Business of Being Born or

something like that.

The other day I mentioned that I had started watching a documentary and couldn't finish watching it. Well, the documentary that I watched was called The Business of Being Born. I was interested in watching this because one of my favorite bloggers RAVED over the book and movie and how it changed her life.

It's about childbirth, midwives, doulas, natural vs drugs, home deliveries, OB's, and c-sections. Only it was all very one sided.

The movie focused on how OB's are surgeons and are more interested in cutting and efficiency than the normal process of labor. They gave examples of how if a woman is not progressing at a certain rate then she is given pictocen. Then because the pictocen is not natural and causes significant pain this encourages the mother to get an epidural. The epidural can then sometimes stall labor which leads to low heart rates for the baby which of course ends right where the OB wants it to...in the operating room.

While science paints a very different picture I would like, for the moment, to put that part aside. What I want to talk about is risks. I will grant that complications of pregnancy are low. Most births are very routine and show no signs of complications. HOWEVER there are still risks. With a husband that is an OB I hear about the risks. Hell, with Palmer we were at risk.

To me it is just comforting to know that the heart monitor is hooked up and if at any moment something goes wrong we can have the baby out in minutes. If you were delivering at home or at a birthing center then your odds are more like 15 minutes at best. A lot can happen in 15 minutes.

Don't get me wrong I have a lot of respect for midwives. I actually see two midwives who are the partners of my OB. Midwives are VERY popular here in PA which is very different then what we were used to in KS. I just think that home deliveries and birthing centers add risk that I am unwilling to assume.

So the newest uproar took place in New Jersey. A woman with mental health issues refused a c-section that was deemed necessary. The baby was born medically OK but was then taken away from the mom and given over to social services. My understanding was that the refusal for a c-section was not the determining factor but was taken into consideration. The arguments on both sides are very heated. If there is anything that I have learned from Bret is that you don't know what happened just from someone else telling you are reading about it. I know that doctors do not suggest c-sections without weighing all of the risks carefully. I know that a lot of natural childbirth advocates are feeling as if this is verification that doctors are taking away their rights as pregnant women. I feel that the article is very one sided and does not present the facts accurately. I encourage you to read the article. I am having a hard time finding the actual court ruling because most of the links to it are not working. If I find it I will update. I am interested in knowing what you think...even we don't agree :)