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Please Note: After nearly 30 years, I have recently "retired" from actively "catching babies" and am devoting my time doing research and writing. This web site takes up most of my free time. My age and my health issues have caught up with me as I have realized I have become an "old cluck" instead of a "spring chicken". It is time to pass the "stick of midwifery" onto the newer generation. I still continue to supply this information as a guideline for other younger midwives and student/apprentice midwives in establishing their own midwifery practices. May you all have quiet easy deliveries and health moms and babies!
We believe that women should be able to reclaim their bodies and their birthing rights after they have had a cesarean delivery. Due to the great emotional and physical trauma which often occurs and is associated with a cesarean delivery, women opting for a VBAC may need minimal to substantial support from the birthing team. With extra labor support, it has been shown that a majority of women who have had previous cesarean deliveries are able to birth their babies vaginally, with safe and healthy (not to mention emotionally healing) outcomes for both the mother and baby.
We assist with natural, holistic childbirth at home.
We are available and with the laboring mother from the beginning of labor to several hours after the baby is born. This allows continuous care, careful monitoring of both the mother and the unborn baby, emotional and physical support for both her and her partner (who often times can be more nervous than the mother and may have unresolved feelings left from the previous cesarean experience resulting in an unempowered-helpless-fearful emotional state of being). We work with the mother and baby as whole beings, and not just a uterus giving birth to a fetus. We offer natural means of assisting labor. These may include upright walking, position changes, water laboring in warm tub or shower, adequate nutritional and hydration, massage, encouragement, various relaxation techniques.
Studies have shown that the babies are the initiators of labor by releasing hormones (such as a small amount of oxytocin) to the mother's blood stream which then sets off her own hormonal release, which initiates and continues labor. Although science has does not completely understand this process yet, one theory has been that the baby induces labor when the mother's body is unable to satisfy his-her nutritional needs any longer. In other words, they become hungry and are looking for nutrition beyond the capabilities of the mother's blood-nutrient levels.
On the average, babies born by cesarean and induction have lower birth weights and have fewer weeks gestation than are babies born vaginally without induction. This suggests that cesareans and inductions are occurring before the mother's body is ready (ripe) and the baby has reached full maturity. At the other end of the spectrum, inductions and cesareans occur when the physician fears the baby may be post dates and becoming too large (greater than 4000 g or 8 lbs 13 oz). Determination of baby size is very inaccurate whether by ultrasound or by palpation by an inexperienced health care provider. The babies that have been born by cesarean or induced without initiation of labor account for the majority of admissions to high-risk nurseries. Although some of these infants were born by cesarean or induced because of medical emergencies that may threaten the life of the infant or the mother, a majority of them are miscalculated due dates, fear of large baby size, convenience scheduling, or misdiagnosed fetal-maternal distress.
Pitocin and prostaglandin (PGE2) inductions are shown to contribute to severely painful labor conditions, higher incidence of fetal distress and injury, uterine rupture and repeat cesarean deliveries. Although these induction drugs have a higher incidence of complications, all of these conditions can also occur without induction and outside of a medical facility, but much, much less often.
When a woman reaches her 42nd week of gestation and she has not began labor yet, some of the holistic (home remedies) which may be used by the woman and her midwife include:
Labor drugs (epidurals and other medications are often used in medical settings. In the United States, more than 90% of women in some hospitals use the epidural anesthesia. When done correctly, some women have found this method to be an excellent pain relief, especially for the exhausted laboring woman.
However, No drug administered during labor has been found to be totally safe for the baby. ALL drugs cross pass the placental barrier to the baby during labor. There are potential side effects for the mother and the baby.
The most common effects of an epidural on a baby during labor is a fluctuating heart rate. Labor drugs, in general, can have greater potential for fetal distress, resulting in hypoxia (low oxygen), possible brain damage and fetal death. After birth, a depressed respiratory system and other neonatal complications are common. Apgar scores generally are lower in medically managed births with a higher incidence of babies being placed in neonatal intensive care units.
Maternal complications can include a drop in maternal blood pressure. Women having medications are usually confined to their beds during labor, attached to electronic fetal monitors (EFMs) and a IV drip. This can make labors longer. Another effect that an epidural can have in a first-time labor -- which is what the woman may be having if she did not have a previous vaginal birth, is a slowed or stopped labor. If an epidural is performed early in labor at 2 centimeter dilation, there is a 50% chance of another cesarean. At 3 centimeters, there is a 33% chance, and at 5 centimeters dilation, an epidural will put you at little or no chance of a cesarean. Some women develop fevers 100.4 or greater after having epidurals. This can effect their babies. About one-third of babies born to feverish mothers are taken to NICU for further testing for sepsis (infection), sometime with very painful test procedures such as a spinal tap (lumbar puncture in which spinal fluid is drawn out for testing). Women having epidurals often time have problems with second stage labor and have difficulty in pushing out their babies. Episiotomies are common place and always used with forceps or vacuum extraction usage for these medicated births. Both of these can be traumatic for the baby and can result in serious injury.
MoonDragon Birthing Services will accept healthy, low-risk VBACs as clients for a homebirth setting as long as they fit within our practice guidelines. Locally, our hospital-based birthing centers have refused to accept VBACs and refer them to the hospital delivery wards to birth their babies. Their success rates are low and their intervention rates are high with substantial lack of emotionally-based birth support for their moms and babies and a low VBAC success rate. We hope to provide an alternative service to VBAC moms not wanting a standard hospital birth with a high possibility of a repeat cesarean.
Links:
MoonDragon's ObGyn Information - Cesarean Section
This Home Birth after Cesarean site is owned by
Leather Dupris
MoonDragon Birthing Services .
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