Thank you to Tiffany, for sharing this link with me regarding birth intervention. Finding a pro-natural birth ob or midwife is the first step in having an intervention-free birth.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Cascade of Intervention
Posted by Christine at 11:44 AM
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4 Comments:
Thanks for posting this. It's a great chart that easily shows how interventions lead to more interventions.
My first midwife with Savannah, explained this same example to me. I'm so thankful the Lord put her in my life!
That's awesome! Thanks for sharing, Christine!
How to handle your own child birth experience is a complex decision -- even more complex than your chart! Years ago, when my children were in uturo, I considered the natural way; after all, we were living in rural Montana where natural is more common than anything else. However, for some reason, we did not follow through and just went to a regular obstetrician -- thankfully, because my first daughter got "stuck". Fortunately, we were miles from a highly skilled hospital and highly experienced doctor -- my doctor had never donw a low c-section and there was no time to get me to a big-city hospital, so he just pulled her out with his hands. (I guess a midwife might have done the same.) That experience was enough to keep me bonded to the doctor (vice midwife) approach -- and again, thank God, because the next baby was born with her spine in a sac that tore at birth because she was breech. Both of us could have died without some sophisticated care. I was at a more sophisticated hospital than the first place, this time in Texas, but not enough for my daughter who had to be airlifted to another hospital. My third child had the cord around his neck. He was born naturally, but the doctor had to physically reach in and undo the positioning. The fourth child was two months premature and needed steroids while I was in labor to make sure his lungs would be well developed; those steroids were later to save his life (part of several reasons he lived) since he ended up with a tracheotomy and needed good lungs.
Based on those experiences, I advised my daughter-in-law to also take the doctor route, and that was lucky because the first child was born with a swollen kidney and the second was born in pieces and had to be sewn back together (lay description, of course).
For those who think that doctors cannot do "natural" birth or that doctors will intervene where not necessary, I would point out that the patient has the final say. I crossed off everything on the hospital admission form that I did not want done, including c-section and all medication. My last obstetrician promised me, "If you say, let me die, I *will* let you die," and he was serious. I was the one who made the choices every step of the way, including on every intervention (of which there were almost none, mostly natural things like unwrapping that cord manually). I think far too often we women get intimidated (especially by male doctors) into saying yes when we mean no.
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