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| Posted By |
70745 on 1/19/2008 11:50:17 AM |
| Subject: |
Desperate for guidance and change |
| Message: |
Hello fellow advocates of normal birth. I come to you in desperation and frustration. I'm working on my LCCE right now, a slow progress that has been interrupted by my own second bundle of joy arriving. In the process, I've been exposed to the horrifyingly limited experience that every single woman living in this area is exposed to. There is nothing here to offer a woman who might be seeking a normal birth. It literally is impossible to have a normal birth...that is if you'd prefer not to have a screaming match with the doctors and nurses at our hospital. I'm sure the doctors and nurse recognize that women must consent, but so many women don't realize they have that option. Every woman regardless of circumstance is on continuous EFM because of the somewhat recent loss of a baby at our only local hospital. Our induction and cesarean rates are through the roof, a good bit higher than the national averages. Our pediatricians are the biggest threats to breast feeding success. There are no midwives within an hour and a half's drive. There is only one doula. There is only one place to receive childbirth education classes, and that's the hospital. Due to politics, those classes aren't based on normal birth. I've heard time and time again, you have to walk the line if you want to create change. You have to create change by introducing your students to the possibilities and letting them seek out the options they'd like. The thing is.....the options don't exist. I'm so discouraged by the idea of teaching a class on normal birth. It will only lead women to frustration and disappointment in their own experiences when the options don't exist and their doctors betray their confidences by pressuring them into unnecessary and potentially dangerous interventions. Walking the line is a wonderful idea if the options at least existed on some level. But they don't, and I fear I would lead the women to worse memories of birth experiences if I taught normal birth. Where do I turn? What would make it possible to recruit normal birth advocates, like midwives and more doulas? What do I need to do to at least make normal birth an OPTION? Please help! |
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