low intervention births ( carryover from BYC)

[big brown horse]

My older sister had her heart set on home birth. It didn't work out and she was rushed in for an em. c-section.

She was crushed and even suffered a bit of depression over the whole deal. IMO, the end result is the same, don't beat yourself up over "it" not working out the way you had your heart set on.

I say be prepared for your delivery to go either way and try not to get too upset over how your baby decides to "head out".

FD, that sounds like my other sister's natural child birth experience. She had her first daughter like that back in '85. Nobody could believe she did it without any drugs.

 

[FarmerDenise]

FD, that sounds like my other sister's natural child birth experience. She had her first daughter like that back in '85. Nobody could believe she did it without any drugs.

MIL thought I was absolutely nuts to not want any pain meds. She said she just wanted to be knocked out (she had 4, one died in infancy) and be handed the baby a few days later, when she was up to it. She wanted to stay in the hospital as long as possible. She also thought breastfeeding was gross.

I managed to get out the same day. It was sooo nice to be home in my own bed with my new family and my animals.
Our downstairs neighbors fed us for the first few weeks. If they saw me sleeping on the couch, they would quietly open the door and put the food on the table (out of reach of our dog). They also walked our dog for us.

 

[Bettacreek]

I originally wanted to go without pain meds. I ended up in labor for 52.5 hours, had to be enduced which gave me back labor, then went with the epidural for the last few hours. My second time around, I was in labor for slightly less time (still two days, but this one wasn't as bad), but waited to go to the hospital, ended up driving there and gave birth in about an hour after arriving, without any medications. It was MUCH easier this last time around. The epidural and their tinkering ways were the worst part of my first birth (if they'd have left me the hell alone, I probably would have been fine). The second time, they checked my cervix twice, and cut the cord, then checked Tripp, but other than that, the birth was completely hands-off for them. I WOULD have tried a home birth, but I lived in an apartment and really didn't want to associate my births with that place. Had I had my own home, I would have tried it.

 

[patandchickens]

My older sister had her heart set on home birth. It didn't work out and she was rushed in for an em. c-section.

She was crushed and even suffered a bit of depression over the whole deal. IMO, the end result is the same, don't beat yourself up over "it" not working out the way you had your heart set on.

I say be prepared for your delivery to go either way and try not to get too upset over how your baby decides to "head out".

This is excellent advice, for every part of pregnancy *and once you have the baby*, not just for labor and delivery.

In fact it is perhaps even MORE useful once you have the baby then during pregnancy

Pat

 

[Lady Henevere]

My best piece of advice is research a lot (which it sounds like you are already doing), find a doctor/midwife/doula who shares your point of view and you really like and trust, and go with your instincts about what's best for you and the baby.

I have only one child and everything about the birth was awful. I was not informed enough to to really be an advocate for myself and the result was a mess. The good news is that DD turned out just great and I (mostly) recovered.

Best of luck to you and your family when the time comes!

 

[Mackay]

big brown horse - a lay midwife has had training through turtorship, independent study and often but not always in a free standing lay midwifery birthing center. Their education is not regulated and they take no test. There are a couple of states that do regulate them, such as New Mexico, but it does not reach the standards of a certified nurse midwife, generally requiring that their study be documented along with the actual births they attend in training. The scope of practice is more limited for sure but generally is sufficient for a successful home birth if your lay midwife is smart and had sufficient dedication and training

A certified nurse midwife is first an RN. Then she/he has taken additional standardized nursing training to become a certified nurse midwife. She is tested in the speciality and licensed. She is qualifed to work in a hospital and may be involved in doing high risk births. She has a physcian backup that is available for consultation and intervention if necessary. They most often work in a hospital but some do homebirths or run free standing birth centers. Their devotion to the 'natural birth process' is individual according to their personal beliefs and experience. Some programs may require a certified nurse midwife to now be a bachelors in nursing or be a Nurse Practitioner. The field has been developing since I spent any time looking at it and it still varies from state to state somewhat.

I spent a couple of weeks working with a certified nurse midwife when I was in nursing school as part of my practicum as I wanted to see if I might be cut out for it. I ended up choosing lay midwifery due to my ever increasing distain for the medical way of things and I was aleady fully converted into alternative things even before nursing school.

Regarding episiomoties. One goal in home births is to avoid tearing. Episiomoties are never done and I would only think it might be possible if the heart beat of the baby was lost and it was felt that the baby would be lost if the birth were not immediate. Anyway, I've not seen it. It is most associated with forcepts births which lay midwifes don't do anyway, at least these days.

Tearing is not felt during the birthing process. The whole area is so numb from the pressure of the head on the perinieum that it does not feel the tear occur. Tears are avoided by a dedicated midwife or doula working the perinieum with olive oil, stretching, stretching over the course of active labor.
A birth that comes too fast may cause a tear and those things do happen. Some tears require suturing afterwards and I have done some. It you get to it shortly after the arrival of the placenta (within an hour or so)there is still no pain as things remain numb for a while. Some midwives refuse to suture saying that it is not necessary. Well, I suggest that you talk to a few women who went without. Sex with a loose opening is not all that pleasant and many women and husbands come to complain about it later if things do not heal up tightly. Most large tears will heal in a good closed form, but not all. I feel it is better to fix it when it wont hurt to do so and to be sure of a good outcome. Small tears generally require not suturing in my opinion.

That an old episomotomy scar requires another cut is a fallacy. It does require more work to stretch the opening as scars may have a tendency to tear along the same line but you can get around it with work. There may be some tearing no matter what you do. Generally it is felt that a tear will heal stronger than a cut. If a tear occurs up into the uretra then I would think that neglect occured, unless the birth was soooo fast nothing could be done. I have not seen this but I have heard of it and it is rare. A surgeon would be needed in that case.

In my opinion ultrasounds of the unborn should be avoided at all cost, and left only for the most urgent of concerns by a physician. Many midwives suspect that ultrasound will damage developing nerves in a babies ears if admisisted at critical points in development and it is felt by some that it is the cause of increased hearing impairment that we are seeing these days. Of course a Dr. and likely even a certified nurse midwife will argue that tooth and nail... but I have offered my warning.

 

[Mackay]

My older sister had her heart set on home birth. It didn't work out and she was rushed in for an em. c-section.

She was crushed and even suffered a bit of depression over the whole deal. IMO, the end result is the same, don't beat yourself up over "it" not working out the way you had your heart set on.

I say be prepared for your delivery to go either way and try not to get too upset over how your baby decides to "head out".

I have seen women become very disturbed after such incidents. I would suggest that what this woman went though is a great shock, to be rushed in. Shock precipitates hormanal changes which affect the psyche. Often bonding is interruppted and not permitted to flow naturally under these circumatances and the possibility of drugs interfering with that process are a real possibility. All these things affect the psyche through hormanal disruptions. To just "get over it" is not always possible.

If this long term postpartum (more than 3 weeks) depression occurs I strongly suggest that a consult with a naturopath be done as there are herbs and homeopathic remedies that can bring the woman around. Rmember that one of the leading symptoms in post partum depression is denial. The woman will deny to herself and her family that she is depressed. She will not reveal that suicidal thoughts are occuring so it can be hard to get a grip on what is happening,. In Europe they treat post partum depression with bioidentical hormones, which ultimately it the most direct approach.
Post partum depression is an illness but does not need drugs such as prozac or paxil. This is what can lead to long term disaster. Instead of restoring order and balance more caos to the hormonal system is introduced.

 

[big brown horse]

Her bout of depression didn't last long. I don't think it was as serious as PPD. She was just really bummed b/c she planned this wonderful home birth and, as you said, it quickly turned into shock etc. when she was rushed into the er.

Also, it didn't help that when my niece was delivered she had a nice sized abrasion on her head from all the pushing etc. (Her head was tilted the wrong way and my sister has barbie doll hips.) I think it made my sister feel guilty too for trying so hard to do it naturally.

Also, with her arms splayed out on the gurney and strapped down, she wasn't allowed to hold the baby right away. She had to wait until the surgery was finished.

Anyway, I guess the point I was trying to make was don't beat yourself up if things don't work out the way you had your heart set on.

Mackay, thanks for educating me on the difference b/t a lay midwife and a certified midwife.

Great advice on PPD too.

 

[On Our own]

I won't go into the details of my birthing experience with DD1, but it was bad. Reeeeeaaaaal bad. Fortunately we sort of knew ahead that it was already going south so we knew there could be no home birth so I was at least prepared for that part.

But, they had pumped me full of steroids before the birth (emergency C) and essentially just stopped it with no step down at all. Steroids withdrawal, heart drugs, massive shock to the system, sick baby..... PPD Oh yeah!


To me it isn't important how they get here so much as it is how you feel about how they get here..... It was very hard at first yes, but the end result was that we both lived.

Do have to give kudos to the nursing staff though - they were awesome and stood tall in refusing FIL and MIL entrance.

 

[big brown horse]

On Our Own,

I would love to learn more about doulas. I had a midwife but no doula. (That was over 13 years ago, I never even heard about doulas back then.)

I think we have a doula over on BYC.