And you know, I'm always interested and a bit weirded out at how invested many women seem to get in others' choices for childbirth. Like, you see people being all evangelical about natural childbirth and trying to convince others to go without pain relief. On the other side you hear statements comparing non-pain relief users to crazy people. But ultimately, given a non-emergency labor and delivery, it doesn't really matter what you do. You get a kid at the end of it.

Now I'm obviously some sort of masochist, because I opted for no pain relief (initially, but it transpired all the way through) for exactly one reason: curiosity. I just wanted to see how much it hurt. Heh. I was lucky in that the whole thing took just 4 hours and didn't really hurt that much. Individual variability be praised :)

I've been reading The Skeptical OB lately. She's fiesty, but I like that in a blogger.

I'm always interested and a bit weirded out at how invested many women seem to get in others' choices for childbirth.

Totally! Not only childbirth, but childrearing, too. I have a FB friend who is a hardcore breastfeeding evangelist. It's working well for her, but she's really critical of women who don't do it and who use 'excuses.' There's a detestable strain in our culture's social interactions among some women that is really focused on criticizing other women, and it does flow over into parenthood.

A Facebook friend was watching another friend's young son during the birth of her 2nd child. She posted a Facebook status, "Katie's having the baby! Everyone pray she has a natural birth!" And all I could think was, is that really the most important thing? How about, pray she has a healthy baby?

We had every "normal" intervention there is during our kid's birth. We had wanted a home birth and ended up in a hospital, with a c-section, after drugs to induce labor failed, and it took 4 fetal scalp monitors to finally get one that worked, etc. etc.

I realized that it is far more important what happens once the kid gets home.

good grief, I realise people can be judgemental assholes, but some of the comments on that blog TPS posted really go beyond the pale.

it reminds me of some kind of weird variant of the macho boy's-club military hazing rituals or something; "hey I lived thru it so you should too!"

JFC. we women really can be our own worst enemies sometimes.

It's not the done thing here in Japan to have epidurals unless it's a c-section. You can go to a hospital that does offer them - mostly those are the Catholic ones.

I don't think it's barbaric or misogynistic to not give epidurals. But I also think that the person who needs to decide is the woman giving birth. For as long as she is able. I don't believe anyone should be criticized for the choices they make - there's no shame in seeking out pain relief.

There is too much placed on having a wonderful joyous experience and that is wrong. If you end up with Mum ok and baby ok - then everyone did their job.

I had no pain relief during my induced labour. I got through it with breathing. I don't think it was heroism - but like climbing Mt Fuji it was a physical experiment to see whether I could do it. And now I know I can. Never have I experienced pain on that level before. But in the unlikely event I need to go through it again - then I would choose not to have an epidural because I know I can get through it without it - and why complicate things?

Knowing how astoundingly painful it can be however I would never belittle someone for choosing not to experience it.

I'm always interested and a bit weirded out at how invested many women seem to get in others' choices for childbirth.

I really agree with this. I feel that sometimes women are each other's worst enemies. Like all the anomosity we should have grown out of when we finished middle school and stopped three way call attacking each other becomes about childbirth and child rearing. I try to take the position that we are all just winging it-we are all trying our best and we will all make mistakes, no matter how many books we read, experts we consult, or how sure we are that we're doing the right thing at the time. So cut each other some slack and hope everyone returns the favor. Very interesting links, gaspode and TPS, thanks for sharing.

I was arm-twisted into having pain meds I didn't want, and proceeded to pass out between contractions. It made my experience of labor chaotic and miserable. It likely didn't have any effect at all on the emergency surgical birth. Everybody thought I was some hippie goddess desperate to have natural delivery, so the surgery was later than it could have been. Mostly, I wanted as little medication as necessary, in hopes of the healthiest outcome for me and my baby. The boy had the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck 3 times, and wouldn't have made it out okay without surgery. Also had a ginormous head, and completely declined to make the standard exit. I had post-surgical complications (that sucked).

I wish the medical folks had chilled out a bit more about the meds. I'd have been awake enough for an earlier choice about surgery and might not have had such serious complications. But the boy and I are fine, and that was always the goal.

Also, don't name a baby while on morphine.

Aw man, what an awful story, theora.

See, when I talk about being invested... that's the health care people too. It's the dogmatism from both sides that is fucked up.

Speaking as a childless woman, I also wonder why all the judgmentalism seems to be about how people give birth . . . not whether they ever do it.

My own (doctor) mom was a huge believer in natural childbirth, which resulted in an incredibly long and painful labor with me. She also ignored the hemorrhages she experienced after she came home from the hospital until my (doctor) dad and (doctor) grandmother dragged her back to the hospital, thereby likely saving her life. I could never get her to explain to me in an understandable way what was so much better about childbirth without pain relief.

I have had two unmedicated labors/births, the second of which was at home (to a 10lb! 8oz! baby! who came out feet! first!) a mere 11 weeks ago, so it is pretty fresh in my mind. My experience in both instances was that the pain of labor was manageable. Intense, and requiring support and focus, but ultimately manageable. Other women have different experiences and different circumstances, obviously.

I would not presume to dictate what choices are available to laboring women for pain relief. I would hope, on the other hand, that all women feel that they have agency in making those decisions, and not feel pressured or railroaded by health care providers to choose one way or the other.

I tried to have a natural childbirth. My mother had 4 natural childbirths (the first one completely unprepared when the saddle block didn't take). So I thought I could do it.

I was wrong. WRONG. I had a longer than average labor (about 24 hours) and it was intense and close contractions from early on.

On the other hand, I breastfed for almost two years, with relatively few problems. And sometimes I have felt judgmental about women who don't/can't breastfeed.

I guess the point is that it is easy to get up on your high horse when your horse is actually a lot less high than somebody else's.

There's a detestable strain in our culture's social interactions among some women that is really focused on criticizing other women, and it does flow over into parenthood.

And of course, vanishingly few people would ever criticize a *father* for parenting decisions. But that's a whole other issue entirely :)

My question would be what% of labors are induced for pregnancies w/o complications rather than letting nature take its course?