What a wonderful opportunity to mingle with women who want to care for other women! There was a lot of talent, wisdom, heart in this group. I'm convinced they will make a real difference for many women in our area.
In order to finish their certification, new doulas must provide labor support to three mothers and receive positive evaluations from each. If you are looking for a doula, or know someone who would like one, please have them email me (douladay@gmail.com) and I'll be happy to connect them with one of the doulas-in-training.
Saturday, October 27, 2007
DONA Doula Training a Success!
I just arrived home from a wonderful DONA International Doula Training, taught by DONA International President Debbie Young. It was held at Birthroot Midwifery, a beautiful birth clinic in Fayetteville. A group of 13 women from around Northwest Arkansas, and from as far away as Tulsa, OK attended the 3-day training that will prepare them to complete their certification or recertify as birth doulas. Attendees learned skills such as comfort techniques for labor, the emotional stages of labor, prenatal and postpartum support, communication techniques, marketing of services, and care of women with special needs. The training culminated in a surprisingly accurate simulation of a birth, where all of the trainees were able to practice their new skills on "Britney," a teen mom in labor (played by trainer Debbie Young).
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Sesame Street - Buffy Nurses Cody
Chapter Co-leader, childbirth educator, and student midwife Carie Means found this sweet vintage Sesame Street video that shows breastfeeding in a very positive light. Thanks Carie!
Woman in Residence
Kay Smith, a local childbirth educator and leader in the NWA birth community sent me this beautiful excerpt. . .
"Here is an excerpt from Dr. Michelle Harrison's book Woman in Residence. She is a family doctor who did residency training in OB/GYN. This book describes her experiences as a resident. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all OBs adopted this point of view?"
Kay Smith
“Imagine dancers on a stage. Once, doing a pirouette, a woman sustained a cervical fracture as a result of a fall; she is now paralyzed. We try to make the stage safer, to have the dancers better prepared. But can a dancer wear a collar around her neck, just in case she falls? The presence of the collar will inhibit her free motion. We cannot say to her, “This will be entirely natural except for the brace on your neck, just in case.” It cannot be “as if” it is not there, because we know that creative movement and creative expression cannot exist with those constraints. The dancer cannot dance with the brace on.
In the same way, the birthing woman cannot “dance” with a brace on. The straps around her abdomen, the wires coming from her vagina, change her birth.The birthing woman plays in an orchestra of her body, her soul, her baby, her loved ones, her past and her future. And we do not know who leads the orchestra.
Doctors cannot lead the orchestra, because they are not within the process. Unable to hear the music, trained only in modalities of power and control, they can only interfere with the music being played.What should they be able to do? They should stand ready to help the player in trouble to get back into rhythm. Instead, they take over. Instead of supporting the mother, they say, “Okay, you have failed. It’s our piece now.”
How do you get a 30 percent Cesarean rate? You orchestrate it. You write a piece in which the third movement is a Cesarean, then build the first two with that in mind. You write in a different language; you write in terms of centimeters of dilation, external fetal monitor, internal fetal monitor, pH, scalp electrodes, Cesarean birth experience, arrest of labor, protracted labor, fetal distress, episiotomy, prolapse, cephalopelvic disproportion, ultrasound waves, amniocentesis, “premium baby,” post-mature (when the baby stays too long in the uterus), “maternal environment” (formerly known as mother). Those are the words, the notes, while the piece is played to the rhythm of fear."
Here is another excerpt:
“Often I don’t like the women I've delivered. I don’t like them for their submissiveness. When I make rounds in the morning I ask, “When are you going home?” They answer, “I don’t know when my doctor will let me.” They have let themselves be imprisoned. For me, the submissiveness of one woman becomes my own, as though we were all one organism. . . . I used to have fantasies at Doctor’s Hospital about women in a state of revolution. I saw them getting up out of their beds and refusing the knife, refusing to be tied down, refusing to submit—whether they are in childbirth or when they were forty and having a hysterectomy for a uterus no longer considered useful. Women’s health care will not improve until women reject the present system and begin instead to develop less destructive means of creating and maintaining a state of wellness.”
"Here is an excerpt from Dr. Michelle Harrison's book Woman in Residence. She is a family doctor who did residency training in OB/GYN. This book describes her experiences as a resident. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all OBs adopted this point of view?"
Kay Smith
“Imagine dancers on a stage. Once, doing a pirouette, a woman sustained a cervical fracture as a result of a fall; she is now paralyzed. We try to make the stage safer, to have the dancers better prepared. But can a dancer wear a collar around her neck, just in case she falls? The presence of the collar will inhibit her free motion. We cannot say to her, “This will be entirely natural except for the brace on your neck, just in case.” It cannot be “as if” it is not there, because we know that creative movement and creative expression cannot exist with those constraints. The dancer cannot dance with the brace on.
In the same way, the birthing woman cannot “dance” with a brace on. The straps around her abdomen, the wires coming from her vagina, change her birth.The birthing woman plays in an orchestra of her body, her soul, her baby, her loved ones, her past and her future. And we do not know who leads the orchestra.
Doctors cannot lead the orchestra, because they are not within the process. Unable to hear the music, trained only in modalities of power and control, they can only interfere with the music being played.What should they be able to do? They should stand ready to help the player in trouble to get back into rhythm. Instead, they take over. Instead of supporting the mother, they say, “Okay, you have failed. It’s our piece now.”
How do you get a 30 percent Cesarean rate? You orchestrate it. You write a piece in which the third movement is a Cesarean, then build the first two with that in mind. You write in a different language; you write in terms of centimeters of dilation, external fetal monitor, internal fetal monitor, pH, scalp electrodes, Cesarean birth experience, arrest of labor, protracted labor, fetal distress, episiotomy, prolapse, cephalopelvic disproportion, ultrasound waves, amniocentesis, “premium baby,” post-mature (when the baby stays too long in the uterus), “maternal environment” (formerly known as mother). Those are the words, the notes, while the piece is played to the rhythm of fear."
Here is another excerpt:
“Often I don’t like the women I've delivered. I don’t like them for their submissiveness. When I make rounds in the morning I ask, “When are you going home?” They answer, “I don’t know when my doctor will let me.” They have let themselves be imprisoned. For me, the submissiveness of one woman becomes my own, as though we were all one organism. . . . I used to have fantasies at Doctor’s Hospital about women in a state of revolution. I saw them getting up out of their beds and refusing the knife, refusing to be tied down, refusing to submit—whether they are in childbirth or when they were forty and having a hysterectomy for a uterus no longer considered useful. Women’s health care will not improve until women reject the present system and begin instead to develop less destructive means of creating and maintaining a state of wellness.”
Monday, October 8, 2007
The Business of Being Born
We are working hard to pull together the details for a special "kickoff" event this December. We will be hosting a special benefit screening of Ricki Lake's new documentary, "The Business of Being Born." We've reserved White Auditorium at Northwest Arkansas Community College (more details to follow) which seats 250 people. Let's fill those seats!
I'm very excited about the attention that is increasingly being paid to the real state of affairs in maternity care today. I recently was introduced to the head of obstetrics of a local hospital and I told her about BirthNetwork and a little bit about the film. It's definitely a difficult subject to talk about with a member of the medical establishment. It's easier talking about the "woes" of care that isn't mother-friendly or evidence-based to people who already feel the way I do. But as birth activists and advocates, we really need to bring this conversation out into the public forum. We need to learn how to talk to CEO's of hospitals and heads of nursing and obstetrics and labor and delivery. We need to do more than encourage women to stand up for themselves. We need to be willing to put on our best "dress for success" suits and walk into those hospitals and advocate for women directly.
The conversation really revolves around transparency in maternity care. Women have the right to full access to information about risks and benefits of procedures, rates of intervention for hospitals and providers, and they need to be informed of all their options without pressure to choose more intervention. Women won't be able to do what's best for them and their babies until they know that choosing a care provider is much more than just finding the hospital with the nicest birthing suites. I hope that this benefit screening will finally open up the conversation here.
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