... about "natural birth" and "your body knows what to do"?

[ParsnipsAreTheDevil]

I keep seeing the whole "don't worry your body knows what to do" thing thrown at pregnant women and it was a massive part of the hypnobirthing course I did before
DS was born (he's 2 now). When it came to it it turned out my body didn't have a bloody clue what to do. In labour for 3 days, wasn't dilating, emergency c section and we both got sepsis. Felt like a massive failure afterwards thanks to the massive emphasis on natural birth and my body categorically NOT knowing what to do?

Aibu that what we should be saying to pregnant women is to keep an open mind about birth? I've met a few women since who had very similar experiences to me. Breathe the fecking baby out my arse.

The only thing that works about hypnobirth is calming you down before labour and making you less anxious.

I had excellent one to one MW care with first two was wasn’t anxious and had quick births.

I turned to Cd of hypnobirthing calming because my MWs were a source of stress with third pregnancy. The techniques were really useful when I realised MW weren't even going to try and get to us in time - they'd previously insisted fast labours like my previous never happened and they weren’t listening to us.

With first two labours pain got worse and worse till MW turned up – they didn’t give me anything I think they helped me be less anxious as experts were there. I think the hypnobirthing techniques did similar calmed me down – so I could then cope and get on.

I think for me at least fear mad the pain feel worse.

YANBU about doubting "your body knows what to do".

Every woman and every labour is different - and evolution needs just enough to survive so I'm glas medical science has options to help pg women.

YANBU. I think what’s needed is a more balanced approach. In my experience (gave birth 2 weeks ago) it was just one extreme or the other - either the ‘totally natural, trust your body, everything will be lovely’ nonsense, or the total car crash horror stories of birth were thrust at me. There was no balance that represented how it actually went for me. I gave birth 2 weeks ago, and my body totally didn’t know what to do and would never have birthed ‘naturally’ without total disaster, but thanks to sensible medical intervention, I actually had a pretty ‘good’ experience, pushed my baby out safely and with major damage to me or her, and I don’t feel traumatised or like a failure. I wish I’d known it could go like that!

I also think that there needs to be much more done to prepare partners for the brutal reality of birth. I’m not traumatised by what happened to me, but my incredibly stoic, brave, unshakeable husband definitely is. He was totally unprepared for how it was going to make him feel to stand by and watch the person he loves most in such pain and distress, to fear the loss of one or both of us and to not have any control over the outcome. He was an amazing support to me and I couldn’t have asked for more from him on the day but I had no idea until afterwards what a huge impact it had on him to go through that with us.

*without major damage!

53rd Way:

Weird to hear so many women say they had midwives/doctors deny they were in labour.

My mum was a midwife in the 50s and 60s, and often talked about labours going on for days. When I had DS2, I had very strong 'practice contractions' for 3 days, then my waters broke and the contractions carried on and became labour. When the midwife asked me when contractions started, I said 'Thursday' and she said 'They can't have done, that would mean you'd been in labour 3 days'. I said, 'OK, fine, you can say they started after my waters broke at 7.30 pm yesterday, but I know I've been in labour since Thursday!'

I was also told my waters definitely hadn't broken (they had) I kept telling them they had, it took hours until they believed that I hadn't just peed myself. I mean I actually heard and felt a 'pop' and then a gush of fluid, I really wasn't imagining it 😂

Oh and ds wasn't engaged so waters breaking could have been potentially an emergency. Not the time to disbelieve someone and make them feel silly.

If it wasn't for medical science is have died in childbirth with DD1.
However, by the time I had DD2 my body knew what it was doing and she arrived quickly with minimal damage.
Childbirth is natural, but it is also highly risky. Before modern medicine, it wasn't uncommon for women and babies to die in childbirth. That fact seems to get forgotten a lot!

YANBU OP. Nature may have designed our bodies to give birth they way we do, but nature also does not give a toss if 1/4 of us die in childbirth, as they used to back when we did it the 'natural way'!

Of course the majority of women will be absolutely fine after a natural birth and it is lower risk for most women and babies. But I have found many midwives incredibly patronising and refusing to tell women accurate information on the risks or what to expect during labour. I know that reassuring women will help reduce stress and therefore help prevent problems in labour, but many take it ay too far. I was left feeling like I just didn't trust the people who would be looking after me, which had the opposite effect to what was intended. It made me far more stressed about what to expect.

@PaulHollywoodsSexGut four!?
Not particularly late bakers, my mum was 2 weeks overdue with me but bang on time for my sister. I tend to think it's a combination of my genes, DH's, and just bloody awkward babies! My MIL had a failed induction & c section for her pfb then elective for DH so I turned out more like her funny enough.
Mind you at least I can say I've had 2 babies and never had a contraction

I also experienced a registrar I'd never even met before marching in, informing my partner that 'We'll be taking her down to theatre in a few minutes' and attempting to march out of the room again. I actually said 'Er? Excuse me? I haven't even been asked about this!' She did apologise, sit down and explain that the consultant had looked at my charts, wasn't happy and had decided to offer a section. But I was raging at the time that I seemed to be having one with no discussion, whether I wanted one or not! I can't imagine they'd just announce to a man that he was having an unplanned knee replacement in five minutes without even asking him for consent first...

I’m sat here with my 3 week old baby and can honestly say I loved giving birth.

The reason I loved giving birth is because I had a tens machine, pethidine, gas and air, and an epidural. She was back to back and it took me 2 days to dilate to 3cm. I couldn’t sleep or sit down. I’m glad I took control of the pain as I’m sure I would have ended up with a c section otherwise. The worse part was being at home but once I got to hospital (at only 1cm) they took great care of me.

I think being open minded is the only way to go and I hate that having pain relief or intervention is seen as some sort of failure.

It's interesting to read that so many women with back-to-back babies progressed slowly. It makes me feel better about my own labour.

I wish I could go back in time to when I was in the latent phase, and tell myself that I'd actually find it the hardest part to deal with. The contractions weren't that bad individually, but after 12 hours they were wearing me down and I really wanted pain relief. But the hospital still didn't want me to come in as my contractions were irregular.

Yanbu.
Childbirth fucking hurts- there’s nothing nice and fluffy about it.
BUT I think it’s important not to go to the other extreme and denigrate women who choose to keep things as natural as they can when that’s possible.
I came in for some raised eyebrows from some friends and relatives when I said I was having my first baby in a stand-alone MLU. It was a text book pregnancy, I wasn’t overweight, didn’t smoke... I knew that I didn’t want to be in a medicalised atmosphere, I knew I was prepared to give birth on gas and air with a midwife supporting me. So yes it was natural, but it doesn’t mean I was into fairies, whale music or any other wooo... I just wanted a non medical birth.
Live and let live.

I gave up on midwives rather than natural birth. Between 30 & 38 weeks my MW told me I had gestational Diabetes (wrong), Baby was breech ( no, baby was still turning daily), that I needed a c section (wrong). And she rang me on my due date at 9am just as I’d decided everything was done and I’d put my feet up, to bully me into going for a stretch & sweep to hurry things along. I wasn’t even 10 minutes late ! She’d never had a baby herself and was a complete basket case.
In the end we told her to go away and stop twitching.
My body sort of knew what to do, at least I knew when to go to hospital, with the delivery team providing the necessary extra guidance.

The normal birth rate goes down year on year, even among low risk, healthy women.

What's changing about our bodies?

And why do our bodies seem to know what to do far more often in some birth environments than others?

There's a pathos in the increase in interest and desire for a natural birth among women overwhelmingly birthing within a system of maternity care where ever increasing levels of defensive obstetric practice are making natural birth an absolute rarity. :-(

"I hate that having pain relief or intervention is seen as some sort of failure".

I'm not sure that it is.

Almost everyone has some sort of pain relief in childbirth.

Most women don't consider themselves or others as failures for using it do they?

It was true for me, and I didn't even go to hypnobirthing or have a clue what it was! I loved giving birth and have done it 7 times with another on the way

And no it doesn't get easier every time, although the first time is definitely a bit of a shock!

"because people base many of these ideas on really iffy philosophy with no scientific basis - which is not to say that there are not mistakes & that we should read up (from well sourced research) about choices."

According to NICE - choosing a non-medicalised setting for your birth results in women having much higher rates of straightforward birth.

There's a clear physiological rationale for not exposing women to disruption and stress in labour, and discouraging the sort of births that many women have in a hospital setting - on their backs on an obstetric bed.

And almost nobody says 'natural is always right'. What they say is practices and environments which support the normal physiology of birth can be beneficial for women and babies, and that there can be important benefits to a natural birth if it's achievable for the woman.

My body hadn't a bloody clue! EMCS after dayyyyys of labour and I had sepsis and baby had GBS! Horrendous experience! Can't say I'm having another any time soon!

I definitely think keeping an open mind is very important, you can have your heart set on a particular birth plan but you’ve no way of knowing what will happen. I read lots of birth threads on here when I was pregnant as I felt that way I was prepared for all (or most) eventualities, but other people might not feel the same.
I think “your body will know what to do” could give comfort and confidence to some people but as others have said it just isn’t true for everyone.

According to NICE - choosing a non-medicalised setting for your birth results in women having much higher rates of straightforward birth.

I don’t understand why this is so resisted. It is also science. Along with the statistics that say home birth is as safe as hospital.

I took a really scientific approach to my DS’ birth. I read masses of statistics and papers and ended up with the plan being home birth if all went well and ELCS rather than being induced if he was too late.

It did all go well, I had a great home birth. I absolutely accept I was lucky to not need any interventions but I object to any implication I took a hippy dippy approach. I was most scared (assuming baby fine) of an instrumental birth causing injury/ incontinence. Stats for avoiding this were best for home birth so that’s what I did.

It’s really refreshing to read your post RiddleyW

I got really annoyed with the raised eyebrows I got when I had my first baby in a stand-alone MLU. When I pointed out that the MLU had an exemplary safety record, that no woman was allowed to birth there unless she was low risk, and that I wanted the best chance of a birth without epidural, instrumental delivery etc, they didn’t really know what to say. I really object to the idea that women who make this decision are ridiculed as being ‘hippies’ or what not. For many of us it’s a well thought out, educated decision with a clear evidence base.

With my second child i needed to have a CSection - so I was under consultant care in hospital, no question about it. I was told this was the best outcome for my baby for medical reasons and I wouldn’t have dreamt of arguing. When there are medical reasons a hospital birth is the right place.

Home or MLU birth is extremely safe when You are low risk. And many of us choose that environment precisely because we dont want a hospital atmosphere with anaesthetists and invasive pain relief. Many low risk women would still prefer hospital- either because it makes them personally feel more secure or they want an epidural which can only be administered in hospital. Which is fine. But don’t knock those women who don’t want that

I don't think plying women with falsehoods about "Your body knows what to do" is the only way to go into labour with a calm and positive mindset.

How about "This will be challenging but there are lots of tools available to help me manage it"? Or "I'm in the care of some very capable and well-trained people who will strive to communicate with me as far as possible about any intervention they deem necessary"? Or "There's every chance my labour will go smoothly, but if it doesn't, there are other options to get things moving"?

I don't think we have increasing rates of defensive obstetric practice. Where does that idea come from? On the contrary there are more midwife led units opening and there is much more support these days for non-medical forms of pain relief and other non-medical practices to assist birth such as keeping lighting low and encouraging active positioning, both of which assist the natural process in terms of supporting the right hormones etc to get going. We learn more about the process of childbirth as time goes on and not just more about the risks but more about what makes it more likely to go smoothly.

I do agree there seems to be poor understanding/sympathy about women having a difficult latent stage. I also had that problem. I don't know what my baby's position was, maybe he was back to back, I actually have no idea. I know I didn't sleep for two nights and this made everything incredibly difficult because I was exhausted of course. However I am grateful that I was not "on a clock", I was never given anything to speed up my labour and nor was a c-section suggested. I sometimes see horror expressed at women being "left" to labour for days and days but actually I was okay with this and much happier to do it on my timescale. Neither myself or my baby was in danger (just tired - we both slept for hours after the birth) and it would have been unnecessary to speed up the labour. Perhaps I ought to have been given the option - the option I was given was pethidine, to allow me to rest and recuperate energy before continuing, and I would have taken that had I not been told on admittance to hospital that I was at the "magic" 4cm. If I had been offered oxytocin as an option to speed up labour, I would hope that it would have been presented as an option, and not as a "You must do this".

I think people are maybe too set on how their birth will be

Truth is, there are no rules.

Those people adamant they will do it drug free annoy me just as much as the ones that demand an epidural before they’ve ever experienced labour.

I think we are in way too much of a hurry to accept intervention sometimes, but also not confident enough to say ‘this isn’t right’ at other times.