child birth

Comment Of The Day: “Who Killed ‘Judith’s’ Baby?”

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

 

This is “extreme free-birthing“…doing it all alone. Not recommended.

I love it when a new commenter makes an entrance with a Comment of the Day, and that’s what Megan did in response to last week’s post about the credulous mother-to-be who placed inordinate trust in the opinions of amateurs and well-meaning activists with tragic results.

Here’s the way the poll on that story has turned out; polling closes in a week, so if you haven’t voted, time is running out:

Frequently first time visitors with especially impressive debut comments are only interested in a single issue, and go recede into the mists of anonymity from which they came, never to be heard from again. I hope that isn’t the case with Megan.

Here is her Comment of the Day on the post, “Who Killed Judith’s Baby?”

I’d like to offer my 2 cents as a pregnant woman who is currently planning a “freebirth” (but is open, of course, to taking whatever unpredictable path unfolds in labor).

Judith is responsible for her body and her baby. This is one of the core beliefs, in my opinion, of anyone who is willingly choosing to go this route in pregnancy and childbirth. The freebirth movement was born out of women who wanted to take more responsibility for their pregnancies/births, rather than feeling like another number on an OB conveyor belt. Typically, it is women who want to lead the decision making process when it comes to what is done or not done to their bodies (which includes their babies, obviously).

There are so many problems in our current obstetric system, it is one of the least evidence-based areas of medicine, period. There are been plenty of research to show that new technological advances have NOT improved average outcomes in the past 30-40 years, such as constant fetal monitoring, multiple ultrasounds, C-sections, inductions, etc. That being said, if you’re going to make radical choices that go against common sense consensus and what history has shown to be true about pregnancy (ie: a pregnancy lasting 44 weeks + has a very high risk of stillbirth), you must also be willing to suffer the consequences of those choices. Judith will live with the consequences of her choices for the rest of her life, it is heartbreaking. No one will suffer more than her, and my heart goes out to her. There is no worse pain than losing a child.

I still believe that women should always be the final decision makers over their bodies, even if those decisions are shortsighted or ill-informed.

If anyone is interested, the reason I am planning a birth without medical professionals present (except that I will have a friend present who received midwifery training but never ended up becoming licensed) largely has to do with my first birthing experience in the hospital, and the protocols in place that are presented without care for a woman’s bodily autonomy. I was given ZERO choices about how my care proceeded at 40 weeks, was told that I HAD to be induced, after having 2 HBP readings over the course of 24 hours. I had zero symptoms of preeclampsia, was incredibly healthy, and felt great. I’ve since consulted with several OBs who agree that mine was an unnecessary induction. Nevertheless, the OB that was on staff that morning was a cautious one, proving that sometimes all it comes down to is a provider’s personality, and I was shuffled into the standardized induction protocol. This turned what I believed would be a powerful, momentous, incredible experience in my life (initiation into motherhood) into one of extreme pain (pitocin contractions don’t give you breaks!) and then numbness (epidural to numb the pain), leaving me feeling helpless and completely dismissed by staff. I’m one of the “lucky” ones who goes through this process and doesn’t end up with a C-section (you’ve got about a 50/50 chance after being induced with pit). Continue reading →

Ethics Bulletin: Payback Is Not Always Unethical

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

"Sure, honey, take all the photos you want. And if your girlfriend wants to see the birth of our daughter, she's welcome too!"

Washington Post advice columnist Carolyn Hax, as I have noted before, has an almost pitch-perfect ethical sense, and negotiates difficult relationship dilemmas with consistent skill and wisdom. She is too nice sometimes, however, and her recent advice to an expectant mother is a striking example.

The woman wrote Hax about how to handle the request of her AWOL husband, who left her mid-pregnancy to move in with his mistress, to witness the birth of his daughter. He also wants his family to be present. The mother-to-be said that she fully intends to allow her child to have a good relationship with her father, but she does not want either her weasel husband or his family, which hid his affair from her, around when the baby comes. “I don’t want any of them there,” Expectant Mom writes. “Many of them knew about the girlfriend but kept it from me, and I don’t want my husband to have the satisfaction of comforting me when I’m in pain. Do I have the right to tell them this, in some collected, nonconfrontational way?” Continue reading →