jriegel

We are choosing a midwife for many reasons. First, it's just much more personal, like someone else said in an earlier post. They are there for you, meeting with you, not waiting to get to the next patient down the hall. The whole practice and philosophy of midwifery is to comfort the mother and make her feel relaxed and at peace, to educate her about her body, her pregnancy, and the process of pregnancy, labor and birth.

Also, we feel like a lot of the "problems" that hospitals and doctors are there to help with or "prevent" are actually caused by that type of birth. For some women, it is medically necessary to have a hospital birth with a dr. on call, because they have a high risk pregnancy (my mom, for example, had preeclampsia and toximia and almost had a stroke when she was in labor with my brother because her blood pressure was so high).

There is a method (like "Lamaze") that you may or may not be familiar with called the Bradley method. Dr. Bradley observed animals when they go into labor and realised that when labor hits, they stop everything they are doing and just let it take over their body. They lay still and limp until the baby is born. They don't try to distract themselves, they don't tense up and fight against the labor. They don't travel (most animals instinctively know that labor is coming and will find a place to be before it hits), like women do who have hospital births. What he observed is that travelling often slows down labor - the adrenaline of getting to the hospital in time in traffic actually slows down labor because it tells your body you are moving and it is not a good time to have a baby. So when you get to the hospital, and there are four or five other women in line to have a baby, they often times give the mother something to speed up the labor. This makes it much more painful for the mom (and also helps increase the chances of episiotomy or tearing the perineum), so she often requests drugs for the pain, so she is drugged and not completely with it (and so is her baby) throughout the labor. Many midwives will help you have a birth in a hospital or birthing center if that is what you want or what you need, with a doctor standing by.

We are also choosing a midwife/homebirth because we feel like the hospital is not the environment we want our baby's first breath to be in -- hyper-sterile with super germs and viruses because of constant oversterilization, and hundreds of strangers and their germs in the building. We would rather be at home, in our space, with our germs and our things and our life and welcome our baby that way. I don't know of any doctor that will come to your house to deliver a baby, so, obviously we need a midwife.

There is a fantastic book that my husband and I are reading together called "Ina May's Guide to Child Birth" by Ina May Gaskin. She is the leading midwife in the US. Even if you are not considering a home birth, or even using a midwife, she talks about the ability of a woman's body to give birth and go through labor - it's is absolutely incredible. She mentions the phrase "giving birth is like trying to push an orange out your nostril" or similar analagies and says "but it's nothing like that at all. The nasal cavity was never designed or intended to pass an orange through it, or anything bigger than a little mucus. A woman's [birth canal], however, was designed just for the very purpose of having a baby". She also mentions that women who often have hospital births request medication to avoid the pain, but in the process usually have an episiotomy and have to have the baby pulled out with forcepts or a vacuum, instead of the body doing it's job (because it's not sluggish and numb)... All her efforts to avoid pain during labor result in more pain and grogginess after the baby is born, making it difficult to connect with or even hold her baby until the drugs or pain wear off.

Midwives, whether in your home or in a hospital or birthing center, are very good at honoring any wishes you have for your labor (breastfeeding or at least holding or seeing your baby immediately after it is born, specific positions you would like to labor in if laying on your back is painful or slowing down your labor) where as doctors and nursing staff usually try to do it their way, the text book way that they were taught and have observed.

One last note, most doctors and nurses, unless they have had a child of their own, have never seen a natural, normal birth from the start of labor to the end. They come in periodically when their schedule permits or when they try to get things moving so their schedule is permitting them to visit the how-ever-many-other women are in labor at the same time as you, or when there is a problem. Midwives are trained and make a career out of being present with the laboring mother, for hours if necessary, and walking through the process with her and helping her understand all the sensations she's feeling and are almost always aware of fears or questions (they do it for a living!) and are there to answer and calm. Most labors in hospitals don't go very smoothly and are quiet painful because of doctors and nurses (usually strangers) popping in and out and shouting down the hall and telling you to push and wait... Whereas a midwife builds a relationship with you throughout your pregnancy and is there with you through the whole process.

Just a lot of thoughts for you... You should seriously consider reading "Ina May's Guide to Childbirth"... It's totally eye opening about your ability to have a baby!