Why I Birth At Home

or "Ignorant Obstetrician Alert"
Read this article.

Now, tell me how that made you feel? If you are like me, it made you hair pulling mad!

I could rant about nearly every sentence in that article. I won't rant about that much in this blog post, well at least I'll try not to.

"Not fear of childbirth, despite the fact that is is inherently dangerous..."

Childbirth is NOT inherently dangerous. Yes, there are things that can go wrong, but a knowledgeable woman who knows her body and herself or a good care provider will know when a woman needs care. The idea this OB has comes from her education. An education that stresses and highlights the dangers without the knowledge about how birth happens in the absence of 'management'.

"evidently only losers, the weak and the unempowered, fear pain"

No. No one likes pain and, yes, we even fear it. Pain does not have to be part of labor, not always. NCB advocates do not think women are 'weak' for needing pain relief or fearing pain. We just know that the risks often outweigh the benefits. Simple risk/benefit analysis.

" who is going to buy the services of someone who hectors you to avoid pain relief when you are in agonizing pain (a doula)"

Obviously, this OB has no idea what a doula actually does. And it is likely that the 'agonizing pain' is due to AROM or pitocin or being forced to lay in bed instead of moving around as a woman will when in labor if left alone.

"And who is going to let her precious baby be delivered by a high school graduate who knows nothing about science and thinks gems have "energy" and flowers having healing "essences" (a CPM, a certified "professional" midwife)"

I don't know any midwives who believes that. And the derogatory way she uses, "high school graduate" as if a midwife gets no other education is just disgusting. My midwife is a CPM and is excellent and very knowledgeable.

"Who is going to waste hundreds of dollars on goofy ideas "

I've had three home births and not spent a dime on any 'goofy ideas'.

"Craig Thompson, professor of marketing at University of Wisconsin wrote about this tactic in Consumer Risk Perceptions in a Community of Reflexive Doubt the in the September 2005
Journal of Consumer Research... "Advocates of natural childbirth seek to inculcate reflexive doubt by countering two common sense objections to their unorthodox construction of risk: (1) medicalized births would have never gained a cultural foothold if they were so risk laden and (2) the medical profession would not support obstetric practices that place laboring women at risk"

Medicalized birth gained a foothold by powerful and expensive lobbies to outlaw midwifery and promote medical licensure. Ever heard of the damage caused by the routine x-rays of pregnant women? Scopolomine? Thalidomide? Dorsal lithotomy? Routine episiotomy? Constant fetal monitoring? Mr. Thompson is obviously glaringly ignorant of obstetrical history, but then, he is only a marketing professor.

" That's why it is absolutely imperative for natural childbirth advocates to hid the fact that in the 100 years after its advent, modern obstetrics dropped the neonatal mortality rate 90% and the maternal mortality rate 99%."

And even so the US has just about the highest infant and maternal mortality and morbidity rates in the industrialized world! What an accomplishment! What sets us apart from those countries with better birth outcomes? Numbers of midwives.

OBs can't even claim responsibility for much of the decrease in mortality. Antibiotics have had an enormous impact. So have other technological advances that are not attributable to OBs.

"such as forceps deliveries—as unnecessary intrusions whose primary function was enabling physicians to display technical skill."

Forceps deliveries would be much less necessary if OBs did not require women to birth lying on their backs. I will acknowledge that there are time when they could be necessary, but not always necessary as was purported by some OBs.

"The message, integral to natural childbirth advocacy is clear: Obstetricians can't help women because their technology is useless (except in the rarest of circumstances)."

I don't know of any NCB advocate that would say OBs are useless. We all know that things can, and sometimes do, go wrong and we are thankful that there are those that are able to help in those instances.

"You need to buy books and visit websites"

I've bought very few books and while I do visit a good many websites, that is free.

"And for the truly committed, you need to pay a high school graduate who is "trained" in normal birth (kind of like a meteorologist who is trained in forecasting only good weather) to do basically nothing except call 911 and disappear if things go wrong."

The insane hegemony is getting tiresome. This OB has no idea how midwives are trained. If a woman has to go to the hospital the midwife will go with her.

"NCB advocates must convince you to spend tens of dollars on books, hundreds of dollars on classes, and thousands of dollars for the company of women who are incapable of doing a blessed thing if complications occur."

Again, I don't spend much on books, and in any case, no one convinced me to buy them. I wanted them so I bought them. I don't spend anything on classes. And my midwife is very capable in the event of complications.

"They must fill women with misinformation about childbirth and keep those same women ignorant of what science actually shows. "

I love it! Obstetrics, the profession that uses evidence based methods less that any other I am aware of, saying the the NCB community is misinforming women! What a joke!

"NCB advocates must create an alternative universe entirely unmoored from the reality of childbirth dangers, unmoored from scientific evidence,"

Yes, because there is so much evidence for constant fetal monitoring, excessive use of ultrasound, the use of pitocin and epidural and those interventions have been thoroughly researched. Ma'am, you are ignorant about NCB and its advocates.

" or pay thousands of dollars for what are essentially lay companions with no particular knowledge of childbirth"

Your pedantic hegemony is nauseating. Really.

"When it comes to natural childbirth, follow the money. Without fear, NCB advocates won't make money."

Yes, follow the money. Know what you'll find? That birth in hospitals with OBs in attendance is the reason that the US spends more that any other country in the world and we still have some of the worst outcomes.

This article made me so angry and just plain sick that OBs like that can practice and influence women.