"he had the cord wrapped around his neck and WOULD HAVE DIED!!" - Page 2

[gcgirl]

Originally Posted by MegBoz

:
I'm sorry for your loss. And you're right - it DOES happen, so we should "Give the mother the benefit of the doubt" & not doubt her story. However, that mother should give the original poster the benefit of not fear-mongering! Telling horror stories & scaring Mamas away from home birth isn't right.

It's my understanding that a trained midwife generally knows how to deal with cord issues. I don't see why the possibility of a cord issue would mean a homebirth is out of the question.

[mamakori]

Both of my children had nuchal cords and both were totally fine (DS #2 had mec., but Apgars of 9). Cord accidents do happen, but in the vast majority of cases, there's no issue. I haven't looked into the statistics myself, but going by what others posted, if 1/5 babies has a nuchal cord and nuchal cords are responsible for 1 death in 1000, that means that only 1/200 or 0.5% of nuchal cords are fatal. That's not zero, but it's pretty similar to the risk of uterine rupture during a VBAC.

[Sweetiemommy]

Excellent points being made on this thread. I do want to give my personal opinion that an experienced midwife is more likely to have a few tricks up her sleeve for dealing with cord issues, as compared to an OB who is more likely to resort to a c-section or to perform some other heroic measures, while he/she has the NICU handy. I'm trying to say that a homebirth midwife has to use a different skill set to ensure safety and has more experience dealing with difficult birth situations in a natural way. The doctor is more likely to intervene in a completely different way. With that said, I haven't heard of any babies having serious complications with cords at home (in my personal experience) but I do hear of them happening at the hospital from time to time. One example, a doula I know told me this story, the hospital OB felt for a cord when the baby's head came out, it was loose enough that a midwife might have just looped it over the head or waited, he decided to cut the cord while the baby was still inside. The shoulders were suddenly stuck and of course the mother was on her back with an epidural. So it was suddenly a very serious emergency and the baby ended up in NICU (he was fine, but it was an ordeal!). Now I'm just being the Monday morning quarterback, but I think a midwife would have handled that completely differently. So whenever someone asks me about cord issues, I tend to say, "my midwife knows a lot more about how to resolve a cord issue than an OB in the hospital." And she's also completely unlikely to break my waters, which increases the likelihood of such things. Anyway, not a scientific response, but I agree with pp who said that cord issues do happen, but being at a hospital isn't going to guarantee a positive outcome.

[mamabearsoblessed]

All of my babies have had nuchal cords. These are our stories... though all my babies were in hosp. births.
First dd was wrapped 3 times, she was perfectly fine at birth.
Ds was wrapped twice with an incredibly short cord, my m/w did cut his cord as he crowned because of the shortness and tight wrap he was not going to come easlily. His first moments were tense for all of us but it was nothing my m/w couldnt' handle and he was safe, thank God.
DD was a requested induction on my part following decreased fetal movement and very very low fluid (after req. u/s nst and bpp found these to be true just as I sensed). Her cord was incredibly long and her body was wrapped so tightly that even though she was engaged she had stoppped moving. WE have pictures immed following birth where her vernix is clumped/lined in spots where her cord lay so tightly against her body. She had 2 true knots, pulled tightly, one under an arm, 1 between her legs, around her neck 3 times, and around her body like spider girl. My m/w was amazed with her birth, the cord was the longest she's ever seen and couldn't believe it. She had no decels during labor or birth as I was on the ext monitor becasue of a nagging fear and worry I had about her cord throughout her pg. I thank God everyday she is here safe and sound, but at no time during her labor and birth did she decel or stress. My m/w did somersault her out because it was clear she had a nuchal cord. Thta said, had my mw even given me 'the look' I would have been in a c/s before she could even suggest it at that point, I went in there with a feeling her birth would be very diffrerent, and very alert to that.
I'm sorry the people in your life feel its appropriate to scare you when you are preparing for the birth of your baby . The most impt undertaking is your confidence in your mw and peace with your decision, your instinctual feelings. A hb mw, like other pps have said, will know how to handle what arises.

Congrats on your impending birth!

[mamabearsoblessed]

just went back and read *all * posts
Cheshire and Mom to E & A ~ I am so sorry for the loss of your Babies, I cannot imagine the pain and heaviness of heart their loss brings.
I know things with my dd2 (and even the others) could have ended very differently, I take nothing for granted.

[KimL]

why wouldn't you believe it? My son would have been a goner if i had not been right there to have an emergency csection.His chord was doubled around his neck and leg. He was in the birth canal and struggling. The very day he was born, a mother (right here from mothering.com) lost a child due to almost the same circumstances, but having him at home.

I was allowed to try and birth naturally, right up until the *hit hit the fan. It was understood that, above all, i wanted to birth this child naturally. Yet, in the end, i am so thankful for my live child.

Even though I'm an extremley alternative parent and person, if I had another baby I would have it at the hospital for this very reason. My childs life isn't anything to take chances with.

[bandgeek]

Originally Posted by KimL

Even though I'm an extremley alternative parent and person, if I had another baby I would have it at the hospital for this very reason. My childs life isn't anything to take chances with.

Babies have oxygen deprivation and brain injuries in the hospital all the time as well. Often times they can't prep for a c-section fast enough. Not one homebirthing mama on this board is "taking a chance" with her child's life any more than a hospital birthing mama is.

[Storm Bride]

Originally Posted by KimL

why wouldn't you believe it?

Well, I wouldn't believe it, because if true cord emergencies were as common as OBs and their patients make them out to be, the human race would have been extinct a long time ago. That's not to say it doesn't happen...but it doesn't happen as often as they like to make it sound. And, I'll tell you something. IME, about 90% of women who are sectioned for "huge babies" that turn out to be 7-8 pounds (or less) are then told that "it's a good thing we operated, because the cord was around his/her neck and he/she would have died if you'd tried to have a vaginal birth".

I was allowed to try and birth naturally, right up until the *hit hit the fan.

You are allowed to try and birth naturally at any time, whether the *hit hits the fan or not.

Even though I'm an extremley alternative parent and person, if I had another baby I would have it at the hospital for this very reason. My childs life isn't anything to take chances with.

Babies die because of being born in the hospital, too. You can give birth anywhere you want, but please don't perpetuate the "if it's not in the hospital, it's taking chances with the baby's life" stuff. That's the kind of mindset that resulted in me having a social worker come to my door while I was naked in a birth pool in my living room.

[Hannah32]

Originally Posted by Storm Bride

Well, I wouldn't believe it, because if true cord emergencies were as common as OBs and their patients make them out to be, the human race would have been extinct a long time ago.

I don't think that's true at all. It was very common in previous centuries for women and babies to die in childbirth. Heck, it's common in some countries today. But women in previous centuries tended to attempt more pregnancies, thus ensuring the survival of the human race. Really, I think you're using a bit of a strawman argument there.

That doesn't mean that people can't homebirth if they want to, because as it's been said, babies can and do die in the hospital. There are no guarantees, but a modern hospital or a skilled midwife today is probably more adept at handling those emergencies compared to previous centuries.

[member234098]

The reason that so many women died in childbirth 100-200 years ago is because doctors refused to wash their hands in their rounds between the morgue and the maternity ward. It was called puerperal fever and doctors blamed it on the mothers and told them it was a mental condition - "it is all in your mind". If you do not believe me, google Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis and see how his colleagues treated him when he confronted them with the truth and with a remedy - handwashing with chlorinated lime solutions to kill the germs.

It is not universal hospitalization that saves women in childbirth today; it is antibiotics for infections and blood transfusions for excessive bleeding, neither of which needs to be in a hospital.

In the 1940s-70s, women would be recuperating in a hospital for a week after the birth. Today, most women are shown the door after three days.

[ScarletBegonias]

Originally Posted by Cheshire

But, we also shouldn't leave moms to believe that home births are all rainbows and butterflies.

i'm sorry for your loss.

i want to address this statement, in a general way, not directed toward you, mama.

having a hospital birth does not guarantee a good outcome. we shouldn't lead moms to believe that if they birth in a hospital, all will be well.

either statement is blanket, unfair and untrue.

NO birth is all rainbows and butterflies. anyone thinking this about home birth OR hospital birth is a fool indeed. research bears this out.

despite what americans are led to believe, research shows that mothers who have a PLANNED hospital birth (or an UNPLANNED unattended birth), are more likely to end up with a difficult birth/unnecessary interventions/bad outcome (directly caused by interventions in the case of hospital birth). worldwide statistics and research shows that trained, experienced midwives are more able to deal with possible complications (like nuchal cord), BEFORE they become a complication, and with good outcomes, as compared to their hospital counterparts.

time and again, mothers are told one thing at their baby's birth, and when those same mothers ask for their records, a completely different story is told by the written records. which story is most accurate? in most cases, no one affected by the birth will ever know. this is an important point to bear in mind when comparing personal birth stories and comparing statistics.

eta: fwiw, both of my children had the cord wrapped around their necks at least once, with ds having a true knot that had become "stuck" on a node sticking out of the umbilical cord.

[tygrss]

Originally Posted by ScarletBegonias

NO birth is all rainbows and butterflies. anyone thinking this about home birth OR hospital birth is a fool indeed. research bears this out.

This is the key to the entire discussion IMO.

Most babies with nuchal cords are fine, some are not. None of us KNOWS what will happen until it does (sucks, but it's true), so we have to make the best decision for ourselves and OUR families. Fear-mongering on either side is unnecessary, as is down-playing another mother's concerns.

[~Katie~]

to the mama's who have experienced losses.

I think the OP is looking for reassurance and support in regards to her questions, it can be a bit unnerving to hear scary stories as a pregnant woman who plans to homebirth. It is my understanding that cords around necks are common, and true emergencies as a result are rare. I'm not a medical professional so I can only pull from my own experience. My DD was born with her cord around her neck, I felt for it after her head was born and my mama instinct kicked in and I knew to loop it off the back of her head. Then I pushed the rest of her out and she gave a good cry and was fine. I think there are many factors that come into play for every labor and their subsequent birth outcome and each woman has her own individual experience.

[khaoskat]

Originally Posted by bandgeek

Babies have oxygen deprivation and brain injuries in the hospital all the time as well. Often times they can't prep for a c-section fast enough. Not one homebirthing mama on this board is "taking a chance" with her child's life any more than a hospital birthing mama is.

Just to back this up...

Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton, Ohio lost a $31+ million lawsuit this past July (2009) on a VBAC gone wrong. The baby was deprived oxygen, has CP, is wheel chair confined and will need skilled assistance 24/7 for the rest of his life. And yes, I have seen this child in person, not just read it on the news. I didn't know what was going on when I was in the Courthouse, but I happened to be walking by the family after one of the kids siblings testified and came out crying. I thought it was a criminal trial of some type, not med mal.

[khaoskat]

BTW, Wikie, for once, has a nice article on this issue, with many references for it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuchal_cord

Here is one that says single nuchal cord is great for vaginal delivery. Multiple wraps may need more monitoring or earlier intervention. Baby was born with 8 wraps via c/s after 6 hours of labor when it couldn't tolerate it any longer.

Again, along those lines. DD2 had it wrapped 4 times around her neck, and 2 times around her body. She was a textbook reading on the EFM through out my entire labor that I was there. No fetal decels, always passed NST's after finding the wraps with flying colors in about 5-10 minutes. During delivery there was never any indication of fetal distress. I did end up with a c/s, but it was not related to the nuchal cord, it was related to the fact that DD2 turned transverse during delivery and stuck her arm out the birth canal, engaging her shoulder in the pelvis. Even during all this, her fetal heart tones were perfect/text book.

So, that is my experience with a nuchal x6.

I also did research on this issue a while ago, when this happened, and found (but cannot right now) a study showing that there was no difference in waiting for labor on its own vs c/s w/o labor.

[Storm Bride]

Originally Posted by Hannah32

I don't think that's true at all. It was very common in previous centuries for women and babies to die in childbirth. Heck, it's common in some countries today. But women in previous centuries tended to attempt more pregnancies, thus ensuring the survival of the human race. Really, I think you're using a bit of a strawman argument there.

Do you have stats on how many babies women used to have? I hear all the time that women used to have these huge families, but I never see anything to back it up. Sure - families of 4, 5, 6 kids used to be a lot more comon, instead of the widespread 1-3 we see these days. But, doubling the number of kids isn't going to result in saving the race from cord accidents, if they happened at the rate OBs claim they happen at. They basically claim that every baby with a nuchal cord would have died without their intervention. It's just not true.

Child spacing is discussed here a lot, and the fact that at least some families in the 18th, 19th and early 20th century had a baby every year or two, and ended up with 10-15 kids, doesn't mean that's the norm throughout human history and pre-history.

That doesn't mean that people can't homebirth if they want to, because as it's been said, babies can and do die in the hospital. There are no guarantees, but a modern hospital or a skilled midwife today is probably more adept at handling those emergencies compared to previous centuries.

Do you have any evidence? Personally, I'd rather have my life and my baby's life in the hands of a homebirth midwife than a hospital OB. Antibiotics and blood transfusion save a lot more women and babies than hospital protocols (such as nothing by mouth, routine IV, induction, augmentation, multiple vaginal exams, c-section, etc. etc.) do, imo. The fact that midwives 100, 200, 1000 years ago didn't have access to antibiotics doesn't mean they were any less skilled. It just means they didn't have the same tools.

[lunarlady]

When I was laboring at home, my daughter's HR dropped dramatically during pushing. One of my midwifes said "I really need to you to take some slow, deep breaths for baby." And I did. I continued to do so every time she said "deep breaths for baby." Each time, you could hear my DD heartrate jump up. It was amazing. In a hospital, I don't think I would have had that same instruction. Deep breaths might have been c-section, or an oxygen line, or some other intervention. My DD was born with the cord three times around her neck. The midwifes said it was like a Circue de Solei birth because I pushed her out so hard that she flipped coming out, the cord caught, and she twirled down to the bed. She was absolutly fine and continues to be so to this day.

While I do feel hospital birth is very safe for most women, I also know that it depends a lot on the hospital you are at. I know quite a few friends who labored almost right until their child was born with very limited checks, only once every half hour or so. One of our good friends didn't even have a doc or nurse in the room when her son started crowning. Her DH had to go out in the hall and yell for someone. What if there had been an emergancy? Would that 10 minutes have made a difference? So in my mind, the benefit of HB is that I have several professionals whose soul focus is me and my birth. Zero time from the start of an issue to the attention of my MW.

I find that most women with positive hospital births went to a hospital where they had nurses checking on them very often, or a doula along who was working with the hospital staff to moniter the birth, so they did get quite a bit of individual attention. It just goes to show that no matter what type of birth you are planning, it pays to plan ahead for your attendents. And that in labor, a good attendant is the key to recognizing and responding to any issues, regardless of the setting.

[craft_media_hero]

Originally Posted by Cheshire

I would just encourage you to not doubt all of the stories you hear because, first, you weren't there and aren't a medical expert so you can't be sure, and second, because I'm sure there are plenty of cases where it does save a life versus the cases where it may have been an unnecessary intervention. Give that mother the benefit of the doubt - she doesn't need her birth second guessed because the listener believes they know more about birth than the care providers she trusted.

I'm sorry for your loss. I don't doubt all the stories I hear. I don't doubt your story or any of the other stories on this thread.

I do doubt that every complication that results in c-section actually needs a c-section, so I'm sorry, but I do doubt how necessary some of these procedures are.

I don't "believe I know more about birth than the care providers" which is why I have questions. I do give the mom the benefit of the doubt (I know she believes her story), BUT I also believe that a full episiotomy and the doc pulling her son out may not have been the only way for the birth to be handled with a positive outcome.

I don't believe that all cord stories are myths, either. There are true cord injuries, obviously. There are also A LOT of horror stories that are not true, where any and every complication is blamed on the cord being around the neck. The "myth" I am looking to dispel is that the cord is the cause of fetal distress and cord issues=c-section as the only way to keep the baby from dying.

I'm not fear-mongering. I'm doing the opposite. People are fear-mongering me, and I'm trying to work through their horror stories by taking a grain of salt here with you all.

Thank you all for participating in this discussion; a lot of beneficial information has come forward here.

I feel like I'm getting a more "real" perspective on this subject here than I am IRL where it seems like the second people hear I'm pregnant they have to go on and on about every horror story or everyone they know who has had a bad experience, and it's tiresome and really insensitive.

I'm hearing lots of positive cord stories and also some tragic ones, but in general what I'm getting is that these issues are rare but can happen, they're not always predictable, and even having a fetal monitor can't always tell you if there is a cord abnormality or not.

[MegBoz]

Originally Posted by Storm Bride

Do you have any evidence? Personally, I'd rather have my life and my baby's life in the hands of a homebirth midwife than a hospital OB.

I've joked often that "I'd squat alone in the woods before giving birth at GBMC." (hospital in the area with the highest CS rate - 44%.) To those who aren't familiar with the concept of intentional UC, this sounds like an extreme statement. But I really do think that UC can be preferable to some of these awful hospitals. (And I personally WOULD chose it if faced with UC vs. bad hospital.)

That being said, it is a fact that hospital-attended birth is safer for both mama & baby than UC. Of course, no one has studied intentional, planned UC vs. hospital birth. So we don't know how they would compare. But, again, when comparing people who have no medical care whatsoever to even bad hospitals, the hospital outcome, at least in terms of death, is better.

Originally Posted by craft_media_hero

IRL where it seems like the second people hear I'm pregnant they have to go on and on about every horror story or everyone they know who has had a bad experience, and it's tiresome and really insensitive.

Yup, that's how it is. Of course, if you mention you're even thinking about HB, you'll get it a lot worse. Because, of course, ya know, "My baby would have died if we weren't in the hospital." Well, yes, that is absolutely positively TRUE in many cases. But the fact of the matter is that it's probably 100% FALSE in even MORE cases. (OR, the truth is that the hospital interventions CAUSED the fetal distress that the baby needed to be saved from via CS.) Hence... my exasperation at the attitude of Americans towards birth (and the atrocity that is American maternity 'care' today.)

Yes, as others have said, education is key. There are no guarantees anywhere you birth.

[Storm Bride]

Originally Posted by MegBoz

Yup, that's how it is. Of course, if you mention you're even thinking about HB, you'll get it a lot worse. Because, of course, ya know, "My baby would have died if we weren't in the hospital." Well, yes, that is absolutely positively TRUE in many cases.

I agree. I think Aaron would have lived, if I'd transferred sooner, and that's incredibly hard to live with. Of course, if I hadn't been treated with so little respect in my previous hospital stays, I might not have been too terrified to transfer, so I think there's lots of burden to go around there...too bad none of the other people who contributed (the nurses from previous hospital stays, the OB who bullied me into the surgery that cost me so much of my abdominal/pelvic sensation, the person who called CPS on me while I was in labour, etc.) will ever feel the weight.