Are there choices?

If you are becoming a mother soon for the first time, you may want to know there are choices. You may or may not know that.

There are women who strongly prefer to give birth in hospitals and others who desperately want to be able to have a home birth. In most nations in the world, in 2016 it is legal to do it either way and can be handled with the level of safety needed. Each nation has their own regulations and tendencies.

It is also possible to choose a different option if you have more than one child. For instance, one woman who was a good friend early in our motherhood years, had her first child in a hospital but was able to have her second child at home. This was done perfectly legally in England in the 1990s.

The main choices are:

1) Hospital - this includes giving birth drugged or even planned C-sections which some women actually choose.

2) Maternity Ward - this can include giving birth in more of a natural child birth environment. Nurses and Midwives handle nearly everything but there are couple of doctors nearby who can be called in in the event of any emergencies.

3) Birthing Center - this is essentially a private maternity ward separate from a hospital.

4) Home birth - this is what it is called. One gives birth at home. In many nations one can have a professional Midwife or even Midwifery team and doctor to be present at the home to help out and make sure it goes well. This is legal in most nations but may require significant pre-arrangement.

Beds, Pools, Natural & with Drugs

Most women go through standing up and sitting down during labor. Women can give birth squatting upright or lying down. In Europe and North America most women prefer or need to give birth lying down. Most do it on a table or a bed.

However, for those who really want to know, there are also birthing pools. The idea of these is simply to allow the mother's body all the support of water and to help the baby transition more smoothly by arriving into other waters and then moving into air rather than going directly, suddenly and completely from womb waters to the air - which is really a bit like how it is for astronauts coming back from the Moon. Most of you have enjoyed the support of water - the perception that the air is that much less supportive is accurate.

Birthing pools have to be prearranged and it is best to handle them in conjunction with midwifery or your local nurses and doctors.

Many women give birth without the use of painkillers during labor. For some reason that is called natural childbirth. The pain during labor is caused by the fact that the mother's cervix comes apart and opens up with the same degree of flexibility often seen when people watch nature videos of snakes unhinging their own jaws in order to take something in. Most of the time, the woman's body does nothing like that, making it quite uncomfortable. A woman can have a better or worse prepared body for giving birth but it is pretty challenging even in the best of conditions. To get personal for a moment, my mother told me that as her 3rd child, it only took her 2 hours to give birth to me, with maybe 3 or 4 hours in labor. When I had a baby it did not go so smoothly. I hoped to give birth safely at home but ended up in the hospital. Then after hours in labor when I finally seemed to be 'opening up' enough due to some other problem I ended up knocked unconscious and put under the knife for an emergency C-section. The total time in labor was 19 to 24 hours. They gave me drugs but in truth, I felt it was because the midwives who had no children yet hated the sound of my screaming. I found it brought some relief to shout very loudly during contractions. Also, I was moody because I had a goddess quallity midwife during the pregnancy but then when I gave birth she was nowhere to be found. Anyway, I ended up using drugs during the second half of the labor process. In truth it didn't help nearly as much as would have hoped. I'm not sure I would recommend it.

Conclusion

You do have some choices in relation to how you give birth, and what your context will be like during labor. While there are choices in most nations there are also regulations. Depending upon your family, you may feel forced one way or another but if you are fortunate you will be able to use your freedom to choose and give birth to a healthy baby the way you want to.