Everytime I Watch OBEM I Shout, 'GET UP'!

[Treadmillmom]

Oh, it so winds me up, slow labours, forceps, episiotomy...why the hell do I never hear a single MW say;
change position
get on all fours
stand up
go for a walk
Grr. I watched it last night and that 25 year old with the dyed red hair who ended up with an episiotomy and threatened forceps I just didn't understand why no one suggested she shift!

I gave birth there btw - in a pool on all fours!

I had DD using a birthing stool - it was great; I was upright but had support. It wasn't sparkly purple though.

I have noted that the mums giving birth in the pool, although not pain free, baby seems to come out a hell of a lot easier.

I always wanted that, unfortunately with twins that was no way and ended up having an emcs anyway so completely not what I wanted but that's pre-eclampsia for you.

It must be so uncomfortable to lie on your back in so much pain, the body surely fights to get in the right position?

I was wondering if the 'active birth' people are more likely to say no to filming?

flisspaps they just said that they had to monitor DD's heart rate and attached me to the monitor. They then inserted a catheter and told me I wasn't allowed to eat anything. I had really really wanted an active birth, until I went into hospital I'd stayed on my feet and was walking round as it helped with the contractions. Unsurprisingly I ended up with a long labor (36 hours) and epidural then all sorts of drugs as i couldn't stop being sick and then a forceps delivery.

I suppose that illustrates my point then really Broom - if you weren't aware (or told) of WHY you had to be on the bed then I would assume from my seat way over here that it was 'just' hospital policy.

Yet you found being active helped with the contractions - and then in hospital got put on the bed and so starts the cascade of intervention.

It's what I did first time round (induction). Won't be what I do this time. Turns out that actually you do have a choice about CFM, getting on the bed etc. You generally don't get told that in hospital (but you do get told on MN!)

With my first DC I refused to get off the bed except for a bath even though the MW kept nagging me to walk around a bit or aleast change position. I was in soooo much pain. Didn't need an epidural in the end but very nearly did, and intervention.

With my 2nd I insisted to DP that I get off the bed and move around, go for a walk around the corridors, and I even planned to not give birth on my back like the last time. The pain was no where near as bad (although DS was over 2lb lighter than DD who was born first so maybe that's why?) and baby shot out. They predicted a long labour with my second and I surprised everyone by pushing him out (on my back!) with 6 minutes of waters breaking and 3 pushes.

I do wonder why no one ever seems to mention moving around or even changing position really on OBEM when every single MW I have ever spoken to says walking around can help (unless you're hooked up to monitors or had an Epidural).

I assume it's filmed in a clu rather than a mlu? I wish they'd show a home birth.

Dunno if anyone else has said this, but I was desperate to move, had my big ball all inflated but because the inductions didn't send me into full labour they insisted I lay down with a monitor around my tum. It was only in the last hour or two that they put a monitor on DD's head inside and I could sit up. After 36 hours of faffing about with the gel and hormone pumps (I think I have that right, it's all a bit of a blur) and fair amount more with no sleep I couldn't be arsed to cough, never mind walk around.

I'm pregnant with my first so have no birthing experience yet. But if I were to go on what I've digested from films, television dramas and documentaries - so OBEM - I'd be thinking the only way to give birth is on your back, with little to no control.

I think this is really, really sad and kind of damaging. I've been reading up on active birthing and it's a bloody revelation! It makes total sense, to be on all fours and opening up your pelvis, to use gravity rather than pushing against it, and more than that - to be actively present in your labour rather than just having things done to you. Which is what programmes like OBEM really, really give the impression of! Programmes like OBEM do seem to perpetuate the stereotype of births as screaming, terrifying things happening. I'm not suggesting that those that have those types of labours aren't in agony - but from popular culture, I thought that they ALL had to be like that.

I always remember my GCSE science teacher showing us a documentary about child birth, and he said before he played it - I just want you all to see that a labour doesn't have to be with the woman screaming and writhing in agony. I can appreciate now what he was trying to say, although at the time a class full of fifteen year old girls just jeered at him with "That's not what my mum says!". And it was true - the programme he played showed a woman breathing, huffing and puffing, obviously in pain but not uncontrollable, pushing her baby out in a very concentrated way.

Now, y'all might jeer at me - wait until your own labour - but I fully intend to be active in my labour. I've read enough and seen enough videos of active births, particularly water births, to be convinced that an attempt to be in control of your own labour is the best way forward.

As soon as I was admitted I lay in a bed and told to stay there while they monitored the baby's heart every time I do much as sat up they would come back in and tell me to stop moving as it was affecting the readings, I had to stay like that until son was born. Needless to say I was very distressed and upset all the way through as the last thing I wanted was to stay perfectly still in that amount of pain and also new that lying down was not helping in anyway but watching Obem i often wonder if my experience is more common than I had thought

Darlene Yes, it'll be a CLU as there's obstetricians there and access to epidurals rather than an MLU. As has been said before, earlier series were much more positive and less interventionist but they were filmed in a different hospital.

It's a shame only one series of Home Birth Diaries was made - that really opened my eyes to how different things could be!

toxictiora, your experience is very common. DS1 had decels early on in labour and although he was actually fine it was insisted that I kept the continuous monitor on. Luckily I did have a forward thinking midwife who encouraged me to move. It seems that medical staff seem incompetent in examining a woman in any other position than on her back which I think is actually ludicrous, considering it is the position most woman hate the most during labour.

I was in a CLU for my DD's birth 6 weeks ago. I had thought they were going to let me have her in a MLU, but they said at the last minute that they wanted her monitored throughout. My first reaction was: 'oh no. They aren't going to make me lie down are they?' and was told that no - they would encourage me to move around and that as long as I didn't get tangled in the cable, I could walk around a short distance and be in any position I wanted.

I paced throughout the first stage and delivered on all fours on the bed. The whole thing took an hour and a half from beginning to end.

I think a woman should give birth in any way she wants - and if that is lying down then, fine. However, I think monitoring should not require a woman to lie on her back. I'm not sure why it does in other places. My hospital didn't have fancy wireless equipment or anything.

I also don't think the number of women on their backs in bed is down to the fixed cameras. The cameras seem to manage to cover most of the delivery rooms from lots of angles. You can see the partners, for instance, in various parts of the room and the midwives and staff too. It is not as if you can only see what's happening in the bed area, so I think that's a non-argument.

There are such things in existence as wireess monitors that strap onto your belly and then transmit to the machine remotely. With them you can move around much more easily. Sadly they seem rare as hens teeth in the NHs, no doubt due to £, but really how many women end up with slower more expensive labours and more intervention from being kept on their backs?

The NCT sell purple birth stools, but they are pricey !

i wish i'd known about those birth stools with holes in!
i did spend some time on the toilet, but i was so paranoid i would give birth down there that i couldn't relax myself - even though it felt like the best position to be in. (ie the most productive)

not at that price though - maybe a commode?

HOW MUCH?!

I had all sorts of grand ideas about active birthing but position of DS meant that I couldn't stand without my legs collapsing in pain.

Agree that in OBEM they do seem to arrive and merrily hop onto the bed where they remain until baby appears.

I gave birth there too GoldenGreen, in fact it was the brown haired midwife (Zoe, I think her name was) who was on this week's programme.

My experience of LGI was v diff to that seemingly portrayed by OBEM. I overheard quite a few women on the labour ward being encouraged to walk around, myself included! (would have loved too, but v bad PGP made it nigh on impossible)

Once in the delivery suite, I laboured in water as intended to have a water birth. I got out as my waters needed breaking (still kinda unclear as to reason why, too much g&a!) but afterwards Zoe was really encouraging to get me back in the water, having actually read my birth plan, however by this point I just couldn't move off the bed as I felt so heavy after being in the water and the PGP was even worse!

When I my tens machine broke and I demanded drugs, she was very 'are you sure' then calmly ran through the pros and cons of diamorphine, meptid and pethadine.

Yes I gave birth on the bed, but I was kneeling up hanging onto the backrest which was fully up, having been encouraged to move and find a position that felt right.

I think it must just be down to editing and the selection of participants in this run of OBEM - think it's possibly doing a disservice to the LGI...

Yes, pesto at that price it is a little disappointing that they are not sparkly. Seems as though the idea is that, unlike on a toilet, you can actually deliver the baby there.

I have done 5 labours walking around and then giving birth kneeling up. all labours quite quick and no forceps etc. I only lay down once to do the pushing stage and that was because I had that I didn't want to tear in my birth plan, so the mw suggested I lay down to slow the birth down a bit.

I agree with the OP, i watched this weeks especially I wanted to yell "walk around" to them. I wonder if the midwives ever suggest it because my experience is that it is quicker and less painful. I am always reminded of the cascade of intervention thing from my NCT course years ago. This series seems to prove that point.

(am pg with no 6 now and would like to try a water birth, but wouldn't say no to an epidural if I was labouring for hours and getting exhausted. Just not sure that people are always aware that this is more likely to lead to forceps etc etc).

oh and in my last labour for some reason I read a bit of Ina May Gaskin in the early stages, and she talked about tribal women (maybe) giving birth hanging from low branches of trees! so the rope above the birthing stool mentioned in an earlier post does make sense I think.

I wanted to be upright during my labour with DC1.

Unfortunately my blood pressure dropped like a stone so I couldn't even get my head off the pillow without starting to black out. I was a dead weight when my XP and sister got me to the hospital. Didn't have any drugs though, despite thinking my brain was going to explode from the pain. Had an EMCS for unrelated reasons though (faulty cervix).

I have to say the amount of women on their back in OBEM does suprise me.

bettybat good luck and I think from what everyone else has said on here that you're going down the right route. I wish I'd had another baby as I would have liked to have control, would have liked to try hypnobirthing techniques but alas it was not to be and I'm 40 now, single parent so my chance has passed.

I did fancy the water birth as well. It would have been a no go because I was expecting twins but the mw said they'd maybe allow me to spend some of the labour in there. As I said, pre-eclampsia took all of my decisions out of my hands so I had to do what would let us survive. (Twins were 5lb 4oz and 5lb at 36 weeks so god knows what weight if full term!) Note that this is 10 years on but still feels like yesterday!