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Humanized Caesarean Birth: How do we help the 5-15% who will need a c-section?

7K views 106 replies 41 participants last post by  mmaramba 
#1 ·
Disclaimer: I have never had a c-section.

I've been watching the c-section threads with interest, and I'm wondering how we as a community who care about childbirth can help on a large scale to make c-sections a more humanized experience for mom and baby (or babies.) That there are too many c-sections performed is indisputable, but if we take the WHO recommendations of 5-15% optimal c-section rate, that still means that at minimum 1 in 20 women will need a c-section. That's a whole heck of a lot of women and babies who truly need to birth by caesarean in order to have the safest start to their extrauterine lives together.

Does anyone have any ideas as to how to make change on a macro level for women and babies who require caesarean birth? If we were create an "ideal" c-section scenario (blaring red light emergencies aside) what would that look like, and how do we get there?

Thank you all in advance for all your input!
 
#102 ·
Just to clarify, when I say "humanized" with regards to any birth, vaginal or caesarean, what I am trying to describe is a birth that is centered on the human realities in birth, primarily supporting the mother and child as they get to meet eachother face to face for the first time, only deviating from that as primary focus when there is a clear medical reason to do so. Focusing on excessive bleeding when that is an issue? Absolutely appropriate. Keeping a healthy infant out of the mother's line of sight for the convenience of the staff? Not compassionate or humane to me.
 
#103 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by lovebeingamomma View Post
If you're objecting to generalizations then stop generalizing the "natural childbirth community" negatively. This has turned into such a "Us and them" discussion, there seems to be a whole lot of bitterness with nothing constructive happening. What exactly are you suggesting the solution is, never have threads like this? Or is it just because it was started by someone who didn't have a c-section? Do you have specific suggestions for better wording?
**NM!** falling on deaf ears here.
 
#104 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by GuildJenn View Post
Perhaps not, but I think that when women challenge post c/s women on their experience and choice they are behaving disrespectfully. I also hate the way people pick at women who post on their Facebooks about planned c-sections (a reasonably recent thread on this forum) and so on and so forth.

I'm just not going to change my mind that women CAN be more respectful even while seeking their goals.

I also keep saying this: The NCB community loses my support because of that kind of thing. I can no longer wholeheartedly recommend to friends that they look for doulas or even come here to read up on the things because I don't believe they will be, in the end, supported if things go wrong - and that is when they will need the support.
Well, I am very, truly and deeply sorry to hear that, but I want to be as clear as crystal if I haven't been up to this point.

1) I, TOO, think that when women challenge post c/s women on their experience and choice they are behaving disrespectfully.

and

2) I'm ALSO not going to change my mind that women can be more respectful even while seeking their goals. In fact, that was a huge part of my point.

I know this is getting into a whole "no true Scotsman" argument, but I have repeatedly reiterated that attacking and nitpicking other women in the way you describe has NO PLACE in the "NCB community." That has in fact been the crux of all I have posted-- that women nitpicking each others' choices and/or circumstances, particularly directly TO those women, is unproductive in the extreme.

I feel a bit that we are going in circles here, and I understand why, but... Really, as far as I am concerned, we should be attacking the myth of "too posh to push" just as we should be attacking myths surrounding homebirthing and VBAC'ing, etc. The way to fight a system that divides to conquer is not to further those divisions with judgment and ridicule and personal attacks, whether direct or subtle. And I kind of feel like I am hearing "Well, I'll stop judging when you stop judging," from some (perhaps not the majority, but enough) on BOTH sides, or all "sides'. (*sigh*) That does nothing for any of us.

And, by the way-- that was not my point, either. I didn't mean to imply that NCBers are excused from attacking other women because they are also under attack from "mainstream" folks. I only meant that there is a common cause for all of our problems, and if it's not the non-evidence-based and largely disrespectful, misogynist system, then the only other conclusion is that it's "women's nature" or some other such nonsense that I simply refuse to accept.

I do think it's sad that you no longer feel that you can endorse doulas or MDC... Although if it's only that you can no longer "wholeheartedly" endorse them, I can completely understand that. To be perfectly frank, I don't wholeheartedly endorse anything, really. When I refer friends here, for example, I always do so with a few caveats. But that's in part because nothing and no "movement" is a monolith. We are all simultaneously part of communities and individuals with our own minds to make up.

Personally, it's hard for me to imagine becoming truly disillusioned with, say, NCB-- regardless of what some who identify themselves as part of the "NCB community" say or do to me now or in the future. That's because NCB simply makes sense to me, from many perspectives-- scientific, psychosocial, anti-oppression, etc. There are tons of people within that "community" who have very different perspectives from my own. I am never going to see eye-to-eye with HBers who come from a libertarian or quiverfull perspective, or midwives who believe in the necessity of tons of herbal supplements, or people who genuinely believe that, say, women NEVER make babies too big for them to birth or that XYZ intervention is NEVER necessary. I don't even believe that very many OBs are primarily driven by a strong profit motive.

But shoot-- I think a healthy skepticism and challenging of any system or community from within is a Good Thing. Particularly good for a movement that is about tearing down old norms and stereotypes. I'm not into NCB because I think it's a bad thing to completely entrust our medical care to OBs and give up our own autonomy, but it's somehow a GOOD thing to do the same with midwives. (And I have sometimes seen that attitude here and elsewhere.) I'm "into" NCB because I think we should be empowered by the evidence to make our own decisions about our bodies and our babies with the guidance of respectful care providers who really know their stuff.

And that's all I have to say about that.
 
#105 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by Storm Bride View Post
I'm hearing this from more and more women here lately. I find it really interesting, because the NFL community is the only place I've ever found any support. Actually..."c-section support" were the Google search terms I used to find MDC in the first place.

I have found that the only way a woman will get true support for her C/S here at MDC is if she is traumatized, not accepting, of her C/S. Those of us who post here saying that our experience was a good one most of the time are either ignored or told that we must be mistaken or still not realizing what happened to us. Many women have asked for a C/S support forum and have been told that it is not possible here.
 
#106 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by TCMoulton View Post
I have found that the only way a woman will get true support for her C/S here at MDC is if she is traumatized, not accepting, of her C/S. Those of us who post here saying that our experience was a good one most of the time are either ignored or told that we must be mistaken or still not realizing what happened to us. Many women have asked for a C/S support forum and have been told that it is not possible here.
 
#107 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by TCMoulton View Post
I have found that the only way a woman will get true support for her C/S here at MDC is if she is traumatized, not accepting, of her C/S. Those of us who post here saying that our experience was a good one most of the time are either ignored or told that we must be mistaken or still not realizing what happened to us. Many women have asked for a C/S support forum and have been told that it is not possible here.
I don't know all the details of those interactions, but I would just like to add for the record that I find that very concerning, and at this time am in full support of such a board. I belong to another NCB board that requires interventive birth stories to be linked instead of directly posted, for example, and I think that's fine. After all, the board is for support of no/low-intervention birth. Requiring links is not meant to stigmatize interventive births, but not to normalize them on that board, nor to subject women to such stories who would rather not read them.

However, not allowing a support area for C/S moms... I can't really understand the reasoning behind that. If could conjecture as to why that seems to be the policy, but I'd rather not. There is a VBAC forum, of course, but... I mean, I can understand not wanting to endorse their overuse, but this is not like routine non-religious circumcision, where I can understand MDC calling it a closed case. (Whether one agrees or disagrees, I can see why MDC is unwilling to host a debate on the issue or support it. There are plenty of other places online where you can find people who do support routine infant circumcision.)

But C/S... Even 99.9% of NCB-supporters would agree that they are not inherently bad things. They're surgical procedures, and they can absolutely save lives and health. It's a fact that most women who have had them, even unnecessarily, believe they were necessary, but as long as justifying all C/S, generally, is not a part of it (and I'd hope not, being that this is MDC)... I mean... Women who have had C/S and are perfectly happy with those C/S still need support in recovery and whatnot.

 
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