got blasé about seeing babies removed with instruments. I'm glad we have modern obstetrics and I'm profoundly glad I'll probably never have to know a mum die in childbirth, but I am appalled at the sheer brutality of a lot of hospital births compared to the home births I've witnessed and experienced myself. I know - and the evidence supports my beliefs - that something is happening to women in hospital which makes too many of their births go shit-shaped, and I'm afraid epidural is sometimes part of the problem. Threads like this where someone tries to reduce the complexities of this issue to one of competitive birthing thoroughly piss me off. I think it trivialises the issue.

What about the woman's condition at birth, Minifingers? I notice you haven't referred to my post about the (potentially horrendous) consequences of vaginal birth. I don't think women are fully briefed about those, whereas all the possible downsides of an epidural are dwelt on at length.

And, while I'm here:
"if you're willing to accept that interventions are always unavoidable, you're going to be listened to"

Not the case: 1) I have seen patients ignored and not listened to many, many times - very often no one takes much notice at all of what they want, and 2) if this is true, how come so many women ask for intervention in the form of an epidural and are not listened to, and get fobbed off?

No, but equally we don't have to justify not having pain relief.
It does sometimes seem as though its entirely acceptable to say 'no one would have a tooth out without pain relief', or 'there are no medals for going without it'. These type of comments imply that women who go without are either some sort of masochist, choosing to go through extreme pain just for the hell of it; or that we do it expecting some sort of public recognition. The truth, for some women, is that we view giving birth as wholly different to 'medical' situations. I don't expect every other woman to see it like I do - and that's fine. But some respect the other way round would be good too. You don't need to agree with it, or even understand it- but you can still respect that some women feel very deeply that they want to try to give birth without pain relief

That was in response to brgdl

It's not remotely about trivialising the debate about birth choices.

It's about asking why a woman's birth is seen as something which can be competitively compared.

janey, many women are lucky to even be able to merely want to give birth without intervention. For many, it's not a case of not wanting to try to do without.