C-sections

I have to do some more work on this, and I'm going to say it very poorly, but the fact that African American women are disproportionally likely to have unnecessary c-sections makes me think that there's more going on than just medical convenience. Tulane University researchers published a study in the April issue of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

MotheringDotCommune community participants tell tale after tale of how incredibly empowering natural child birth is for the women who do it.

Ok, this is a wild and crazy question, but by robbing women of the empowering experience of deliverying her own baby(ies), are we contributing to the continuing of racism, sexism, classism, et al?

I have a lot more cogitating to do... What do you think?

Busy Week

'Nuff said.

Interesting work being done on the the rise of the number of premature babies, including the blame being partially apportioned to elective deliveries. Bad health implications for the babies themselves.

Equally interesting reading on the risks associated with the gaps between babies. Too long a gap or too short a gap between babies is associated with higher health problems for baby 2. (The Deuce, as I like to call him/her.)

I'm thinking that pointing out that extended breastfeeding does a marvelous job of encouraging spacing between children (as does regular birth control). That lactational amenorrhea just rocks. And to think, Mother Nature (or evolution or whatever, not going into that debate!) designed us just perfectly to enable that spacing!

Making Me Rethink My Thoughts

A big thank you to the 13th Carnival of Feminists, especially Women'sSpace, for making me really think about my knee jerk reactions to the Britney Spears birth statue. Goddesses on Parade should be required reading. Did I react to her statue because it was pornographic? Did I react because she has celebrity? Did I react because the statue showed birth as oversexualized? What is oversexualized anyway? What makes porn porn? My reaction was "Barf." Not my most eloquent, and I apologize.

I am dismayed at my own knee jerking. I'm also still dismayed at the statue. Art doesn't necessarily have to reflect reality, but Britney did have an elective cesarean. I don't know if she actually labored or not (not that it's any of my business, for that matter!) I'm dismayed at the message that the pro life community has been trying to make out of that statue: hurrah for young women who have babies early and stay home to take care of them instead of working.

Is the pro choice movement going to foster a statue of Katie Holmes screaming her head off? I have my doubts. Is some other movement going to make a statue of Angelina Jolie giving birth in Manhattan, when she's clearly planning to do it in Africa? Again, call me Thomas.

FDA provides LMS clearance for standalone offering of CALM Curve

Now we have computerized modeling of labor providing "consistent and objective evaluation of labor progress."

I think I'm completely creeped out.

You're going to hook me up to god knows how many machines, feed vital statistics into a software model and predict exactly how it is that I'm going to labor and progress. Note please that this company is trying to appeal to both sides of the argument:

In some cases, it can therefore be used to confirm the need for a cesarean for women demonstrating symptoms of dystocia (slow labour). In other cases, as concluded in cross border clinical studies involving some 11,000 first time mothers, the use of CALM Curve, when introduced, contributed to a safe fall in cesarean rates from 19.54% to 16.62% at 12 months (P equals 0.00006). CALM Curve can provide meaningful assistance to U.S. clinical teams where cesarean section rates exceeded 29% in 2005.

Like I said, I think I'm completely creeped out. What happened to mothers helping each other with birth? I know, it's a very emotional question, and maternity outcomes have improved since we began introducing some medical advances to the process of labor and delivery. But, the decline in maternal mortality in the United States has leveled off since 1982. We've thrown some awesome technology at the problem, and serious dollars too, but we have not improved outcomes for mothers since 1982.

The best "new advance" we've introduced lately is the doula.

In the late 1970s, when Drs. John Kennell and Marshall Klaus investigated ways to enhance maternal-infant bonding they found, almost accidentally, that introducing a doula into the labor room not only improved the bond between mother and infant, but also seemed to decrease the incidence of complications.(6,7) Since their original studies, published in 1980 and 1986, numerous scientific trials have been conducted in many countries, comparing usual care with usual care plus a doula.

Women cared for during labor by a birth doula, compared to those receiving “usual care” were

• 26% less likely to give birth by cesarean section
• 41% less likely to give birth with a vacuum extractor of forceps
• 28% less likely to use any analgesia or anesthesia
• 33% less likely to be dissatisfied or negatively rate their birth experience

Off Topic, But I Can't Help Myself

When I grow up, I want to be The Decider, too.

Eloquent

It's not too hard to be more eloquent than I can be:

"The medical profession has done a disservice to women. They’ve turned pregnancy into a disease and childbirth into a procedure,”
~Marsden Wagner, a Swedish World Health Organization health specialist.

But wait! There's more!

This widespread inability to know what normal, humanized birth is has been summarized by the World Health Organization:

“By medicalizing birth, i.e. separating a woman from her own environment and surrounding her with strange people using strange machines to do strange things to her in an effort to assist her, the woman’s state of mind and body is so altered that her way of carrying through this intimate act must also be altered and the state of the baby born must equally be altered. The result it that it is no longer possible to know what births would have been like before these manipulations. Most health care providers no longer know what “non-medicalized birth is. The entire modern obstetric and neonatological literature is essentially based on observations of “medicalized” birth."

Delay Cutting the Umbilical Cord

Here's one for the good guys - delays in cutting umbilical cords are shown to be extremely beneficial to preemie newborns.

The birth activist community recommends delaying cutting the umbilical cord until it stops pulsing. Perhaps that pulsing indicates that it's still doing some of its important work and ought to be left alone to do so. Hmmmmm?

Hooray for New Zealand

They're increasing the rates of breastfeeding! Woo hoo! It can be done, it can be done! All it takes is paid parental leave and the baby friendly hospital initiative (BFHI).

How much does anyone want to bet me that the incredibly family friendly Republican party puts the BFHI on their party platform in the 2008 Presidential election? What about paid parental leave?

I hear the screaming of laughter across the nation.

Breastfeeding Mom Asked to Leave Club

From the lovely Lactivist: Breastfeeding mom asked to leave club.

There was a nurse-in at a Starbucks here in Maryland this past summer. While I wasn't part of the group, I would have loved to have been. There's a whole campaign aimed at getting the coffee chain to write formal policies about breastfeeding in their stores. One of their links is to the La Leche League webpage on which state laws say what in these United States. Perhaps some of our English sisters will get fired up and do something about the right to nurse in public.

Real Breasts

Awesome read about breasts at Womens Space.

Three cheers for women who are brave enough to nurse in public!

Honored

I'm honored to be part of the Twelfth Carnival of Feminists.

Fascinating reading - an amazing collection of thoughts.

Response to Brittany's Birth Statue

Here's an interesting commentary on the Spears statue...