Last night I heard about a study that reaffirms what our mammal cousins have known instinctively for thousands of years... birth should happen in a dark, comfortable place! It also helps explain why most women go into labor in the middle of the night (which is, of course, why doctors find inductions and cesareans so much more convenient). And why so many labors slow down or stall in a hospital setting....
Read the rest of this post over at my new website!
10 comments:
I'm glad I evolved beyond a cat. They can have their warm dark caves. You can't sue a cave. I'll take the hospital everyday - deep pockets.
I'll let your wife chew you out for that one. :-P
Genius! Nature (meaning God) is perfection. We, with all our "advancements" are rather idiotic!!!
amen amen and amen.
i never knew the info about the sleep hormone(was it melatonin?) and its buildup during meditation, relaxation, hypnobirthing and such. another point in the pro's column for natural birth. hypnobirthing was my best training for two of my births.
such great timing for me to read this! i just read leboyer's "birth without violence," which (although a little melodramatic) makes a case for giving birth in the dark. the idea behind his approach is to make birth as non-traumatic as possible for the baby, who should be delivered into a dark, quiet, calm place. a really interesting read. thanks for the post!
Thanks for all the comments, everybody!
Emily- my sis-in-law is planning to use hypnobirthing and raves about it... I'm planning to finally do some research into it soon!
Missy- I think I got that book from the library once and read at least some of it. Cool stuff!
Just out of curiosity, if you go the "natural" route, do they ever induce? I would be scared to not be induced a week or two after my due date because when my mom had my brother they never induced and he ended up being 11lbs 4oz. She had a lot of damage after that. In fact, they had to do a c-section with us and then her uterus could never recover and she had to get a hysterectomy. My sister and I have both had to be induced. I did convince my doctor to try oxytocin before pitocin, though, and it put me into labor despite all of the hospital staff telling me it most likely wouldn't. :)
Hey Linda!
There are definitely women who plan to go unmedicated but end up being induced. From what I've heard, though, it's very difficult to avoid drugs after being given pitocin because of the unnatural intensity of the contractions.
Midwives do tend to be more comfortable allowing women's bodies to go into labor on their own. Sometimes this ends up resulting in a large baby (my sis-in-law went late and delivered a 12 pounder vaginally!), but I think just as often the babies are normal in size. Due dates really aren't very reliable... I think they should just give women a 4 week time frame instead of an exact date.
If a woman is nearing or going beyond 2 weeks late, midwives also tend to encourage more natural methods of inducing labor--like herbs and things that will prompt your body to produce oxytocin on its own like nipple stimulation or intimate contact with your spouse, etc.
When you say the doctor let you try oxytocin, what do you mean?
Thanks for your comment! :-)
Linda,
I just went back and re-read your posts about the birth... so the prostaglandin gel is what they used to put you into labor? I'm so glad you avoided pitocin! (I've heard pitocin labors are killer!)
Maybe you already knew this (or tried it) but semen is full of prostaglandins. Here's a little TMI for you... It's actually largely responsible for my first baby's labor starting. ;-) It doesn't work for everyone though... I think your body just has to be ready to go into labor already.
Amen. Makes perfect sense!
Post a Comment