Dream Birth Location?

[SophieJaneC]

Hello everyone!

I'm an architecture student at Bath University and am currently designing a Birth Centre. I'd be really grateful if anyone has had their baby in a birth centre or is going to, why they chose the birth centre (or Midwife Led Unit) over a hospital or home birth?
Was there a feature that you particularly loved or even hated?
Or if you decided against a Birth Centre, what was your reason?

Basically, if you could design your dream environment to give birth in, what you you pick?? Even if it's on top a mountain in the middle of nowhere, I'd love to hear!

I'm very grateful for any responses!

Thank you

[Prettybaffled]

Peace and love back to you dm

Article sounded interesting but too exhausted/busy dealing with poorly dc to read it! I am sure it will be interesting when I finally get to it.

I think there are many potential mysogeny narratives around birth that I can think of. One is yours and another is banging on about the faultiness of the labouring woman's equipment and using a 'science' largely compiled my male obstetrics Drs to say that the female body can't do x or y eg 25% babies have to be induced to save them or they will die etc etc.

Very happily a signed up feminist but I think the equation is far from simple.

I entirely agree no one should be crowing about their superior birthing. We should all be supporting everyone's choice to do their own thing - twinkly lights in birthing pool for me and elective cs/epidural asap for others.

[ispymincepie]

Finding it pretty interesting how there's an active thread about a BBA (born before arrival of 'professional') and there are pages and pages of 'you hero', 'you did amazing', 'wonderful job' etc....and not a single person telling her to shut up with her perfect birth and that it's all down to luck

[FuckOffDailyMailQuitQuotingMN]

Yes, it's great to see how people are warm and responsive to someone who shares their joy unabashedly, isn't it?

Maybe it's because the OP hasn't adapted the idea of frebirthing as a sanctimonious religious belief that she can bash other women over the head with and tell them they are doing it wrong.

You share your story with joy and happiness, good for you. You share it as a demonstration of how other women fail, shame on you.

[FuckOffDailyMailQuitQuotingMN]

By god, ispy you are so desperate to be the victims here, it's breathtaking.

[ComputerUserNumptyTwit]

The human body is, in comparison to other mammals (including other primates) rubbish at giving birth. Our babies are born really quite prematurely in comparison to other mammal young, because otherwise they simply wouldn't make it out through our narrow hips. It's one of the downsides of being bipeds.

Denying that is pretty misogynistic imo.

[randomsabreuse]

Being bipedal is our main handicap to giving birth easily... well that and the fact that we have to give birth head first rather than arms first so that little bit of extra assistance requires gadgets rather than just a gloved hand pulling gently on a wrist to stop the baby going back in.

In the large quadrupeds the birth canal is much straighter which helps. Because of this and smaller heads relative to bodies 10% of mother's bodyweight is normal...

[FuckOffDailyMailQuitQuotingMN]

This thread is turning into an absurdity if it wasn't already one.

Prettybaffled Yes, I agree entirely that birthing and women's oppression is not simple, I think you will find that if you read the article in the New Statesman that the author also cites feminist writers who describe ultra-medicalised births as being quiitte negative. (I am not sure that she characterises them as misogynistic but misogyny [and worse] is definitely implied if not said overtly).

You say that you are a feminist, I can only assume that this is because you think I am positioning myself as a feminist - I just want to clarify that I am not posting "as a feminist", I am interested in feminism but I wouldn't say that any part of my life is a feminist ideal.

The point is that no matter what space women carve out for themselves in birthing ("natural", medicalised") etc, they are encouraged to fight over the best way to give birth. That in-fighting is pointless, disempowering, fractious, and oppressive. A woman's body isn't public property for everyone to have an opinion on just because she is pregnant!

The most radical position seems to be to allow women to make conscious choices as individuals about their own birthing and support each other in those choices and not glorify our own choice to the detriment of other women - either in medicalised birthing or in freebirthing or the million places in between.

[Prettybaffled]

I agree with your last paragraph entirely. We all need to honour each other's choices. That includes the choice to see birth as an agonising ordeal (which some do) or to see labour itself as a life affirming amazing experience (which for me it was despite all the dramatics with blood!)

I don't think anyone ever encouraged me tacitly or overtly to compete with other women about birth.

I told you I was a feminist to explain that my disagreement about whether a particular mysogenistic narrative was key was not down to a knee jerk of 'there are no mysogeidtic narratives'.

I don't call really find this thread absurd. I think it will actually be useful to op to be able to reflect on how different expectations of and understandings of/wishes for birth are. Op it would be very interesting to hear whether any of this has been of use in your project of attempting the impossible of designing something that would be liked by the majority of birthing mothers.

Good luck with your design op!