Women are encouraged to have vaginal births due to…

[Undkonm]

1. cost
2. because women are not treated like men in terms of pain management

I have read (and also strongly believe) that the nhs encourages vaginal births to save money. A consultant has recently come forward to say exactly this. It is appalling and women are still falling for the narrative that vaginal birth is the only real way to give birth.

Don’t get me wrong, I know there are huge risks with all medical intervention such a c section. But I know so many people who have ended up with an emergency c section and it’s been awful for them. In contrast, those I know (including myself) who elected a c section by choice had a peaceful and largely predictable birth.

This toxic narrative that birth is only birth if you give birth vaginally is another abuse of women. I am glad I had the insight and confidence to push for what was best for me. I know other women who desperately wanted a c section but were pushed around and didn’t get to have it elected.

When will this end? I should add that I also strongly believe women who want vaginal births should be absolutely supported but it should be an active choice to do that, not the expected ‘norm.’

Do others agree? Do you have other thoughts on this? To go one step further I think the abuse of women continues when the baby arrives with huge pressure to breast feed. Just leave women alone to make decisions that are right for THEM.

Vaginal birth is normal. It’s painful but there’s pain relief. It’s comforting k owing it’s something your body is programmed to do so that takes the fear away. It’s meant to happen.

My vaginal births were great. Popped them both out in no time. With my second I was up and in the shower within half an hour and home within 6. I definitely would not have chosen major surgery instead if it was offered.

I had an elective c section. I later found out my 11lbs baby's head would have been too big to fit through my cervix anyway. I wanted a natural birth in the midwife led unit but wasn't allowed because I'd developed pre-eclampsia, my choice was induction or c section, and there was no way in hell I was getting induced! Then the bloody midwife wouldn't let me have the gentle c section I'd asked for either. I wanted them to give him to me and let the umbilical cord go white before they clamped it, and let me see what was going on, and I wanted to keep my placenta.

I think women should be allowed to choose what they want for themselves. I've heard enough terrible things about giving birth, I did a hypnobirthing course to try and get through labour and didn't really need it. I think birth is over medicalised enough.

I had a planned c section with no issues and easy recovery and my sister had a vaginal birth with severe tears and couldn't go to the toilet for months without numbing creams or sit down properly for months.

C sections are better for mum and better for baby.

Unless the reality is not that simple.

But that’s exactly my point - we don’t have accurate statistics.

Home birth carries a greater risk that medical attention won’t be there in time. It’s all swings and roundabouts.

@Peregrina my home birth became my emergency c-section, after two previous births, the latter of which was the most straight forward vaginal birth, assisted by an absolutely amazing Midwife, I was deemed low risk.
I had one proviso and that was if the midwife wasn't happy at any point during delivery, then I would move to hospital care. As it was, she ended up needing to ring 999, after a fairly standard labour, I was 8cm when I transferred to hospital, but my pesky cervix wasn't going to move any further than that, come hell or high water, DC was distressed so into theatre I went. A selection of the best anesthetics and a short snooze later, and DC and I were alive and well. Not the lovely, relaxed birth I was expecting but the outcome was the same, Mother and child, alive and well
The after care left a lot to be desired, if this had been my first, I think I would have been emotionally scarred, but given it was my third, I just wanted to get home as soon as possible.

This, and all the complications that come with stressful, sometimes life-threatening emergency c-section situations.

The pressure on women to give birth vaginally when they are either terrified of it or have good health reasons not to is nothing more than hatred of women.

Agree in UK there is almost “brainwashing” beliefs that c-section is bad, no bonding, bad for baby . unhealthy … that it’s against nature. It’s wrong & and never needed.

I had medically required c-section .. breach baby . So many women have told me that it was unnecessary, baby could so easily been turned around, “Mother Nature” would have fixed baby at last moment for natural birth. It’s like listening to a crazy person in a cult.

Second baby, 2weeks early c-section because i was very ill and deemed medically required. Dr during c-section said “lucky having this c-section, cord around baby’s neck”. Again, women telling me “Mother Nature” would have made the cord unwrap. You didn’t need c-section! Where I felt so relieved that baby didn’t suffer from my illness & the cord didn’t strangle baby.

I have concluded that there is crazy hate happening in UK in regards to women vilifying other women for c-sections. No reason or logic can convince that c-section is ok.
Fact I need to defend myself for medically required c-sections is insane. It’s so unimportant once you have the baby in your arms, safe and well.

The threshold for going to c section should be lower. I know too many women forced to endure 3+ day labours that all ended in traumatic interventions and significant damage to mum and/or baby. It is major abdominal surgery so of course vaginal delivery should always be encouraged, but at what cost when it goes wrong?

That great for you, but I think it's made you deaf to the larger picture here which is pressuring women to have vaginal births when they don't want to have them, often for good reason.

@pointedlypointless my first baby died in childbirth due to a cord accident. Anyone who suggested to me in my subsequent pregnancies (with planned sections) that mother nature always knows best was told to fuck off.

Forgot to add ! And physically, my emergency c-section was a lot easier to recover from than my intervention vaginal birth by a wide margin. Once the catheter fell out ( someone forgot to inflate the balloon ) and the wound dressing fell off and I had had a poo, DC was discharged from SCBU, I was out of there ! two days earlier than the vaginal intervention birth

I had an elective CS after a textbook first pregnancy and 'natural' delivery which ended tragically. My baby died in the final stages of labour, which was a truly horrific experience including ineffective pain relief, manual breaking of my waters, episiotomy and high forceps delivery. (The last was the worst pain I have ever experienced.)
For pregnancy no.2 I was extremely worried, I was in low grade labour for about 40 hours. When the consultant came to see me and asked how I was I said 'exhausted and apprehensive.' He was concerned and arranged the CS which was done that evening. DS was born around 9 pm.
They got me up the next morning and I carried DS (just under 10lb) down the corridor and back. I had already breastfed him.
Perhaps I was lucky but the aftermath of the CS was better than the vaginal delivery with the rushed and clumsy episiotomy, use of forceps which resulted in bruising++ on my notes, and a long term anal fissure.
My CS scar healed well and I was almost back to normal in about two weeks.
DS and I bonded so quickly too -- due in part to lack of trauma for me, I firmly believe.

This.

I had very fast labours- didn't have adequate pain management for either and for my second was actually sent home, despite begging them to let me stay because my first labour had been so fast (don't remember either of my waters breaking). As a result, my second baby was born in a car. Probably would've happened with my first if I hadn't lived so far from the hospital. The midwife had the cheek to tell me with my second if I wanted any more I should have a home birth. I never wanted a bloody home birth, I just wanted to be listened to.

@pointedlypointless I agree. There is a religiosity about it.

It reminds me of two creative / hippy women online that I follow that were pregnant, and in the lead-up to their pregnancies were posting all kinds of things about the medicalisation of birth, how it's related to patriarchy, how caesarians are about the medical establishment having control. These were U.K women which makes those posts not as relevant as they might be in the U.S. Their posts were featuring things about essential oils, chakras, breathwork, that sort of crowd.

Both wanted homebirth, which they ended up having. In both cases, they were rushed to hospital. In the first case, it was actually quite serious and she and the baby could have died by the sound of it if they couldn't have got there in time. She didn't post about that for a while, but it took her time to get over the shock of the experience.

Even though I'm sure plenty of vaginal births can go well, I hold these type of women responsible for spreading the idea that vaginal births are mostly & light, whilst not acknowledging the risks enough.

I suppose it's a bit like the vaginal birth thing - even if women and babies died in the past, if they didn't have bodies well designed for birthing or breastfeeding, there have probably been enough generations now that people with bodies not well adapted to birthing or breastfeeding are back in the genepool.

Also, the later in life a woman has her first child, the less likely she will be to produce enough milk. So women who may have been genetically able to produce enough milk in her twenties, may not be able to if she has her children in her 40s, which of course is more common now.

You have already mentioned archaeological remains of very early bottles, wet nurses etc. The book "Milk" by Joanna Wolfarth is an interesting read btw, for a look at societies where NO-ONE breastfed, amongst other things. There's no reason their decendents must be able to bf.

So although I agree, milk formula companies do advertise and will have stopped some women from breastfeeding, who otherwise would have been able to breastfeed, it doesn't follow that "most women are able to breastfeed". I have been to lots and lots of breastfeeding support groups, with women desperate to do so, doing all the "right" things, who absolutely did not make enough milk, after weeks or months of trying. Very, very sad to see.

I'm so sorry for your experience :(

Unrelated to your exact situation, but it really fucks me off when I hear of women who've had traumatic first birth being pressured to have a vaginal birth again for their second. It's fucking misogyny.

💯 agree

Against medical advice? If the medical staff advise for a reason, why would you not take the advice?

Perhaps it depends on where you live. There was some concern with our local hospital pushing C Sections especially if they thought birth would be near the weekend. C sections are fairly major surgery with all the attendant risks.

I also hate the induction shaming that goes on especially from the likes of NCT. My NCT leader ran a whole session on the cascade of intervention without giving any actual information on what an induction involves. In some cases induction is necessary. I had an IUGR baby who needed to be induced and felt ashamed of it.

Is the shortage of midwives because it's a degree level course now?

Why is the 'medical advice' to book an induction for if you get to 40 weeks? What's the medical reason? I went to 42.5 weeks and went into labour naturally. They suggested induction at 39 weeks but gave me no 'medical' reason for this.

An obstetricians need to have his ruling over my birth almost cost me and my baby our lives. He was absolutely against a C-section and completely disregarded my cardiologists advice. Cat 1 C-section and a whole lot of trauma followed.

I then had the most perfect planned C-section with my second and it was amazing.

My third, although it was emergency and microprem delivery was also as relaxed as it could be, even with the chaos going on. That was all because the Doctors actually listened. I got upstairs to the ward and was abandoned by the midwives though. I had to walk almost 15 minutes to our nicu as it was restricted visits due to Covid and was told paracetamol for my pain relief. Eventually a Doctor in nicu raised concerns and I was allowed to use the lift saving 10 minutes of the walk and was prescribed oral morph.

For what it’s worth, I would’ve loved to have had a vaginal birth but my heart wouldn’t have handled it, which was proven by my first baby and failed induction leading to the C-section.