Hoping for natural birth in hospital, sharing OB update

luvmygoofyguy

Update to wordy post last week, follow-up with OB yesterday. Before appointment, I had gotten further along in my reading, including Cythia Gabriel's Natural Hospital Birth, which gave me some ideas of ways to express our hopes/wishes without outright challenging the hospital's policies and/or OB's philosophy.

Long discussion (think longest I've had so far with OB), a lot of open back & forth btwn Dr & us, but @ the end I think we were satisfied could work together toward the same goal - a healthy baby and mother. Also able to present our arguments in a friendly, open manner that still advocated our position.

At times felt like living out actual scenarios from books I've read, and successfully dealt with them while avoiding being overly aggressive or alienating. Felt like I was really being heard- so empowering!! I feel much more confident that the hospital birth won't be an impossible hindrance to our hoped for natural birth. She was willing to hear me out on things, and didn't flatly reject anything made me more comfortable that we'd made a good choice in staying with her. I'd say she's somewhere in the middle of the spectrum between active management and expectant management. Could always wish she was closer to my opinions, but at least she's not on the complete opposite side of the spectrum.

Huge difference to start by focusing on how happy/excited we were, and was our wish/want/desire for something, rather than challenging medical assumptions a particular policy was based on. Similar to what the book advocated, also helped to use the "we'd like to think/talk more about this" approach on things that she seemed to be more hard-core about enforcing. Amazing how, with persistence and further discussion, OB's language would change from "you must do this" kind of orientation, into more of a "we prefer you to do this, but we won't make you" one on several things (just like the book). 

 Tried not to be as wordy this time (sorry about that!), but wanted to share the good vibes, and maybe it will give some encouragement to other moms to be out there who are hoping for a natural birth in hospital.

luvmygoofyguy

Sorry for the long post, I'm not good at this. Shorter than last time, though!

tokenhoser

Sounds like a productive conversation.

My doctor was really open to the things I really cared about. In exchange, I didn't argue over every hospital policy. It also helped immensely to labour at home and limit my time at the hospital - policy can only affect you once you're there.

pugznploons

that's awesome!  I read the book earlier in my pregnancy but need to do a re-read as we get closer and start putting together our birth plan.  

luvmygoofyguy

tokenhoser:

Sounds like a productive conversation.

My doctor was really open to the things I really cared about. In exchange, I didn't argue over every hospital policy. It also helped immensely to labour at home and limit my time at the hospital - policy can only affect you once you're there.

thanks for pointing this out. This is something she reminded me of at the appointment, and that laboring at home would help a lot.