horrified

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, when I come across a link that I find hold important information, I'll usually share it on twitter, and sometimes on facebook as well.  Every so often, I come across too many links in one day.  And sometimes, I have too much to say about them for either twitter or facebook.

Today is one of those days.

Today I came across the term "pit to distress."  This is, apparently, a medical term meaning that the doctor wants to use large doses of Pitocin in order to make the woman's labor progress as quickly as possible, and even to cause fetal distress so they can call for a c-section.  

My first reaction was skepticism.  This sounded too horrifying, too downright malicious, to possibly be true.  Then I read the following posts:

"Pit to Distress": Your Ticket To An "emergency" Cesarean?

"Pit to Distress": A Disturbing Reality

"Pit to Distress" Around the Birth Blogs

Each of those posts (and there are plenty others) recounts either a L&D nurse's personal experiences with doctors who practice "pit to distress," or link to nurses, doulas, and midwives who have also personally dealt with it.  I can't say how widespread this practice might be, but that it happens at all sickens me.  That it happens often enough for this many birth attendants to say, "Yep, I've seen that," is horrifying.  These posts were all written last summer.  Has this practice died down since then? Increased? I don't know.  But dear lord.  I wonder how many of those women had any idea what was being done to them as the Pitocin was increased (or as their nurses battled with their doctors to keep it from happening).  

See, I don't blame women for wanting to birth in a hospital. I may not share it, but I can understand that desire.  I do blame is the doctors and hospitals who practice this sort of "medicine," as well as the lawsuits that have made it so that we collectively believe that performing major abdominal surgery is somehow "safer" than letting labor progress on its own.  This is what drives women like me to not want to touch a Labor & Delivery unit with a 10 foot pole.

And now, the flip side-- another amazing post I came across today, except this is a positive one.  This is a midwife's description of what generally happens during prenatal care and then home birth with a midwife:

What is a Home Birth Like?

It seems a lot of the vitriol against home birth seems to come from people who have no idea what one is like, or what a midwife's role and capabilities are.  So, here's hoping that spreading posts this like last one around might help improve that just a bit.