What Matters most?

Sometimes my friends ask me whether it’s difficult to stay quiet when my clients make choices that I wouldn’t choose for myself. Or when I see a labour heading down the textbook ‘cascade of medical intervention’ route. Or when I’m encouraging my clients to ask more questions of their care provider, to see whether there are any alternatives to the proposal on the table, and they don’t really have any interest in doing so.

The honest answer is yes, it sometimes can be difficult, especially in the volunteer work I do where I have only just met the birthing couple at the point of labour. In these situations there has been no prior meetings or chance for the relationship trust to cultivate, and I sometimes feel the frustration of the passive role required of me.

And naturally, in my head in the moment, my opinion is the most valid and the most informed and obviously, without question, the most knowledgable. Which of course is utter nonsense.  Actually it’s nonsense in every area of life when our own personal opinions are unjustifiably the most important to us. 

| “The rule is perfect: in all matters of opinion our adversaries are insane.” - Mark Twain 

First off, the medical staff and care providers are brilliant, intelligent, caring people. They want the best for my client, and have extensive training and experience that inform their decisions. 

And secondly, every birth is uniquely different, and what may not work for one birther will work fantastically well for another. 

So yes, it can be difficult to bite my tongue when I believe there is a better option for my client. But what really matters isn’t how the course of labour progresses, but rather, how my client feels about the progress of her labour. 

The truth is, my own personal opinions about optimal birth choices are completely irrelevant and have no place in your birthing room. The only thing that matters is that you feel like you are heard, respected, given the information you require, and have authority and control over what is happening to you at every step of your birthing journey. However that looks, whatever unexpected turns in the road you face, you feel the respect and support you deserve. That is what will allow you to feel the sense of ownership over your birth that you need, and that is what will protect your mental health in the days and weeks after labour. 

It’s not about whether or not you took any pain medication. It doesn’t matter if you birthed your baby via csection or vaginally. There’s no additional superwoman gold prize for how your birth experience went, or what you were able to endure, or how long your labour took. None of that matters in the end. 

The bottom line is, there is no gold prize Mama. The prize is pink, squishy, and worth far more than its weight in gold. And as long as you look back on your birth experience and own it, knowing that at every turn you made informed decisions that were  uniquely right for your body and your baby, then you will hold your beautiful prize with such pride in yourself. And everybody, including you, will know that you completely crushed your labour and birth, and that you are a badass birthing goddess!