A {not-so} Tiny Birth

"She gave birth to him at home," I told a friend about my sister and newborn nephew I had just come home from visiting. Her face screwed into a strange, disgusted expression and a drawn out, impulsive, "reeeaally?" snuck out of her mouth. I smiled, almost expecting the reaction, and gently nodded. You could see the wheels turning in her head. "Could I have done that? Would I have done that?" The thoughts were almost flying out of her mind. She shook her head and spiraled into her own birth stories quickly spouting out why she would not have been able to do that. Her first baby had been taken by caesarean because she was "too big." So, the next one she simply scheduled that way. "How big was your first?" I asked. "7 lbs. 8 oz," she replied...And in the lull, the curious question came next, "How big was your nephew?" I smiled, "9 lbs. 12 oz." Not the teeniest tiny birth. Part of me wanted to smile and say, "Tell me again why your first had to be caesarean?"

I resisted because I know the birth world. There are those who understand and respect it, and there are those who fear it and shut their eyes until it is over. I have witnessed nurses popping in and out of hospital rooms of mothers working to birth babies, and quietly, yet consistently, reminding them that the epidural is "ready when you are!" I have seen mothers enter transition, and opt for anesthesia just minutes from the moment baby could be in their arms! No one tells them. If they could have just held on another few moments. The message is, "You cannot do it. You cannot do it." 

I have also seen women who know birth. They know the work of it, and they understand the flow and the stages and they tune out the world, sometimes they even tune out their own minds, and their body carefully, meticulously brings the baby down and out. These women are surrounded by knowing professionals. It is always work--that's why it's called labor. But, as with everything, there is a rhythm to birthing a tiny baby. Contractions wash in and out. Transition brings harder, more difficult maneuvers, strong sensations, and pushes a woman to her limit. If she can just make it through, she has her baby in her arms! The pain is over. You are a mother to a beautiful, newborn tiny. 

There are two different sides to birth. It can be beautiful, it can be terrifying; it can be peaceful, it can be traumatic; it can be aware, it can be shocking. At some point in history, it turned from natural to medical. While there are instances where medical is good, the majority of births are natural. Women deserve the right to a least restrictive birthing environment. She should be able to walk, to sway, to submerge in water, to eat, to chat. Instead, many healthy mothers are strapped to beds, pumped full of IVs and drugs, put into overdrive so that she cannot handle it. While some precautions are good, there are many that are unnecessary and we cross the bridge from preventative to disruptive. 

It is my mission as a birth worker to make women aware; to take the fear out of birthing, and to return the mother's control to her birth.

Our 9 lb. 12 oz. (after he peed and pooped!) nephew getting his newborn exam at home from the lovely midwife, Rebecca, from Wholistic Midwifery Services, Inc.