Last Week we Gathered to Chat About Home Birth
We do this every three months here in Cape Town, in a lovely home in the seaside village of Muizenberg. Lana and I have been running these gatherings for the last five years. They were born out of a need and a desperation to provide support and information to those seeking direction and advice around this obscure birthing option and the gatherings have gained a momentum of their own. When we first started them we would work so hard to spread the word, posting flyers to all the midwives and interested antenatal teachers. We would arrange speakers and explore themes. We would advertise and spread the word and we would always lose money running them but loved it and loved the responses and stories we got. They were always worth it. And then something shifted. The gatherings grew. And so did the stories. And the variety and range of people who came. It has become such a safe space to listen and share. Mothers, fathers, doulas, midwives, interested parties attend and all seem to leave humbled and moved. As do we. Every time. Mothers share their birthing experiences, their eyes still glowing with oxytocin. These women, these strong strong women, share what made them feel strong and empowered. They share their vulnerable and beautiful stories to a hungry audience, an audience who needs affirmation and support in the choices they are making. “Stories teach us in ways we can remember. They teach us that each woman responds to birth in her unique way and how very wide-ranging that way can be. Sometimes they teach us about silly practices once widely held that were finally discarded. They teach us the occasional difference between accepted medical knowledge and the real bodily experiences that women have – including those that are never reported in medical textbooks nor admitted as possibilities in the medical world. They also demonstrate the mind/body connection in a way that medical studies cannot. Birth stories told by women who were active participants in giving birth often express a good deal of practical wisdom, inspiration, and information for other women. Positive stories shared by women who have had wonderful childbirth experiences are an irreplaceable way to transmit knowledge of a woman’s true capacities in pregnancy and birth.” – Ina May Gaskin I feel honoured and blessed to be part of these gatherings every three months. I do wish we could run them more often but for now, every three months will have to do. Thanks again to all who come and share....
Read MoreI Never Want to go Near That Hospital Again!
I never want to go near that hospital again! Strong words said by a mother… Then another mother says to me, “There’s no way I’m going to the hospital!” And then another mother says, “I don’t want to go to the hospital for even one check up. Everyone I know ends up with caesareans…” Three different mothers. Three very different scenarios. Three very different backgrounds. Three different belief systems. And yet this very strong underlying feeling from all three. And all in the same week. What do I do? What do I say in these situations? I sit and write this whilst waiting for my students to arrive. I am part of a group of women who teach the 4th and 5th-year medical students ‘compassion’ as part of their obstetric training. It is a programme that was started several years ago by midwife Robyn Sheldon. The students arrive and I put away my pencil and notebook. They are chatting amongst themselves. I hear the words, “I am so tired.” repeated several times. We begin the tutorial by sitting quietly and comfortably in chairs in a circle. The pressure is off and all we need to do is observe our individual breath as it moves in and out of our nostrils. We allow ourselves to just be. We observe or thoughts, emotions and feelings as they arise and drift in and out of us. We note the hustle and bustle taking place around us in the hospital. The clanging. The announcements. The hurried footsteps. The cars in the road outside. We notice these things but each time we go back to our breath, allowing that to be our centre and anchor. After some time, we open our eyes. Now it feels like we have truly arrived. It feels like we are truly present and can now truly see each other. We begin the tutorial by going around the circle and checking in. How has their week been in the labour ward? One by one, we go around the circle and what I hear is distressing story after distressing story. They are exhausted. They feel overwhelmed. They do not like how they are being treated and they cannot bear how the women in labour are being treated. They cannot wait for this part of their training to be over. Some had really looked forward to being in the labour ward and being part of birth and babies, bringing new life into the world. But right now, it feels like a war zone and something they need to get through and survive. I tell them briefly about the blog post I was working on when they came in and the title, I never want to go near that hospital again! I tell them about the three different women who shared these sentiments in three different settings and all in the same week. I say it is a pity because, in an ideal world, these women would live in a society where they could trust and feel supported by the health care system. What has happened when seeking help from places meant to heal and support comes as a last resort? Or is stressful and traumatic? Or something to be avoided at all costs? We discuss this further for some time when one student pipes up, “You can add one more person to your blog post who never wants to go near a hospital again, a fourth-year medical...
Read MoreThis is Marthe and she had a Home Birth…
When Marthe was eighteen years old and newly married, she went into labour one Cape Town spring morning. She was living down the road from her Aunty Maggie and Aunty Martha’s house and the two busy body aunties came to see if the pains the expectant mother was complaining about were indeed the pains of labour, they were there to keep the nervous young husband at bay, and to send a young boy to summon the midwife. The local midwife soon arrived on her bicycle and stayed with young Marthe for three days before deciding to send the young woman off to Groote Schuur hospital. The labour was taking too long and the baby was not coming. The midwife was concerned. After three days of labour and after being transferred to the hospital, Marthe gave birth to a skinny little baby girl. The doctors were baffled as to why the tiny girl had taken so long to come. Eighteen months later, Marthe was in labour again. Again she was at home, and again the local midwife joined her. This time the labour seemed to be progressing smoothly and soon Marthe began bearing down. By some strange twist of fate, the house across the road caught alight. While Marthe easily heaved out a large ten-pound baby girl, a woman died as the house opposite burnt to the ground. (Birth and death walked side by side down that road that day…) Marthe was my grandmother and the large baby girl was my mother. Marthe was pregnant again three years later, and she gave birth easily, at home, attended by a midwife, to another girl. Smaller this time. Life went on and many things changed, especially my grandparents’ social status and when my grandmother fell pregnant in her thirties it was only natural, that this laatlammetjie(1) birth would take place in a hospital, under the care of the best doctors that money could buy. It was years later, when my grandmother was hard of hearing, and cataracts had begun to form in her eyes, that I took her along to a birth film festival I had organised in Cape Town at the Labia theatre. On the drive home, she divulged her birthing stories to me, and she admitted that giving birth at home, had been for her first prize and that paying all that money to have her baby “delivered” in a hospital had been a disappointment. After watching these beautiful birthing films that night, she had only one regret. She would have liked to have had a water birth! * (1) Afrikaans: a child born many years after his or her siblings * My grandmother died in France two years ago, whilst on holiday with my aunts. She had been quite ill and been a given a short time to live so she took herself and her daughters off on one last holiday and shopping spree before she passed away in Nice. She was cremated and has been at rest in a crematorium in Nice. This week my aunts bring her back to Cape Town where she will be buried, alongside my grandfather (who passed away over twenty years ago). Rest in Peace Jiajia, and welcome...
Read MoreBirth and Death
Birth and Death. Two words we do not like to see together. To put them together makes us feel uncomfortable. Birth is about life. The beginning and emergence of a new existence. It is about newness. The beginning. What do we associate with birth? Love. Light. Joy. Life. A new beginning. Who wants to think about death at a time of birth? Death is about illness and sadness and loss. It does not evoke beauty and joy. It is something we try to avoid. Death is so final. It is something we do not wish to associate with birth. But in my experience, birth and death seem infinitely intertwined. The feelings the two evoke are so similar. One brings intense sadness and a sense of loss, and the other brings intense joy, but both have the same underlying feeling of being wide open and vulnerable and confused. Both need nurturing and safety. Both bring on a sense of being in an altered state, a state of being in touch with something greater and more infinite than ourselves. Both bring things into perspective, make clear what is important, valuable, precious to us. Both make life incredibly tangible and real. This week it will be eight years since my mother, my sister, and my stepfather were all killed in a car accident. When I lost so many members of my family, the feelings that came up, were so very similar to the times when I had given birth. The intense pain, the vulnerability and the incredible lightness and insight into the life process. And the feeling of being on the threshold of something… My friend Caitlyn visited me some time after the accident, and while I lay curled up on my sofa feeling sad, she folded laundry and brought me soup. Some time later, she told me that she had been at a loss as to what to do in that situation. She drew on her experience of attending births and thought that she would do what she would do for someone who had just given birth. I remember how grounding and comforting the familiarity of that simple gesture was. It did not take away the rawness of the pain I was experiencing, but it did provide a safe space for me to experience it in. These days, I spend a lot of time attending births. I wipe sweaty brows with a cool cloth, I breathe with women, I hold them, I move with them. I am there. I am witness to this incredibly vulnerable state, this time that can reach a point where it feels like she is looking death in the face. I am there to create a feeling of safety, to remind them that they are going through this process to bring forth...
Read MoreWaiting…
Waiting… Waiting for that baby to come…when will it come? The clock ticks. Tick tock. In this article on estimated due dates in pregnancy and induction of labour, Dr Michel Odent, likens the ‘ripening’ of the baby in the womb to the ripening of a fruit on a tree. Not all fruit ripens at the same time, and we do not expect to pick it all at the same time. We pick the ones that are ready first, and then the next and then the next. So why this hang up with the due date? Why the rush to induce and get things going so soon after this date, whether by chemical OR natural means? What is a due date anyway? The estimated due date is based on Naegele’s Rule, a system worked out by a German obstetrician called Franz Karl Naegele who lived from 1778 to 1851. He worked out that a pregnancy lasted more or less 280 days (about 40 weeks) from the start of the last menstrual period. But, as I am sure he realised, everyone is different, everyone menstruates differently, at different times, has different cycles, either short, long, irregular, heavy, mild. Every woman’s body is different. And so is her baby. And so is her pregnancy. The key words here are ‘estimated due date’ and ‘more or less.’ Only 4% of babies are born on their estimated due date, with a first-time mother birthing her babies a week or so late, and yet we set so many first-time mothers into a panic when they have not gone into labour by their due date. My first baby decided to arrive at 38 weeks gestation, I was not expecting him so soon, his clothes were not ready, and neither was I. My second baby hung in there until 9 days after her due date, and of course, from my previous experience, I assumed I would have another ‘early’ baby. By the time my daughter decided to trigger her labour, I was going pretty mad. My third labour started 15 days after my ‘due date,’ by then I had given in and decided I would certainly be pregnant forever. My fourth emerged three days after she was ‘supposed’ to. It is not an exact science. No matter how advanced the technology nowadays…we can only wait and see…as long as mother and baby are fine, all we can do is wait and watch the mother’s belly ripen. The baby, when he or she is ready to be born, will send a message that tells the mother’s body that it is ready. The mother’s body can then begin labour by slowly releasing oxytocin, the hormone of love. The mother and baby work together to bring the baby into the...
Read MoreEvery Mother is a Goddess
In her book Misconceptions: Truth, Lies, and the Unexpected on the Journey to Motherhood, feminist writer and mother, Naomi Wolf speaks about her experience of becoming a mother for the first time. One of the things she wrote that stood out for me was how this highly regarded intellectual, academic, writer, author, woman, suddenly found herself to be an unseen person. She was walking down the street with her infant, and one of her students walked right past her, did not recognise her, in fact, the student did not even see her. I know that before I gave birth, I did not value mothers or motherhood in the way I did after I gave birth for the first time. I loved my mother and I respected her, but I do not think that I fully valued or saw who she was and what she had done to bring me into this world. During my first labour, I remember my mother’s eyes, soft, dark, familiar, slightly concerned, loving, strong, holding me, carrying me through this experience. And I remember at one point asking her, “How the hell did you do this four times?” She smiled, then laughed softly, shook her head and said, “I don’t know…” And continued to hold me with her gentle touch and soft eyes. After I gave birth for the first time I was high, the love hormone oxytocin coursing through my entire being. The world melted away and the importance of anything beyond the little bubble of warm cosy devotion I inhabited with my newborn son, evaporated. Everything dissolved, except for my deep connection, regard, admiration, and respect for all mothers in the world. I saw mothers and motherhood in a new light and I wanted to bow at the feet of all motherhood. I could feel their sweat, their pain, their love. And any mother who had given birth more than once, was most certainly a goddess. Her work, her love, was beyond my comprehension and understanding. I was in awe. Standing on the other end of having given birth four times myself (and that lovely strong bolus of oxytocin long having left my system) and now having attended numerous births, I feel very strongly that our work as those present at births is to mother the new mother. When a woman births, not only is a baby being born, but so is a mother. How we treat her will affect how she feels about herself as a mother and as a parent. Be gentle. Be kind. Listen. She knows best. She is the mother of this child after all. Or as the mother of midwifery, Ina May Gaskin so eloquently put it: ”If a woman doesn’t look like a goddess during labor, then someone isn’t treating her right.” Happy Mother’s Day…to all the...
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