Ho hum
I'm an NCT teacher and I've only come across one low risk mum in my class who wanted an elective section. I contacted the supervisor of midwives at our local hospital on her behalf and supported her to get the section that she felt she couldn't do without.
Other than this one person, all the women who pass through my class would generally prefer an unmedicalised birth if this is possible for them and want to know what they can do to give themselves the best chance of achieving this. Most would also prefer not to have more pain relief than they need.
I really can't see what's controversial about this.
Yes - agree that it would be horrendous to not have access to emergency medicine and antenatal care. Interestingly enough though in places like Chad really basic interventions result in huge falls in maternal and infant deaths: just having access to midwifery care makes a big difference, having good nutrition (the high number of obstructed labours women experience in these places have a lot to do with the fact that many women have had rickets in childhood), encouraging women to delay childbirth until they are out of adolescence, and discouraging the practice of infibulation.
On a personal note: I had complicated 2 complicated pregnancies (gestational diabetes, huge baby, cervical suture), followed by complicated/long labours (ds1 - shoulder dystocia, ds2 - 48 hours in active labour), without pain relief, at home.
And actually I do feel my birth experiences have made me a better person. Not better than other people, just better than I was before. I came out of them feeling stronger in myself - that I'd been through a really challenging experience and I'd coped. It's made me less frightened - of everything.
"That's interesting Pruners, because that's how I feel about medicalised birth. It was horrible, but we came through it unscathed and I'm proud of that. I don't think natural birthers have the monopoloy on feeling like that."
No - I agree. My first birth was very medicalised, but I also found it an emotionally satisfying experience in so many ways, even though, looking back, I felt that the inadequate care I'd had caused most of the problems with my labour that I then needed medical help to overcome.
And I still came out of it wanting to avoid having another medicalised birth if I could for the very simple reason that I felt (and feel) that avoidable medicalisation is unhealthy for mothers and for babies.
I do think there is a massive problem with maternity care in the the UK though. Midwives are indoctrinated to promote normal birth (ie, birth without interventions) - but they simply don't have the professional or institutional resources to make it happen for the majority of women for whom it should - theoretically - be possible. Women are being set up for disappointment, and unfortunately it seems to be the NCT that keeps gets scapegoated for it, for daring to raise their expectations in the first place.
"I had a 9lb first baby with no pain relief. Am I smug? No, because I can no longer cough or laugh without risking peeing myself"
Do you think that if you'd had an epidural it would have made it easier for you to get out a 9lbs baby and left you with less pelvic floor damage? I had an epidural + pethidine followed by a forceps birth with my first 9lbs 6oz baby, and I can tell you that peeing myself when I cough is the least of the problems that I've got with my pelvic floor.