Saturday 19 November 2011

NHS, it's not about the birth - a cautionary note.


“Which hospital do you want to go to?”

What a question to start such a journey, on reflection this would have been a good point to cut and run but I suppose hindsight is a wonderful thing.

We were given a choice of two. A choice, we mused, we didn’t even know we could choose where to give birth and to be offered a choice seemed great. “These are the tests we can run for various things, have a think about it and let me know if you want to go ahead with them.”

I was talked down to at this first meeting,” It will be okay when you go in to hospital – there’ll even be something there for daddy to do.” No attempt to engage by knowing the first thing about you, no questions to reveal I already have two children despite this being our first. No preamble, no time maybe for niceties in the cut and thrust world of baby delivering.

Fast forward a week and to a phone call, “I’m just here with your neighbour who’s pregnant – did you say you wanted the test or not?”
What a question to be asked over the phone, in front of a neighbour – is this patient care?

The first scan, great – a chance to see the baby. Not really. A chance to start the clock. Must stick to the schedule. The countdown starts to plus or minus 3 days from the Estimated Date of Delivery. No news yet as to how many women give birth within this prediction. Telling the future has been the sole preserve of mediums and weathermen before the scan. Now it is presented as medical fact that you will give birth within this time or we will induce you. The schedule must be right. No room for doubt, for family history or individuality here. Must stick to the schedule.

Then a letter. You need to come for a repeat scan. With the consultant. No explanation there then, time to worry a little. In we go. “Why are you here?” she asks.
 We don’t know and now we are worried. Why are we here?
“You’re fine and so is your baby.”  Relief and anger in equal measure. What was that about then?

“We want to have a home birth.”
“ Right, time to get out my list to check you can then. Yadiyadiya. You seem to fit the profile of acceptable home births. Yadiyadiya. I’ll need to check your house and you’ll need plastic sheeting… a lamp Yadiyadiya. Ah there’s butter, you use butter not marg – you can have a home birth”.

EDD looms large. ’Hospital is not a good place’ going around our heads. My daughters birth by butchery seared onto my brain. What place in birth does hack and deliver have after failed induction, epidural and drugs a plenty?

Consultant meeting. To discuss our choice for a home birth and question the validity of EDD estimations.  “Do you know how many still born babies I’ve delivered to women like you?” Sounds like coercion at best and emotional blackmail at worst to me. At 41 weeks is this the way to speak to an expectant mother? Giving an unknown fear a face based on anecdote. Bullying. Coercian.

Be gone our system of care, away from my life for good. No longer will I listen as you give me information I know to be a lie. How powerful you think you are. What ivory tower do you look down from surrounded by contrary evidence a plenty. Your own actions at odds with everything you purport to stand for?

One born every minute.
What new travesty is this that birth has been reduced to? Mother and baby are both alive. Is this really the best we can do? The gold standard of care from a natural process that’s evolved to further the species is that they’re both alive. What place does a hospital have in birth anyway?
 Doctors have medical knowledge. They apply this knowledge.
Midwives have knowledge of birth, the hospital experience too often shields them from the beautiful simplicity of a natural birth.
 Women have knowledge of how to birth. They are blinded from this knowledge.

“They have drugs to take away any of the pain.”
“Take everything you are offered, I did.”
“ Have a c section, it’s so much easier.”
“I was coaching breathe, push push push, now breathe, push push push. It really helped.”

I’m horrified by every conversation that contains these sentiments and worse.

You’ve missed the point.
Babies are birthed not delivered.
The responsibility for this lies with you. Don’t lie back and think someone else will do this for you. Don’t lie back at all for that matter.
You grew this baby. Your body will grow a baby you can birth. Take heed, you’ve got nine months to learn to listen to your body as you once listened to your mothers heart beat as you grew. Nine months to learn that birth is a transformational experience. That pizzas are ‘deliverd’.

Your body will provide the drugs you need from within. Far stronger than any you could buy or take. Far more in tune with what you need. Your own bespoke cocktail to take you far away but still in touch. In control of your own destiny and choices while the new life emerges.

 “The pain,” they say, “the pain.” This is not to downplay the fact it will hurt. Of course it will. How can it be transformational without pain? Not unmanageable pain though, the pain of a new life. This is part of the ‘birthing a baby’ package you signed up for. To deny that part of the experience is to deny the chance you have to change your life forever.

 A town, a city, a country - filled with women transformed through birth would be a formidable place indeed to live. Women. Couples. Empowered to affect change secure in the knowledge that nothing is impossible.

 Don’t put more effort into researching your next car, job or holiday than you would into birth and what it means to you. Make your choices based on what you can find out, not on what you're given. How valid are the methods and drugs advised to you? Who were the sample women for the research? How similar are they to you? Come to terms with the choices you can make and be at peace with all the outcomes. When you’ve made that journey, come through the other side and life is forever a more satisfying experience you’ll thank yourself.

 Become a champion of your world. Raise your own expectations and base them in reality. A reality that can offer you your dreams, if you only knew.

Friday 28 October 2011

Last day

Last day of the holidays, last day of blogging for 100 words a day for 7 days. Last chance to over run, inform, amuse, capture your interest with a merry dance, bore, annoy or pass you by.

An audience, the difference between talking to yourself and saying something? The pressure building until the post is published, what will it be today? What will make sense in only 100 words, give or take, so little for so much? What will my voice sound like when it's written down?

Oh audience - whose visits to my page enthrall me, to the UK, USA, Australia, Germany and France no less. I've tracked your clicks and visits, held in thrall as my graph rises and falls with each new visitor. Apple, Facebook, Android, Internet Explorer, Chrome and more - all charted in a pie for me to gaze at and wonder.

I'll sign off with a request - if you visit one last time please leave a comment - 10 words each should do the trick and then I'll have 100 words more, at least, to play with. 10 words to leave your mark upon this page. 10 words to share with this exclusive audience of ours. 10 words to say goodbye.

Thursday 27 October 2011

Philosophy

I was asked the other day what it was like to live in my world! I've been thinking.

 As a child I read and re-read The Hitchhikers Guide 'trilogy' and followed these with Dirk Gently. Indeed it is hard for me to imagine my view of the world without a quote or aside from Douglas Adams creeping in as a point of reference. Those aware of Douglas Adams may also be aware of the "Total Perspective Vortex" into which Zaphod Beeblebrox was put in order to show him how insignificant he was in the Grand Scheme of Things. While he waits the tortuous screams of previous 'visitors' are played out, reliving the moment when they are confronted with the total enormity of the universe and the opposite miniscularity of their importance within it.

It doesn't work for Zaphod, of course, because the universe he's in has been created for his existence, so all it does is stroke his already inflated sense of self worth.

In my world I am aware of how insignificantly small my part is in the Grand Scheme of Things, a kind of permanent Total Perspective Vortex overview to life - but at the same time I am also aware that I am the most important person in my own universe. Without me in it my actions are not actioned, my thoughts are not thought and my life is unlived. A paradox of importance and insignificance, perfect.

But not as snappy as - No Worries :)

Wednesday 26 October 2011

Fear

Daddy scared, Daddy scared, Daddy pick me up,
The creature slowly turned around and fixed us with a look,
It's eyes burned brightly in the gloom, it's claws were long and sharp,
It's movements fast and blurred and silent in the quickening dark,
The chase is over, before the kill, a howl to freeze the blood,
A boy, a man and creatures all, were rooted where they stood,

Daddy scared, Daddy scared, Daddy pick me up,
No time to move or get away, I cannot bear to look,
Slowly creeping forwards now and sliding down the hill,
Moving ever closer scaring animals at will,
Now close enough to touch and see it's breathing in the air,
The boy pulls off his mask and smiles, a boy without a care,
A laugh, a smile, a friendly howl, the boy no more than ten,
Daddy scared, Daddy scared, Again! Again! Again!

Tuesday 25 October 2011

On Gruffalos and Birth

I was going to write about our birth experience but have been beaten to it by Julia Donaldson. The Gruffalo's Child is a near perfect metaphor for how we experienced birth, let me explain...

As the child gruffalo (us) in the story hears the tale of the Big Bad Mouse (birth) she decides to go and investigate. At every encounter she thinks she has found what she needs but each new animal (professional) is not what they first appear and gives further weight to the scariness of the mouse (birth). She finally finds the mouse (birth) and can see it is not so scary after all, until the mouse uses the moonlight (womens reported experiences, one born every minute etc) against the Gruffalo (us). At this moment the Gruffalo's child runs back to the safety of the cave. The mouse (birth) waits outside, safely misrepresented until the meme is broken.

Just a thought :)

Monday 24 October 2011

Rest

Rest.
Eyelids heavy, retune your senses, what is this time?
Rest.
Legs winding up, coiled ready to spring at will?
Rest.
Mind marching, why aren't we moving?
Rest
A new focus or old battles?
Rest.
A break from work?
Rest.
Time to dream?

Rest.

One of many.
Rest.
Know it well, or not at all.
Rest.
Find peace and readjust accordingly.
Rest.
Time to make yourself again in a new image.
Rest.
Soar above the highest peaks and dare to dream aloud.
Rest
Eyelids heavy, senses retuned, reanimated, refreshed , until the next time.
Rest.

Sunday 23 October 2011

I didn't...

I didn't get a lie in today...
I didn't mind making pancakes with Louis.

I didn't want France to win when the game kicked off...
I didn't want them to lose by the end.

I didn't think I had that many jobs to do...
I didn't do even half of them.

I didn't predict how the football would finish...
I didn't realise how much I would enjoy it.

I didn't want the film to ruin the book...
I didn't want the film to end.

I didn't know if I could cook from frozen...
I didn't ride Alpe D'Huez because I was full.

Saturday 22 October 2011

Running and happiness

Weekly running. Morning views.
The best time of the day. Quiet. Still. Peaceful.
Did I always know and forget about this slice of time?
Does everybody know? Because they should.
It has to be cherished and visited often to make sense.
The odd encounter not as rewarding as the frequent visit.
Little and often, so true of many things.
I don't smile because I'm happy, I smile and happiness follows.
I don't run because I feel full of life, I run and life follows.
From sedentary pedestrian to ironman and adventurer.
Mountains. Hills. Lakes. Pavements.
Weekly running. Morning views.