Most people know that I am a HUGE homebirth advocate. I love it, I love midwives, I love the entire experience of birthing in my home…. climbing into my bed with my new baby and the rest of my family.
My first was born in the hospital, and my last two were at home. If I were to have more children, there is no way you could convince me to birth in the hospital. Birthing at home is ideal for ME, it may not be for you, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Not everyone can have a homebirth….and not every woman wants a homebirth.
I think it’s time we stop focusing all of our energies on homebirth. Yes that’s how every woman birthed many moons ago, and more women are choosing to birth at home. but it’s not the ideal way to birth for all women.
Your ideal birth might be birthing in the hospital with all their fancy technology at your fingertips, wearing perfect makeup, or maybe a birth center….it’s your body and your birth.
Maybe our time and energy would be better spent if we put our focus into helping men and women learn all they can about birth itself. We present fact-based evidence…after that it’s up to the woman to decide what’s best for her.
And can we stop telling the story of having a homebirth in the hospital? I get where people are coming from on that topic, but I think it sets women up for possible failure. It also sounds like no one ever has a peaceful hospital birth experience, and we all know that’s not true. There are policies and procedures that the hospitals have to follow, and a hospital is not your home. Not all hospitals and their staffs are terrible. Infact, there are some really great Hospitals, OB’s, Midwives, Doulas, and Nurses working in the hospitals….imagine that.
We need to stop bashing women because they choose to birth differently than we do.
I’m guilty of talking about homebirth like it’s the ideal choice for every woman. No more. Don’t we realize it’s not how we birth that makes the mother? How a woman births has become a competition. It’s not good enough to give birth unmedicated. Now you’re a super woman if you birth at home, but you gain the ultimate in respect if you birth unassisted out in the woods or by the ocean. I’m not making fun of people that do that….I would love to birth near the ocean! I think we’ve lost focus and we need to bring it back to the whole woman, meeting her where she is and making sure she’s informed of all her choices, then supporting her in the birth she chooses.
If a mom chooses a cesarean, stop talking about her choice and offer to bring her meals or do her laundry. She made her choice, bashing her decision won’t change it.
We’ve got to stop the birth debates, bullying, and scare tactics. It’s not helping anyone and it makes us look like jerks.
The woman that chooses an epidural deserves the same love and attention as the woman that chooses to birth at home. They are both becoming mothers in their own way.
Birth matters for every woman, whether she realizes it at the time or not, let’s do our part to support the decision of her ideal birth, not ours.
The Mahogany Way 