A few people have raised the issue with me about my choice to have a home birth. So I thought I would have my say here and hopefully it won't turn into too much of a rant.
I believe home birth is safe. I believe, for me, home birth is a better option in my personal circumstances than birthing at my local hospital.
I think there are so many myths out there about the safety of home birthing, which isn't helped by the fear mongering shit the media puts out. I watched the Sunday program about home birth and I was disgusted - it was supposed to be about the police treating it like a crime scene when a baby dies during a home birth and instead it was an attack on home birth, a disgusting portrayal of how "unsafe" it is.
I hate the fact that they make it out that babies only die in a home birth - you never hear about the babies that die in the hospital. Statistically, a higher amount of babies die in hospital. And the interesting thing is - even if its a home birth patient that has been transferred to the hospital and the baby dies in hospital, it's still recorded as being a home birth statistic.
So I'll blab on a bit about why I like the idea of a home birth.
First up - your relationship with your midwife. This is a professional who gets to know you on an extremely personal level, before attending to you at your most vulnerable moment. This is someone who takes the time to get to know you, instead of being rushed through a checklist while a dozen more women wait to be seen that day. You see the same midwife. They meet your husband, have cups of tea together, play with your children. For 6 months you are in contact with the same person. They discuss your fears, your previous births, they know what you are capable of on the day because they know YOU. I've never had an appointment last for less than an hour, and I'm pretty sure that doesn't happen in hospital.
I also get the impression that people think home births are scary because of the midwife - home birth midwives have exactly the same training as hospital midwives with one exception - they are extremely skilled at reading their birthing mother because they don't have machines to tell them how mother and baby are doing.
They carry portable dopplers to check the baby during labour, much less intrusive than being on continuous monitoring and strapped to a bed. Did you know that being strapped to a bed and being in that position can compress the oxygen given to the baby and then the machine tells the midwife that the baby is in distress? Seems a bit funny to me that women are put in a position that could cause foetal distress to be monitored for foetal distress....
So I've covered why I'm not scared of anything happening to the baby during labour - Doppler takes care of any concern and I'm not put in a position to decrease oxygen levels.
Uterine Rupture - it's no secret that I've had 2 csections. Uterine rupture is a risk, however quite small. First time mothers being induced have the same exact risk of rupture as a woman attempting a vbac. And I don't know about you, but inducing first time mothers seems to happen quite a lot. And with a rupture comes a warning. Symptoms of it happening. We just don't spontaneously combust because we have a scar. There will be pain between contractions. There will be fresh blood on your cervix that the midwife can see. I've had 2 successful vba2c's and the only pain I felt was the contractions. I don't need a machine to tell me my own body and what I'm feeling, I'm more than capable and so is every other women yet it's almost like our power has been taken away. Trusting ourselves is non-existent because a doctor (who has probably never met us) thinks something could be going on. It shits me to no end that vbac is put out there as a high risk birth, yet they are still inducing mothers!
Next up - bleeding after birth. Midwives bring drugs to the home birth to stop bleeding, same ones given in the hospital funnily enough. They don't need a big red button on the wall to press in an emergency because its not needed. They know what to do, and they also know the number of the ambulance just in case.
What if the baby gets stuck? Independent midwives are also trained in this situation just like hospital midwives are. Lets not forget that midwives have been delivering babies for centuries and obstetricians are trained surgeons. I like obstetricians - this isn't a bashing against them - but they are trained in what can go wrong at a birth, not trained in normal, every day, low risk births.
What else is there? Independent midwives are extremely skilled at what they do, and to accuse them of being unprofessional or not good at what they do or to even accuse them of not caring about their clients and whether or not the baby dies - it's just disgusting. To accuse mothers of not loving their babies because they choose to have a home birth instead of being in hospital - is also disgusting.
Home birth is safe. With an experienced midwife who knows what she is doing it is just as "safe" as a hospital setting. Without any possible intervention (which may or may not be needed) it may be considered even safer than a hospital birth. My midwives aren't "cowboys" and are fairly conservative as independent midwives go. They don't do home births for breech babies, or twins. So they do have their own definition of what a "high risk" birth is to them. Some midwives do them at home. Some don't. So please don't put all independent midwives in the same box, because they just aren't all the same.
I trust my midwives, and I trust my body and I trust the process. So please, enough of the home birth bashing. Most of the stuff out there are just myths and are just not a true representation of how a home birth really is.
You may not agree that home birth is right for you, but please don't accuse me of not loving my baby because I choose this type of care. For me, this IS the best I can do for my baby - while also making sure I get the most respectful birth experience possible.
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