shekinahbirthing.com Blog

October 12, 2008

Not birth-related; very important

Filed under: Uncategorized — Administrator @ 11:23 am

I have deliberately avoided bringing non-birth-related politics into my blog or website, until now.  There’s a time and place for everything though.  And no matter which candidate has your vote, this issue needs to be addressed.  Take a look at this Op-Ed piece by Frank Rich of the NY Times.  Read some of the articles that are linked to, within the editorial.  I’m both appalled and very concerned.  Someone needs to find the brakes, NOW.  http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/12/opinion/12rich.html?ref=opinion

Political debate is one thing.  Disagreement with your political rival is perfectly acceptable.  Calling that person or party out on things with which you disagree, or making voters aware of things which you believe they need to know, is fine.  But inciting fear and hatred are not okay, and never will be okay.  It’s incredibly naive to think that silence on this issue will be perceived as anything other than tacit approval. 

This is a very volatile time and people are afraid.  Fearful people, especially when in mob mentality, are potentially dangerous to themselves and to others.   It’s always unwise to toy with such dynamics, but this is a particularly bad time to unleash that pattern.  No matter how you may wish to believe that it serves a particular campaign’s ends, the truth is that this kind of thing serves NO ONE– and in fact, it does us all an enormous and wounding disservice.

Political leaders MUST step up and stop this madness, rather than feeding the frenzy.  We have plenty of other challenges to deal with currently.  We don’t need ugly divisiness to hinder and sidetrack us, especially as it’s going to take working TOGETHER to get us through this financial meltdown.  Please take a moment to call or email both major parties’ candidates, as well as the independents in the race, and tell them to put an end to the racial epithets, the fear-mongering, and the insidious incitement to violence.  We are better than this.  We will not tolerate this descent into madness, and those who claim to have our best interests at heart MUST address it and stop it amongst their supporters and at their rallies, dinners and events. 

It ends now.

June 25, 2008

And another thing…! (Take 2, Mainstream Medicine Freaking Out: AAP On Mandatory Vaccination)

Filed under: VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, postpartum, pregnancy — Administrator @ 6:01 pm

Speaking of alliances, undercover dictatorships and despots… have you seen this?

To me, the information below is also very indicative of a change in the tides.  There are just too many desperate moves by mainstream medicine coming into play right now, as they try to keep a stranglehold on us all.  To continue to control us, as We-The-People have been controlled by them in the past.  Thing is, I don’t think it’s working so well any more.  I see more and more people waking up and saying NO, in response to these heavy-handed and despotic maneuverings– even amongst those who don’t make the same choices that we do with regard to birth place, birth attendant, and/or vaccinations. 

I don’t believe in coincidence so, to me, the timing of these issues is a beautiful and encouraging synchronicity.  I’m grateful.  Onward!

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NVIC Vaccine E-Newsletter
June 19, 2008
AAP Leadership Fights Informed Vaccine Choices

by Barbara Loe Fisher

www.vaccineawakening.blogspot.com
www.NVIC.org
www.StandUpBeCounted.org

In another fit of pique aimed at the growing number of vaccine-educated parents questioning pediatricians about the safety of vaccines, the largest private medical organization representing medical doctors treating children – the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) – recently announced to its membership that it will fight doubting parents in their offices, in the media, on the internet and through a partnership with other wealthy and powerful organizations funded by a pharmaceutical industry committed to doing the same thing.

On May 30 (2008), the AAP leadership reports that it met with the leaders of 15 allied organizations in Elk Grove, Illinois to discuss the growing refusal of parents to vaccinate their children according to recommendations of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and AAP. A recent letter to AAP members stated:

‘The group agreed that recent attacks on vaccines have left parents confused. The rates of exemptions are climbing, and the protection of communities from vaccine preventable diseases is in jeopardy. Participants identified several factors that promote anti-vaccine information:

· Parent-to-parent spread of myths,
· A public that does not understand the risk of vaccine-preventable diseases,
· Internet and media exposure that is not balanced,
· Decreased trust in the government and health care providers,
· Slow response to negative news coverage, and
· Increasing calls for philosophical exemptions.

The group recognized strategies that have worked in the past to address these drivers, agreed to jointly promote the positive value of vaccines, and will come together again in July to develop a cohesive message for dissemination. This message will be disseminated in mainstream media, through professional organizations, and via Internet tools. Materials are expected to be available by fall 2008. The group will formally be known as the Immunization Alliance.

Information on the AAP website gives pediatricians instructions about what to do with parents who refuse to obey the doctor’s orders, including a sample letter that states:

‘By not vaccinating your child you are taking selfish advantage of thousands of others who do vaccinate their children, which decreases the likelihood that your child will contract one of these diseases. We feel such an attitude to be self-centered and unacceptable. We are making you aware of these facts not to scare you or coerce you, but to emphasize the importance of vaccinating your child. We recognize that the choice may be a very emotional one for some parents. We will do everything we can to convince you that vaccinating according to the schedule is the right thing to do.

However, should you have doubts, please discuss these with your health care provider in advance of your visit. In some cases, we may alter the schedule to accommodate parental concerns or reservations. Please be advised, however, that delaying or ‘breaking up the vaccines’ to give one or two at a time over two or more visits goes against expert recommendations, and can put your child at risk for serious illness (or even death) and goes against our medical advice as providers… .such additional visits will require additional co-pays on your part. Furthermore, please realize that you will be required to sign a ‘Refusal to Vaccinate’ acknowledgement in the event of lengthy delays.

Finally, if you should absolutely refuse to vaccinate your child despite all our efforts, we will ask you to find another health care provider who shares your views. We do not keep a list of such providers nor would we recommend any such physician.’

Educated parents of America attempting to make informed, voluntary vaccination decisions for your children be warned: your pediatrician is out to change your mind about vaccination or teach you a lesson you will never forget.

Hang on to your child because the doctor you have trusted with your child’s life might just try to make you out to be a bad parent and not only throw you out of the office but notify state officials to charge you with child medical abuse if you don’t agree to give your child every one of those 69 doses of 16 vaccines that doctors working for the Centers for Disease Control say all children from birth to age 18 must get.

Be prepared that the doctor, who you pay to keep your child well, may dutifully obey recent orders given by the AAP leadership to implement one-size- fits-all government vaccine policies: no questions asked. The next time you visit your pediatrician and attempt to ask a question about vaccine reactions or suggest your child get fewer or no vaccines (especially if your child has already suffered serious vaccine reactions your doctor refuses to recognize) be prepared to be humiliated, harassed, threatened and thrown out of the office.

The message from the AAP leadership to vaccine-educated parents is: you WILL give your children every vaccine that industry produces even it brain damages or kills them. You DO NOT have the human right to protect your child from vaccine injury and death because you MUST sacrifice your child for what AAP and government officials have decided is the ‘greater good.’  Your child does NOT belong to you and if you don’t agree to do exactly what we say, we will make sure your family is denied medical care.

Sounds like a smart plan to me, pediatricians of America, if you want to fatally compromise the last remaining shred of trust that mothers and fathers have in your knowledge about vaccine risks and how to minimize them for the children they love more than anyone in the world.

In the words of Jim Carrey: ‘How stupid do you think we are?’

Twenty-six years ago, the co-founders of the National Vaccine Information Center came to the table with the AAP leadership to talk about compensating children injured by mandated vaccines because the AAP said it was a matter of ’simple justice for children.’  We believed the AAP leadership really cared about minimizing vaccine risks for the individual child rather than just wanting to pass the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 for the purpose of protecting drug companies and pediatricians from liability for vaccine injuries and deaths so they could continue to implement one-size-fits-all vaccine policies. Time and time again over the past quarter century, the AAP leadership has demonstrated that they betrayed the trust of parents then and now by refusing to work with parents to minimize vaccine risks.

In 1982, it was far easier to sweep vaccine injured children under the carpet because 1 in 6 American child was not becoming learning disabled and 1 in 150 child was not regressing into autism. Today, there are so many highly vaccinated children who are sick and disabled that there is no place to run and no place to hide.

The vaccine safety and informed consent movement has been led by educated middle class mothers and fathers who DO know how to tell a bad scientific study from a good one; who DO know how to calculate the amount of mercury or aluminum in a vaccine; and who DO know the difference between being told a lie and being told the truth about vaccine risks.

AAP: we are not stupid. We will not stand by and watch our children and grandchildren become vaccine damaged because you are obsessed with forcing every child to use every vaccine that Pharma produces with no concern for protecting the children who cannot use every vaccine safely. You can deny us medical care and try to take away our human right to voluntary, informed consent to vaccination but you will never win the war you have declared on millions of vaccine-educated parents in America.

Two things to add…

Filed under: VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, pregnancy — Administrator @ 5:32 pm

An acquaintance of mine says that the AMA resolution on home birth is nothing new.  She feels that the disclosure of same has worked well for the medical powers-that-be: namely, she thinks it was an easy way for them “to make the birthing world freak out.” 

I don’t agree.  After 20+ years of birth advocacy, I’ve seen a lot of attempts at power-grabbing by mainstream medicine.  I have NOT seen anything this blatant and possibly desperate.  In spite of the fact that neither the AMA nor the ACOG has overtly tried to make home birth illegal (yet), I believe that their resolution to develop model legislation must be taken as a signal of their ultimate intentions. 

In other words, I think we need to be prepared for an AMA/ACOG joint attempt to legislatively force the issue with regard to home birth and non-nurse midwifery options on a nationwide scale.  This is new. 

What I also believe is new is the size of the response it’s getting from “our side.”  I find that encouraging, and feel that even if my colleague is correct, this is a good sign.  A sign that brings to mind– for me, anyway– the MAP model of the Eight Stages of Social Movements.  (If you’re interested, check out this link:  http://www.indybay.org/olduploads/movement_action_plan.pdf)  I think we might be experiencing a Trigger Event.  I hope we are.

Meanwhile, for anyone who might be inclined to dig further, here are some bits of information that may be edifying.

A link to the AMA Resolution on Home “Deliveries”: http://www.ama-assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/471/205.doc

And I’d like to end this post with a quote by Dr. Benjamin Rush, who signed the Declaration of Independence and is one of my favorites amongst the Founding Fathers (along with my distant relative, the other Benjamin– Franklin, that is).  Dr. Rush was clearly a visionary man, stating this:

“Unless we put medical freedom into the Constitution, the time will come when medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship… to restrict the art of healing to one class of men, and deny equal privilege to others, will be to constitute the Bastille of medical science.  All such laws are un-American and despotic and have no place in a republic… The Constitution of this republic should make special privilege for medical freedom as well as religious freedom.”

Despotic.  Undercover dictatorship.  Un-American.  I like the sound of that, especially when applied to the good ol’ boys at ACOG and the AMA (present company excluded, Dr. Fischbein).  The next time anybody has the opportunity to give someone in the media a soundbyte about VBAC, home birth, midwives and the AMA/ACOG resolutions, for goodness sake, quote Dr. Rush and use some of these words/phrases! 

Let’s see who’s really freaking out.  I could be wrong, but I think our trigger event is right here, right now. 

Point/Counterpoint: Expert vs. Idiot

Filed under: VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, pregnancy — Administrator @ 11:12 am

A friend of mine who is on the FAM board forwarded this to me.  It’s about the recent AMA resolution regarding home birth, but there’s a good bit about VBAC too.  It’s VERY quotable, and I invite you to pass it along as much as possible.

In contrast to the doctor quoted in my previous post, this one IS actually an expert in his field.  Sad that many (most?) people will hear and give credence to what the Idiot says, rather than what the Expert addresses. 

************************************************************************************

This letter was written by one of the MDs in our community and he asked that I share it.  You may respond directly to him if you wish.

D, CNM
So Cal

—–Original Message—–
From: Stuart Fischbein
angelfischs (at) yahoo (dot) com
Monday, June 23, 2008
5:35 PM
To: ExBd (at) acog (dot) org
Douglas H. Kirkpatrick, MD
The American College of and Gynecologists
PO Box 96920
Washington, DC 20090-2188
Dear Sir:

I am a practicing OB/GYN in southern California and Fellow of ACOG and recently was informed by midwife colleagues of your recommendation and encouragement for the AMA to lobby Congress for a law banning out of hospital birth. Funny that I had to hear of this decision from outside sources and was never approached by my college to see how I or my local colleagues felt about it. I have grave concerns regarding my organization taking such a stand. I think we are all agreed that ACOG has a statement regarding patients’ rights to informed consent and informed refusal. Yet, it seems with every decision our organization moves further away from that basic tenet.

ACOG’s little “guideline” paper on VBAC in 2004 where the word readily was changed to immediately has had the chilling effect of doing away with VBAC options at hundreds if not more hospitals. Not due to patient safety, or the ideal of giving true informed consent but really, let’s be honest, to fear of litigation. I have seen how patients have become counseled by obstetricians at facilities where VBAC has been banned. They are clearly given a skewed view of the risks of VBAC but rarely told of the risks of multiple surgeries. If you think this is untrue you are, sadly, out of touch with real clinical medicine.

As to out of hospital birthing, please give me the courtesy of an explanation as to the data you used and the process by which an organization which is supposed to represent me came to this conclusion. Any statement saying that it is as simple as patient safety and that one-size fits all hospital birth under the “obstetric model” of practice should be applied to all patients is, putting it nicely, not really in line with what best serves all our patients. In many instances, hospitals are not safe, certainly not nurturing and have a far worse track record for disasters than home birth. Even when emergency help is nearby this is true. The focus of all of us in medicine should be on reigning in trial lawyers and tort reform and lobbying Congress for that. The best interest of the college members and the patients we serve would be for my organization to spend its time and energy on something that has true benefit.

Removing choices from well-informed patients and caring doctors and midwives is wholly un-American.

So please send me detailed information on how ACOG decided outlawing home birth was a wise thing to do. You must have scientific data to take such a drastic stand. Please make it available to me so that I may share it with like-minded colleagues. I would also like to know the process by which this came to pass. Who first raised this issue and why? What committee reviewed all the data and did its due diligence in interviewing those of us with long-standing experience in backing midwives who perform out of hospital births. There must be a fine, non-confidential paper trail you can share with your members. Specific names of committee member who voted for this would be enlightening and I am requesting this information. I would like to know the background and expertise regarding out of hospital birth for each member who had a hand in the decision to go to the AMA.

We live in an odd era where once something is said or recommended by a legitimate organization such as ACOG it has deep ramifications never intended, such as becoming fodder for trial lawyers trying to squeeze the lifeblood and dignity out of your members. Or forcing women to travel hundreds of miles in labor to find a supportive facility. Or even worse, to have them arrive in a VBAC banned hospital and refuse surgery. Can this be the best we can do for our patients? Remember, your VBAC statement was meant to be only a recommendation but quickly became the rule by which hospital administrators, risk managers and anesthesia departments of smaller hospitals banned this option for thousands of women. An option that, in proper hands, was the safe and accepted standard of care for 30 years. In fact, you still have an ACOG VBAC brochure that recommends this option!

For those of us working at smaller hospitals where VBAC was banned due to lack of emergency help (anesthesia, OR crews, etc.) there is a big question that has perplexed us, that no administrator seems to be willing or able to answer. That question is: “If a hospital cannot handle an emergency c/section for VBACs, and most emergencies are for fetal bradycardia, hemorrhage (i.e. abruption) or shoulder dystocia, not for ruptured uteri, then how can they do obstetrics at all?” For they seem to still be able to have a maternity ward without in house anesthesia. Will someday ACOG, in their great wisdom but seeming disconnect from reality, make a “recommendation” that little hospitals stop providing obstetric services? Will this better serve women and their communities throughout America?

I am frightened and angered by what you have done in my name. Now I ask you to defend your position in encouraging the AMA to lobby Congress for another restriction on the freedom of choice that belongs to women and their families. Those choices include midwifery and the right to have the most beautiful and life changing event occur wherever best fits their desire.

Midwives are well trained and required to have obstetrical backup. They have very special relationships with their patients and want the very best outcomes for them. They do not need me or you to police them. We have a habit in our country over the past 40 years of thinking we can legislate out stupidity. All that has done is erode the individual freedoms that belong, by birthright, to each of us.  I would hope you trust your Fellows to know their specialty, their colleagues, and what is best for the patient as an individual.

These decisions do not belong to politicians or faceless committees. You should have more faith in your members to give balanced informed consent. Again, my recommendation to you is to put all your considerable energy into changing our legal malpractice system. Those of us actually practicing medicine and caring for patients know this to be the greatest threat to the mission and responsibility we have chosen to undertake.

I look forward to your response and possibly the beginning of a meaningful dialogue.

Sincerely,

Stuart J. Fischbein, MD FACOG
Medical Advisor, Birth Action Coalition

June 19, 2008

Transcript from Fox News: Ricki Lake “irresponsible” to promote home birth

Filed under: VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, pregnancy — Administrator @ 2:30 pm

This annoyed me enough that I took the trouble to transcribe it, since I couldn’t find the link to pass along.  Look at the things this doctor says.  He doesn’t even communicate well– ruptured placenta??  Sorry, Doc, I’m just a layperson but while I know about abruptions and accretas and percretas and previas, I never heard of a RUPTURED placenta.  I HAVE heard of study after study proving that home birth is safe, but none that prove there is more risk of complications.  I’m sure you, the educated reader, will find plenty of other absurdities and inane, inaccurate, stupid things within his comments.  I won’t ruin your fun in tearing this guy apart by giving away any more spoilers. 

Suffice to say, I read this and the doc comes across as a blithering idiot.  Yet this man puts himself out there as an expert, and proclaims that Ricki (and the rest of us) are not?!?  And people believe him?!?!  It boggles the mind.

More propaganda, and not even done well.  Please pass this on.  I hope Fox News and Dr. Siegel do get “lots of calls” on this segment!

Eileen 

*****************************************************************************************************

Dr. Mark Siegel on Fox News: Ricki Lake is “irresponsible”; she’s not an expert  

Host: Former talk show host, Ricki Lake, is in a heated battle with the American Medical Association.  You see, Ricki Lake delivered her second son in the bathtub of her New York City apartment seven years ago, by choice.  It was planned, with a midwife.  Now the AMA is calling the safest location for childbirth a hospital, a connected birthing center or other approved facility.  You may not be surprised to hear that. 

But now Ricki says she feels attacked, and there’s this war unfolding about whether it’s safe to have your baby at home and with a midwife.  Fox News Medical Contributor Dr. Mark Siegel joins us now to weigh in on this.  Hi, Dr. Siegel.

Dr. Siegel: Good morning, Megan.

Host:  Okay, so… is it so much the problem of, you know, having the child at home?  Is that the problem?  Or is it using a midwife instead of a doctor?  What’s the problem?

Dr. Siegel:  The problem is that Ricki Lake is in the middle of a mess here.  She’s irresponsible, I think, to be weighing in on this.  She’s not an expert.  

Look, the fact is that we w… before home birth can even be considered, there’s a lot of things that have to be done in advance to screen people for this.  People that are at high risk for genetic abnormalities, for early birth weight infants, premature births– those people start having home births, we’re going to have more and more complications.  

Secondly, a lot of the complications that occur, you can’t even predict.  You know you could have bleeding during childbirth, you could have a ruptured placenta, you could have a cord wrapped around your neck.  Study after study has shown a higher risk of complications with home birth.  The AMA is right, I believe, to be saying the safest place for a birth is in the hospital. 

Host: Alright, now let me ask you this.  My camerawoman, the woman on the other side of this picture, has done a documentary on midwifery.  Which for some reason is pronounced ‘wifery’ rather than ‘wivery.’  Uh, in any event, she says… she wants me to ask you… if a woman’s healthy and has no complications during the course of the pregnancy, what’s the objection to having her give birth at home with a midwife? 

Dr. Siegel: Well, Megan, I’ve already said… the objection is much less.  But look, we’re dealing with star power here.  I mean, with Ricki Lake weighing in on this, a lot of people could be having these births at home that should not be having them.  That’s my biggest concern.  You know, the person on the other side of the camera, doing the documentary is correct.  The risk of something happening is much less if it’s somebody that’s healthy, someone that has been screened with an ultrasound, we know that the cord isn’t wrapped around the neck, we know that it’s not a breech presentation.  We know that there’s no problems earlier on in the pregnancy.  Fine, that decreases the risk.  It’s still not 100%. 

Host:  In other words, you can’t predict whether problems will occur?

Dr. Siegel: Well, a shoulder can get stuck, a cord can get wrapped around the neck…

Host: Is a midwife qualified to deal with all of that?

Dr. Siegel:  I do think a midwife is qualified.  You know, we’re going to get a lot of phone calls on this segment no matter what, Megan, but I think she is qualified or he is qualified, but an obstetrician with training in complications is MORE qualified and that’s the side to err… I err on.  All three of my children were born in the hospital and that’s not an accident.

Host: Yeah.  Interesting.

March 15, 2008

Another take on ACOG/Homebirth statement

Filed under: Uncategorized, VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, pregnancy — Administrator @ 11:11 pm

A fellow doula in my area posted this to a Yahoo group and while I don’t agree with everything written, parts of it are wonderful.  She has not verified that these are Karen Brody’s (BOLD founder) words, but they are purported to be.
****************************
The Childbirth Secret

Have you seen the hot-off-the- press ACOG Statement on Home birth? Oh, geeze…come on Guys. Why does ACOG continue to bash home birth and midwives? Of course we all know that Ricki Lake’s film, among other artistic efforts out there, showing home birth in all its glory was just too much for ACOG to handle. Home birth has been kept underground so much that most women never even imagined a birth like that was possible before Ricki Lake’s film. I remember sitting next to a woman in her twenties at the Business of Being Born showing in New York City who wasn’t a mother, who told me she figured she’d have a cesarean because that’s the fashion, who was in tears by the end of Lake’s film, looking at me afterwards saying, “I didn’t know a waterbirth was possible or even legal in the United States.” But now, ACOG is scared out of their white coats because women like her know The Childbirth Secret. They know that not only is it possible to have a waterbirth at home, but for most low-risk pregnant women it’s a safe, and sometimes – thank you Debra Pascali Bonaro (www. orgasmicbirth. com) orgasmic. Yes, childbirth can be pleasurable for women. This is The Childbirth Secret ACOG is so vehemently protesting.

I feel like we’re in the final scene of the Wizard of Oz where the witch and the Wizard all feel like they are going to get their way, keep things status quo. ACOG is the Wizard, the doctors who side with ACOG the witches and the consumers are Dorothy, the Lion, The Scarecrow and Tin man. Yes, the consumers are a bit afraid, but they are still moving towards Oz and confronting the Wizard. The Wizard, behind all his bells and whistles and smoke is really just a weak guy who is trying to create a powerful all-knowing image. If Dorothy and her crew don’t move forward, tell him he’s not being nice, then nothing is going to change…he’ s going to keep on bullying everyone who comes into his path. Are you getting me?

It’s just too obvious this whole thing today is a Wizard of Oz movie. Really.

Okay, I just have to dive into ACOG’s (aka the Wizard) Statement for a moment.

FIRST PARAGRAPH: “complications can arise with little or no warning even among women with low-risk pregnancies. ”

Sorry Boys….I have talked to countless home birth midwives and it seems they virtually never see complications arising in low-risk pregnancies without significant advanced warning. Why don’t you tell it to women straight? This is exactly what is being seen in hospital births today. Low-risk women are entering hospitals and often after receiving intervention without warning emergencies arise. Now that’s a true statement.

PARAGRAPH TWO: “ACOG does not support programs that advocate for or individuals who provide home births.”

Let me re-write that with a bit more truth in there: ACOG does not support programs that advocate for individuals who:

* Monitor the physical, psychological, and social well-being of the mother throughout the childbearing cycle

* Provide the mother with individualized education, counseling, and prenatal care, continuous hands-on assistance during labor and delivery, and postpartum support

* Minimize technological interventions

* Identify and refer women who require obstetrical attention

(thank you Citizens for Midwifery! www. cfmidwifery. org)

ACOG doesn’t support this kind of birth for women?

PARAGRAPH THREE: “Childbirth decisions should not be dictated or influenced by what’s fashionable, trendy, or the latest cause celebre.”

Okay, now we know you’re scared out of your pants of Dorothy and her posse! Thank you artists like Ricki Lake, Debra Pascali-Bonaro, Jennifer Block, Tina Cassidy, and – oh – me!

PARAGRAPH FOUR:”there is no scientific way to recommend an “ideal” national cesarean rate as a target goal.”

Hmmm…the World Health Organization seems to be able to find a scientific way. It’s called 15% for industrialized countries. The US is over 30 percent. Shame on us.

PARAGRAPH FOUR (again!): “Multiple factors are responsible for the current cesarean rate, but emerging contributors include maternal choice and the raising tide of high-risk pregnancies due to maternal age, overweight, obesity and diabetes.”

Hold on…are you blaming mothers? Here’s where my BOLDness really gets fed up. Have you BOYS ever read the Listening to Mother’s Survey II which found that the maternal choice issue for increased cesareans is virtually non-existent. I also want to comment on maternal age. Scaring mothers who are in their forties that they have to have a cesarean to birth their babies is just wrong. Sure, sometimes age will put you at a higher risk, but a healthy woman in her forties is by no means high-risk just because of her age. There are plenty of women in their forties these days whose bodies rock.

PARAGRAPH FIVE: “The availability of an obstetrician- gynecologist to provide expertise and intervention in an emergency during labor and/ or delivery may be life-saving for the mother or newborn and lowers the likelihood of a bad outcome.”

Wait a minute – did you just say the OB-GYN was available during labor? Maybe by phone, but in general most OB-GYNs show up mostly for the pushing and that’s why ..mothers need interventions. ..monitoring. ..all to keep the OB-GYN informed by phone of how the labor’s going and encouraged that the mother is making progress.

PARAGRAPH SIX: “It should be emphasized that studies comparing the safety and outcome of births in hospitals with those occurring in other settings in the US are limited and have not been scientifically rigorous.”

Have you BOYS ever heard of very scientific and embraced studies from other industrialized countries… like the UK? It’s interesting to me that a joint statement on home birth made by the UK’s Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and the Royal College of Midwives in April 2007 opens by saying, “there is ample evidence showing that labouring at home increases a woman’s likelihood of a birth that is both satisfying and safe.”

ACOG, you’re busted.

PARAGRAPH SEVEN: “The main goal should be a healthy and safe outcome for both mother and baby.”

And by that you mean a planned c-section?

I’d love to know how you define healthy? Judging from the number of birth stories I’ve heard in America today emotional health isn’t a part of your health picture.

PARAGRAPH SEVEN (again!): “Choosing to deliver a baby at home, however, is to place the process of giving birth over the goal of having a healthy baby.”

Someone wake me up. Am I in a time machine and just landed into the 1950s? Trust your doctor… not yourself…blame the mother. Okay, beam me to a different time period – maybe 2025 so I can see a time when mothers aren’t afraid to not follow doctors orders when their gut is telling them something distinctly different. I’m not advocating to forget about the baby – quite the contrary – having a positive, pleasurable birth is all about thinking about the baby. Just check out APPPAH (www.birthpsychology.com/apppah/) and you’ll know what I mean.

So are we clear what The Childbirth Secret is? It’s just like the book The Secret. It’s something anybody can hold. The Law of Attraction. If you want a positive birth experience put it out there, seek it, believe you will have one, surround yourself with people who have experienced birth and pleasure. Now THAT might bring ACOG’s house crumbling down…another statement will certainly be issued…maybe two. And we’ll start to see a birthing climate that honors women’s choices. Finally.

It’s in Dorothy and her posse’s hands to make this happen. I’m in. You?

Posted by birththeplay. com at 11:02 AM
3 comments:
Anonymous said…
Scarily enough, there are plenty of women among the ACOG BOYS! Women OB/GYNs are more likely to choose c-section for themselves! Talk about the ultimate brainwashing. I can’t even imagine being so out of touch with my body (or my intuition, or my integrity!)

3:04 AM
labortrials said…
The reason many of us refer to ACOG is male is because it is a patriarchal institution. Women OBs are subject to the same male-dominated thinking and action that we associate with male OBs.

This is a great post. I agree with your dissection of the statement. I’d also add that cesarean birth is much more fashionable, it seems, in Hollywood than natural (non-interventive non-medicated) birth. Most women who choose cesarean birth have been SCARED into it anyway. They certainly HAVEN’T been informed of the risks – both short-term and long-term – cesarean surgery.

10:43 AM
birththeplay. com said…
Yes…I use BOYS not because all the ACOG folk are men, but because it is very much a patriarchal institution.

www.birththeplay.com
Karen is the playwright of the play, BIRTH. She is the mother of two boys, born at home with Mary, Ida, and Stacey — midwives in Arkansas. In 2003/2004 Karen interviewed over 100 women across the United States about their birth experiences. She wrote BIRTH in response to what she learned from those mothers’ birth stories.

February 5, 2008

Trying to empty my cup

Filed under: EFT, birth, doulas, energy modalities, midwifery, postpartum, pregnancy — Administrator @ 11:04 am

So I just read something that has thoroughly confused and bewildered me.  It’s a quote from someone who is very well-known in the birth world, and most of you would instantly recognize her name if I used it. 

“I don’t ever want to get over the PTSD from my first birth… it’s the fire that keeps me going.”

I find myself repeating the words over and over in my head, trying to wrap my mind around that statement.  And I keep coming up with the same response.  “Whaaaat?!?”

Surely she’s not serious.  Is she?  Surely we’re not supposed to believe that.  Are we?

And if she is, and we are… what in hell are we supposed to GET from that?  I understand re-framing.  I teach and facilitate it!  But this isn’t about reframing, or it doesn’t seem to be.  Am I missing it? 

As I unwind all of my own stuff around her words, I can sit and ponder what she’s said without chasing my tail to the point of mental exhaustion, trying to figure it out.  But I still don’t understand. 

And I don’t understand why we would glorify that quote either.  With my still-not-quite-empty cup, it doesn’t sound all that healthy… though I could be wrong.

Love,

Eileen

February 1, 2008

Troubled Waters

Filed under: VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, postpartum, pregnancy — Administrator @ 1:11 pm

I’m mulling over a couple of things that happened recently, both of which are troubling me.

For one, a doula acquaintance of mine experienced a really difficult and traumatic birth with one of her clients.  Unfortunately, that’s nothing new.  It’s the aftermath– and the doula’s actions in particular– that disturb me.  Summed up in brief, I think she decided to spill everything that she saw and was horrified by, when the parents were in a very vulnerable space and didn’t benefit from hearing all the graphic details.  In addition, the doula’s personal state of shock and distress (secondary trauma) caused her to present the story in an even more unhelpful way.  Telling the parents the “whole story” helped HER feel better.  She told me it did.  But from what she told me regarding the parents’ reactions, I think it’s possible that she worsened the trauma for the mother.  Maybe the father too. 

Two, I attended a birth with a rare client of my own, and found the midwives’ actions to be pretty startling.  In a nutshell, I’m not used to seeing homebirth midwives act like hospital staff.  Call me naive but the truth is that I’ve been very lucky in my 20+ years of serving mothers and families.  My experience with homebirth midwives, even the most clinical or abrasive of them, has usually been that they don’t act like drill sergeants… or nurses and docs in a hospital.  These did.

The connection that I see between the two events comes belatedly, and only after writing about both.  It boils down to what I perceive as an alarming number of birth practitioners serving themselves, rather than mothers and babies and families.  That’s not what we’re supposed to do. 

Unloading your own distress on a vulnerable postpartum family is not okay.  That’s why we have doula groups, so you can process your wounds and get help and support, and then NOT dump on the family or make things worse for them.  (Argument to expand on, another day: “They had a right to know what happened.  I wasn’t going to HIDE it for the doc!”  Fine.  Agreed.  And there’s such a thing as an appropriate, time, place, and method of disclosure, too.)

Making a birthing woman be “with midwife” is also not okay.  These ladies were telling the mother– a second timer who had her first child naturally and vaginally, even though the babe was persistent posterior and a compound presentation too!– how to push.  And I do mean purple pushing.  Make no sound.  Send that all down to your bottom.  Don’t stop to take a big gulp of air in mid-push, because you lose momentum that way.  Push through the whole contraction.  Push now, because you’re complete.  (Not because you have an urge to push.)

You can’t be in that position/place, because it’s not good for me.  (I’m not kidding!) 

And the most telling of all…

You can’t have a baby with your legs together! 

They continue to tease my client about this.  It’s as though they don’t get it that she didn’t feel SAFE to open and blossom around them.  Their fear and their demands of her for their own benefit, ignoring what was working for her, made it all the more difficult for her to relax and OPEN.

As Michel Odent says, in answer to the question, “When x happens, what do you do?”… first, ask yourself what you did to cause it.

So in thinking about all this, I realized that I’m guilty too.  I’d like to offer a public apology to Bonnie, and to her nearly 20-year-old daughter, wherever you both may be. 

Bonnie, I’m deeply saddened by my actions when I remember your birth.  I regret that I brought fear into your space, and that I caused what should’ve been a calmly triumphant, peaceful moment to a panicky one.  I know that made it harder for everyone, and much less safe for you and your baby.  Everything was fine.  I was wrong and you were right.  I should’ve trusted… you, your body, your baby, birth, myself, and intuition.  I wish I had known enough to apologize then, instead of 20 years down the road.  The words “I’m sorry” are inadequate, but they’re all I have to offer other than a sincere and heartfelt promise: I have and will continue to do everything in my power to avoid making that mistake again.  Thank you for helping me to learn a better way.

With love,

Eileen

Dr. Wonderful… paging Dr. Wonderful…

Filed under: VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, postpartum, pregnancy — Administrator @ 12:17 pm

If you do nothing else today, please visit this link and enjoy the post and the incredible photos.  I promise it’s well worth your time.

Dr. Wonderful, I don’t know you but I love you.  You are a beautiful, brilliant and enlightened man.  You’re a priceless gift and an inspiration.  THANK YOU for being on the planet at this time, and for restoring my crushed faith and my lost hopes.  With your beautiful service to women and babies and families, you show us, remind us, how things CAN be. 

That makes it that much easier for this old doula to hold on a bit longer and to keep believing in miracles.  I believe your presence will allow the next person to follow in your footsteps that much more easily.  And then exponentially, in waves, I believe we will see more and more doctors like you. 

I hold the space for that miracle to come into being.  I believe.

With love,

Eileen

 

January 10, 2008

Waterbirth International In Danger Of Closing

Filed under: VBAC, birth, doulas, midwifery, postpartum, pregnancy — Administrator @ 11:31 am
The post below is from Barbara Harper.  It would be a huge blow to natural birth and birth advocacy to lose Waterbirth International.  Please do what you can to help, even if it’s only to help spread the word and/or to hold space for the miracle Barbara says is needed.
Love,

Eileen

***************************************
Subject: [MFCInews] Waterbirth International in danger of closing

I cannot yet imagine a world without the voice and work of Waterbirth International – we get calls and emails every day from women who need help convincing one hospital or another to let them labor or birth in water.  If we die – a big part of the movement dies.  Waterbirth has shown us all that women know how to give birth and babies know how to be born.  Waterbirth gave us “hands-off”, sit back and let the baby out.  I see waterbirth mentioned on Blogs every single day, not to mention Baby Story on the TV.  I took Waterbirth International to ACOG two years in a row – and was the ONLY booth showing birth films to obstetricians and especially to student physicians.  There were tears, laughter and outrage – just the thing to stir up those young crop of doctors.  I am finally realizing a life’s dream.   But now I am faced with letting this dream go.  Perhaps I have done enough.  Perhaps it is time to quit.
About 18 years ago, maybe it was longer, when Mothering Magazine was facing bankruptcy Peggy did a heartfelt plea asking their readers to consider ordering a Life-time subscription.  I think the subscriptions were $1000 or $1200, I can’t remember now.  I do remember that I couldn’t imagine not reading my Mothering.  So, I bought two and gave one to my obstetrician’ s office.
How can you help us stay open to take the next phone call? – to convince the next obstetrician to incorporate waterbirth into his/her practice – to work with the nurse midwives to install pools in their facilities?  To educate an entire hospital on the benefits of allowing women freedom of movement in the water.  How much is it worth to see waterbirth become the norm in the US, like it is in the UK?  I think we only need a few more years to make that happen.  Do women really want waterbirth to be an available choice in every hospital?  I think so.
Can you help us by getting the word out on blogs and lists?  I had to let go of all of the staff except one person to process orders.  Miraculously, we made payroll today, but we can’t hang on much longer.  We need a miracle.
If I need to call every single waterbirth parent personally, I will.  I don’t want 25 years of work to end over a measly $200,000. The work that we have done the last few years has been phenomenal.  How God arranged for me to teach in hospitals and medical schools around the planet – Taiwan, Venezuela, Turkey, Mexico, Canada, Holland, Portugal, China, Trinidad, Croatia – I’ll never figure that out.  I laugh out loud sometimes when I get up in front of an audience of physicians in a medical school overseas – who all want to hear about waterbirth and the incorporation of Gentle Birth practices and principles into their routines.
Think about what you can do and call me if you want to chat or if you have some great ideas on how we can quickly move into the black and keep waterbirth alive and thriving.
We need your help.  Barbara Harper needs your help.  The waterbirth/gentle birth movement needs your help.
Blessings,

Barbara
Barbara Harper, RN, CLD, CCE
Founder/Director
Waterbirth International
http://www.waterbirth/. org
503-673-0026 -office (out of US or in Portland)
800-641-2229 – toll free
503-710-7975 – cell phone

We LOVE helping women get into Hot Water!!  And have been doing it for 24 years!!

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