A note to anybody else attempting to find a doctor to vaginally deliver a breech baby near Knoxville, TN (or in the Southeast, in general): it's REALLY REALLY difficult. I don't know how this situation turned out so well, but I would not expect to be able to just call the Farm and be admitted late in pregnancy. My baby has been breech since his 31 week prenatal appointment. We were also going to Lisa Ross. I was told not to worry, there was still time, etc, etc, but, being paranoid, I started doing everything to try to turn him: inversions, crawling on hands and knees, cold/hot packs, music, Hypnobabies "Turn Baby Turn" track, sitting on a birth ball, chiropractic Webster technique 3x/week, swimming in a warm pool, handstands in the pool, moxibustion with an acupunturist and then nightly at home, and finally an (unsuccessful) ECV at the hospital at 37 weeks. I researched caregivers who would potentially deliver a breech baby (there are exactly 2 that I could find in the Southeast; 3 if you count 14 hours away in Florida), and one said they accepted patients until the baby's birth. Great, I thought--I have an option if the ECV doesn't work. However, when I called again shortly after the first conversation, I was told there were no appointments until January. Well, the baby's due just before Christmas. There was no flexibility (and that's not their problem, really), and the situation was the same at the Farm. I could almost hear them shrugging at the Farm when they said, "Well, make sure the sutures are double when they do the c-section, so you could try to come here next time--we're full." How nice. It is so INCREDIBLY frustrating to read all of the updated studies that say there is no greater risk to the baby with a vaginal birth (as long as criteria with mother/baby are met), and c-sections are overdone, and then to have absolutely no choice whatsoever. And all the time there are sites out there that advocate for mothers to do it naturally for the sake of the baby and their own health. I'm very healthy, the baby's healthy and on the smaller side of normal, he's in the perfect frank breech presentation for vaginal birth, and yet there is NO ONE to deliver him, so I have major surgery with major recovery scheduled in just over a week. To add to that frustration, the doctor I switched to is even trained in breech delivery, and he had quite a bit of experience before hospitals/insurance forced him to stop offering that as an option. I think I need to stop going online to read stories about how wonderful it is when women are brave enough to deliver breech babies vaginally and how it's the best, safest option because it makes me wake up in a cold sweat at night that I'm needlessly endangering my son, myself, and any future pregnancies I might have. I'm glad it worked out for you and for anybody else who happens to be lucky enough with timing or location to figure out someone to deliver a breech baby.
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- she's thinking about a homebirth next time), and beat me by 13 hours.
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