The Blessings of a Home Birth

In the wake of all this talk about birth and womenʼs rights to choose if, how, when, where and with whom to give birth, I recently discovered that I have been blessed beyond belief – more than any woman I know.

Donʼt worry, I am not going to go on and on about all the things I am blessed with. I simply have to say that I have four children and absolutely no birth trauma.

No c-section stories.
No episiotomies.
No monitors strapped to me in labor so I couldn’t move.
No food restrictions during labor.
No patronizing comments or looks by medical staff.
No encouragement to give up on the natural thing and just go ahead and have the epidural.
No unwanted prophylactic treatments of my newborn without my consent.
No separation of my baby from me ever at any time.
No loud or sudden noises causing a rush of adrenalin into my bloodstream during labor impeding the effectiveness of the other birth hormones and increasing my chance of needing medical interventions.
No beeping machines.
No feelings of not being safe or lack of trust in those who I depended on for the survival of myself and my baby.
No dehumanizing invasion of privacy.
No eyes rolling at me.
No pressure to commit fear-based decision making instead of information-based decision making.
No excessive ultrasound requirements.
No lack of attentive support.
No being left naked in a paper shirt in a cold room with my feet in stirrups waiting for some stranger to come touch my most vulnerable body parts.
No CYA (cover your ass) policy and protocol based confrontations with caretakers during before or after labor causing detrimental or debilitating stress to me and my family.
No lack of supportive and consistent council during postpartum breastfeeding difficulty.
No being subject to medical negligence during prenatal care, labor, postpartum or well visits with no legal recourse because I was forced to sign release forms in order to receive care.
No lack of baby care resources as a first-time mom.
No uninvited and not prescreened strangers in my sacred birth space.
No feelings of powerlessness (except in surrendering completely and blissfully to God during labor but I think thatʼs actually powerfulness; at least it was for me)
No postpartum depression due to lack of support and follow up care including herbal medicine support for balancing hormones by my highly trained, and experienced home-birth midwives.

Like I said, I have been blessed beyond belief.

photography by David Zimand