What wonderful feedback there has been so far on the birth story series! Today we continue with a guest post from Katie who shares her thoughts on how and why she planned an intervention-free birth:
Don’t be a hero . . .
You know there’s no gold star at the end . . .
But WHY??
All of these comments, and many others, were heard in the months preceding my daughter’s birth in February 2008. When I mentioned that I was planning to pursue natural childbirth, I mostly got a LOT of strange responses, very few of which were actually supportive.
My guess is that there are 2 reasons behind this:
- The reasons for pursuing natural (intervention-free) childbirth are often misunderstood.
- It’s assumed that because of my choice – I am judging you for yours.
Honestly, I had no strong feelings about medication during childbirth prior to becoming pregnant. Once I knew I had a precious little life growing inside me, a beautiful gift from God, I realized that part of my role as The Mama was to make informed choices about my child(ren). And so, I began to read.
I visited websites, read blogs, checked out books, and talked to friends… and surprised myself by not-so-slowly becoming convinced that natural childbirth was the right choice for me and for my family.
I didn’t want to be a hero – nor did I want to earn anyone’s respect by “proving how tough I was.” What I did want was to give my body the chance to do exactly what God made it to do – grow a little life over the course of nine months and give birth in its own time. I had no delusions that it would be easy, nor did I care what people thought about my choice. My husband was incredibly supportive, and I believed that God had created a perfect system for “being fruitful and multiplying.” (Granted, this perfect system of His exists in an imperfect world, and does not always proceed without unavoidable complication).
I took a natural childbirth class at a local birth center, and planned an intervention-free birth at a hospital (we were a bit gun-shy of the birth center for our very first pregnancy). I was able to give birth to my daughter in a hospital, surrounded by fabulous nurses and doctors who took excellent care of us – and I did so without intervention (oh – aside from my water being broken right before I began to push).
The things I’ve learned and truly believe from my experience are:
- 1. Preparation is key – I did so much reading and had gotten such a wealth of information from my childbirth class that I felt well prepared for the task ahead. It was tough – I’m not going to lie – but I truly believed I could do it, that I was MADE to do it, and that I had tools to help me.
- 2. Barring any aforementioned unavoidable complications, all women are capable of having an intervention-free birth.
- 3. That being said – the choice to pursue a drug-free birth is not necessarily for everyone. I believed it to be the best choice for me, and I pursued it aggressively. I’m thrilled with my birth experience and my daughter was born healthy and strong. That was most important – period.
- I don’t expect rewards for being tough, and I don’t judge anyone else for their choices. I do believe that we all have a responsibility to make informed decisions about childbirth – but those choices won’t look the same across the board.
Katie is a happy at-home-mama to Hazel (16 months old), wife to Mark, and is looking forward to welcoming Baby 2.0 sometime in August. Thanks for reading - check out A Heartful of Eternity for even more!
(precious newborn close-up photo by timsamoff)
