Crossroads

[skjaere]

I've been drifting along, seeking a new path for a while now, and I think I may have found something I'd like to do. It doesn't look like the training is terribly expensive (compared with going back to Uni), and it's a very direct form of activism. I don't imagine there's a whole lot of money in it, but the work sounds very satisfying, which is

Comments

[superl99]

I don't know what this particular doula's views are as I haven't had time to look over the blog, but can I suggest you read this blog as well?
http://skepticalob.blogspot.com/

[lyndagb]

Damn, Mary I think your LJ is incompatiable with explorer! That's the third time I've lost a comment!

Don't ncessarily read that blog. Based on my quick reading it's a fairly extreme obstetrician (who actually IS in direct financial competition with midwives for cases, unlike in the UK where they work in a complementary way mostly) in a system where there is usually no options of milder pain relief and heavily interventionist approaches to labour are perceived as normal.

As for the waterbirth comment - are the sheets of her delivery beds, the bloody, possibly contaminated (don't ask) vaginas of her 'patients' so pristine that she thinks a pool is sooooo much worse? And it's nothing like sticking your head in the loo thanks so much. I mis-spent plenty of time head hanging over the bowl in my younger years my birth pool smelled pretty damn sweet in comparison. And there was no poo.

She may not be as nut-job-ish in other parts but I was getting to angry to continue!

[superl99]

I'm not saying everything she says is right, and she has a very sensationalist style, but I agree with her about the hijacking of 'womanhood' and especially childbirth by biological essentialists and anti-rationalists. The idea that nature knows what it's doing is rubbish, as humans have evolved to be complete crap at giving birth compared to every other mammal due to our upright walking modifications

[lyndagb]

Yeah okay, your version seems much more reasonable

[superl99]

Oh absolutely, I think it's shocking that some places completely outlaw midwives, and I think a combination of overseeing doctors and 1-1 midwives is the best option. I'm sure part of why this isn't done in the US is the fucked up nature of the whole medical system there. But I think there should only be the one level of midwife, rather than the pseudo midwives you can get in the US which do not have the appropriate level of medical training

[lyndagb]

Well it's best to labour where you feel relaxed and safe, so if HB would scare you then of course don't do it! I don't know what happened with your friend so it may not apply to them, but the UK data suggests that at a whole sample level, homebirthing (or planning to, including those who have to transfer) is associated with less chance of complications happening in the first place. It was seeing that data as a student which made me interested in having one in the first place