24 JULY 2023 CHOICE

My oldest daughter will turn 46 in a week. She does not wish to be reminded of her birthday; but I keep reminding her that it was one of the happiest days of my life. I was fortunate that her planned home birth was a gentle and quietly joyous occasion. This has not been the case for many women, whose hospital birthing experience left them emotionally scarred. I was tripley blessed because all three of my daughters were born at home, attended by midwives. I knew, years before I ever became pregnant, that I would give birth at home. This is how it has been done for centuries.

Women today remain oppressed by the heavy hands of medical professionals, insurance companies, and government policies. Those in power believe they have the right to decide and to control what a woman does, or does not do, with her own body. They believe that they “own” the children that she brings forth. After having three wonderful home births, I began to train as a midwife myself; but the threats being made towards midwives for births gone wrong, caused me to abandon that pursuit. A few midwives, and even parents, have been sent to prison for “involuntary manslaughter” and for “practicing medicine without a license,” because a home birth had gone awry. The thing is, having a baby is not a medical condition. It is a natural process. The real issue is that the doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies do not make any money when a baby is born at home. When your babies are born at home and not subjected to “routine” tests, immunizations, circumcisions, and checkups, it is more difficult for the government to keep track of them.

What modern society does not and will not accept is that sometimes babies die; and sometimes they are born breech, and sometimes they may have less than perfect health. This is true whether they are born at home or in a hospital setting. Those who do not understand the temporal condition of life itself, seek to blame others when a birth does not go as planned. They bring forth lawsuits and go after the midwives, who have only the purest of intentions. Parents who choose home birth are well educated and healthy. Their decision is based on careful planning and good prenatal care – far better than what they would receive in a typical medical facility.

Certainly, there are women who bring children into the world without the slightest care about what they are doing. Some will continue to smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol, and even do drugs while they are pregnant. Many mothers-to-be are in poor health from a lifetime of eating junk food and possibly even becoming obese, already endangering the health of their child.

In the natural world, for many species, a very small percentage of offspring actually survive their first year. This is the means by which Nature’s balance has been maintained, preventing any one species from over-populating. Our own human history contains gravestones of babies and small children that had not survived. The parents of these youngsters grieved; but they understood that life goes on, and they often had subsequent births that were successful.

I watched a movie the other evening that kept me on the edge of my seat, wanting and needing to know how it would end. It was called, “Pieces of a Woman.” The story was about a woman giving birth at home, played by actress Vanessa Kirby. The acting was very well done. In this movie, the baby died shortly after the delivery. The woman’s family wanted to incriminate the midwife; but fortunately, the grieving mother testified that the midwife was not to blame – no one was to blame. I cannot help wondering if human consciousness will ever reach that place of not needing to blame and to judge others. I do believe that as more women become educated, we will demand to be given back our own power to choose. What we do with our bodies is our choice – ours alone.