birth circle

On Thursday night was the monthly meeting of a birth circle. I group of women who get together to discuss birth and options and just get in touch w/ other women who want to know stuff about birth options. In attendance are doulas, midwives, childbirth educators, hypnobirth educators, women like me who want to have a homebirth, and women who want to know more to have a better experience w/ 2nd or 3rd baby. It is such an empowering group and makes you feel SO in touch with the primal feeling of pregnancy and birth.

The discussion was about VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean.) I was lucky enough to not have a cesarean w/ my first pregnancy, however with any hospital birth there is a possibility that you may have one. Doctors push them, it is more convenient for them to plan a c-section or require a repeat c-section. Its crazy. Women were created to pass a child into the world, and there are times when it is important to get the child out immediately. BUT it is rare. We shouldn't be forced to be cut open, we shouldn't be forced to lose the moment of birth.

A few of the women shared experiences that just made me cry. It hurt me so much to see their pain from a previous cesarean. The feeling that they "don't work right" was common, as was the feeling that their dream birth was robbed from them. It reinforces that feeling I have that medical doctors do NOT always do what is right, sometimes they can even make it worse. I only hope that my next experience is better, that I can have th dream birth that I want.

Home Birth- it is my new dream. The dream to labor in my house, to be close to my husband and daughter. To lay in my own bed, to shower in my own shower. When it comes time for my child to pass through my loins into the world, I want to do it in my bedroom, in the comfort of my home so that the first sight my darling infant sees is his/her home. So that I will have that memory with me, of the joy of the birth at my home. So the doctor will not take my baby away form me and I can put him to my breast for his first meal immediately without him having any drugs in his system because I have none in mine. It is a beautiful dream!