Article on laboring womens' rights

Is a woman in labor a person? Legally?

This article really shook me. I cannot believe that something like this could even happen. It is so upsetting that a woman's rights over her own body could be superceded by anyone, let alone her physician.

This is just another reason to make sure you have chosen a like-minded provider who understands and respects your wishes. Granted, this will not ensure the labor and delivery of your choosing~ there are too many variables (the largest of which is mother nature) while woman and child work through this stressful but momentous event. It is not clear in the article whether the mother did endanger herself or her child by refusing a C-section, but what is clear is that there was a healthy outcome.

The idea of 'safety' is a relative one, especially when it comes to something as random and up for interpretation as medical testing and procedures. Truly, labor and delivery is more of an art than a science, and I wish that there were some philosophy in there as well. Sadly, the philosophy of medicine in Obstetrics has been replaced by legality, and attorneys. But regardless, whether is was 'safe' for this mother to deliver vaginally is not the issue here, the issue is that no two people have the same idea of what 'safe' means. To some, nothing is more safe than a C section, and to some, nothing is more safe than the natural process of labor. Most of us fall in the middle somewhere, and there is no 'right' answer. We all have to answer to the forces of our environment, be they our malpractice insurance, the hospital, our bodies, or our hopes and dreams for a beautiful baby and a beautiful birth.

Once again, I urge you all to try to understand where the other 'team' is coming from, and instead of becoming more polarized and combative, try to meet in the middle. Perhaps if the 'natural' and 'medical' camps spent energy on this instead of fighting against the other side, sad cases like this would not have to happen.

Consumerism in medicine has never been as important as it is now~ so choose your birth team and facility wisely, and let the almighty dollar cast it's vote on what kind of care will succeed in the end. Choose wisely for yourself, your friends, and your daughter, so we may hope to have a better system in place sometime soon.