Friends of friends just had a stillborn. They didn’t listen to the doctor when he said “induce.” They didn’t listen to the doctor when he said “c-section.” They insisted on natural childbirth.
You got to hold your kid six hours after he was born. They did get to hold theirs immediately, but buried him three days later.
Another friend really wanted a natural vaginal birth, even though her doctor advised her against it. Her story has a happier ending, she has a wonderful, perfect four year old son. But she didn’t hold her kid for 16 hours, because she was in surgery (or post-op) for that long repairing her shredded vagina and will never have another bio child. She did get the vaginal birth she craved - I’m willing to bet that she spent much longer recovering from it than she would have with the c-section the doctor advised.
My sob story, my son was born in another country to another woman and he was six and a half months old before I held him. Not only did I miss his birth and not get to breastfeed him, I missed him learning to crawl, to sit up, his first tooth and his first smiles.
If you don’t trust your doctor, find another one. Have your records transferred and reviewed. But if every doctor is telling you the same story, and you are still willing to risk your life/health and your baby’s, maybe its time to re-evaluate and get some perspective.
Cessandra I’m sorry…I’m working on a case right now that upsets me.
Your doctor would most likely would NOT have told you if there was an ominous fetal monitor strip while you were having the baby. Just not a good idea. Also, he sure wouldn’t have told you if your baby ended up having good APGAR’s after delivery…no reason to… Fetal monitor strips are there to help but are not entirely predictive on a good/bad outcome. Your attitude towards your doctor bothers me as per your ‘golf game’ comment. I promise you although you may hear about the odd doctor doing stupid ridiculous things (like the check cashing dr.) that is an incredilbe rarity.
Really…it is, as I said, better to be safe than sorry…so vaginally might be ok to try in a hospital with a doctor and fetal montoring strips but you may end up with another C. Also, if your prior baby was large, that’s another good reason for an elective c.
I wanted to have my daughter vaginally but when at 36 weeks my blood pressure ballooned and I started gaining a lot of fluid my OB scheduled an induction. Unfortunately she was crooked in the birth canal and after 20 hours of labor showed signs of fetal distress. I felt guilty about the C-section but I am thankful every day the option was there for me or we both would have died.
Our daughter was handed to my husband in the delivery room and he went with her for the stuff they do (eye goo blood tests …) while they cleaned me up. We all went to recovery together and then all moved to our room for the next 5 days. I was walking around the next day (although slowly and gingerly) The recovery didn’t take as long as I thought and that included the bout of pneumonia I came home with! The suckiest thing was not being able to drive for 8 weeks.
My doctor said that this c-section did not make me any more likely to need one should I have another baby than if I had never had a c-section before. I was happily surprised at that!
My friend had a successful VBAC and is thankful she tried it.
Good luck finding someone who will give you a chance to try!
There is also the belief that an episiotomy can be like cutting the edge of a sheet, it provides a place to tear and that sometimes the tear from the episiotomy is worse than the tear would have been with no episiotomy.
My C-section story was pretty similar to the one in the OP, including the lack of any evidence that it was necessary. (I was glad to have it, having no desire to push at that point, but that’s another story. I’m not Mrs. Earth Mother, lets just say that. Plus, I was delighted to stay in my fancy-schmancy maternity hospital a few extra days.) Anyway, you say you can’t find midwives willing to support you in VBAC. That’s not surprising to me. Midwives are generally inclined to take only the lowest risk cases. A doctor, on the other hand, should be easier to find.
She had the episiotomy, and tore as well. As Dangerosa mentioned, they are now thinking that tears do heal better than cuts (partly because they tend to be more shallow, I understand). But it’s certainly still possible to tear. The bad thing about it going all the way to the rectum–an inch or two–is that you then get a whole lot of trouble with bacteria and fecal matter, etc. Takes forever to heal.
I’m going to tell another ‘c-sections aren’t so bad’ story–there was a woman in my playgroup who stuck with labor for a week, insisting that she was not going to have a c-section. She did finally give in, but felt awful about it. A year later, she was still saying that as far as she was concerned, it was the end of the world and the worst thing that could have happened, etc. I personally can think of much worse things. I’m certainly not accusing you, Cess, of having a ‘natural childbirth or bust’ attitude–I just want you to watch out for the idea that c-sections are somehow less worthy and ‘worse’ than the usual kind of birth. I’m very grateful we have them, though I agree that some people get pushed into them too quickly for various reasons.
Cessandra, can I suggest finding a parenting-specific website with message boards and asking your questions there? ParentsPlace.com is one that I know has several VBAC-related boards, you might even find someone from the Houston area who has some local advice.
I know something about this from personal experience. Ok, my wife actually went through it, but I was there.
1st pregnancy: C-Section after almost no labor, not emergency but there were extenuating circumstances.
2nd pregnancy: C-Section after 27 hours of labor, 2 hard
3rd pregnancy: VBAC
4th pregnancy: VBAC.
Oddly, after every pregnancy: “Oh, let’s have another one!”
All in the hospital, by the way. I would not attempt a VBAC at home. In the rare circumstances that something went wrong, it will be an emergency do something NOW DAMMIT kind of thing. BEst to be surrounded by all of the equipment in the first place, just to ease your mind if nothing else.
18 months between deliveries is fairly iffy in terms of risking the scar :(. Uterine rupture is a bad, bad thing.
Having said that, all those people with horror stories, do you really believe that EVERY c/sec is done with good reason? I certainly don’t. My second son who was born at home would have been a c/sec in hospital. First birth after unexplained stillbirth? No way was I going to be allowed to birth vaginally in the hospital.
BBJ, I disagree entirely that it is inappropriate to tell a labouring woman that the foetal monitor is showing a problem. In my labour with my third son, there was a point that the midwife was telling me we were heading to theatre if the heartrate didn’t recover. It did recover but I know I would have handled an emergency c/sec better knowing why I was in theatre. But I don’t think being in labour is enough reason for a woman to lose her right to informed consent.
Catastrophic outcomes are rare in VBAC. It’s just that when they happen, they are terrible. But even with uterine rupture, it’s not automatic death for mother and baby. A lot of women do VBAC and have good outcomes. Informed choice is a good thing.
I didn’t say it was appropriate…just said it happens…but it’s one of those issues that is a surgical decision (not the c-section, the fetal strips) as there are disagreements as to what they might mean and as long as the baby os neuologically ok afterwards, there’s no reason to freak the mother out…it’s like telling a patient after surgery, well good gracious I thought you were a goner in the middle of the surgery when the operation ended sucessfully w/ no lasting problems.
Nope. Totally disagree. Women in general have the best chance of reconciling the birth they wanted with the birth they got if they are given full access to how and why decisions were made.
I’m speaking here as someone who had a baby die because an obstetrician made a wrong call. What has helped me deal with that loss has been that he admitted he made an error and with the benefit of hindsight would have done differently. TBH I prefer the outcome I had – there’s no way my son could have been born and not been massively brain damaged. Without knowing what was said and how he reached that judgment call, I would have had much more difficulty making my peace.
The women I saw when I was doing advocacy work who really struggled to deal with outcomes or births that went bad were the ones who didn’t know the hows or the whys of the decision making process. Birth’s an emotional and spiritual event for most women – it’s not an appendectomy or haemorrhoid removal operation. If the birth ended with positive outcomes for mother and baby and the mother has no questions about why she ended up with a honking great episiotomy or an emergency c/sec, then maybe she doesn’t need to know. We always encouraged/insisted that midwives gave their clients copies of the clinical notes so that women knew what went on throughout the pregnancy and birth.
BBJ, if everything ends up a-ok and the mother doesn’t ask any questions, I can see not worrying her for no reason. But if I ask and the doctor lies, that is unethical, IMO. Honestly, I don’t think he did lie, so I don’t think he acted unethically. I just think he hurried more than was necessary and deprived me of that immediate mom&son moment. Which wouldn’t even be SO bad except that it may now mean that I don’t even have a second chance. It really does upset me, and the fear that I may go in bright eyed and optimistic and have the exact same thing happen makes me wary of going to the hospital.
(I was hormonal yesterday. Hope I sound more rational today.)