It's my choice
It is much more acceptable for a woman to say that she gave birth without any pain relief, or at home by the fire or even in a birthing pool than it is to say that she has chosen to have a section. However, there are lots of women who take this route but who probably keep it to themselves.
Too posh to push? I laugh at this pointed argument and say no, but I do believe in having a choice about how I give birth and I choose to plan it like I plan other important activities in my life.
At 37 weeks pregnant, I am due to have my second elective section in 12 days. I know my baby is coming out on Mar 21 sometime in the morning and I know that the procedure will take the best part of an hour. I had a planned C-section with my first child and had a most pleasant experience and so this time around I am not changing my birth plan.
My first baby Siofra is now four-years-old. When she arrived into the world on Feb 7, 2008 she was simply perfect. She was plucked from my womb by a team of experts and my trustworthy obstetrician with no complications. I was taken to the operating theatre at 9am, prepped and given an epidural. My husband John was then allowed to come in to be by my side while the procedure was taking place.
Siofra was born 28 minutes after I arrived into the theatre. There was no panic, no tears, no screaming in pain and no drama. It was a quiet, calm and exhilarating experience. My baby was not distressed, she had not spent hours trying to battle her way out of a narrow birth canal and most importantly she was perfectly healthy.
I was ecstatic, as was my husband who was sitting by my side for the whole experience as calm as I was and happy that we were both happy and healthy.
The bonus of a section for dads is that they then get to bond with the baby minutes after the delivery because although I got to hold her immediately, she was then taken and cleaned and examined before being handed to my husband who had 20 minutes with her on his own as he waited for me to return to the room.
Of course, I was numb from the epidural from the waist down for some hours after the birth which is what any woman who gives birth vaginally will also experience if they too choose to go with this form of pain relief. I was on morphine for the day as a pain killer — and it worked. The nurses took the baby for the first night and returned her to me early the next morning. I was rested and, although stiff, still well able to lift the baby and feed her. Later, I was encouraged to get up and walk around and this was not too painful. I was on suppository pain killers for the next couple of days until I was discharged four days later. By then, I was up and about and feeling very confident and capable.
At home, we got on with the job. I was able to negotiate our spiral staircase, do light housework and, more importantly, care for our baby girl. I was driving after a few weeks.
I was lucky to make such a quick recovery but I feel this is because there was no traumatic labour and no emergency surgery. The procedure was so well planned that it didn’t pose any problems for me or for the surgeons. In my view, there is nothing natural about suffering days of labour with the possibility that you may end up exhausted and having an emergency C-section at the end of the ordeal. Of course this is not the case for most women, and you will no doubt have read news stories where women have had their babies so quickly they didn’t even make it to the hospital and ended up having them at the side of the road. However, I chose to avoid both of these scenarios.
I knew before I ever became pregnant that ‘pushing’ was not for me. You can say I was too posh to push — I have heard it all — but the experience I had giving birth was worth all the jeering and disapproving glances. I wanted to be a mum but the thought of giving birth petrified me. I wanted the least intrusive experience possible and I knew that in order to get through the following eight or nine months, I was going to need to sort out my ‘birth plan’ well in advance.
Women have told me that vaginal childbirth is ‘a gorgeous experience’ and something that ‘they really wanted to feel and experience’. I understand that this is the case for many women, but it is not for me. I was born vaginally and my mother admits there is nothing romantic about the experience. In fact, I was breach and they still delivered me vaginally, three weeks early and not in a very calm environment. My mother is very supportive of my decision to opt for a section and I can understand why.
The bottom line is that women should have a right to choose how they give birth.
We are living in the 21st century. Everything has changed in the last three decades. It is not unlikely that the way in which we give birth will also change. Like in every other walk of life, women should have a choice to have an elective section whether they are private or public patients.
I believe this is the way things will be in the future, and I hope that this will make the decision to become pregnant a happy one for many women who have an innate fear of childbirth.
As for the future, this will indeed be my last elective C-section as my doctor has agreed to tie my tubes while on the operating table this time around. As I only have one ovary and one tube (I lost one of each during an emergency operation some 10 years ago) it will be a clamping procedure. At 38, I feel that my childbearing years are now well and truly behind me. I feel lucky to have one healthy child and another baby on the way.
I look forward to my next birth with trepidation and a little nervous apprehension — just like any other woman who is planning to give birth in the foreseeable future. But also happy in the knowledge that it will go according to my birth plan I encourage other women not to be afraid to take control of how they would like to give birth.
72,675 women gave birth in acute public hospitals reporting to HIPE in 2010.
Normal (non-instrumental) deliveries accounted for almost six in every ten deliveries, followed by caesarean section at 26%. Instrumental deliveries accounted for the remainder.
Almost 24% of women who delivered and who were treated on a public basis had a caesarean section — 44% were elective, which includes sections recommended by consultants for medical reasons.
Almost 35% of women who delivered and who were treated on a private basis had a caesarean section — 60% were elective, including sections for medical reasons.
From the Economic & Social Research Institute on activity in Acute Public Hospitals in Ireland, 2010 Annual Report
