Hygeia's Stories- UNNECESAREAN & HBACs

Bones that are not broken do not need to be set.  So why are we tolerating the epidemic rate of bellies being slashed when the overwhelming majority of these women are perfectly capable of a perfectly natural birth?

The bright lights and total strangers of my own hospital birth experience immediately shut down my labor.  Like any dog or cat would have done, the external disturbances caused my biological intelligence to shut down progress until a better environment could be established.  Since I was both physically and mentally in the clutches of hospital staff, I froze instead of fled.

Soon began the interventions in reaction to my body's determination to protect itself from the inhospitable environment.  A total stranger reached in and broke my baby's water sac.  Another total stranger stuck a needle in my arm and began the pitocin drip.  After twenty three hours of this nightmare another total stranger pushed her finger up me, then announced coldly that I had one hour to dilate four centimeters or there would be an automtic C-section...hospital policy.

That was twenty three years ago, when the C-section rate was just starting to invade the bodies of women and the babies in their womb.  I had never even heard of a C-section, I had no idea what that nurse meant, I only knew that I felt cornered, defeated, and afraid...very much afraid.

While my newborn brought me great joy, my stapled-together abdomen was in horrific pain.  This experience caused me to never want another child.  Five years later, the pregnancy test came back positive and I had the task of ending what needed a new beginning.  In order to end the illusion that my previous C-section had been necessary I asked a friend to study my medical chart.  In her experience as a labor-nurse she sadly admitted that the notes from my chart reflected the growing norm...unnecessary C-sections resulting from interventions that led to further shutting down of the female's biological birthing process.

With reality at the helm, I immediately became involved in the grass-roots VBAC movement (vaginal birth after C-section) and committed to staying away from all medical intrusion.

At every turn I was labeled selfish and irresponsible, including threatened with the criminal charge of medical neglect.  Despite all these challenges, Jasmine Kokee Halfmoon was born inside a mountain cabin on the beautiful Hawaiian island of Kauai.  With her birth came the restoration of my personal power.

Some two years later the pregnancy test registered positive again, and I combed through my last birth to see where improvement could be made.  Jasmine's birth had been smooth and painless in the first several hours of labor, but the woman who lived at the cabin insisted that something must be wrong since I was dancing happily instead of enduring agonizing pain.  Her influential remark became a psychic intervention that fanned self-doubt to the point of shifting my energy from trust to fear.  Fear causes tension that leads to pain, and birthing Jasmine ended up being a very painful experience.

My intuition insisted that the experience of birth was designed to be otherwise, so with this third pregnancy I committed to a perfectly painless and thoroughly pleasant birth.

I met each contraction with an orgasm derived from gently stimulating my clitoris.  By the time my son slithered out from my body I was in total ecstasy.  Perfectly painless and thoroughly pleasant...by daybreak, with newborn at my breast I finally had the confidence to begin writing my book PRIMAL MOTHERING IN A MODERN WORLD and also transformed my prenatal journal into the book I CAN DO THIS!

It took this perfectly primal birth to unleash my courage and my creativity so as to share my experience, strength, and hope with other women aspiring to practice true empowerment.

Since then, more and more primal mothers have joined the ranks of females who are taking their biological intelligence seriously.  As the primal mothering movement furthers itself with each woman taking her life, her body, and her baby into her own hands we are breaking the curse of "pain and complication in childbirth" and replacing it with the cure...women being their biologically intelligent selves clear, true, and bright while sharing that power with others seeking their own internal light.