OBs, Midwives, Lies and I Have No Idea How to Title This Post
Friday, May 18, 2012 at 6:22AM
It’s been about four years since I embarked on this here journey to figure out what the hell the problem is with maternity care in the United States. I’ve been down a few roads and back, tried on a few frameworks and took them off in favor of cruising around the interwebs naked and now have my mind set on (read: am obsessed with) a different way of tackling the problem using research that’s been around for decades.
Here are a few things I have learned, and I have learned them in a pretty unique manner, mostly in the last year or two. If a person is going to flat-out lie to your face, either to keep you around as a patient or to inflate their competence as a care provider, they’re going to do that whether OB or midwife because some people lie. Some people don’t recognize that they themselves are lying because they have come to believe their own bullshit and live in La-La Land and there’s no sense in trying to convince them to leave. Every population has a subset of liars, and at 38, it’s probably high time I accepted that sometimes people just plain lie and it’s not caused by or indicative of their profession. They’d be blowing smoke up your butt if they were a contractor or a politician. Best thing to do if things consistently don’t add up? Find a new care provider with your best interest, not just theirs, in mind and be happy.
At this point, I can’t decide whether the battle between OBs and midwives is funny or pathetic. I am sure that the majority of each are pretty content to work together and can logically appreciate what the other brings to the table in terms of a holistic approach to maternity care even if their philosophical underpinnings differ in some areas. I can’t help but chuckle now when I read some midwives talking as if the OB-GYN caused the fall of the Roman Empire and I guffaw when I read ACOG materials that refer to “collaboration with nurses and OTHER HEALTH CARE PROFESSIONALS.” Ah, yes. The “M” word is so totally gross.
I have decided that if I ever have another kid, I am going to go with a veterinarian as a care provider. Since I’m not a fancy purebred type, I don’t have to worry about having a c-section planned for my litter as is the trend for many breeds. I like that they can perform a cesarean, have extensive medical training and know how to just leave a bitch alone.
Peace.
Reader Comments (16)
Am I allowed to LOL if I am a CNM sitting in a high risk conference with OB's while reading this? Cause I did:)
Nice! Perfect venue. Thanks for reading. :)
Amen sistah.
Bahahahaha..."know how to just leave a bitch alone." I'm on a teleconference for work and forgot to mute before I snorted. Wish we were neighbors 'cause I'd totally make you have coffee with me once a week to make me laugh.
I have no doubt in my mind that this is a big part of why some folks go the UC route. With all of the lies, denial, inter-professional warfare, and refusal to implement evidence-based care, plus the average family's tiny income as a limitation - there are places where a mom has no better care option than self-reliance.
Angela, yes! But only if you will teach me how to write better, you tiny wordsmith.
dsmythe, that makes sense. Sounds like the breakdown in trust in the patient-provider relationship is pretty pervasive in other areas of medicine, too.
Oh, please! You're a better writer than I am, hands down.
dsmythe, that's exactly why I've had two unassisted.
Love. It.
Wait, are they seriously giving dogs c-sections these days? I mean, I see them in the doggie bjorns and strollers and with their booties and Burberry (sp?) coats and all, but et tu Brute on this?
Please keep sharing what you've learned! Love it.
Liars do turn up everywhere. My former boss a pathological liar-- the kind who would lie about what she had for breakfast. It was kind of fascinating when it wasn't completely effing up my work life. So yes, I hope your advice to run like hell once you figure out your OB or MW is a liar is well heeded.
Wave to us from The Hague! xox
i had what i like to call MEDwives for my birth and was lied to quite a bit. i trusted them as midwives to be more hands off, less interventions, etc. but yet they were just as invasive and full of shit as an ob (sorry ob's). i made the wrong choice thinking that because a midwife had that title they would provide honest and nurturing care. instead i got 3 different midwives during my labor who all followed hospital policy first and patient care second. because if they gave a damn about what i wanted and needed at all i wouldn't have had to have the c-section that was so absolutely unnecessary. looking back on my entire pregnancy and the birth i realize i made the wrong choice trusting the practice and should have done a home birth with the kind of midwife who would have (hopefully) been more honest and lived up to the name midwife the way i thought one would be.
@MomTFH, for some breeds of dogs - like bulldogs for example - caesarians are needed because they've actually been bred so that their heads are too big and their pelvises too narrow. Pedigree dog breeding is in many cases a shining example of human stupidity and cruelty.
I love the veterinarian as care provider.
(Although... lately I've found that a lot of them have joined various corporations that try to sell you all sorts of (I suspect unnecessary) procedures for your beloved pet for many thousands of dollars instead of just doing a sensible simple procedure in the case of (for example) diarrhea... I've had one vet try to push the diagnosis of pancreatitis on me... I could tell she felt kind of bad about having to do say to me the things she said but she suggested - and my dog only needed some hydration. A simple subcutaneous injection that does NOT cost thousands of dollars. But the guilt-tripping was incredible. If I didn't know what pancreatitits ACTUALLY looked like? I would have believed her.)
But most importantly, I think in any given group of people there is a percentage that lies. And then there's a percentage that is unable to tell the difference between the way they think reality OUGHT to be and the way reality is: people who never question themselves. And it's a pain in the ass that the rest of us, who ARE able to tell the difference but have better things to do with our time than argue, have to spend our time arguing anyway.
(This, for me, is personal in a whole other way. I am from Hungary originally and that entire country's political system has been hijacked by people who don't want to know lies from reality. It is really, really, not funny. And by the way, one of the surest signs that things are going very badly in Hungary is that the one OB who has ever truly supported home birth in Hungary is now in jail, and for a crime she did not commit. Just google Agnes Gereb to see what I mean.)
Your last paragraph made me smile!
@Rebekka, thanks for the clarification, but that was @Another Rachel. The names are under the comments.