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happyfamily's comments:
on Midwifery Controversy
I agree! Thank you for posting! We need more home birth advocates to be vocal and let women know they don't have to suffer with the docs in the hospital. This is the United States- women should have the best care in ALL states, not just Oregon....
posted 2 years, 9 months ago
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on Midwifery Controversy
I agree with you wholeheartedly. For my first birth I was going with an OB in our local hospital here in Oregon, and in the 8th month I switched to a midwife and a home birth. I was told NO to all of my requests for a gentle birth without any drugs or eye drops given to the baby, and none given to me. I also asked my OB if he would "allow" food and water, pacing, a shower for pain, a birthing stool or ball....no, no, no. Then I asked if he would be the one delivering my baby, since I'd only seen him from the beginning of the pregnancy, and he said, "Well, it will be whatever doctor is on call when you go into labor." How sad. Not quality care at all! I even asked if a nurse could stay with me and coach me through the birth, and he said no, they are too busy. So I began to look for other options, and I found a wonderful doula who introduced me to a midwife who was very experienced, and my son was born at home, with no destructive interventions or drugs, a 5 hour labor, and a few minutes of pushing- turns out I was "allowed" to have everything my friends in the Netherlands get as a "basic right", and it was, in this instance, a complete reversal of the "more expensive is better" line of thinking. I thought my OB should have been given 4 thousand, and the midwife at my home birth 18 thousand.
posted 2 years, 9 months ago
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on Midwifery Controversy
I like your comment gbr- thank you for the calm, thoughtful post on a topic where I tend to get pretty heated. :) I have been so grateful to have professional quality midwives deliver my two sons, and now my third out of the hospital! I feel horrible when I get phone calls from women in other states asking how they too can have the experience I had, and I have to tell them, I'm sorry, your state does not allow midwives like Oregon does. I wish every woman had the options for birth like I did.
posted 2 years, 9 months ago
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on Midwifery Controversy
I don't mean to be rude here, but honestly, I believe that the care providers don't do the best they can at hospitals, and midwives are being kicked out all over the country because they CAN provide a better birth, both at home, in a free-standing birth center, and in the hospital. Doctors and nurses are afraid to take a stand and tell the truth, and many times, they actually cause the problems parents ask them to prevent in their gentle birth plans. A "riskier" birth is being induced, lying flat on the back, many antibiotics and drugs pumped into an already stressed immune system, demanding pushing when the mother is clearly not there yet, denial of basics like water and food, and, to add insult to injury, no nurses and doctors STAYING in the room with the laboring mother....all this for thousands more dollars than a midwife charges to actually stay by your side and coach you through a wonderful, life-changing experience in a gentle way.
posted 2 years, 9 months ago
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on Midwifery Controversy
They SHOULD sue. I'm so tired of doctors and hospitals trying to take away women's rights. If women have the right to abort a baby, they should have the right to give birth in a SAFE environment- far from the hospital rules and procedures that have made the United States 41 out of 41 countries in terms of safety for the mother and baby during childbirth. That means 40 other countries are better able to keep us both alive during a very dangerous time. I think if we had more midwives and freestanding birth centers in this country we could take those dismal numbers up, and probably join the top 10 nations. OBGYNs are clearly not able to provide quality gentle births.
My first was a home birth, my second was with the same midwife at their newly built birth center, and my third, due in November, will be with the same midwife at the same place! I am so happy to be able to have peaceful, wonderful births....at our hospital I would have been subject to the no food/no water rules, the mandatory hep-lock, the no water births, use of showers, or births on a stool, the bright lights, the obtrusive nurses and beeping machines, and in general, a lack of calm, professional care. I believe these midwives in Oregon are FAR more qualified and knowledgeable than the doctors, and OBGYNs are afraid of them for that- harassment is the correct word, as they are trying to take away our rights to have a beautiful birth.
posted 2 years, 9 months ago
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