Crime and punishment

I am so sick and tired of helping women deal with medical misinformation. Don’t get me wrong – I’ll never tire of helping women, I am just so sick of deliberate weighting of evidence or only giving one side of the story or even downright lies and deceit. I should probably wait until I calm down a little before I blog about this, but I just seem to get angrier every time I think about it. There seems to be a habit among some health professionals of punishing women who decline their interventions during pregnancy and/or labour and birth. Don’t get me wrong – I know there are “good” staff out there – I am friends with some – but I have witnessed this sort of thing too frequently.

Some of you may remember my reference to Sally in my previous post (http://charisbirthsupport.blogspot.com/ ) – well once again the treatment this lady has received at the hands of the medical profession has inspired this “blog of disgust”. It seems the hospital staff couldn’t let Sally enjoy her “babymoon” without scaring her silly about the consequences of her labour choices on the health of her baby. (Despite her labour choices resulting in an empowering natural birth of a healthy baby weighing just over 4.5kg) I would hate to think anyone’s reasoning would be so petty, but it seemed as if they were punishing her for being “uncompliant during labour.”

Sally’s crime number one: Not attending the hospital when her waters broke, and then not accepting IV antibiotics when she did so. Sally stayed at home for nearly 2 days, monitoring her loss for smell and change of colour, monitoring her temperature and how she felt. Baby was moving and she felt fine with no signs of infection so Sally made the informed decision to wait for true labour to kick in. I believe she took vitamin C every 3-4 hours to help her body keep any infection at bay.
Punishment: The staff thought that Sally’s amniotic fluid smelled “off”. Sally and her 2 support people hadn’t noticed any change in odour over the 48 hours her waters had been broken, nor at this time. The baby had blood drawn to test for infection (though showing no signs of distress or illness and had breastfed beautifully). The staff acted as if they expected the baby to be infected and not simply monitor her as a precaution. They also cultured the placenta (which eventually came back negative). When the blood results on the baby came back fine – the staff were still reluctant to empower Sally to make her own decisions about how to mother her precious baby, and told her that the presence of the fine hair on her baby’s ears was a possible sign of infection so they had to keep a close eye on her. ???? What was the motive for this statement? A bold lie to get Sally to do what they wanted?? An ignorant statement that was just something to say?? ALL babies have hair on their bodies – called lanugo – and it starts to disappear in the last few weeks before birth. The last place it disappears is the ears and the back. If Sally’s bub was born just under the 38 week mark, it makes even MORE sense that the baby would have hair on her ears. (Though I have seen this on some babies that are over 40 weeks). Since when does a body grow hair on the ears as a response to infection? How dare they tell a mother that a normal occurrence in a baby is a sign of infection! What the staff were trying to do – consciously or unconsciously – is to keep the balance of power on their side. We are the professionals with the knowledge – you are the mother who did not follow our advice now suffer the consequences – your baby is sick.

Sally’s crime number two: Having a baby over 4.5kg.
Punishment: The baby was subjected to frequent routine BSL checks as per policy in every hospital (pricking the baby’s heel to get a drop of blood and testing the blood sugar level). Sally was not “allowed” to co-sleep (as per hospital policy) and was not allowed to breast feed on demand . Yes – in spite of all the research that indicates frequent breast feeding the most effective way of treating things like low blood sugars and preventing/treating jaundice, the staff demanded the baby be schedule fed – FOURTH HOURLY !! Sally was told that she “must sleep” and that her baby needed to develop a “healthy feeding pattern and learn to regulate her blood sugars.” And just how was the baby going to do that when she wasn’t allowed to feed? If the baby had of been allowed in bed with her Sally could have rested and fed at the same time. I find it amazing that at the same time they were limiting how much she fed, they told her they were worried about the baby’s blood sugar levels and “if they did not come up” would have to “give her formula”. Hello!!!! Let her feed form the breast whenever she wants to and her blood sugar levels would regulate themselves!!.

After this piece of advice, Sally was given another gem – she was told that because her baby was big that she wouldn’t have enough milk for her, and rather than get sore nipples, she should consider giving formula to supplement. After all, you couldn’t have the baby “sucking all the time”. I thought that it was COMMON KNOWLEDGE that the more a baby sucked, the more she stimulated her mother’s milk supply. I thought it was COMMON KNOWLEDGE that supplementing a baby with ONE bottle of formula put the baby at risk for an allergic response to milk as well as disrupt the colonisation of the baby’s bowel with good bacteria and well as have the effect of DECREASING the mother’s milk supply and make breast feeding failure more likely? Apparently it is not common knowledge and ignorance in the medical midwifery world is alive and well. Apparently, it is especially true with large babies that you need to “get them into a routine from the beginning”. Too bad if little baby was hungry and wanted to feed from her mother – sorry, the staff member says you have to wait another 2 hours! Oh dear – a low urine output and low blood sugar levels? It’s just as well you are in hospital my dear because we can tell you that your baby needs formula and you don’t have enough milk!! I am absolutely disgusted and angry – but I know this happens to women all the time. NO mother instinctively denies her baby be fed when she is asking to be fed – that only comes when people in authority demand it and how dare they.

All of this ignorance brings to mind another case where a home birth transfer was punished for planning a home birth in the first place. When the mother declined a vitamin K shot for her baby, the medical staff threatened to “keep the baby for observation” for 3 days, but if she consented she could go home. Informed consent? Or illegal abuse – even assault and battery?

How are the medical/midwifery profession ever going to achieve any level of respect among thinking women when they act like this? Is this the sort of “collaborative practice” that home birth midwives will be forced into if by some miracle amendments are made to the coming law to allow them to continue to practice? I absolutely stand against the idea that current practice or medical opinion is the ultimate authority in the health of mother and baby. The medical profession – and hospitals – are there to provide a service – not be the final authority over a woman’s body and her baby. If we start thinking of them in this way, when they say to us “no you can’t feed your baby” we can tell them politely and calmly that we can and we will and that they cannot stop us. Women – claim your birthing power and your mothering power!!