Childbirth in my life and around the world
To be frank, I have no experience about birth so far. I did not know about any information of my own birth because my mom didn’t mention about it or record a video of my birth due to our conservative characteristic to some extent, I think. Unfortunately, now I can not still know about my birth from my mom since she has passed away when I was in Senior School, not even from my dad because he was kept away from the delivery room. I am not married yet and I don’t have a child or take part in any birthing experience. However, I heard about some information from my sister, who has a daughter at the age of four now. My niece was born in a hospital weighing 3.4 kilograms in good status. My sister told me that she stayed at home until her amniotic fluid broke early in the morning at around seven. She was then transported to the hospital and stayed in the delivery room until midnight at around eleven. My sister chose to deliver naturally through the vagina instead of via cesarean section. Since the family members were kept away from the delivery room, my sister depended all on the midwives. She was told that she couldn’t walk around but just stayed on bed since the amniotic fluid broke, otherwise it would impact the health of the baby and might lead to asphyxia. The midwives instructed my sister to take deep breaths and relax at the beginning to save energy in spite of the great pain. Then she should push the fetus hard out of her vagina. Regarding birth, though I don’t have personal experiences, it is risky but great. Seeing the nature and nurture of next generation brings us hopes, gratitude, love and care, especially for my families. A new life, which doesn’t come easy to this world with regard to the long time of pregnancy and caution, is added to my family, which seemed drear to some extent after my mom’s death. This new life brought us joy and laughter, and kept reminding us of our mom’s inspiring words, which is valuable to us to nurture and educate our own child.
Actually I was not that surprised to read that in US almost 100% of births take place in a controlled and/or clinical settings. In such a developed country, I am sure that US has a much maturer medical systems to offer a much safer and cleaner environment for births and reduce the rates of maternal and stillborn or newborn death. What surprised me is that outside of the United States the majority of births occur at home. For example, about 30% of births in the Netherlands are planned home births, which is considered as a normal procedure in low risk pregnancy. (Berger, 2012, pp.103) In Hans’ rapid response (2011) to the article
Commons committee calls for more choice over home births, he stated that “
in the same low risk population of pregnant women, the hospital delivery group had more interventions.” In this developed country, home births is as safe as hospital births, and even better than hospital births because of less unneccesary medical interventions which might cause unexpected harm on the mother and baby, and the supports of medical professionals. (Berger, 2012, pp. 103) Compared with my sister’s experience, I don’t think the medical systems and professionals in China so far would allow her to have a home birth and could compete with the Netherlands regarding home births. From Berger’s (2012) text, I learned that China has a higher rate of cesarean sections than other nations. Seeing this, I search on the net and found out that even cesarean sections can bring the mother and baby a higher rate of safety; however, it also brings more expenses and more complications like postpartum haemorrhage of the mother, hypoimmunity of the newborn, Sensory Integrative Dysfunction (SID), and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), etc. Therefore, depending on the conditions of China, I think the best way to deliver a child is to deliver naturally in hospital in the delivery room instead of in the operation room for two main reasons: one is that natural deliver can to some extent avoid complications and better a child’s development; the other one is that if an emergency happens in birthing, it saves time to transfer the mother from the delivery room to the operation room rather than from home.
PS:
回复删除reference:
Berger, K. S. (2012). The developing person through childhood (6th ed.). New York, NY: Worth Publishers. Chapter 4, "Prenatal Development and Birth”.
Hans B. Burggraaff. (2011) Home births in the Netherlands. Retrieved from: http://www.bmj.com/rapid-response/2011/10/29/home-birth-netherlands
Hi, Xiaowan, What a beautiful blogsite you have and I have enjoyed reading your post. You mentioned that, in China families are not allowed in the delivery room with the mother. I remember when my mother was having children, families here in the U.S were not allowed in the delivery rooms either, the fathers had to wait in the waiting room until a nurse came out and told the father that his baby was born. That was a long time ago, but now the mother has a choice of whom she wants in the delivery room with her including the father. I,m not sure if children are allowed or not. I agree with you that baby's should be born naturally because giving mothers medications to induce labor, or for pain -I feel can get in the baby's bloodstream and cause complications. My oldest son was born with a heart disease called, White Parkinson Syndrome and he was on medication for his heart for years and had surgery on his heart 2 times, but he's doing great now and I sort of believe that his heart problem could have been from me being on medications during delivery, I,ll never know for sure, Just glad he's doing fine.
回复删除Hi Xiaowan. I loved reading your post and hearing about experiences from outside of the US. It is neat to get your perspective in a class like this. Reading about the prevalence of home births from around the world made me thankful to have delivered my children at hospitals. I have 4 children and 3 of the deliveries were C-sections (one of which was an emergency situation). While I think there are many great things about being able to deliver at home, I know that for me, I would have been one that might have had serious complications...maybe even resulting in death. I have several friends who have decided on home births. I think it's really important to consult with your doctor and weigh the risks. For me, it wouldn't have been right, for others it is a wonderful experience.
回复删除Good evening from Chicago, Xiaowan, thank you so very much for sharing your very detailed insight on your sisters birth of your niece and also the transparency of your story. Child birth is a very serious process and the importance of the right sterile equipment in the event of a medical emergency is time sensitive. I have not, and I am blessed to say, had any complications in the delivery room. Yet I am confident in the health that I take part in myself and how I value and follow-up with appointments and well-check visits on the baby, as well as the modern day equipment that is used nowadays. You have extensively reviewed many regions, including China, which gave me a closer look at what the experience may have been for your sister. You also share with us what the Netherlands and make a great comparison among these countries including the United States.
回复删除It was a pleasure reading your blog and I look forward to what you have to share with us in this class moving forward. Take care.