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Hi Yo,

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I’m curious as to your thoughts on those who can’t have a homebirth.  I’ve had one c-section and one barely pulled-off vac with huge support and pushing in every position.  I have statistically small android hips that create posterior stuck babies.  I did everything I could between yoga, food and chiro to help myself the second time but five hours of pushing later, nothing happened and it came down to a section again or forceps and episiotomy.  I don’t feel I was forced and am happy my son was born vaginally.  Your home birth video was fantastic and inspiring but sadly not an option for me, it seems.

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Hello!

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I have a long history of upsetting people by not telling them what they want to hear, but I know you’re familiar with my blog and my writing and I get the sense that you’re open to my opinion.  I certainly don’t want to undermine your experiences at all, and of course, I’m not a doctor or a registered midwife or a soothsayer, so this really is just my opinion based on my own experiences and learning (and not a medical diagnosis at all!).  I have a feeling that you will take what I have to say here in the spirit of love and hopefulness and openness with which it is intended.

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That said…I don’t believe it!  I mean, I don’t believe that your first c-section and your forceps-assisted VBAC are indicative of your body not being capable of birthing spontaneously.  And I definitely don’t believe that a diagnosis of “small hips” has any significance at all.  Women are still being told this nonsense all the time, but I have personally witnessed many tiny women birth at home, some having VBACs at home, after being told by their doctors that they would never birth vaginally on account of their “android hips”.

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I have also personally witnessed mothers pushing for six, and even seven hours, and then birthing perfect healthy babies!  Especially when I read that your baby was born vaginally (with forceps and episiotomy), there is no doubt in my mind that your body is capable of birthing without those interventions.  Because,  your baby made it through!  It happened! And if it happened with forceps, it can happen without.

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After almost every one of the births I witness, I come away just so relieved that this particular woman wasn’t in the hospital—because there is almost no instance when I don’t see something that, in the context of the medical institution, wouldn’t be interpreted, and acted on, as a pathology to be rectified with whatever technology they have at hand.  For example, babies who sit for five hours at the perineum, who then emerge!  In hospital, these babies would be swiftly extracted with…forceps and an episiotomy.  Yet, in my experience, it is actually very common for babies to sometimes take a good long time coming through the birth canal.  These babies are often born with very moulded skulls, as is the incredible design of birth.  And I really want to be clear that the fact that these births occur as beautifully as they do, has absolutely nothing to do with me! I’m just a witness, and a post-birth housecleaner, and really, the important work that gets those babies out, is entirely the mother, and has much to do with the work that the mother does during her pregnancy, to shift her mental state, and her self-defeating attitudes, and to address her fears, and to unlearn all the negative received information that we take in from our culture when it comes to birth, and in finding people who understand birth, to surround her and to support her.

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I have seen some really exceptional births, and births that have rattled me, but what I end up taking away from this work more than anything, is just how well birth works, when approached with immense patience, and the knowledge that there is quite a spectrum of “normal”, and that sometimes babies just take a really good long time to emerge.

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During the birth process, our own bodies go through incredible, dramatic shifts, to allow our babies to pass through.  It is absolutely normal to feel as though, during five hours of pushing, that “nothing is happening”, but every single sensation is creating physical, physiological and chemical changes, and minute shifts, and small movements, and all of this is real, and important, and part of the totality of birth working the way it is supposed to.

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I say all this hoping so much that you won’t take this as a criticism in any way of you, but instead as a suggestion that might open the possibility in your mind that your prior caregivers were maybe…wrong! And I don’t mean bad or malicious or anything like that, but it’s just that so many doctors and midwives are inculcated in a particularly limited understanding of the variations of normal that birth can encompass.

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My own first birth was 30 hours of intense sensations, intense back pain, and seven hours of pushing.  I realized many months later, after talking to my birth attendant, that my baby had taken a posterior position.  I’m so glad that my attendant never said anything to me about my baby’s position prior to my birth process, and I’m so grateful that I went into that first birth experience without any negative expectations about my body’s capacity.  I do remember though, during that extremely long pushing phase, clearly thinking (and saying) “there is something wrong! My baby is stuck!” And my birth attendant simply said, This is normal.  You’re doing it.  Your baby is moving through your body.  And then…he came out!

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My birth attendant also taught me to attend births, and remains a very close friend, teacher and mentor.  She works in an area where there is a fully established presence of regulated midwives (she is an independent birth attendant, and not affiliated with regulated midwifery).  A very large portion of her clients are women who have been “risked out” of home births with regulated midwives, and many of them have a history like you do.  They go to her because they are looking for a different answer, and the support of someone who will stay open to the possibility and the likelihood even, that they can birth the babies they have successfully conceived and gestated for nine months.  Her stats are pretty incredible—the vast majority of her clients have normal spontaneous births at home, despite their supposed “risk”.

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This article was written by Gloria Lemay.  It is absolutely brilliant, and speaks specifically to the issue that you’ve brought up here, about pelvic size, and the capacity to give birth, along with some fascinating anthropological references that should give everyone pause.

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I hope all this is helpful, or interesting to you, and I hope that if you have another baby, you will consider the possibility that you can totally do it at home!  Usually, in every community (I hope!) there is someone—an amazing doula, or an underground birth attendant or a wise woman, or a friend—who also knows the truth about birth, which is that most women can do it!  I think you can too.

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<3

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If you’re interested in my free book on Ecstatic, Physiological, Autonomous Homebirth, you can get it here.

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And if you have a question for me, and your’e open to the answer being used (anonymously!) as a blog post, give me a shout at sasamat.clark@gmail.com.  I can’t guarantee I will get to everyone, but I promise to do my best.