Does Refusing a C-Section = Child Abuse?

[ProfessorLaytonIsMyLoveSlave]

See article here.

This is just shocking.

Bloody hell what a mess.

That's actually made me cry.

It is hardly surprising if a labouring woman, whose body is engaged in trying to produce and protect a baby, would become assertive when challenged. How sad is it that this woman's doctors and the courts failed to understand that.

It certainly highlights the over-medicalisation (??) of births in the US. I always thought it odd that on TV women were shown to have an epidural at basically the first contraction, and thought it was just for the tv (and could be in some cases) but knew there was a higher intervention rate over there anyway. This shows that women are having their choices dramatically taken away. WHY would you consent to a csection before it is necessary. That just opens the doors to intervention where it is not necessary, at the will of the doctors, preying on women who think they 'cant take anymore' who CAN actually have the birth they want but are not in a state of mind to contradict the doctors. (does that make sense?) It will also increase the rate of women feeling bad about not having the birth they want as they were pushed into something they didnt want.

How sad for the family involved.

Good grief these doogooders are turning the place into a fascist state. A womens body is her own and a child is not a child until it is born and taken its first breath.

Thank the lord the court actually overturned that decision. Given the fact that some courts have found in the favour of a person who put their new Winnebago on cruise control and went into the back to make a coffee, crashed and sue the maker and the women who sued a shop because she fell over her own child and won, it could have gone the other way.

I guess that any woman who has been told her newborn child is to be removed from her immediatly for whatever reason, is prone to show chaotic and aggressive behaviour. It would be unnatural not to.

I'm shocked at the swift decision to remove the child, are there any other facts that are not reflected on the the story?

Quite Orangerie. I actually snarled at my FIL when he jokingly suggested he was taking my 24 hour old DD1 with him when he left. I couldn't help it.

I had heard about blanket consents being signed in US hospitals, but it is just ridiculous. Obviously it is to standardise procedures and reduce litigation, but to go into hospital to have a baby knowing that you are signed up for cannula insertion, pitocin, ARM, CFM, episiotomy at the doctor's whim, and that you have an even chance of an emcs is pretty unpleasant. I don't really see how blanket consents can be considered informed unless the doctor comes and takes you through the whole thing in a detailed (and time-consuming) way.

A friend also commented "the real issue, it seems, is how powerless women with a history of mental illness are treated. It seems that any means necessary would/could be used if you have a little crazy in your background and piss off the staff."

One factor that the hospital might be considering is that once the doings have hit the fan and an emergency C-section is medically indicated, the consent taken at that time isn't worth the paper it is printed on. Very hurried, people putting drips in you, wheeling you to theatre, woman in pain. The whole consent thing (understand information given, process and communicate decision) is hardly perfect in these circumstances, maybe why they go through it all earlier whist everything is OK.

Not sure of legal implications in this country if a medically justified c-section is refused. In the emergency situation, it might be that unless the woman can communicate that she has understood and processed the information given and still decided against c-section, she'd get one anyway, as she'd be deemed incompetent to make that decision. Rather than looking at the mental health history, this is probably what they would do.

All far from ideal, really.

That is a reasonable point, smuggins, but the risks of having all those things pre-consented at the start of labour outweigh the potential benefits, in my opinion as a woman who has given birth three times (all long labours which would undoubtedly have been heavily medicalised had I been in that hospital) and an operating theatre nurse. It would take away any control a woman might have over her own labour - and that is a huge retrograde step.

My first labour lasted 37.75 hours, and ended up with 1.5 hours in second stage - had I been in the hospital in the article, I would have had a drip, an epidural, drugs to speed up the labour and would most probably have ended up with a c-section. This would have been a traumatic labour and experience for me, and would have affected my chances of having a vaginal delivery with subsequent children, plus exposing me to the risks of abdominal surgery plus the longer recovery time involved.

As it was, I was involved in the decisions on my care, and was helped to deliver vaginally by an experienced senior midwife. I did have an episiotomy, and consented to it at a time when I was in great pain, yet I still feel that I was able to make an informed decision, having taken the time to educate myself about labour and the choices involved. Had the midwife felt that a ventouse/forceps/caeasarian delivery was neccessary, I still feel I would have been able to give informed consent.

Although it was a long labour, and ended in an intervention that, prior to labour, I hadn't wanted (the episiotomy), it was still a positive experience for me. I felt in control of what was happening to me (as much as is possible in labour) and was involved in the decisions that were made.

That is a horrific article and certainly not something i would expect to experience in the US. It is interesting that she has a husband and the baby has a father whose mental stability was not considered in removing the child.

I suspect there is more to the story than is printed in the article. However, if it is all true and accurate, then it reminds me of the way Fran Lyon was treated here in the UK. Pity that this woman and her husband did not do as Fran did, and leave the country before the birth.

I wonder how Fran and Molly are today? Hopefully enjoying there life away from UK Social Dis-Services!

Strix - John Hemmings the MP who supported Fran says they are doing very well abroad.

The US is a country where bereaved mothers who have had stillbirths have been prosecuted for homicide. And the Appeal Court said the state's case was bollocks.

Horrifying that the state could break the law so blatantly in order to bully a labouring woman into obeying whatever orders a doctor chooses to give at some future time.

Oh, and the idea that hospital staff can do what they hell they like to labouring woman because it is assumed they are 'incompetent' to give informed consent by virtue of being in labour would be very dangerous indeed.

There ar only 2 words here that I can think of.

Fucking Hell!

This is truly horrifying.

Did I read it right it took her 3 years to get her child back?

very good post stayingDTG

THat article sums up why I would never want to give birth in the USA. It is just awful the way women are on their backs strapped to monitors as standard.

That is absolutely horrifying, and I say this as someone who wants an elective C-section when the time comes!

Surely we all have the right to refuse medical treatment for ourselves? How can we justify trying to remove that basic human right from women who happen to be pregnant/in labour?

As for 'pre-authorising' medical staff to do whatever they want during the labour without any need to ask for consent at the time, presumably meaning the woman has no right to refuse anything, I am really quite uncomfortable with that as a general concept.

No wonder women go for home births and independent midwives.

Another reason why I chose to give birth to all three of my children here in Scotland.

I'd never give birth in the US and highly advise my daughters not to do so, either. Thankfully, they're growing up to be sensibly British.