'Free birthing' AIBU to think this woman should not be encouraging people to do this

[WilliowGreen]

In this guardian article this woman boasts about her wonderful birth experience by rejecting all care including scans because "it was not empowering".
Before I had my baby (she is 2 weeks old) I would probably have thought her lack of self awareness was funny. Now it quite irrationally fills me with rage.
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/apr/28/experience-i-had-a-free-birth.

Sorry that was to maisy

Yes increase we are pretty much on the same page

Also people are responsible for themselves and their own decisions.

You can't go blaming other people for everything.

giles She worries me because people like her go online claiming to be natural gurus and people follow and listen to them.

I saw an awful documentary about health vloggers and almost none of the people bringing out these clean living guides have any nutritional qualifications at all. The issue is people sit and watch them and end up acting in accordance with these people.
They showed that young adults were chagumg their eating habits based on it.

My worry is that lasses like this have a following of other women (some may be more like me and interested in green parenting etc, but others will be the sort of conspiracy theorist end and most will be in the middle). They help create an echo chamber where stuff that is at best inaccurate or at worst outright lies.

I can fundamentally take an issue with her choice and accept that she'll do it anyway. But I can't morally get my head around her self publicised lifestyle thing.
(People like that are the reasons that some of my green parenting books have to make it very clear that vaccinations are safe etc.)

But it's their right to follow them.

Millions of people are bombarded daily with all sorts of influences. I get what you are saying I do. But no matter what she says or does she is not holding anyone at gun point.

It is not her fault that people fail to do their own research. That is on the person who decides to do it.

She worries me because people like her go online claiming to be natural gurus and people follow and listen to them.

But not you or me or Giles or anyone else on this thread? Just stupid people.

Most people think it is a good idea to go through pregnancy and childbirth with a degree of medical advice.

FWIW I believe that people do stupid things all the time, myself included. But mostly they already have that idea in their heads in the first place and latch on to other people who have the same views to confirm their own world view.

Why does giving birth have to be some sort of 'experience'?

Why isn't is just producing a baby, everyone's safe, go home.

Why does it have to be some sort of woo, enlightening, enriching experience

The first time I gave birth I had the kind of production line birth that a few posters on here seem to want women to have and it was traumatic as hell. I had no idea what was going on and to be honest it probably created more work for the NHS. I also think it triggered my PND.

My husband and I waited 10 years for our second baby, we had multiple miscarriages and I was taken into a little room about 4 years ago and told that I would never have children and that I was not too old to access IVF.

Two years ago we found out we were expecting and I was determined that the process would be empowering, enriching and enlightening.

I read every book going including a lot of Ina May Gaskin. When we found out that the baby has a high risk of DS etc we took the blood test but refused the medical intervention. I took advice from my NCT counsellor, yoga teacher and other people who would be considered a bit WOO and stood firm against the increasing medicalisation of my pregnancy. We accepted extra scans but turned down an induction and caesarean and fought to give birth on a midwife led ward. In reality my husband and I led most of the process whilst the midwives watched on. I refused to give both lying on a bed attached to machines as the consultant originally wanted. I did consent to checks on my blood pressure, heart beat and blood sugars during the process but in a way that allowed me to be mobile.

Giving birth to me was an experience, and I find it quite strange that other women would want to mock or undermine that. We turned up with our fairy lights, music, bean bags, chants ... even soft furnishings. Using my reading of WOO books I was calm and in control of about 98% of my son's birth and it was a beautiful and moving experience that I would repeat tomorrow. Well I would but on my son'a first birthday I found out that I had cancer and so it is unlikely that I will.

Giving birth in a hospital does not have to be a production line, it is OK to seek alternative methods and to question medical advice that doesn't make you some kind of special snowflake or selfish.

I will never understand why think they are entitled to having 'an experience' while giving birth - let alone a positive/empowered one.

The aim of 'giving birth' is to have a live baby.

It is not about the mother or for the mother.

There was a free birthing/home birthing advocate and campaigner in Australia whose baby died in childbirth (she was five days in labour with no medical attention).

She said that she did not regret it and it was not traumatic because she had done it the way she wanted.

I shit you not.

www.skepticalob.com/2011/02/janet-fraser-dead-baby-not-as-traumatic.html

FWIW I believe that people do stupid things all the time, myself included. But mostly they already have that idea in their heads in the first place and latch on to other people who have the same views to confirm their own world view

Exactly

That's the internet for you. You can find thousands of people who think just like you.

Bit you kinda have to have been looking for them in the process.if you are researching a decent vet in London you aren't going to get some free birthing forum.

An article trapped between dog poo offences in the local woods and the recipe for red velvet cakes is very clearly not some medical fact file.

She's not claiming to be a Dr or a midwife.

And if people found her blog online well they also had access to medical information too.

People need to take responsibility for themselves. If I can walk down the street not karate kicking people after a game of mortal combat so can everyone else.

We seem to blame everyone else for everything. I've watched thirteen seasons of Grey's anatomy. I still wouldn't perform surgery and anyone who does has a very serious issue. We can't censor the world

If we had a properly resourced NHS with sufficient staff to go around with proper training in how to support women, then free-birthing would only seem a viable alternative to the genuinely batshit. And that would be no bad thing.

I think anyone who goes into hospital should have the right to expect an experience that is as good as it can be made. Our present rulers do not agree with me.

The aim of 'giving birth' is to have a live baby.

It is not about the mother or for the mother.

The aim is of course to have a live baby but I disagree that it isn't about the mother. The first time I gave birth it was all about the baby and it was awful. This time we wanted the baby but I was at the centre of the process. I spent those 9 months mentally and physically preparing myself. My body was going to not only produce the baby but also hopefully keep him alive for the next six months.

FWIW I believe that people do stupid things all the time, myself included. But mostly they already have that idea in their heads in the first place and latch on to other people who have the same views to confirm their own world view
Oh I have no doubt that it's confirmation bias.
I guess I just worry that for someone who's had awful experiences of hospitals might read her stuff and think 'oh that's viable and I don't have to see doctors'.
We seem to blame everyone else for everything
It's not so much that I blame her for other people's decisions. I just get very irritated at people setting themselves as some kind of health and lifestyle guru via social media and using it to spread misinformation.

I agree that we can't hold her responsible for other people failing to do proper research.
But it still winds me up and makes me irritated.
People who've done the dieting ones have ended up with lucrative publishing contracts etc which then only given them more apparent legitimacy.
If you look at Hemsley and Hemsley's about page, they make all kinds of claims about being able to help with digestion etc and the at the bottom they have a disclaimer that says they aren't qualified and you shouldn't do any of their stuff unless you've seen a health care expert aka. Buy your lifestyle but we know it's all crap and we don't want to get sued. www.hemsleyandhemsley.com/about-us/

Sorry - personal irritation is lifestyle 'experts' who know sod all.

The aim of 'giving birth' is to have a live baby.

It is not about the mother or for the mother.

Sorry, but I don't know if these two statements are from the same poster.

Separately they are questionable. Coupled, they are chilling.

limited they are from the same poster and said in succession.

I agree, limited, the callousness of saying the mother doesn't matter is absolutely chilling. Human rights don't apply to women having babies, apparently.

Oh yeah. I just noticed Tw1nset. Because the kind of thing Snapcrap describes happens all the time and is completely typical of all women apart from you and me and 'snapcrap*. I shit you not.

I don't understand that train of thought at all.

You can't look after the baby without taking care of the mother.

How do you expect people to consent to anything when they can't trust you.

And who's going to look after the baby when the trauma you have inflicted means that they physically or mentally are unable too.

I will never understand why think they are entitled to having 'an experience' while giving birth - let alone a positive/empowered one

The aim of 'giving birth' is to have a live baby

It is not about the mother or for the mother

you are aware that babies die in hospitals too right? with all the medical stuff, they still die?
As for birth not being about the mother, thank god even the medical profession don't agree with you on that one, jesus wept.

I will never understand why think they are entitled to having 'an experience' while giving birth - let alone a positive/empowered one.

Of course having a baby is an experience. It can be an awful experience or a wonderful experience or anywhere on the spectrum in between but I really don't understand someone saying it isn't an experience at all.

It is not about the mother or for the mother.

Oh dear god. Giving birth is something I did. I laboured. I sweated. I bled/shat out of places I don't want to think about. It was very much about me. Anyone who disputes that can fuck right off.

But the NHS don't agree 'it's not about the mother'... they prioritize keeping mother and baby alive.

What it is not about, is the mother wanting x,y,z and that taking priority if there are more fundamental life saving priorities that the HCP need to focus on

Like it or not people have a right to choose. People will agree or disagree with someone's choices but it's there and thank God it is.i would not want to live somewhere where it wasn't.

Some of the comments on here are incredibly disturbing.

Welcome to mumsnet. Where we will indulge a trigger warning on a pet thread but dismiss a person's right to decide what happens to their body

What it is not about, is the mother wanting x,y,z and that taking priority if there are more fundamental life saving priorities that the HCP need to focus on
Not true. If a baby is deteriorating and 'needs' to be delivered quickly, any mother is absolutely within her rights to refuse ventouse/forceps/emcs on any grounds she wishes.

SecretFreebirther:

I'm sitting here looking at my DD and thinking that anyone who would actually decline an emergency c-section/forceps/ventouse when a medic is telling them their baby is in actual danger, is quite possibly out of their mind. But unless a doctor is prepared to have them committed because they lack capacity, you are of course absolutely right. Just because I would accept any treatment to save my baby (in a heartbeat), doesn't mean that is something I can insist on anyone else doing.