AIBU to think this was wildly irresponsible?

[LylaLee]

I have a friend, "Ann". We used to be close but lost touch.

She and her partner have a 5 year old and she's just had a new baby.

She had put her 'birth journey' on Facebook. (Text, not video/pictures)

She and her partner have a third person in the relationship, "Carol", a woman who is her partner Bob's girlfriend. It was the three of them in the bedroom. (The 7 y/o was with a nanny in another part of the house).

She wanted a birth with no medical professionals, just the universe, incense etc.

Bob delivered the baby with Carol helping.

They wanted a lotus birth (where you don't cut the umbilical cord). But the placenta was not detaching, so after a few hours after the baby was born, they went to hospital (baby outside the body, placenta inside, umbilical cord still attached.)

None of the three are medical professionals. She's an artist, he's a musician and I don't know what the Carol does but Ann said she'd not a nurse/doctor/midwife when I asked.

There's nothing wrong with having a baby at home. Nothing wrong with the 7 year old being there.

But to have no medical person present is disgusting. She could have died, the baby could have died.

I said congratulations, but I feel disgusted by her selfishness. They could have left the 5 yo motherless.

FFS.

AIBU to be appalled? On mobile so I can't enable voting.

Completely irresponsible. The whole "it's natural, my body will know what to do" crowd seem to forget that childbirth was the biggest killer of women before modern medicine. I am all for birth choices (home birth, midwife led, Caesarian, hospital etc etc) but free birthing is ridiculously dangerous.

And as an aside, i know it was a typo but I love the reference to Carol as "the Carol". Lol.

Intuitively I agree with you...

But within the last week we've been told that 2/3 of maternity units in this country provide dangerously substandard care to women and babies. We talk about "birth choices" but the reality is that women are frequently disenfranchised and mistreated during childbirth. It's not really surprising that some women are so mistrustful that they attempt to take back control by giving birth outside "the system".

@LylaLee you aren't being unreasonable, it sounds like the adults involved were irresponsible. As someone else said it's parents making a choice that suits them rather than their baby, and that isn't a great start for any child. They are only very lucky their baby is ok. And I'm not sure why some folk are jumping on you for daring to anonymously ask something on AIBU when it's exactly what everyone does on AIBU threads the world over.

I suppose that for me a shitty hospital trumps 'Bob and Carol'. Unpleasant/traumatic experience Vs staying alive. The hospital deaths would likely have unfortunately happened to someone staying at home with no medical care.

There's certainly risks with going into hospitals at the moment to give birth.

There are risks to giving birth at home without medical assistance.

Personally I don't have enough medical knowledge and statistics to judge exactly how much the risk increased for Ann.

But as someone else has said, they sought medical assistance when needed and everything seems to have worked out.

Yes, they are lucky it worked out.

It just seems like a massive gamble.

I could shoot a gun at myself and be lucky it wasn't loaded. Is it worth the risk if I'm not actually actively hoping to die.

Most births, especially second + births, don't require medical assistance and aren't going to become emergencies though.
If she was low risk and had a normal first birth it's not a huge gamble.

Have you ever been on AIBU? She's come on to see if she's being unreasonable about her opinion on this situation and to see if others think the same way.

Anecdotally I know someone who's second baby was born at home with very little medical assistance and her baby was born not breathing. He is now very severely disabled. It probably could have been prevented had she been in hospital. It's not ever worth the risk.

Replied to the wrong person 🤦

’women have given birth for millennia’ 🙄

you realise 1 in 10 births the mother died? Not 1 in 10 women. 1 in 10 births. In a time with no birth control. Go back through your family tree and see how many in your family died.

I just love how people paint this rosy picture of yesteryear like humans did so much better and modern times have messed everything up. Couldn’t be further from the truth . At the height of smallpox in some countries children weren’t even counted as members of the family until they had smallpox and survived because so many died.

What actually is the risk though? Nothing in life is risk free, there are risks to pain relief and medical procedures during pregnancy and birth so it's not like you can never take a risk at all.
Planned home births for low risk women have better outcomes than hospital births, so are we saying that any woman choosing unnecessarily to have her baby in an unsafe hospital is taking too much risk?

Anecdotally I know two women who had second babies at home (unplanned) and unassisted and they were both healthy and happy. Anecdotes don't tell us very much.

Im not sure there’s enough information to say whether she was unreasonable or not.

as pointed out, straightforward first birth, textbook pregnancy, then I’m not sure I would be having kittens about it as when they needed medical help it was sought and it worked.

would I take that risk? No. Would I recommend anyone else to do it? No. However, I’ve had five kids and all of mine I needed medical assistance so my view is probably coloured. If someone else has had nothing but positive experiences I can see why you would want that lovely soothing home birth. I would in an ideal world.., but as it will never happen, give me all the drugs and let me enjoy someone else making me tea and toast after 🤣

>What actually is the risk?

Probably about the same as before modern medicine. As pp said there, if was a group of ten pregnant women, one wouldn't survive. I'm not sure the stats for the baby surviving.

^>women have been giving birth for millennia. Yes, and it's been the leading cause of death in women for millennia. Now we survive childbirth and die of cancer, stroke or heart disease instead.

Yea, you could be run over tomorrow, or collapse at home. What is the point of this thread?

Death is inevitable. Make sure you live a great life. All up to you.

Statistics

Well, I'm thinking that if anything went badly wrong they would have called an emergency ambulance? It wouldn't be my choice but if they were my friends I certainly wouldn't feel disgusted by them. Are you actually friends?

As I said, we used to be friends.

So an ambulance takes 5 - 15 minutes to get to you (best case scenario). Do you know how quickly a person can bleed out?

How would they know things were going badly wrong until it was too late? My first was in distress during labour. He was born via c section, within 10 minutes, with me under general anaesthetic. There was no way I’d have known he was in distress if I’d selfishly decided to birth at home with no medical professional present.

I don't see what the problem is actually. What they did was perfectly legal and they did actually seek medical assistance when needed so.... it's not like they continued with the plan at all costs. They went to the hospital when they needed to.

@LylaLee you seem cross....I find it confusing. Getting worked up over relative strangers birth story is not a productive way to spend a Sunday night.

It won't be anything like the same as before modern medicine. We now have better hygiene. better nutrition, better general health, better antenatal care.
The risk of the mother actually not surviving would be very low.

You read stories about investigations and inquiries fairly regularly where hospitals have failed to monitor probably and didn't pick up fetal distress, didn't respond quickly or appropriately due to unsafe staffing levels etc - being in hospital is absolutely no guarantee of safety.

The majority of maternity units in England are inadequate or unsafe - going in to hospital is a risk too.

I am a student midwife and it never ceases to amaze me how quickly and heavily a woman can bleed after birth. She could bleed to death in a matter of minutes without medication and trained staff. I have seen beautiful births with an unresponsive baby, shoulder dystocia, a cord prolapse, a snapped umbilical cord etc. You have to be a special kind of midwife to do home births as the things that can go wrong are literally life threatening to mum and baby. Anybody choosing to do this without a midwife is braver than me!

Thankfully someone talking sense!!

Nobody is dissing home birth per se - it's the fact it wasn't supervised by a medical professional that's shocking and neglectful.

Plus my vag would have sealed tightly with Carol in the equation so there wouldn't have been a baby anyway...