Encouraging Joyful Outcomes

Birth is a natural process. Women’s bodies were designed to become pregnant, nurture the life grow inside of them and give birth to their young. This process works well without any intervention over 90% of the time.

After attending a few rather unpleasant hospital births, I began to feel very negative about my work as a doula. I began to doubt myself and whether or not I was capable of providing the support my clients deserved. No one will be surprised to hear that I was feeling very pessimistic about hospital births in particular.

Luckily, I am blessed to have a strong network of doula-sisters that love me and challenge me to look past my frustration and negativity and work out WHY I was getting frustrated. I began to realize that I believed it was my responsibility to create joyful outcomes for my clients’ births.

When a woman chooses a hospital birth it is important that she understands she is going to be birthing her baby in an institution that has the primary goal of maintaining and increasing revenue. Hospitals earn revenue by maximizing the number patients that come through their door and the number of procedures that their staff performs. They lose revenue when they do not perform procedures, don’t fill beds with patients or they are successfully litigated. Therefore, it stands to reason that a lengthy birth with minimal interventions is not in the hospital’s favor. It also stands to reason that no matter what the evidence says, hospitals will encourage medicine to be practiced based on the ‘current standard of practice’ which likely contradict the birth plan/preferences of most labor & delivery patients. The ‘current standard of practice’ protects hospitals during the litigation process.

There are some obstetricians that literally and figuratively sabotage the natural birth process. When I say 'natural birth' I do not mean free of pain medications. I am referring to the natural process that a woman's body goes through to birth her baby.

What I have sadly discovered is that the majority of the women that seek me out for labor support do not trust their doctor. They feel the doctor is competent to handle an emergency, but they don't trust him. For example, they may be told they need to be induced because their pelvis is too small, their baby is too big, their fluid levels are low or they are a few days past their 'due date'. Intuitively women usually don't believe this... but they are too intimidated by their doctor, whom they view as an authority figure, to say 'no' or question the care provider further. When a woman doesn’t have complete faith and trust in her care provider, her decisions will be based on fear and uncertainty. My experience has taught me that decisions made out of fear or uncertainty, usually result in undesired outcomes.

Often women indicate to me that they are leaning towards a natural birth and/or a birth with minimal medical interventions, yet they are aware their care provider generally does not support that type of birth experience.

"You are constructing your own reality with the choices you make...or don't make. If you really want a healthy pregnancy and joyful birth, and you truly understand that you are the one in control, then you must examine what you have or haven't done so far to create the outcome you want."
--Kim Wildner

As a doula, I cannot create the outcome my clients want. The power is in their hands to do that. Even a birth that doesn’t go as planned can produce a joyful outcome. I offer support and guidance through this process, but I cannot create the outcome, nor do I want to. That is in the hands of the birthing woman and her partner.