Monday
Oct112010
Monday Open Thread
Monday, October 11, 2010 at 7:48AM
By Jill—Unnecesarean
This week’s open thread is hosted by doula and blogger Kristen Oganowski from Columbus, Ohio, as a part of my personal sarcastic effort to redefine Columbus Day as a day of celebrating people from Columbus, Ohio.
Kristen is the visionary behind A Woman’s Guide to VBAC: Navigating the NIH Consensus Recommendations.
Reader Comments (33)
Happy National Coming Out Day everyone! Take a moment today to thank the LGBT people in your life for being out and proud.
Columbus may be the home of one of those awful doula-bans (and the infamous Kingsdale "birth plan"), but it also has a wonderful community of doulas, childbirth educators, ICAN leaders, home birth advocates, hospital-based midwives, and home birth midwives who are working to make this city better for childbearing women.
And I'll second the "Happy National Coming Out Day!"
Hey Kristen-- I'm also from Columbus. Unfortunately, I had my son in a hospital (which was not a pleasant experience) and have since become extremely interested in having a home birth for subsequent children. I'd love to find out more about what we have to offer around here in regards to home births and lay midwives.
Totally unrelated to anything Columbus: we know a couple whose baby has been in NICU for over a month with undeveloped lungs due to iatrogenic prematurity. They c-sectioned her (didn't even try to *induce* first, just cut her straight up) because of suspected macrosomia. And now the baby is a month old and she hasn't even gotten to hold him yet - won't insist on kangaroo care. I tried to talk to her about it beforehand and they acted like it was none of my business - which it isn't, of course. except that it is SOOOO sad to me that she didn't even seek a 2nd opinion or try to research her options beforehand. sigh.
Karen, that's really sad. How much did the baby end up weighing? How many weeks along was she? I'm curious.
NICU families have it rough.
Hi everyone- Popping in because I haven't been online on a Monday in awhile. I've been out of the loop of the whole birth world because I'm on a self-imposed break. Infertility is making me crazy.
Love your blog, Jill. I'm always so happy when I open my Greader and see that there is a new post from your blog. <3
@Karen - That is so sad, on so many accounts. It can be very hard to discern exactly what a family is thinking and going through when they have a baby in the NICU, especially for such a long period of time. FWIW, I too would be interested in hearing about the baby's weight and gestational age at birth.
@Lisa - We DO have some good home birth options here in Columbus! The CHOICE midwives (www.choicemidwives.org) are located in Worthington, and they are a fabulous group of experienced CPMs. They even support VBAC (and will be getting my business in a few months :-)). I've also heard great things about Kathy Mitchell (located in Newark). Good luck in your search!
Hey, guess what? Christopher Columbus was born at home ; )
OK, I just laughed aloud. Thanks, EmH.
Some random thoughts. I just finished my OB nursing rotation, which was an interesting experience (I'm a MW wanabe). Its a physician only hospital. I didn't see anything particularly horrifying, just your typical tied-down to the monitor, rushing poor moms along, immediate cord clamping/ baby seperation, etc. I didn't see any normal/natural/physiological/whatever we call them now births. I did see a couple of "necessareans" :) which was probably good perspective. I saw a C-section with a physician who actually talked with the patient during surgery and explained what was happening and treated her like person. And, in the lounge, was a graph per month of elective sections <39 weeks, and apparently they all require a report as to why they occured - yay!
Jenna, congrats on finishing your OB rotation. Doesn't sound like they're really set up for Whatever We Call Them Now births, which is too bad. I love hearing about the caring communication during the c-section birth. That's so important.
I just thought of something. Someone searched for "if I had a c-section, did I give birth" yesterday. I was tempted to write a post with that question as the title and just write, "Yes, you did" in the body but I thought they'd be long gone by then. Even if they weren't gone, that would have been extremely creepy. I just sighed.
Someone on my Twitter list was asking "what is gender neutral parenting?" and I was thinking, that's a tough one to fit into 140 characters. So I told her that nowadays it's mostly not thinking that wearing or liking pink makes your son gay :( (or that that would be a bad thing).
I don't think real gender neutral parenting exists, not even on desert islands, but certainly not once your kid gets to school. All we can do is counter the BS he occasionally tells us about that other kids say (Boys do X, girls do Z, whatever). Course he doesn't even really get why daddies don't get to grow babies in their bellies, but we'll get to that later...
Oh and happy coming out day!
I just thought of something. Someone searched for "if I had a c-section, did I give birth" yesterday. I was tempted to write a post with that question as the title and just write, "Yes, you did" in the body but I thought they'd be long gone by then. Even if they weren't gone, that would have been extremely creepy. I just sighed.
I've seen people get upset at those who use the term "Cesarean birth," because they don't consider it a birth since they did not participate, i.e., did not push the baby out themselves. And I've seen people get upset if you *don't* use the term "birth" when you say "Cesarean" or "C-section," because to them you're not acknowledging that they did give birth. Sometimes, you can't win for losing. :-(
I'm getting back into the birth world loop, slowly but surely. It has been a shitty, shitty, shitty few months. I am trying to work my way out of the grief and misc shit. I am all set for doula training at the end of the month and still hope to set up a website and blog as I move into working (hopefully) in the birth world. In addition to childbirth stuff, I'm reading _Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry into the Value of Work_ by Matthew Crawford. I was intrigued when it first came out and finally picked it up at an airport on Friday. Anyone else read it? Kristen, you may find it interesting as he is also a philosopher. I only just started but am mentally making links about the trades and manual crafts to birth work.
I'm grateful for this blog! I love the new definition of Columbus Day. I like Indigenous Peoples Day, too.
Vanessa-- sending you good, fertile thoughts.
Hey! It's 11:55 pm and I'm finally commenting on Monday Open Thread while it is still Monday.
Kristen rocks. That's all.
No longer Monday (does it count if I haven't gone to sleep yet?) BUT - I have a friend who will be giving birth by C-section in a week. Can someone give me links to suggestions of how to "own" the birth experience, to make it a birth instead of just a surgery? Although I'm not sure I'd have made the same decision in her position, I'd like to offer her some encouragement to make it as beautiful an experience as she can. I know my friend catches some flack for scheduling the C rather than having a trial of labor, but she deserves to have wonderful memories of this birth as much as any mom.
CHOICE also offers doulas and a wealth of childbirth related supports, in addition to CPMs (including a lending library so you can borrow a bunch of books about childbirth rather than buying them). They have a website with all their info. On top of that they offer sliding scales and BARTERING for clients who can't afford their fees. I didn't have a CPM but I used one of their doulas - I was terrified to have a baby in a Columbus hospital (I heard about the Mt Carmel midwives too late) so I drove to Family Beginnings at Miami Valley in Dayton (which is awesome; Dr. Guy rocks). CPMs in Ohio are true heroes, because it's illegal there and they have waves of arrests (there were some CPMs arrested in Cincinnati the year I birthed in OH). I wouldn't be surprised if the powerful natural birthing movement and the quality doulas supplied by CHOICE was behind that doula ban.
Larissa, let me see what I can find that's online. If you can find a copy of Birthing from Within, it has a chapter on making a cesarean special.
Larissa, here's something on the ICAN site about planning a family centered cesarean... http://ican-online.org/pregnancy/family-centered-cesarean