The birth preparation class was very good and useful but it also had its problematic moments. For instance, we spend over 50% of the class talking about the no-epidural no-medication-of-any-kind “natural” birth. We were shown several videos where very young and very athletic women easily delivered babies in this manner. Nobody in the audience was in the same decade of life or had the same degree of athleticism as the women in the videos.
The videos and the lecturers kept using the word “powerful” in connection to the unmedicated deliveries. This method of giving birth is supposed to make one feel powerful (which is the weirdest notion I have encountered in a while), while succumbing to an epidural makes you feel like a failure.
Out of the 10 women in the audience, only 3 had college degrees: yours truly and 2 women who graduated from the local community college. The rest of the women work in menial low-paid jobs.
So imagine this type of crowd hearing figures of authority in an official setting repeat “no epidural = powerful”, “epidural = failure.”
Eventually, the lecturer did mention in a very low-key way that at our hospital over 90% of women ended up requesting an epidural. Now consider how it makes one feel to end up needing an epidural after hearing how one is deficient in wanting one. Wouldn’t it be a lot more productive and honest to begin the birth preparation class by explaining to the audience that the absolute majority of those present will need an epidural and that’s just how things are for most of women these days?
I don’t think the lecturers were so eager to promote the anti-epidural mythology because they are evil-doers or anything of the kind. I believe they want to give a positive, encouraging message to the heavily pregnant audience. The result, however, is that unrealistic expectations are created. Women begin to see delivery as some sort of an exam they have to pass in a way that will demonstrate their worthiness.
30% of all women who give birth suffer from a significant and noticeable post-partum depression. I have a feeling that the conviction that one has failed at giving birth “correctly” might not be conducive to making this number lower.
“Oh, who cares how she comes into this world?” the only woman in the “over 45” category at the class exclaimed. “This is my first child, and I just want to giver birth to a healthy baby, that’s all.”
I think this is an approach that should be adopted by all of the “powerless failures” who cannot accomplish the useless feat of giving birth in the field and continuing picking crops two minutes later.
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I don’t think 90% “need” it, but birth is very painful and people usually don’t like being in pain.
One acquaintance told us about a woman she knew in Israel, who gave birth with epidural and is now in a wheelchair because of a medical mistake. So my mother is strongly against me having one, if I give birth in the future. I guess the risk is very small, but in many cases it is (slightly) safer without. I would want one, but only because of fear of pain, not out of any “need.”
Since you want C-section, it’s not relevant to you, right? Is C-section done with epidural too?
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// I would want one
Which does mean 100% taking one, because I do think there are risks.
I don’t think one or another birth class or Internet forum has any significant influence on rates of post-partum depression. It’s something psycho-biological, not connected to other people.
Is being “powerful” presented as the main reason for unmedicated deliveries? Not health risks? Because if epidural’s risks are not presented, why not take it? The only other reason I can think of is lacking money and/or medical insurance to pay for it. If some women don’t have normal insurance, there may be economic reasons to wish for unmedicated birth.
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“I don’t think one or another birth class or Internet forum has any significant influence on rates of post-partum depression. It’s something psycho-biological, not connected to other people.”
– We all know that “chemical imbalances in the brain” are not an explanation that has much currency with me. And I’m saying it as someone who has had every annoying physical side effect of pregnancy yet not a single emotional or psychological one. And that is while taking bug doses of medication whose main side effect are mood swings, depression and anxiety.
“Because if epidural’s risks are not presented, why not take it?”
– You are asking me? 🙂 I’m totally baffled by this. It’s like some sort of a weird cultish behavior where everybody shares access to the sacred truth and I feel completely confused and excluded. This is mostly a middle-class obsession, so I don’t think it’s about money. I think it has something to do with female identity formation. Do you know how there was this entire Soviet mentality around a boy needing to go to the army to become “a real man”? I think something like that is going on here.
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It definitely sounds like it’s tied into the American middle class woman obsessions with sacrifice for one’s offspring and well-contained, out-of-ordinary-life experiences that empower one.
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“It definitely sounds like it’s tied into the American middle class woman obsessions with sacrifice for one’s offspring and well-contained, out-of-ordinary-life experiences that empower one.”
– Yes, it’s definitely something like this. People seem to be saying that this is one of “life experiences” that have to be accumulated to make for a goo life.
The doctors told us that they insist cameras and recording devices are turned off for the moment when the baby actually comes out. Otherwise, the filming crew can be there for the duration of the event. And you can request a mirror to be positioned between your legs, so that you can see the whole thing. While simultaneously taping it.
I found this all to be very strange.
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“Is C-section done with epidural too?”
– Of course! The pain would be intolerable if one got operated on without one. This is major surgery where an incision is made in the abdomen and the uterus. So I don’t get a chance to refuse an epidural. 🙂 Unless I want a general aesthetic which would make me unconscious for the entire process and groggy for a long time after that.
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Heh, I’d prefer the general anesthesia since I’ve a phobia of needles going in bits of my body that I can’t see and a strong dislike of being touched on the part of the back an epidural goes into. I don’t get grossed out by medical stuff easily but I can’t even look at the Wikipedia article on epidurals without getting shivery all over.
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“I don’t think 90% “need” it, but birth is very painful and people usually don’t like being in pain.”
– For me it isn’t pain because I have a very high tolerance for pain. It’s the terror of vaginal tearing and episiotomy that happen extremely often.
“So my mother is strongly against me having one, if I give birth in the future.”
– I have to tell you that as long as your mother’s opinion on the subject has influence on you, you are not ready to give birth at all. I know what a Soviet mother is like 🙂 and I also had to work very hard and for a very long time to get my mother to understand that her role is to support me in whatever I decide and not to make my body a battleground of her neuroses. Took me until the age of 36, but I got there! There is hope for all of us. 🙂 🙂
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I have two kids — the first I birthed without meds. The second, I was in labor for 33 hours before I finally had an epidural. I think context is all here. In the first birth, I didn’t need it. Yes, it hurt, but it was manageable. The second birth was not.
I do agree that giving birth, period, makes you feel powerful, whether you have drugs or not. Once you go through it, you feel like you can do anything in the world. (Not sure if that’s the same for c-sections but that was my experience with vaginal births.)
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My sister says it’s exactly the same with a c-section birth. 🙂
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Out of the 10 women in the audience, only 3 had college degrees: yours truly and 2 women who graduated from the local community college. The rest of the women work in menial low-paid jobs.
So imagine this type of crowd hearing figures of authority in an official setting repeat “no epidural = powerful”, “epidural = failure.”
Not sure what a college degree has to do with giving birth. Are you saying that you would not be coerced into using the epidural based on the ‘powerful’ attached to it from the authorities because you have a degree? People give birth without college degrees, I doubt that not having one makes you stupid and means that you follow every word from someone just because they tell you to.
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“Are you saying that you would not be coerced into using the epidural based on the ‘powerful’ attached to it from the authorities because you have a degree?”
– This blog requires minimal reading skills that you obviously don’t have. If “no epidural = powerful”, “epidural = failure” transforms into “powerful attached to epidural” in your mind, I don’t think I can help you.
Why do people who are as intellectually limited as you think it’s OK to expose others to their arrant idiocy?
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I didn’t have an epidural with either child, and no pain meds at all with the second one. I think it’s good to encourage people to look at things from all angles, but they should be giving facts, and not value judgements. People who want pain medication or an epidural should have it, and it’s ridiculous to suggest things should be otherwise or that it’s some sort of moral failing if you want or need pain relief.
I was 28 and 32 at the times of my children’s births (not particularly young and certainly not athletic). Then again, I have a relatively high pain threshold, and had relatively short labors (6 hours once the contractions were close together). In addition, I had a history of back pain and arthritis early in life. No brainer to me to avoid sticking big needles in my spine.
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This is a very good point. You have a knack for seeing right into the heart of the matter. It’s terrible that these mothers are being made to feel guilty about needing or wanting an epidural. I also agree with your previous comment that this is some sort of cultural cult. The “natural-birthers” are rabid and very convincing. They are doing a lot of damage because pregnant people, especially people who are experiencing their first pregnancy, have a lot of doubts and are vulnerable to these kinds of zealots.
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You are very kind to me, Kathleen. 🙂
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