Birth has the potential to be the most empowering, or consequently, disempowering event a woman will ever experience. I believe she deserves to have the experience she wants, whether that be unassisted or planned medicalized birth or c-section. What I believe is unfortunate, however, is how many woman who plan for a natural childbirth in the hospital do not walk away empowered by the experience because, unbeknownst to them, what they wanted was never a realistic option due to the way maternity care is handled in the U.S.
I am not against hospitals or doctors. I have met many wonderful doctors and the fact is that most women have a satisfying birth experience in the hospital. But that is not what I want, and the more I think about routine hospital policies, the more it saddens me on a deep personal level. Because no matter how supportive my doctor is, his opinion has no bearing on hospital policy.
There are a multitude of policies and interventions that are frequently complained about (for good reason), but these are the ones that make the idea of a hospital birth horrific to me. They may seem like little things, but the more I think about them the more I feel a very deep sense of sadness.
The first thing I think about is having to take off my own clothes and put on a hospital gown. Why? What bearing does being made to wear a "patient uniform" have on the outcome of my birth or the wellbeing of myself or my baby? Of course I could say no, but the fact is that right from the time I walk in the door I am being told that I have no power, not to mention being labeled a "difficult patient", dooming myself to being treated with disdain for disrupting the status quo.
The second thing I think about is the IV, or in the very least, a heplock. Why? Because if I were to hemorrhage, they might not be able to get an IV in quickly? In all my years of having routine blood draws no one has ever had trouble sticking a needle into my vein. Even I know this seems trivial and I'm not sure why it bothers me so much as I'm not afraid of it and I understand the rationale, but for some reason it just always springs to mind as a source of disempowerment and great disappointment that the hospital does not, in practice, believe I have the right to bodily integrity and autonomy.
Speaking of bodily integrity, the third thing I think about is having an episiotomy performed on me without my consent or, in many cases, forewarning. I know that my doctor would never do this, but what if he can't be there? Again, I'm not against doctors and I hate to sound like a stereotype. But the fact is this does happen every day, because despite the good ones, there are doctors out there who believe that their opinions are always in the best interest, and therefore supercede, the will of the patient.
The final thing, and perhaps the one that tugs at me most deeply, is having to fight to retain physical custody of my baby. Even hospitals that support "rooming in" ("allowing" the baby to stay in the room with the mother) have protocols that mandate the baby be taken away at certain times for examination and observation. I have waited a lifetime for this baby, and the idea of having to ask permission to hold my baby, much less fight for that right as a mother, breaks my heart.
I never expected to have these feelings. But it's a funny thing what happens to you when confronted with a different side of the reality you live. I am among the more mainstream of home birth midwives and home birthing mothers. I believe doctors and hospitals have their place, and I feel fully prepared to accept their help if needed. I am strong, yet the fact is the one encounter I have had with medical management of this pregnancy, my first ultrasound, which should have been the most exciting and happy event to date, was incredibly disappointing and disempowering. I was never expected nor offered to witness the scan, to be a part of the exploration of my baby. Considering that the ultrasound tech knew that the reason for the scan was to "determine viability", meaning it had become uncertain whether or not my baby was still living, I was not offered a single word of reassurance or given any information about what was being witnessed on the screen by the stranger waving the wand over my cold, exposed belly. It was not until she was finished with the scan that she showed me an imagine of my baby, one that even though I was told represented a perfectly healthy fetus, laid there unmoving on its face inside my belly with no visage of a beating heart or, in fact, any sign of life whatsoever. No information was volunteered to me. Everything I know about my baby (that the heart was beating, that he or she is growing appropriately, that the baby is healthy as well as can be determined), I had to specifically inquire about. I left the office, and sit here tonight, still in disbelief that the glossy black and white photos sitting before me are actually pictures of a baby that grows inside me.
** I am behind on posting and this was written some time ago. I am happy to report that my subsequent ultrasound (which was not performed in a medical office) was a very empowering experience, and that we are expecting what appears to be a very healthy baby girl!
