to think the natural birth at all costs ideology is fucking crackers?

[burnagirl]

We have a scandal on our hands. Shrewsbury Maternity Unit.

I couldn't believe what I was reading, but to be honest, I wasn't all that surprised, having had many a run in with the natural birthers/earth mothers in the past.

There is a toxic and insidious ideology permeating the 'birth culture' in the UK. This culture that tells women that our bodies were 'made' to give birth, that our bodies KNOWWWW what to do, that any intervention means failure on our part. That childbirth pain is something to be endured with happiness and joy - I mean, really? Is it some sort of a more 'noble' pain? Something transcendental and sacred and good?

Nah, fuck off with that. You wouldn't have a root canal with no pain relief, so WHY do we fetishise female suffering in childbirth? To me, there's this mile-wide misogynistic miasma around this narrative, probably rooted in religion.

Then there's this totally daft idea of intervention/c-section being a failure. Such bollocks. We don't seem to realise that, from an evolutionary perspective, it isn't even necessary for MOST mothers to survive childbirth. All we need is ENOUGH mothers and babies to survive, so no, our bodies are not sacred temples that somehow magically Know Best.

Can we please do away with the woo around childbirth and just do what needs to be done to ensure that mothers and babies come out of the (let's face it, fucking painful and dangerous) process alive and well, however the hell it happens?

@JassyRadlett I don't really want to quote individuals this time, as this is obviously quite a heated thread and I don't want to seem like I'm targeting individuals! But it is in there. I find it bizarre and simply not true.

I needed my arm to be operated on when I was a child. There was nothing natural at all about the process but I'm obviously very happy and grateful that it was done!

Elc is sold as the worst thing that can happen. It's not.
Having a dying baby wedged half way down your vagina, causing you the pain equivalent of every bone broken in your body, the emotional pain of panic, you may die, your baby may die or be brain-damaged is to me the worst outcome.

I don't really want to quote individuals this time, as this is obviously quite a heated thread and I don't want to seem like I'm targeting individuals! But it is in there. I find it bizarre and simply not true.

Can you tell me the page or the timeframe? Quoting batshit nonsense is fine, stuff needs to be challenged. It is however incredibly hard to engage in meaningful discussion when someone coyly won’t actually tell you what or where they’re paraphrasing, particularly when you’ve been following the thread fairly closely.

What I have seen on this thread is a suggestion that what is called natural birth should perhaps be called something different - I’ve always used ‘vaginal’ for accuracy - because the alternative to ‘natural’ is ‘unnatural’ and several women have said they were made to feel shit about not having achieved the ‘natural’ ideal they felt was pushed at them.

As I’ve said, I may have missed someone saying surgical intervention is natural. I’m sceptical, but hopefully you’ll be able to point me in the right direction.

C-sections are just as natural as NHS vaginal births.

Unless you gave birth in a field, naked with no medical care whatsoever and bit the cord with your teeth? No? Not a natural birth then.

It's bollocks all this.

Living in houses isn't 'natural', posting on here isn't 'natural'.

All utter bull shit.

I’m not convinced people are making the distinction, for some it’s a chance to have a go at anyone who ‘breathes the baby out’ or whatever. The language is fairly telling.

A shame people are using the thread that way as it could be less skewed.

The would you have your dental treatment this way etc stuff is in the same vein. It’s not comparable.

The dentist analogy is an interesting one.

I do have dental treatment (fortunately rarely!) without pain relief. Anaesthetic makes me feel so shocking that I would rather a few moments pain than an extended recovery. That’s absolutely how I feel about c-sections for me.

Fluffy, I’m not sure I agree that it’s just as natural - I think there are questions of degree - but I agree that our modern approximation of ‘natural’ birth has a lot of medical monitoring and support - as an RH- mother with two positive kids I can’t lay claim to an intervention-free birth in any way.

My own view is that if a term is making some women feel shit, we should think of alternatives.

Nobody's having a go at those who choose to breathe the baby out. If that's what you wanna do, that's cool. But consider just how many posters on this thread said they were made to feel ashamed/disappointed for having a section.

People shouldn’t feel ashamed just don’t swing too far the other way with the language and so on.

I’m not convinced people are making the distinction, for some it’s a chance to have a go at anyone who ‘breathes the baby out’ or whatever. The language is fairly telling.

To be frank, I think anyone who tells another woman they definitely either can should ‘breathe the baby out’ deserves to be called out for potentially dangerous claptrap.

Share what worked for you, sure. But I do draw a line where anyone tells anyone else there is one right way to give birth, or that birth is definitely possible one particular way if only you approach it in the right way.

IndellA.

These are the last bastions of archaic care in my view.
Every woman should be allowed an elc if they want and we should all be allowed to choose when we want to die.

Eg... I have a terrible accident... 10%chance of survival I'm a vegetable I want to go.

I'm 75 years old, I have dementia. I can't recognise my family, I don't know where I am. I can't be cured. I want to go!!

@JassyRadlett I was going to go back through the thread for you to find the quotes but @thefluffysideofgrey came and helped me. The bit about 'living in houses' etc made me laugh! I'm not going to post on this thread again because I don't want to get sucked into an online argument but I do wish we could all just agree to disagree and all get along.

‘breath the baby out’ is part of the insults I was referring too. Hence the quote marks. Woo. Batshit. All can bugger off.

True jassy to a point maybe?

It's natural for women in 3rd world countries to die during labour, their babies die... Damage done to both.

Lots of death.
Maybe it's also '' natural '' that humans have evolved and keep evolving and can now safely deliver babies with elc...

I would rather a few moments pain than an extended recovery

I find this fascinating as one of the other baby group mums and I were chatting about this once.

I'd had a failed induction and EMCS, she'd had a 6 hour labour and no pain relief (not by her choice, but that's another story). At about 4 weeks post partum I was back to normal. She was 9 months pp before she felt 'functional' again (her word). She'd had a 3b tear and still isn't fully healed.

Second time around we both went for ELCS.

A vaginal birth doesn't guarantee a short recovery time.

With you 100%

A vaginal birth doesn't guarantee a short recovery time

No of course not, but major abdominal surgery guarantees some recovery time.

Given my health, pregnancy, measures I had chosen to take etc it was an educated choice for me (despite being offered a c-section for baby size/position).

@JassyRadlett

No, there are no degrees because the very idea of 'natural' is so much steaming horse shit.

The idea has fuck all to do with evolution and plenty to do with marketing (natural food, toiletries etc) and down right nasty, moralistic bollocks.

@Dangermouse80 - when you have analgesia in labour, you have to consider the possible effect on the baby and the progress of the labour - so it isn’t as simple an issue as it is with dental analgesia/anaesthesia, where all that matters is that it relieves/prevents the patient’s pain.

Maybe it's also '' natural '' that humans have evolved and keep evolving and can now safely deliver babies with elc...

It’s almost like using an imprecise and value-laden term isn’t necessarily helpful

My idea was that, if I take the analgesia, the baby MIGHT be affected but will survive. And it'll make my experience less agonising. Ergo, worth the risk to me.

I think you're throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

Have you ever heard the phrase cascade of intervention?!

The ideal is to have the best of both worlds: the assumption that in a low risk pregnancy with the right conditions, generally speaking, things will be manageable with gas and air, (and that full on pain relief is likely to inhibit the natural processes of birth and make matters worse unless the timing is spot on), but on the other hand the pain management and medical knowledge is there to intervene if needed.

I think we have to remember that the responses to the reports are now defensive. So "too medicalised" and "natural birth at all costs" will be thrown about.

The likelihood is that the answer will be somewhere in between.

What IS clear is that women were not heard and that's the real issue.

As an ex- midwife I love the straightforward homebirth and hospital birth as much as any other midwife.

However I am realistic enough to know that nature is not ideal and things can go wrong. Technology can be amazing when Mother Nature is being a bitch.

Very wise words, @DuckWillow.

I want to know how many failed inductions are really failed inductions & not because they haven't fitted in with the hospital's time frame? Women should be told that they have the option to refuse to be induced. When I went to hospital I wasn't asked if I wanted to be induced, I was simply told that I was going to be induced. Being a first time mother I didn't know that I had the right to question or refuse any treatment. I also had an epidural, I asked for a mobile epidural but was told that the hospital didn't do them, had I gone to the other hospital in the city, I would have been able to have a mobile epidural. If I had been able to mobilise, the chances of my induction failing would have been less. I felt that all of the birth process was being set up to fail. Nobody at any time took time to explain to me what was happening & why or to speak to me afterwards to go through my notes & explain why I had ended up in high dependency & nearly dying from HELLP within hours of giving birth, the feelings of terror during that first night, I was begging for the nurses to get my husband & parents because I was terrified I would die without seeing them again & them refusing because it wasn't visiting time.