I always seem to be in the mood for a good documentary in January & February. The glow of the holidays has faded & I just seem to want something a little more, well, real. So when I stumbled upon The Business of Being Born languishing around #87 in my Netflix queue, it immediately caught my eye & I wondered whether it was worth the hour & a half. Was it ever.
Okay, so I cried. A lot. This movie is moving & startling. Humourous & heartbreaking. Empowering & daunting. It may even make you question your own birth experiences. It certainly made me think about mine.
In the US, unfortunately, medicine is a big business. And not just for doctors. For hospitals. For lawyers. And particularly for insurance companies. Slowly in the last 40 years a woman’s options for childbirth have been whittled down to the astounding statistic that less than 1% of births being at home attended to by a midwife, while the c-section rate has skyrocketed to over 30%. Shortly after my first son was born I attended a mother’s support group through the hospital where he was born. I sat there & was astounded by the fact that in a room of 15 woman there were only 3 of us who had experienced a traditional (i.e. vaginal) birth. It really stuck out in my mind & puzzled me as to why women seemed to no longer be able to give birth “naturally.”
That is exactly the issue that executive producer Ricki Lake is trying to address in this movie. Why do so many women have a birth experience that is not their own? The unfortunate answer is that most women are not given the opportunity to because either their doctor doesn’t see it as necessary or because their doctor’s hands are tied with medical & legal red tape. I can think of two instances among friends of mine that illustrate this. A good friend of mine had the 2-page birth plan. We all laughed about it, but we knew she was serious. She explained how she had to sit & bargain with her doctor & in the end she had to concede certain things because of “hospital regulations.” Another friend of mine had an emergency c-section with her first child & wanted a VBAC with her second because of a desire to have more children. Not only did she have to interview several doctors before she found one who would do a VBAC, she had to go two hospitals away to a hospital that would accept a VBAC patient.
The movie could easily have fallen into the preachy & self-righteous categories, but never quite does because we follow several women’s pregnancies, including director Abby Epstein, up to birth all with slightly different outcomes. It never steps over the line into judgment of women who choose hospital-setting births. And that’s exactly the message that the filmakers are trying to get across. The blame should not be placed upon the women, but rather the medical/insurance establishment for restricting a woman’s options. The movie seeks to educate women in a way that the traditional medical establishment never will.
Which of course all of this made me think about my birth experiences. Both were in a hospital. And although I had interventions I wish I didn’t (an iv mostly…I hate those things), I was able to have them (relatively) my way & they were both truly empowering experiences.
If you get a chance rent this movie. Or if you know someone who is pregnant, rent it for them. The choices are out there. We just have to seek them out.
As a little footnote, I would hazard against believing that this movie is an entirely American issue, as the most recent statistics for c-sections in Canada is 26% of all hospital births. Unfortunately, it may not be as simple as it being “business” driving up c-section rates.
Erin,
Thank you so much for sharing a little bit of your pregnancy/birth story. I can’t believe that I just watched the video that you linked. I sobbed!! How amazingly uplifting!! I love the sentiment to “trust the babies”, they know what they’re doing!! We, as women, are amazing in what we can do, when we armed with adequate information & have people around us who support our decisions.
Thanks again!!!
I remember when this came out, how it resonated with me and many women I know. I am the type of person who researches everything so I knew what risks and options I had for my twin delivery. My pregnancy was potentially high risk because my girls shared a placenta and a chorion. It was likely that cord veins and arteries were connected and so we were at risk for twin to twin transfusion. I knew all this, I saw a multiples specialist (Dr. Jon Barrett – great doctor) at Women’s College/Sunnybrook ( I live 5 hours north of Toronto). I went for an ultrasound every two weeks until 28 weeks after which point I had to go every week. It was a two hour drive each way to get the ultrasound and see my OB. In the end, I decided to go with the induction at 37 weeks and an epidural. It was not the birth experience I wanted. I had to deliver in the OR, there were a dozen people in there (OB, maternity nurses, NICU nurses, pediatrician, breathing specialists, etc.). Everything was fine but I had to grieve the loss of the birth experience I wanted. In hindsight I probably could have waited to go into labour and deliver drug free, but then hindsight it 20/20. I made my decision based on valid, scientific evidence so I know I made the right one.
Unfortunately, many people don’t know what their options are. They don’t know that the risks of C-section are higher than vaginal birth, even for many twin births where c-section is almost compulsory in some OB’s opinions. OBs aren’t trained to deliver breech babies anymore, that is shocking!
Here is a link to a video montage created by a woman on my AP multiple births support yahoo group. It’s about multiple births and choices.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7E-wULAaD50
Erin
Wow. I definitely have to see this. I have been the target of many, many judgmental and downright abusive comments from people – especially other mothers- for having both of my children at home attended by midwives. I did tons of research, had very uneventful pregnancies, and wonderful childbirth experiences with both.
I never felt that women shouldn’t have intervention or give birth in hospital but just that it didn’t feel right to me. I have been accused of being negligent, putting my babies at risk, and even of being a witch. The process of labour and childbirth is truly amazing and empowering. Having done it twice has changed my life completely and given me a confidence and insight I never had before.
Thanks for the review and recommendation, Margot. I hope this DVD is available in Canada because it is top on my list of must sees.
Ahhh! Even the preview has me teary-eyed! This is SUCH an important issue, and yet so few people seem to take it seriously. I would love to see this movie even though I’ve had my two and don’t plan on any more. Thanks for the reco!