To ask if you free birthed?

[36weeks4days]

I am 36 weeks pregnant and planning on a hospital birth I am hoping for as natural as possible with as little intervention as possible

my friend was discussing her labour plans she is considering a free birth. She birthed at home last time.

AIBU to ask if you have ever free birthed? Why you chose that and how it went?

I don't know anybody IRL who has had one, she is due after I've had my son so won't be able to use her experience but my mind is now wondering whether it's something to explore.

Personally I don’t get the movement at all. It glorifies some aspects of birth while sweeping the huge dangers under the rug entirely.

I don't know anyone who has done it intentionally. I know a few people who had BBA babies, mostly on the way to the hospital, and luckily no major complications.

I also know a few people who would have died, or their babies died, if they HAD done it..

I think the reason we have had midwives throughout history is that you need someone to help you through the birth. We clearly are not designed to birth alone. Then there’s the safety aspect.

Nope. Incredibly unsafe. Especially if it’s you first.

home birth if you want, but you need at least a midwife should anything go wrong and you need assistance.

No, because I would value the life of my baby more than the need to have some wanky free birth.

I had a home birth with no pain relief except for gas for DC2 and the previous one was in hospital with just gas so I have had uncomplicated births - and I still wouldn’t consider such madness.

Edited to add that I live less than 10 min drive from my local hospital but that 10 mins could be the difference between life, death or significant disability.

Fuck no

Any sane woman who cares about the wellbeing of her baby would not even contemplate free birth.

Please don't do it. I know someone who very nearly died giving birth and they were in their twenties and it was a low risk pregnancy so very out of the blue complications. She was in hospital and it was touch and go but thankfully all ok. She would certainly have died 'free birthing'.

Dh is a paramedic and has delivered his share of babies and trust me things can and do go wrong.

Yes it could all be fine (I had 2 textbook deliveries) but 'could' is the key word here. Why risk the safety of your life / baby's life unnecessarily? It's not worth it.

Everyone hopes for a nice easy natural birth with as little intervention as possible but the reality is not everyone gets that. I think free birthing in this day and age is ridiculous and selfish, you or your baby could die needlessly. Is that a risk you want to take?

Only by mistake and that was with DH present and he is a medic and delivered several babies previously.
Though it all worked out fine it could have been a disaster if things had gone wrong even with his knowledge.

No, because while modern medicine has many many flaws, controversies and problems in how we manage childbirth, the mortality statistics for births with no medical support are pretty bloody awful.

My son would be dead if I did this. He had to be intubated and resuscitated as soon as he was born. Totally normal low risk pregnancy.

I've had 3 babies. 2 were born with the cord loosely around their neck. So grateful to have been in hospital.

It’s one of the most selfish things a woman can do. There’s a pretty high chance everything will be fine, but anyone who knows anything about the ‘women dying in childbirth’ stats from history could tell you that without medical attention, the chance of death for mother and/or baby is also fairly likely.

This.

I’d be dead.

Both my children would almost definitely have died without intervention. I might have died too during the first birth.

I have some criticisms about the sequence of interventions we had, but if we'd had none it would have had a tragic ending.

I'm so glad to be alive. I think about how I and my kids escaped death, quite often.

Why don’t you have a natural wisdom tooth removal first and see how it goes and then think about maybe doing it

Do you actually mean free birth (no one accompanying you), or home birth (midwife with you throughout).

No. It's dangerous and stupid.

I'm a huge advocate for hands off birth, for home birth, for intervention-free birth etc. But free birth is nothing to aspire to. It is birth without a medical professional present and that's not a sensible choice.

Medical professionals are not the enemy. They will do their best to give you the birth you want, but they are trained to see issues and to provide essential care. Why would you not want that?

Did I heck. I needed an episiotomy and forceps so if I'd free birthed DS would likely be dead and so might I.

Not much point making a plan for birth IMO as it's something you can't plan.

My son wouldn’t be here if I had. It’s a crazy movement.

Depends on what value you place on both mum and babe being alive and well at the end of it. If you aren’t too fussed then try it out.

People want to do these things because they think it's trendy. It's incredibly irresponsible. Don't risk your health and your baby's for Facebook likes ffs.

This

Doing this on purpose is not a flying start to great motherhood is it.

Women have birthed babies with no medically qualified person present since humans emerged. What do you reckon the infant and/or maternal death rate was like 200, 1000 or 10000 years ago...? Even then, there have always been midwives with some experience to help, we are not designed to birth alone. I'd say your friend is deeply irresponsible, and maybe a bit dim?