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What have you done in a case where you were strongly attracted to homebirth, and your partner was very uncomfortable with it?
I saw that there was some interest in discussing this on another thread, and it's really salient to me right now. I planned a homebirth in my last pregnancy, though it all went sideways due to a placental abruption in early labor. We ended up with ambulance transport and emergency, knocked-out-cold cesarean.
After that experience I felt like I couldn't attempt homebirth again, both because of the fear it engendered and the feeling that if I set myself up with great expectations and they crashed again...it would be too much to bear. But during this pregnancy (which was unexpected and unprocessed), I've felt more and more uncomfortable and alienated by the prospect of trying to birth (vba2c) in a hospital. The phrase that keeps going through my mind is "if you buy the ticket, you take the ride"...and it's not a ride I want to take. Researching and praying and intuition seem to be leading me to move past the trauma and allow myself to plan a birth that I truly want, even with the knowledge that there is no guarantee that it will happen the way I hope it will.
But my husband still associates "homebirth" with "blood everywhere and wife wheeling away on a gurney". Thinking logically, even if we had been planning a hospital birth, it would have gone down in exactly the same way - I hadn't even called the midwives yet. And the experience tested out the emergency backup plan, and it worked beautifully if painfully. But that doesn't take away his fear and discomfort. He's not one to "forbid" me to do what I feel is right (nor am I one to be forbidden), but homebirth is NOT a groovy peaceful idea for him.
When it comes down to my instinct and comfort level versus his instinct and comfort level, it seems to me that someone has to 'win' in the end, and it seems right to both of us that I should. There doesn't seem to be a compromise zone between "yes hospital" and "no hospital." But it leaves me wondering how to handle the birth itself, given that we know that he is fearful and not trusting. So if you've faced this scenario, how did your birth go? How did your partner do? Did you find a compromise or make different choices due to his feelings? Did you manage to overcome the discomfort before the birth, and how?
I saw that there was some interest in discussing this on another thread, and it's really salient to me right now. I planned a homebirth in my last pregnancy, though it all went sideways due to a placental abruption in early labor. We ended up with ambulance transport and emergency, knocked-out-cold cesarean.
After that experience I felt like I couldn't attempt homebirth again, both because of the fear it engendered and the feeling that if I set myself up with great expectations and they crashed again...it would be too much to bear. But during this pregnancy (which was unexpected and unprocessed), I've felt more and more uncomfortable and alienated by the prospect of trying to birth (vba2c) in a hospital. The phrase that keeps going through my mind is "if you buy the ticket, you take the ride"...and it's not a ride I want to take. Researching and praying and intuition seem to be leading me to move past the trauma and allow myself to plan a birth that I truly want, even with the knowledge that there is no guarantee that it will happen the way I hope it will.
But my husband still associates "homebirth" with "blood everywhere and wife wheeling away on a gurney". Thinking logically, even if we had been planning a hospital birth, it would have gone down in exactly the same way - I hadn't even called the midwives yet. And the experience tested out the emergency backup plan, and it worked beautifully if painfully. But that doesn't take away his fear and discomfort. He's not one to "forbid" me to do what I feel is right (nor am I one to be forbidden), but homebirth is NOT a groovy peaceful idea for him.
When it comes down to my instinct and comfort level versus his instinct and comfort level, it seems to me that someone has to 'win' in the end, and it seems right to both of us that I should. There doesn't seem to be a compromise zone between "yes hospital" and "no hospital." But it leaves me wondering how to handle the birth itself, given that we know that he is fearful and not trusting. So if you've faced this scenario, how did your birth go? How did your partner do? Did you find a compromise or make different choices due to his feelings? Did you manage to overcome the discomfort before the birth, and how?