On May 30th, 2008 I woke up at 3:00am in full blown active labor. After only 1 1/2 hours of laboring at home in my tub I was ready to push.
However, it was my first birth and I wasn't sure what my body was trying to tell me (I know, I know....) so I called my midwife who
(Whatever that's supposed to mean. Thanks for the confidence.)
I thought to myself "wouldn't it be nice if they just came here?" It seemed like such a far fetched idea at the time.
But after we hung up, I panicked. "Maybe I'm not in full blown labor? OMG, is this just the beginning??!" I went against instinct. I became so unsure of myself I said we should just head to the hospital. My contractions for all my labors come right on top of each other for 2 minutes each, so it took us a whole hour to even get me out of the tub and dressed. The ride to the hospital was excruciating.
As soon as we arrived I was treated like a number, and sent to my room. There was no love, no compassion, just a following of rules. Put this gown on. (With no offer to help.) Questions questions questions. I couldn't even talk I was soooo deep into labor land, but they wanted to know if I wore glasses or contacts? Plus my full medical history! Wasn't that what my preregistering was for??
I panicked. My body tightened up and shut the labor process down.
I was scared.
And I strayed from my birth plan, begging for drugs. 4 pokes from 4 different nurses ("SIT STILL!") and eventually IV therapy was called. She was a jem and smart enough to just put it in my hand. But those nurses......yikes.
All of this stress and tension when in reality all I wanted to do was push.
My body was like "abort birthing mission, something is wrong here!!" And I actually went backwards in dilation.
(Yes, it happens.)
What followed was the cascade of interventions they talk about, and multiple things were done to my body AND my baby without my consent. I was also threatened, and talked down to numerous times.........all while experiencing one of the hardest and should have been best days of my life. Even thinking about it now makes me ill.
Why didn't I say something? Why didn't I even stick up for not just myself but my baby?
Someday I'll write the full details of her birth, but every time I try I just can't find the words and it's just plain upsetting.
Two exhausting days later I was sent home with a healthy baby and we were both doing alright so they had me convinced that I was lucky, and everything was OK.
But I wasn't. And it wasn't OK.
In fact, I firmly believe that things they did to me could, and probably should, have a law suit filed for. I thought that since I was giving birth in a hospital with midwives I'd be safe and in good hands.
Boy was I wrong.
Instead of litigation, I've chosen a peaceful path. It's taken me until after the home birth of my son to want to even begin to process and heal from my daughters birth.
But now I've found my voice.
I'm starting from the ground up, with the families of the Portland community in a group called Portland Home Birth Families. (We can also be found on Facebook.)
Here's more:
"Portland Home Birth Families is giving local families a voice in the birth center and home birth community. Let's gather to support one another on birth journey's past, present and future"
Interested in sharing leftover birth supplies? Maternity clothes? How about your own powerful home birth tale? Let's chat over some coffee or tea, at a park or cozied up in a home. Maybe even a Summer time BBQ with all the kiddo's crawling and/or frolicking around?
* I would also like to invite those interested in local and/or national activism to join me in our fight for birth freedom. So many women have given so much of themselves to bring out of hospital birth to where it is today.
Let's gather our voices and turn a whisper into a roar!"
Portland Home Birth Families is the localized roots to the tree I am growing called Push For Birth Freedom. Eventually there will be "Chicago Birth Freedom," "New Orleans Birth Freedom," "New York Birth Freedom" "Denver Birth Freedom." You get the idea.
Here's what we have planned (so far) for our Oregon Chapter: (Some of this may be repetitive from what I've already discussed, this is taken directly from our group's page.)
- Share our empowering stories
- Help each other heal from past traumatic birth experiences
- Connect with pregnant women interested in home birth. I had so many questions and would've loved to be able to ask questions to local mom's, not just google for answers!
- Share leftover birth supplies with other momma's or direct them on where to buy locally (especially if UCing)
- Leftover maternity clothes? Let's share those, too!
- Do you have pregnancy/birth/breastfeeding/postpartum Books/Movies you'd like to pass around?
- Let's make a wide base of connections all over the Portland area. Doula's, midwives, chiropractors, herbalists, etc.... anything you can think of that would be supportive in pregnancy, birth, and of course post partum.
- I think birth education plays a huge role in home birth. So many women don't know the solid facts of how your body prepares/labors/births. I truly feel that if women were more educated about their bodies, they'd feel a deeper connection, and consider birthing at home. Maybe it would dispel some of the "oh no, a BABY is about to come out of you!" kind of fear.
I feel very strongly that Pregnancy isn't a disease and Birth isn't an emergency.
- How can we reach out to women in the community on a large scale to educate them beyond traditional birth classes? What about younger women? Is there a way to reach even deeper?
- Also along those lines, let's educate home birthing families on their patient rights in case a hospital transfer is necessary. (Let's make sure not just the mom but the whole family knows so their partner or doula can speak on their behalf while the mom labors.) I was unaware of mine for my 1st birth in a hospital and multiple things were done to me without my consent, yet I never questioned it or said anything until much later. It resulted in some birth trauma, and I'd like to help keep that from happening to other women.
- Let's support legislation in Oregon to help progress home birth into a "normal" light. They need our voices!
................................................
That's right, home birth isn't where it's at today without a lot of hard work and people using their voice to speak up for how and where we want to birth.
I want to talk to hospitals.
Insurance companies.
I want to talk with my local and state officials.
The Senate.
Is there a way to approach them that hasn't been done before? How about the general public? How can we break out of the stereo types and empower all varieties of women? Let's help them make informed birth choices.
Goodness, there's so much I want to share about what I want Push For Birth Freedom to accomplish. But my babies need me, so this has to be all for today. Even though this is all still very new, little by little, day by day, we're making ourselves known and "Pushing" our mission forward!
