From the International Cesarean Network:
The Cesarean Awareness Ribbon debuted in April of 2004 for Cesarean Awareness Month. The burgundy color of the ribbons represents birth and the wearing of the ribbon upside down symbolizes the state of distress many pregnant women find themselves in when their birthing choices are limited. The loop of the inverted ribbon represents a pregnant belly and the tails are the arms of a woman outstretched in a cry for help.
The Mommy-blogs and the parenting boards are all talking about “Cesarean Awareness Month” and I’ve had a few spammy requests to cover it here. Much of the rhetoric follows these lines — “Stop the horrible butchery of innocent mommies! Are you a victim of Cesarean? Post your story!”
So here’s my story.
When I was preparing for Mary, I was easily sold on the idea that natural was the right way to go, that my body knew what it was doing and should be left to do it without paternalistic, corporate Western medicine to victimize me.
So when Mare was born by emergency Caesarian after an induction at 41 weeks, I felt bad about myself.
“Empowered birth” has become a sort of euphemism for a very specific scenario — no drugs, no interventions, the mother a special kind of hero who gutted it out. According to the rhetoric, I had had an unempowered birth — a victim birth, brought on by my impatience, my lack of faith in my body, and a medical system that dehumanized me.
I researched VBAC when I was pregnant with Ren, looking for a “VBAC-friendly” practitioner who would be willing to let me give it a shot, who would help me redeem myself from my first birth. The response was universal — sure you can go for it if you want to. But it’s going to end the same way the last one did.
“My suggestion,” said the third doctor I consulted, “is that you learn to love Caesarians. Because without them, neither you nor your daughter, nor the baby you’re carrying would be here.”
I finally accepted it: it was nothing I did. It was nothing to be ashamed of or blame anyone for. For me, Caesarian was unavoidable. One step up from that — the Caesarian was something to be grateful for. It gave me Motherhood, and it spared my life.
We scheduled Ren’s delivery for ten days before her due date, to ensure there would be no emergency. It was a lovely delivery. Hard going in the surgery itself, pure joy immediately afterward.
This time out, there has never any question that Caesarian is the only option. I am marshalling my support team with a birth plan that includes dealing with the complications I am almost certain to have — problems with anesthesia, and a spinal headache.
“I want to be supported in my choice to push myself as hard as is safe. Remind me to nurse, wake me up if you have to, or put her on if you can’t wake me. Bring me lattes for the headache, and when those don’t work, hold her while I get the spinal patch and then help me nurse lying down while I wait for it to take. Don’t take the baby so I can ‘rest.’ — This will annoy me.”
I’ll never earn the Earth Mother stripe for natural childbirth, but I am about to have three empowered births under my belt. Each one makes me fiercer and clearer about who’s in charge and what I’m willing to do to get my kids home.
If you believe in a woman’s right to choose, a woman’s inherent capacity to know her own body and its limits, then you must also believe in Cesarean-section. Not for everyone, not every time. But in its time and place, it is a life saving — and life-giving — procedure. When you insist that nearly every woman who gives birth by this method is a victim of her doctor and her own impatience you make me suspect that you are actually the one who thinks I can’t think for myself.
I dissuade pregnant women from the idea that Cesareans are “the easy way.” In my experience they are painful, scary, and impersonal. They carry long term health effects. I support every effort to keep women from having them if they don’t absolutely have to.
But I will never support a movement that puts my birth method in the same catagory as terminal illness and domestic violence. I am no victim. And I certainly won’t support rhetoric that paints obstetrics professionals as butchers.
This year I am celebrating Cesarean Awareness Month with the birth of my third child by Cesarean. It is a tribute to the profession and practitioners that granted me what evolution sought to deny: life past the age of 27, and a shot at motherhood. Multiple times.
I have learned to love Cesareans, to accept them as a part of my choice to have a family. I am very proud to be a woman who takes her Cesareans like a champ, who does what she has to do to get the kid home.
Because that’s actually the important part.
Beautiful ! Thank you. Pretty much happened to me the same way. I am grateful to modern medicine that my eldest daughter and I are here and doing well. And that I now the mother of 3 cesarean kids !
A-freaking-men, Liz.
Odd, I was thinking about you today, and how you are preparing for Eden’s birth. (It’s the I-pod–I am waiting for mine to arive in the mail, and while pondering the wonders of the Nano, one thought led to another.)
ANYHOO, with two sons born by c-section, it’s something that comes up. And I get pissed every time I hear the “c-sections are evil” talk, because before there was medical intervention, women died, and babies died. It’s as simple as that.
I didn’t want a c-section either. but since my water broke at 7 PM and I still was only dilated less than 2 cm 8 hours later, we (my doctor AND I) decided Jadyn was stubborn and wasn’t going to go for it. So at 8:17 Jadyn was born via c-section. I lovingly and jokingly refer to her as my sunroof baby (cuz she came out the sunroof..hahaha). And IF I ever get to have another one, I will probably opt for a c-section again. If 6 pounds 14 oz wouldn’t come out, I doubt anything will.
Love you, Liz. You rock!
Good for you and everyone who has done what needed to be done to bring their kids into the world. My first arrived with plenty of good drugs, my second arrived so damn fast that it was a “totally natural” experience. and people compliemented me for this? This was not my preference but WHATEVER just get that kid out and healthy, via natural, C section or by vacumm sucking it out my nose! It just does not matter and you know that –cause you are already a great mom! Cannot wait to hear about Eden’s arrival1
My first pregnancy required a c-section because one of my twins was breach. I wanted to try VBAC, but when my daughter was past due, it was too risky to try an induction, so she was delivered in an OR as well. I would have liked to have had a “natural delivery,” but as I told my OBs, if any of them had a bad feeling about anything that was happening in the pregnancy, my goal was to have healthy children, no matter how they came out.
When you go for your pre-op testing, you might want to ask about something called Duramorph. I was on the Morphine pump for the first c-section, and felt awful for the first two days. The second time around I got the Duramorph, which is injected as part of the spinal. Made a HUGE difference. I don’t know if it’ll help with the spinal headache, but it doesn’t hurt to ask.
The best part of the c-section? The extra time in the hospital – there’s nothing like having baby to make you appreciate someone else bringing you lunch.
I have had so many mums say that they felt ‘cheated’ by a c-section. And I feel just fine. There are other things I am not so happy about, where I look back and feel that my power and decision making was taken from me – and that I would do differently next time (if there is a next time, that is.) But the c-section is not part of it.
I am in the UK, so maybe some things are a bit different, but my story is that I wanted a natural water birth, with limited medical intervention, in a specialist midwife-led unit. Hypnosis and TENS machine for pain relief, and a very clear graded list of medical pain relief after that, that I wanted to *ask* for if I needed, and not be *offered.* I had a very clearly written birth plan – fluid, with options, but showing how I wanted to be involved, and what we would prefer in different options.
Then we were told that baby was big. Really big. And that meant I was no longer ‘low risk’ so could no longer be in the midwife-led unit. So bye-bye water birth, and hello High Risk Unit in hospital.
Then baby was late. They ‘let’ me go two weeks over my due date, even though baby was big, and then it was time for an induction.
Syntocin drip racked up to the highest setting.
And no medical pain relief. Go Me!! Yes, I am proud of this. My body was able to work through 12 hours of induction using TENS and hypnosis. I am not a martyr, and I don’t have an enourmously high pain threshold; but I am proud of what my body can achieve.
I hadn’t wanted to know how dilated I was. I just wanted to get on with it in my own way. The midwife very kindly said she had to talk to me about this. After 12 hours, I was only 2cm gone. The surgeon came in and said that we should give it 2 more hours and if I hadn’t started to progress, then we would have to go with a c-section.
Another 2 FREAKING *HOURS*?! Aargh. OK, I can do this….
2 hours later, I have gone to 4cm. No c-section for me, then. “Oh bugger!!” LOL
And then exhaustion, high temp, etc etc set in. And the midwife again very kindly and gently said that although I had said not to be *offered* pain relief, her medical advice was an epidural.
So I did.
I (eventually) got to 9cm. And no further.
So very gently and kindly I was prepped for theatre. I still had my hypnosis tape playing. I had my toy tiger with me. I had my husband at my head.
And then I had my baby boy. And he is gorgeous. And that’s the end of it!
I think that many of the stories I have heard have caused problems not because of the c-section itself, but the feeling of helplessness around it. When women have been pushed around, and not involved in discussions, when they have not been treated with respect. I felt calm about it as an option; and I think my hypnosis tape really helped with that.
My doula friend said to me once that ‘Caesarian Section’ is a doctor’s term and suggested women call it a Caesarian birth because it is a birth method, not just a medical procedure. Of course everyone needs to choose their own terms but that stetement really resonated with me.
My oldest son was born at 33 weeks and he was breech so he was born by Caesarian and I felt very strange about it. For the longest time I used to say ‘when The Boy was born’ as opposed to ‘when I gave birth to The Boy’ because I didn’t know if it ‘counted.’
Having him arrive 7 weeks early, days after we moved into a new house, weeks before I was supposed to finish at work, while my in-laws were visiting their first grandchild in Europe (so my husband couldn’t spend a lot of time away from the family-owned business), while my sisters were still in university/at work conspired with the Caesarian birth and the NICU stay to make me feel very alone and powerless. For the longest time I associated that feeling solely with the Caesarian and it took me a long time to sort that out.
It took until I was sitting with a group of women who were bragging about their arduous labours and their steadfastness for me to really own my first birth method. I said ‘Wow, that was great that you could go with what your bodies wanted to do. I let them cut me open to remove a LIVE HUMAN BEING.’ It changed the tone of the conversation for the better.
My second son was born by VBAC at 35 weeks (apparently my body just refuses to do that last month.) I felt a different kind of power during that experience because usually it takes me a long time to form a body memory so I am rather uncoordinated and frustrated by trying to make my body obey me but in that case it all came together. (with demerol and nitrous oxide to take the worst of it away – I couldn’t bear the thought of a epidural since the one I had for my first birth made me feel horrible.) I didn’t feel that made me better than anyone else, just that I had a good combination of luck and whatever that worked with me instead of against me for a change.
You are right, Liz, it is just a different route to the same destination and once you get there you shouldn’t feel bad about how you arrived. Especially if you had to be cut open to extract a LIVE HUMAN – that’s intense.
AMEN!!
I had 2 kids by ‘natural’ birth. My sister had 2 by cesarean.
The end result? Four happy, healthy kids and 2 moms who are pretty confident that they made the right decision.
No victims here.
Baffles me as to why people get so hung up on this.
Get the kid out. Get the kid out safely. Keep mom safe, too. These should be the only concerns.
Thanks…no,really.
My first was by c-section. My stupid cervix refused to dilate past 8cm, they could not make the epi work so my legs were numb but I was still feeling every contraction, and after 32 hrs of mind numbing labor I was knocked out cold and had my child removed via c-section. I met motherhood unconcious on an operating room table…but at least I met motherhood and my child was given life.
My second was VBAC,a successful one too. Most people assume that I was relieved that my body finally cooperated and I was given the opportunity to “really have a baby”…That I found a doctor would not “bully” me into an unnecessary surgery gagain. They assume that my second birth was better, more rewarding expierence. The only difference between my births was the fact I was unconcious for one and had terrible(and I mean terrible) hemroids with the other.
Both ended the same way, a healthy baby and a relatively unscathed mother. Who on earth cares how the baby makes the entrance, as long as its a healthy one. As always…you said it better, so my hat off to you!
Thank you, DaMomma! I will admit, I’ve had trouble coming to terms with my own C-section. But even so, I still believe I made the absolute best decision for myself and my baby. And the rhetoric about being a ‘victim’, or ‘butchered’, or having an ‘unempowered birth’ drives me nuts, because I did everything that ‘they’ say you should do to avoid a C-section: I went into labour naturally, I had midwives, I planned a homebirth, and I didn’t have drugs (until I went to the hospital, anyway). My body responded great to labour, I dilated with no problem, and if everything had gone well, it would have been 12 hours start to finish.
But my kid had a freakin’ huge head, and was posterior. He got stuck in my birth canal below my pubic bone and there was no way he was going to get through (and believe me I tried for over two hours). I could have kept trying after we got to the hospital, and they could have pulled out the forceps and vacuum, but neither my husband and I wanted to put our baby through that just so I could have a vaginal birth. And honestly, it wouldn’t have worked anyway; he was really, really stuck.
I’m hoping for a VBAC with my second in June, and doing what I can to get it (still with midwives, but we’ll be in the hospital this time), but I’m learning that only so much is within my control. If I can deliver vaginally this time, that’s great. But if I have another Caesarean, that’s fine too. Because what I ultimately want is not a ‘birth experience’. It is a healthy baby, and I’ll get that anyway I can.
I’ve had two unmedicated births, both at home in my bed with midwives attending. I got my “natural birth” tshirt, baby. I got chops.
And I am here to tell you that one of the things that made me feel most secure about doing that was the fact that one of my midwives (and the daughter of a midwife, too!) had to go to the hospital for caesarian because of the breechiest breech baby that ever did breech. If she’d go, she’d send me if necessary, right? That made me feel much, much safer.
Because.
Zealots freak me out. The ones that say ONLY supermedicalized hypersupervised professional type births are safe, and the ones that say ONLY a supernatural, om-filled, granola sprinkled birth is safe, they all freak me out. None of them are thinking, they’re just following the manual.
You know what else freaks me out? People who know how you should feel about your birth, your miscarriage, your divorce, your whatever. Some women need to mourn the natural birth they feel cheated of. Some women need to be angry. Some women really couldn’t care less how the baby got there. Some women manage to have empowered caesarians and feel proud of that. It’s all real, it’s all valid, and it’s stunningly presumptuous to think otherwise.
In other words, thank you for your post. It was lovely.
Here I sit, mother to two C-section boys, and I have to say I just don’t care that much anymore. I sat and had drinks with one of my very best friends last night, who happens to sit on the national board of I-CAN. You might be shocked to know that she feels more like you do on this issue than you can imagine. I get tired of anyone who has passion about something being called a zealot. She wants mothers to make informed choices. Don’t we all?
Inform us, support us and/or leave us alone. In the end, there are much bigger fish to fry when it comes to parenting.
I just had to de-lurk a little to say Amen to this post! I’ve posted a little before, tested the waters. I’ve been reading this site since I found out I was pregnant with my daughter (now 2) and love every post!
This one hit home though. I was induced for severe preeclampsia and it took 4 days to “work”, 26 hours in “real” labor, and then a baby that got stuck in my rib cage (she was a little hesitant to leave). She had a dent right above her booty because of how high she was in my body. My OBGYN said later that no amount of Relaxin was going to make my hips spread and she would have never made it through. After getting to the hospital on Wed afternoon I delivered the most perfect little girl at 4 in the afternoon the following Monday.
Emergency C section saved both of our lives, she was never in distress but was stuck, and I on the other hand had a BP of 180/110 when she was delivered! I recovered fine from my c-section, except for a little spot on my tummy that is still kind of numb, but who cares! It looks like it’ll be all c-sections for me and that’s just fine. I had all the labor I’m ever going to want to have, that mess is not all it’s cracked up to be! I nursed her right away, walked the night she was born, and went home with a gorgeous healthy baby and a bottle of pain pills, honestly, that’s a best case scenario!
I just wish everyone would leave other moms and their choices alone. I know your site is a leave moms alone site, and I love that. I would not have the girl, and I probably wouldn’t be here either if it wasn’t for my Knight in Shining Blue Scrubs and his trusty Scalpel and that’s okay by me!
I was a “natural” mama, but the birth was the easiest thing about his whole first year. I, for one, wish we’d all focus less on stressing moms out about the birth itself, and remind them that whatever happens, if they’re lucky, they’re going to be trying to care for a newborn infant while recovering from lots of pain and wounds and not getting any sleep at a time when they have had a major bodily trauma. Talk about setting us up for PPD – at least with a C-section, you have a visible scar to “prove” that you’re not completely well…
Anyway, I don’t care what choice a woman makes for her birth. But I do hope, like all her parenting choices, it’s an informed one, and that’s she’s making it herself, and not being railroaded into it, either by aggressive surgical OBs or by aggressive naturalist midwives.
BRAVO! BRAVO!
Good. For. You. My mom is a childbirth instructor and had all her babies intervention-free; until she started bleeding at nine months pregnant with my brother Kevin, who was baby number 8. She was rushed to the hospital and an emergency C-section saved her and my brother’s life. My mom says that recovering from a C-section is ten times harder than recovering from vaginal childbirth, so my hat is off to you in a big way for doing it three times. I’ve done labor twice and I wasn’t afraid, but I’d be scared of a C-section. I’m glad that if I ever need one, the option is there and that women like you have gone there first and set an amazing example.
Hello–I just stumbled across your web site, and really like it. Thanks for the posting about C-sections. I was totally into having a natural birth, did the Bradley method and everything, but in the end had a c-section. The guilt and sorrow about not going natural is still with me, and yes, would like to try for a VBAC is we try for another. But, thanks for what you said because my story is my water broke before my labor started, which is unusual. They usually only let you go 24 hrs and my Dr wanted to c-section right away, but I wanted to try as long as baby was OK. Long story short, we “fired” our Dr and got another who was willing to let me try. I tried for almost 3 days, but never dilated more that 2 cm–even with Pitocin, walking, nipple stim, and all that stuff. Finally, they just had to take the baby out. I was 41 weeks and a day. Baby was healthy and perfect and wonderful. And since I had 5 miscarriages prior, I should just be truly grateful I had him, whatever way he came out. But there’s still that nagging feeling of wanting the experience. So good to know there’s others out there who help me feel less “questioning” myself about the whole thing. Thanks!
Sister, you said a mouthful. I put C-sections vs Vaginal births in the same category as breastfeeding vs formula: As long as the end is met (i.e. the child gets born/fed and everybody survives) then it is a victory and the means are nobody’s business but those directly involved.
Wow, I didn’t know people thought that way about C-sections. I had noticed that there seem to be a lot more births going that way lately, and I wondered what was up with that, but I didn’t know people were making women feel inferior and victimized because of it. That’s a hard enough time as it is… Thanks for your wonderful post! It brought an issue I wasn’t aware of out into the light, and I hope it made a lot of women feel better about their method of childbirth.
well said. i had two c-sections followed by two V-Bacs. i was a good candidate because my c-sections were due to the baby, not me (first child was breech and the second one went into stress during labor). for my two “natural” labors – one was with epidural and the last one was sans epidural. i am grateful for doctors who were willing to listen to both me and babies and help me figure out the best route to go. i would have miscarried my first birth without medical intervention. i do think we’ve come a long way from the 50s when they would just knock some women out for delivery (my mother-in-law was one of the few women at harvard who chose to be awake for her birth and when she got back to her room, there was a note telling her she had a baby girl), but we should always be appreciative of the modern advances that have saved so many lives.
I was in labor for 26 hours before they finally took me to the OR for my C-section. My baby and I would most assuredly be dead if I had not had it. I was most certainly not a “victim” and neither was my beautiful daughter. I only wish they would have made the decision earlier (or that I had had the authority to insist they perform the surgery)!!
If/when my husband and I have another childe (I hope!) it must be via C-section as I was in labor so long that my womb tore when they cut into me.
I have no fear about another C-section. (I’m thankful I’ll never have to experience all the pain of “natural” childbirth!)
Thanks for your well put thoughts! I was blessed to have a complication free labor the first time around, the second time around I was blessed to placenta previa. I had no choice but to have a cesarean. I was terribly worried and hoping for a an eventual VBAC (though number two was still weeks away from being born ha ha!). But I have my c/s, and my son came out perfect. I have no doubts that we both would have died otherwise. I am thankful for skilled doctors that kept us both alive. I am still hoping for an eventual vbac, but not because c/s are not really giving birth, but mostly because I am scared to death of needles. lol
Incredible content- Will come back soon:)