Birth survey, anyone willing to help me out?

[Incubator]

I made a birth survey last night and was hoping to get a few responses. Is anyone willing to share? The survey is designed for women who had a hospital birth. I figured a mothering mama who was unhappy with her hospital experience and went on to have a HB, UC or H/UBAC would be perfect candidates. Please help me get some information and perfect my survey.
The more "Typical" you think your hospital birth was, the better!
Hospital Birth Experience Survey
Thank you!

[Incubator]

I see your results. Thank you very much, and I'm sorry that your birth experience was so traumatizing for you.

[Incubator]

I see two more, thank you both!

[seeing_stars]

I filled out one survey for each of my 3 hospital births. I was happy with 95% of what went on and don't desire to homebirth, but a supportive of others doing so

[Incubator]

Thank you very much for your help. I thought from the responses that at least one of them must have been a repeat. I thank you, and if you know anyone who might also fill it out, please share.

[Fyrestorm]

I replied, not sure if it was what you were looking for since I was a HB transfer...feel free to drop my responses if it doesn't fit your model.

[Incubator]

Fyrestorm, I am very familiar with your birth story and deeply honored that you would fill out my survey. I started crying when I saw your email address. Thank you so much.

[Incubator]

Thank you again, things are looking good. a few quick stats 75% IV usage, 38% induction rate, 57% rate of augmentation, 63% use of epidural or spinal, 25% rate of cesarean, two cases of shoulder dystocia.
Thank you ladies, keep it coming and feel free to share it with others!

[Incubator]

Two more, thank you both. I am so proud to know so many strong women like you.

[jennica]

What are you using the data for?

[Incubator]

I am compiling data for the purpose of curing my intense and overwhelming curiosity.
I'm not incredibly familiar with typical hospital birth. The majority of my friends are like me; natural home-birthers. The friends I have who had hospital births don't talk about them, and I feel awkward pressing them for information. Mostly I want to know, is hospital birth, in general, as pushed as TV programs and those outrageous birth stories you might hear sometimes would make it out to be? Is it worse? I'm mostly curious, for a woman who enters a hospital to give birth who ISN'T like us, how does she experience it?

[Incubator]

I should add, my original motivation to create the survey was to take a look at the birth experiences of the average woman who thinks that women who labor without an epidural are crazy, or a woman that believes her c-section was necessary (I'm not saying it wasn't, quite the contrary! How could I even guess if it was or wasn't without more information?) Hence, the birth survey was born. After finishing it, I was kept up all night by the things I might have missed, and then decided I should try to get as many varied birth experiences as possible, and in the mean time, perfect a new survey that covers all the bases and is more specifically geared to militantly pro-epidural women and women who might choose an elective c-section because "it's better."
I just want to get a better idea of what women actually experience in a hospital, and how that woman perceived it. I'm getting long winded again.

[earthmama369]

I had two hospital births, so I filled the survey in twice, once for each kiddo. In retrospect, dd would have been an awesome home birth. DS was a necessary hospital birth, but if I were to get pregnant again, barring complications, I'd go for a water birth at home.

[LizaBear]

I filled out two - you might opt to drop my responses from the second survey.

[Incubator]

Liza bear, thank you for your response. One of the things that bothered me last night was that I had not entered a question about the condition of the baby to allow for stillbirth, and at what point it had occurred. I am incredibly sorry for your loss, and thank you so much for sharing that with me.

I'd also like to mention that I'm not doing this for any statistical reason. Each and every birth experience is valid, regardless of whether or not it fulfills the reason for my creating the survey in the first place. It's not going to do much to satisfy my curiosity if some kinds of birth are excluded from the results due to circumstance.HB transfers are good, because aside from anecdotes about how horribly HB transfers are treated, I don't have any real knowledge about what it's like. The only reason that the survey is geared toward hospital births directly is because I've been related MANY real experiences of home-birth already. I'm not particularly curious about HB, because I know what it's like, typically. Hospital birth is the real mystery here.

[jennica]

Wow, that is a lot of work to do just for personal curiosity. Are you collecting names with the responses, or is it anonymous? You should see some interesting results, but not sure if a sampling of MDC mamas is quite what you were looking for? Their results, even for hospital births, may not be in line with a typical hospital birth.

P.S. Do you know about The Birth Survey (check my sig). It has been up for a year now nationally, and year before that just in NYC.

[Incubator]

Originally Posted by jennica

Wow, that is a lot of work to do just for personal curiosity. Are you collecting names with the responses, or is it anonymous? You should see some interesting results, but not sure if a sampling of MDC mamas is quite what you were looking for? Their results, even for hospital births, may not be in line with a typical hospital birth.

P.S. Do you know about The Birth Survey (check my sig). It has been up for a year now nationally, and year before that just in NYC.

I am not collecting names with the survey, however there is the option to leave an email address. I've no idea who is who. One of these people could be my neighbor for all I know. The results have been interesting, but that's my opinion and I find every birth story to be interesting. I don't intend to sample ONLY MDC mamas, but their experiences teach me also what can happen to a woman who is more natural-minded, or what can happen to a woman that might cause her to question medical birth. I don't want every single one of the results to be "typical" because anomalies indicate that average does not mean usual or typical. In fact, it is the anomalies that make birth more interesting. It is by no mean a scientific survey. It's just the easiest way I could think of to maybe get some birth stories that I haven't heard before, some insight into what I haven't seen.
For an example, my sister-in-law has repeatedly said before that she wants a hospital birth with drugs, and I believe that she thinks I'm crazy or irresponsible for having a home birth. This makes me incredibly curious as to what her birth experience was like. Every woman I've ever spoken to about my birth experiences (besides my natural friends) has had the same reaction. I want to know why.
I am familiar with the birth survey, having participated in it for each of my births.

[jennica]

Originally Posted by Incubator

I am not collecting names with the survey, however there is the option to leave an email address. I've no idea who is who. One of these people could be my neighbor for all I know. The results have been interesting, but that's my opinion and I find every birth story to be interesting. I don't intend to sample ONLY MDC mamas, but their experiences teach me also what can happen to a woman who is more natural-minded, or what can happen to a woman that might cause her to question medical birth. I don't want every single one of the results to be "typical" because anomalies indicate that average does not mean usual or typical. In fact, it is the anomalies that make birth more interesting. It is by no mean a scientific survey. It's just the easiest way I could think of to maybe get some birth stories that I haven't heard before, some insight into what I haven't seen.
For an example, my sister-in-law has repeatedly said before that she wants a hospital birth with drugs, and I believe that she thinks I'm crazy or irresponsible for having a home birth. This makes me incredibly curious as to what her birth experience was like. Every woman I've ever spoken to about my birth experiences (besides my natural friends) has had the same reaction. I want to know why.
I am familiar with the birth survey, having participated in it for each of my births.

I was just wondering, because above you said you specifically wanted the moms who plan epidurals or c-sections, so I was just pointing out, that is probably not the demographic here. Of course each birth tells it's own story and there may be interesting info from them all, I just thought you were looking for a certain type to compare them with the births on TV, but maybe I misunderstood that?

Also, I was wondering about anonymity because you've been responding to people here with specific info about their survey and birth, that was not posted in this thread. I was therefore wondering if you were collecting names with surveys. I would have assumed confidentiality for something like this, but as I read the thread, it seemed to be something that would be shared with others with names attached, which is something I may not personally want to do. I was just trying to get a feel for that aspect before taking it.

Good luck with your endeavor.

[MegBoz]

Originally Posted by Incubator

or a woman that believes her c-section was necessary (I'm not saying it wasn't, quite the contrary! How could I even guess if it was or wasn't without more information?)

Well, I'll come out & say that plenty of unnecessary c-sections happen in American every.single.day. It's simply stats... the WHO says the rate should be 15% max & beyond that, risks outweigh benefits. It's 32% today in the US.

Last I checked the bodies of American women didn't suddenly, in just one generation, stop functioning properly. So, yeah, that means there are lots of "Unnecessarians" out there.

Originally Posted by Incubator

Every woman I've ever spoken to about my birth experiences (besides my natural friends) has had the same reaction. I want to know why.

I posted a thread "why decide on an epidural before labor?" Some interesting things came out of it that I hadn't thought of before - like the fact that some people's own mothers told them regularly how giving birth was horrific & the worst day of their life. Or others who don't want to feel "out of control" or who just really dislike pain & are willing to take the risks of an epi so they can enjoy the experience & not be in pain.

Culturally, we're taught in America:
1. Birth is painful & dangerous
2. Doctors are to be trusted. They can take away the pain & fix any of the problems that may arise with this dangerous process
therefore... it's stupid to birth at home without a doctor & pointless to birth without an epi & feel all that pain when you don't have to.

So there you go.

[fwlady]

I did 4 surveys, one was a HB/UC transfer. And, I had other births, that I had to transfer after the birth. I think that the survey does need more about the 3rd stage, because birth doesn't end with the baby's emergence. And, other traumatic things can happen after the baby. Kymberli