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.

The NHS is not in crisis because women want to make rational choices about their care
The NHS is in crisis as a whole and every small cost effective interventions matter.

People with cancer don't care about women preferring to have c-sections because they don't want to take the small risk of incontinence afterward. Obese people want drugs known to help lose weight paid by the NHS. Everyone wants the NHS to prioritise their own needs. Obstetrics doesn't get a wild card.

Private maternity hospitals do offer elective sections pretty widely! They wouldn't do so if they were massively more dangerous than vaginal birth. They are businesses
Well yes exactly, they are a business. They offer what make customers happier at a higher cost. Win-win! Totally different to the NHS!

Not all women want c- sections. I would absolutely not have wanted a c-section or a medicalised hospital birth as like to make any decisions needed about my body. When I had my 4 DCs I paid for independent midwives (with a very good consultant as backup) because it fitted in better with my (long) working hours and they were all brilliant. No stitches, no fuss and I was able to go out and about with new DCs on the day of their birth. I think that level of care should be available to all women.

Reading this thread it seems to me that a big question arises as to why so many inductions lead to an EMCS? Lack of staffing cannot help though.

@vivainsomnia Your posts are dripping with contempt for women and their safety whilst giving birth. There's really no point in arguing with someone who thinks women should sacrifice good maternity care for the greater good because other people are sick too.

For all the spiteful comments you are spouting about us all being stupid and thinking too highly of ourselves you come across as shortsighted in your rigid views and unable to see the long term effects or costs of them. You don't appear particularly intelligent. But thankfully idiots on MN don't make choices about our health care 😉

I assure you no one is being denied an emergency c section because the theatres are all full of electives. They run a separate elective theatre and keep an emergency theatre with a full emergency team free at all times to ensure this doesn't happen, if staffing levels drop they cancel the electives to protect the emergency provision. Women are denied emergency c sections by gatekeeping midwives which results in deaths like the maternity scandals all over the news. Also, more elective c sections would mean fewer emergencies because they would avert vaginal births that could have gone wrong.

No one is saying c section should be the default. They are saying vaginal birth should not be the default and be forced. Women should be allowed to choose and elective c sections readily available.

Weight loss injections, knee replacements (who needs those!? Just give the entitled money grabbers crutches!!) cataracts (what's the problem!? Just give them blind sticks!) anyone else who won't die immediately or maim an infant through neglect, how about we just sack off all their care to pay for the cancer treatment because how dare they want the best care not just the bare minimum and risk their long term health doing it!?

A reminder of the women who died because of the RCM's obsession with "normal" birth.

@notquiteruralbliss

Wish that I had done the same with mine. It would have been really brilliant to have proper midwife care with my first birth. I had a very nice community midwife and assumed that I would be looked after in hospital and I just didn't realise how dire it would be. I knew of doulas and did some hypnobirthingf, but what I really wanted was medical professionals who were able to guide me through what was best for me.

@Peregrina

I think, partly it is low staffing and partly there's been a de-skilling in midwifery. There's an obsession with uniform protocols and procedures. And clearly a lack of experience.

Midwives follow a protocol that tells them baby should come out in x situation but isn't a total emergency (which might be totally correct), so they start induction. But, for example, if you are 42 weeks (after which stillbirth risk and placenta failure increases, so NHS likes to get baby out) with a baby that is malpositioned, then that might be the reason Labour hasn't started naturally - the baby's head pressing on the right area is generally a trigger for Labour. Community midwives just measure things, there's, IME, no focus on actually trying to help you to get to a natural birth in your midwife appointments. You might even, as I did, have two sweeps, but there's a real lack of interest in what comes next.

You'll be told to stay active, but that is it. I spent weeks on hands and knees, squatting and climbing up and down stairs during the induction process. But only because I thought it might help after having done some prenatal yoga. No midwife interest whatsoever.

When you are induced, there are protocols to follow - they measure everything periodically, there are rules about how long between them breaking your waters and giving birth due to infection risk etc. a junior midwife will supervise this. But few junior midwives have the experience or are empowered enough to understand the process well enough to think outside the process - is the process actually working? Do I need to consider a different approach? What is needed for this to end successfully? So they basically push you to the end of the process, keep testing you and hope for success and bail out if it looks dangerous or if you go too long and have "failed to progress". As the woman, you feel very much like a piece of meat on a conveyor belt, IME. And you are often alone for part of that time.

To give you an example, you get two doses of the gel to bring on labour. You're told to lie down for a bit after it is put in. I stood up after an hour to use the toilet and lots of water ran down my legs onto the floor. My husband called in the junior midwife, who had no idea whether it was my waters or the gel coming out. (It was the gel). She genuinely had no idea. She also had no real thoughts on baby position and stayed long enough to take my vitals and waved me a cheery goodbye for the next 3 hours. Back to all fours or walking around the hospital for me then.

Then you get dilated enough, get to the delivery suite and lo and behold, you have to be monitored so you have to be within a cable width of the bed in a brightly lit room and you can't even stretch to the corner, let along take a bath or anything like that. It is a miserable, terribly designed process.

@lemonstolemonade I only did it the first time because my patronising GP expected me to take time off work for daytime antenatal appointments and the Independent midwives would see me at 8pm. It was so brilliant though that I took the same approach for all my DCs.

Yes, you did fail to provide a source. That's true. But whatever it is, you misunderstood it.

The fact is, you don't know what you're talking about. NICE, who know better than you, disagree with your take. If you're going to make arguments about costs and resources, do them properly instead of making assumptions.

Swallowed the hype of vaginal birth being best. Should not have bothered, hindsight is a beautiful thing. Only had 1 DC as split with their father. But I was adamant that if I ever had another, I'd only have a C-section. Pregnancy was fab, the birthing experience, not so great. I remember a point of making a bet to myself that one day when I die, I bet it will be less painful than this. That you forget the pain is the biggest load of BS ever.

I can tell that you sometimes people do have to wait for emergency c sections even where there is an elective theatre (that not every hospital has btw) as if there is already an emergency case in the emergency theatre, and an elective in the other then the lady needing an emergency section has nowhere to go. The more electives, the more likely this is to happen. As per my early posts, I do not disagree with ELCS but it should not just be routinely offered to everyone. Everyone is entitled to request one, and if your consultant isn't willing to do a maternal request c section then they are obliged to refer you to someone who will. If you have made an informed choice and decide to go for ELCS then great, but when there is a biological process for giving birth, it will always be the default.

I agree @Undkonm Every woman should have the opportunity to have a c-section. So-called 'natural' childbirth is - and always has been - horrific for many women. Very few women have a really easy birth. And the few I know who have done, were early 20s or younger when they gave birth. Millions of women have died in childbirth, and millions of women who survived have been left with life altering injuries.

I know two women late 20s/early 30s right now, (who I'm actually related to;) one's pregnant, one's trying. They are both 100% going for c-sections. (And are both going private.) I also know two women who live in my street in their early 30s - who had elective c-sections. It's much more calm, and less stressful, and a lot less goes wrong IME and IMO.

People say, 'oh, but it's major abdominal surgery.' But the fact is, there's been a lot less damage from c-sections than from actual vaginal birth. (basing this on people I have known over the past 50+ years.)

And I know this is said over and over again on these type of threads, but if men had to have the babies and there was an 'opening' for the baby to come out, you can bet 100% that every last one would have a c-section, because they would not go through the pain and the trauma and the stress of childbirth. (And the nasty after effects and long-lasting damage that is left for some women.)

A traumatic and stressful birth doesn't do the mother any good, (and as I said, childbirth can do damage to the mother - and often does,) and it doesn't do the baby any good either, because they're stressed as well.

I had an emergency c-section with my first baby, after being in labour for 40 hours, (and her not coming out!) and I had the next one by elective c-section because I was advised to because of what happened with the first one. I recovered within a few days both times, and had NO lasting side effects. The scarring is barely visible.

Conversely, many women around me - who had so called a 'natural' birth were suffering for many months after. A few women I know are still suffering several YEARS after, and have a deep depression - and the experience has ruined their life. Every woman should be entitled to demand elective c-sections. Anyone who thinks they shouldn't - has clearly never had a traumatic birth. Even if they have, no-one gets to dictate what other women do. And if they are funding the c-section themselves, it's got fuck-all to do with anyone else.

It's not just about the money, it's about resources required that ultimately means that an essential operation can't take place because space and staff are elsewhere.

I heard juniors being trained throughout my CS.

They need to learn, and not during only emergency circumstances.

Some elective CS's need to happen to reduce risk, those are also precious opportunities for medical staff to learn and practice without being under intense, life or death pressure.

Also you've talked about other specialties; but they wouldn't be using the same staff! Only the anaesthetists would be covering other specialities.

Your posts are dripping with contempt for women and their safety whilst giving birth. There's really no point in arguing with someone who thinks women should sacrifice good maternity care for the greater good because other people are sick too
Your post only confirms my initial post. It's about me, me, and me. You are using typical sensational words. 'Sacrifice'. Expecting women who are at no specific risk to give birth naturally so that resources can be better provided to those who are at risk is NOT a sacrifice. It's about public health care.

You call it contempt to indeed care that those who do NEED surgery should come before those who just want it.

The misinformation on this thread is scary. I posted the NICE document about the comparison between the two interventions and the risks associated with each which is reliable information.

I have absolutely no contempt for women who are told that they have a medical need for a cesarean. I just struggle with anyone who feel that their personal believes, based on incorrect information, who don't care how their choice affect others, they can demand to have what they want.

Sadly, that's what the NHS faces everyday and why employees are leaving in mass. Day after day having to justify their experience and training to patients who argue that they know better and criticise them because they don't get their way.

Also you've talked about other specialties; but they wouldn't be using the same staff! Only the anaesthetists would be covering other specialities
Do you know someone who have waited desperately for an essential intervention, after being in pain for many months, to be told it's been cancelled just before? More often then not, it's not because of the surgeon, but the anaesthetist or the use of the room.

Patients with C-sections also stay longer on hospital. It's again a bed used when it could be offered to another patient.

They need to learn, and not during only emergency circumstances
There are still plenty of elective C-sections that take place for medical reasons rather than just because the patient doesn't want to give birth vaginally.

These arguments really do not hold.

Fine to express an opinion, but the NHS is a service intended to provide essential medical treatment to people that need it. If you want surgery you don't actually need, you have to go private, and that applies to any other type of optional surgery.

Patients with C-sections also stay longer on hospital.

You can get out after 24 hrs.

I did.

Because the ward was so bad.

There are still plenty of elective C-sections that take place for medical reasons rather than just because the patient doesn't want to give birth vaginally.

I doubt there are many women who go for elective c sections simply because they don't want to give birth vaginally, I certainly didn't. There are circumstances between "medical reasons" and can't be arsed giving birth vaginally.

and that applies to any other type of optional surgery

What, like breast implants and gastric bands - both of which have been done on the NHS.

A woman opting for a c-section - which IS allowed on the NHS, and IS offered to women - instead of a vaginal birth - (to save herself damage and stress and trauma and pain,) is not exactly the same as having something like a boob job or a tummy tuck or a nose job! A c-section is not simply 'optional surgery' FFS. What a rude and ignorant thing to say.

I despair for humanity that you and a few other posters on here have this bizarre attitude that opting for a c-section is somehow making women 'precious' and 'entitled.' But hey, it's only wimmin eh? Who cares about the opinions and views of women, and how DARE they want to opt for something that will give them less stress, less pain, and less trauma, and leave them with far less lasting damage from childbirth?! 🙄

Give me strength!

That poster was correct earlier; the contempt and scorn for women - from some posters on this thread is horrific. It's coming either from men, or women who have never had a baby, OR women who were lucky enough to have an 'easy' birth.

I'm all right Jack, pull up the ladder eh?!

I'm sure you do understand that elective in this context DOES NOT mean optional.

A planned C-section is an option for women who need one, yes. It's not offered as a default option because it shouldn't be. A c-section does not save you from damage and stress.

I had an awful labour which ended in an emergency C-section. Attempting a vaginal birth first was the correct option. There was no indication that I would need a C-section prior to labour.

It did not leave me with "far less damage." It was a last resort considering the circumstances.

I'm 61 and have given birth to my two children vaginally. This first child my DD when I was 28. She was inside my womb for two days without amniotic fluid. I felt a tug the Sunday night and a small trickle of water and was in severe pain.My partner called 999 from a phone box cos at that time (33yrs ago we didn't have a landline. Anyway they took me in and the gynecologist came marching down the corridor putting on her white coat and looking angry that we'd got her up as I think she was sleeping in the hospital plus we called 999 which we shouldnt have.. She checked me over and said my waters hadn't broken and i told her that I was in so much pain and since I was booked in for an inducement the following Tuesday could I stay in until Tuesday. She reluctantly agreed. I was in severe pain from Sunday until inducement day on Tuesday and given paracetemol. The day of inducement came and I seen the look of concern on the Gynecologists face and she whispered to another medic that my waters were broken. They couldn't get an epidural in to me fast enough. They don't usually use encourage epidurals. Anyway the labour was horrendous cos my DD was inside me without fluid for 2 days and it made the delivery very dry and painful. DD eventually appeared 25 hours later. Just when she was born they told my partner to leave cos an epileptic mother in labour came in. They all rushed to her which i don't blame them. But they left my DD in a basinette and left me lying bleeding. I didn't get to bond with my DD and it has affected our relationship her whole life so far. When they finally got back to me to stitch me up, they stitched me up wrong and had pull out the old stitches and insert with new ones. I'd lost so much blood DD and myself had to stay in the Maternity ward for 2 weeks until I got my blood transfusion. They were so short staffed that I had to feed DD while I was hooked up to the blood transfusion. The canula came out and sprayed blood everywhere. It was a horrendous birth and my DD was a hard child to cope with she didnt want to go to school, she would say the stitching in her socks were hurting her but i thought it was an excuse. She was also very hyper and wouldnt sleep in her cot or bed as she got older but the GPs just told me to be stricter with her and not give her e numbers. My DS was born eight years later but I couldn't feel anything in my vaginal area as it was numb from the mess they made of the stitching that happened in DDs birth. But he was born without complications and I got to bond with him and the rush of love I felt for him was awesome. My DD had emigrated to Oz from Scotland several years ago with her partner. They split up due to his infidelity. She has been diagnosed with CPSTD and sensory overload ADHD and has Autistic traits. I blame the mistakes that occurred around her birth. And she was telling the truth about the stitching on her socks annoying her as a kid and that she had seperation anxiety and hated leaving me to go to school.. She gets Medicinal Cannabis in Oz as she had became an Australian Citizen and wanted to remain in OZ. Our relationship is non existent as I have Childhood PTSD an awful childhood and we just clash too much. I haven't had sex with my partner since my sin was conceived 25 years ago cos I can't feel anything. (He's the the bio dad to both my kids)Having my DD vaginally has ruined our relationship and If I could go back and had a choice I would have opted for C Section for both births

Your bad experience with a c-section does not negate all the 100s of 1000s of women who have very successful ones.

And it also doesn't mean that other women should not be allowed to choose a c-section if they want one. No-one gets to tell women what is best for them. Nope. Not even other women!

I didn't say my C-section wasn't successful. It was. It's still major surgery and leaves you with a lot of damage. My recovery was faster and easier than most women's recoveries and it was still very hard.

If you have a good reason to need a C-section, you should get one. If you want one for no reason...pay for it.