DISQUS

I love Kelly! I started following her blog about a year ago after I'd had my daughter and it really is inspirational. I'm there practically every day. The interviews are my favorite part...thanks for featuring her!

I'll speak only from my own experience and the discussions I've had with close friends about their experiences. I had a C-section after two hours of pushing without progress. I had envisioned a peaceful, non-medicated birth where I could move freely -squat, kneel, stretch- and respond to my body's needs. I labored at home until I was 4 centimeters. It was not painless but certainly not agonizing. I was in my home; I felt safe, secure, focused. When we finally made it to the hospital everything started to move at a different pace. People were every where, tons of questions were being asked and I couldn't focus on the pain. I asked for the epidural and was lying down shortly after. I have no regrets about how it all took place because in the end we were both healthy and happy. I prepared through my entire pregnancy - reading, educating myself - and then was startled by how little the people I was in such close contact with during the labor and delivery phase applied any of the techniques to make my delivery a natural one. They all truly saw my experience as a medical condition. My vision for women's health, specifically for prenatal and post natal care, is that medical professionals need to stop treating healthy pregnancies like a condition to be treated. High risk pregnancies, of course, require a different level of care; I speak only to healthy pregnancies. When I walked into the hospital, I shouldn't have been asked if I wanted an epidural. I should have been offered natural options for pain relief. They shouldn't have lied me on the bed for monitoring because it's easiest for them. They should let my body do what it instinctively knows to do to relieve itself and progress. It worries me a great deal that hospital staff are not trained to help a woman labor naturally (maybe in other hospitals they are but in mine they were not). I mean, they do - they smile and offer support and hold your hand and check your IV - but why are they only trained in one fashion? I know that there are doulas available and midwives are fantastic as well but why should women have to seek these options out? Some people don't know they have those options or even where to begin looking. I'm rambling so here's what I would love to see happen in women's health regarding pregnancy -

1. Women need to be educated about what happens to their bodies during pregnancy, labor and delivery. They need to know that the discomfort and pain is the body's way of preparing and getting ready. What's happening is normal not something that needs to be treated.

2. Women need to be made aware of the options available to them for medical care (doctors, midwives, doulas, etc.).

3. Doctors need to take a not so one sided view of pregnancy and labor and be willing to offer their patients a well-rounded perspective.

4. Hospital staff needs to be trained to assist women through labor naturally. I realize that not all staff are alike and my hospital may have been a unique situation but I just have issue with being asked if I want an epi and not being offered anything else. I also realize I have my husband and others have birth partners but it would be nice to have hospital staff educated to take on the task.

I think everyone involved in the birthing process of a healty pregnancy needs to have the mindset of - My sole purpose is to support this woman in whatever she needs so that her body can do its job.