I’m so pleased that this post is part of the Labor Day Blog Carnival. Head over to the Birth Activist blog to read other Labor Day posts.
It never occurs to me to say that I had an “unmedicated birth.” I just think of it as a birth. Maybe a home birth.
Calling it an unmedicated birth defines it in relationship to a norm of medicated birth, but I planned the birth that I did because it seemed so utterly normal to me.
Some people said I was brave for planning to labor without access to pain medication. I didn’t feel brave. In fact, I felt frightened of how painful it would be, but not as frightened as I was of cascading interventions in a hospital setting. I thought laboring and birthing at home was the healthiest, safest choice for me and my baby.
(And don’t even get me started on “natural birth.” Childbirth is always culturally informed – that birth tub (awesome, totally recommended) did not naturally emerge from my pregnancy.)
If you made a choice to labor outside the current cultural norms of hospital birth, how do you describe it? Midwife-assisted birth, natural birth, home birth, unmedicated birth . . .? And how much does it matter to you what it’s called?
I chose to give birth in a birth center, because I wanted to be within easy range of a hospital in case something went wrong (the hospital was right across the parking lot), but wanted a more relaxing, casual environment than a hospital. I wound up spending two full days in agonizing back labor (my baby was posterior) before transferring to the hospital and getting an epidural, which was a miraculous relief and allowed me to actually enjoy my daughter’s birth. I had been fully indoctrinated into the Bradley Method’s hard-lined anti-intervention position, which was why I waited until I was truly at the end of my rope before asking for pain relief, and I think also why I felt like a failure for making that choice – I actually cried because I was so disappointed in myself. The epidural worked great, I had no side effects, and my baby was born vigorous and healthy. I wish I had been given a more balanced view of my options, because maybe an earlier epidural could have shortened my labor (things progressed very quickly after I got pain relief – I think the stress of the pain was slowing things down), and because the shame I felt over the decision was not a pleasant part of my birth experience. I am awed by women who can have births without medical intervention, but to some extent it may not be up to us. Yeah, my childbirth was “unnatural,” but that was unquestionably the right choice for me. I don’t care what it’s called.
You raise another good reason to be careful with language – labor and birth can be difficult enough without the immense moral pressure to do it a certain way. I’m sorry you got set up to feel shame about any part of your birthing process.
Hi there. I bookmarked your blog a while back when you mentioned it on SomervilleMoms during the nursing-at-the-YMCA time. Since then, I’ve really enjoyed reading your writing – thank you! Anyway. This is a topic that fascinates me. My older daughter was born at 34 weeks with no notice (and in 2 1/2 hours, from me waking up thinking “something’s going on” to her being born), so any preconceived notions we had about her birth went right out the window. With our younger daughter, we thought much more about what kind of birth we wanted (or, rather, I wanted – very supportive husband, but really, it was me giving birth!) and ended up with the Midwives at Mt. Auburn. What fabulous people! Like our older daughter, the younger one was born without any sort of intervention/medication, but by choice (whereas with the older one, we had no time for any of that – they just said “get that baby out! No time for an epidural! Push! Push!”). Such a different experience, being in control of the decisions, even though both labors and births were essentially the same – fast and pretty easy (although at 34 weeks we had 13 medical professionals in the room, and at 40 weeks it was just me, my husband, a midwife and a nurse – way better!). So, I guess my point is, having had those two experiences, I think the key is to be making your own decisions, whatever they are.
Alison, thanks so much for sticking around and thanks for the positive feedback!
I love hearing your birth stories, and it feels serendipitous that your comment comes right after Jen’s comment, because she pointed out that “to some extent it may not be up to us” and you pointed out that “the key is to be making your own decisions, whatever they are” and I think your points go beautifully together. As birthing moms, we need to do the best we can to make informed plans and decisions and then we also need to accept that sometimes things just won’t go according to plan.
I call my birth natural – I hadn’t ever thought about unmedicated. Now I want to sit and unpack what all the parsing of language here might mean. Natural has a bias implied – because natural is ‘better’ than ‘artificial’, but that’s a false split right there. Should I say intervention free? But that’s not really true, since like Alison, my child also arrived spontaneously at 34 weeks and we were required by law to birth at the hospital and there I was required to be hooked up to an IV- which I tend to think is an intervention of sorts. And yes, the 13 other people present (later to learn it’s a ‘NICU triage team’, yikes) were very different from what I envisioned for my son’s birth.
What Jen wrote makes me think back to my Bradley method birthing classes, which I ended up loving. I had signed up with a midwife at a birth center and she required us to all take Bradley classes there. But the midwife also talked about epidurals, how she strongly suggested against them but they had their place. She cited several examples of how after long, painful and intense labors women would get an epidural, finally relax and get some sleep and then wake up later with the strength and energy to deliver their children. I liked that: while epidurals are not ideal, they are a *tool* to be utilized for our benefit – and this can even benefit a ‘natural’ birth.
Oh, and my birth was totally not intervention free! When it’s needed, home birth midwives seriously know how to intervene. It’s not even clear to me how many people were in the room at the moment of birth. I think later this month I will have to post my birth story in honor of Bridget’s first birthday (!).
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Hmmmm… unmedicated birth. I agree, it’s an odd term that I would not have claimed for myself- although I guess that I qualify! Here’s Rowan’s unedited birth story.
I had hoped to have a birth at the birth center (home birth scared the bejeezus out of my partner, as I was having a VBAC) attended by my midwife (who owns the center), but instead birthed at SF General Hospital (Baby’s heartbeat was plummeting during contractions, so I was rushed there) with my midwife there. Before going there, I had some saline injected subcutaneously in my lower back (my midwife did that), which I believe helped the back labor.
I had a limited amount of time to push, but push I did! And it was only because my midwife was there that I was spared a C Section. I owe her, big time forgetting the hospital to allow me time to push.
And I did not get meds. I got some local anesthesia for stitching (he came out in three contractions- like a rocket, so I tore), and in recovery. But during labor? No, no meds.
Lily, aka Witch Mom