I found this study from a post on Spirit Led Birth.
The bonding issue is one near and dear to my heart. With my first four children, ironically it was my c-section babe whom I was able to have in my arms the longest in the crucial first hours after birth. With my other two hospital born babies, the nurses found several reasons to take my children away from me. “We need to warm her up in the nursery” “He is breathing too fast, we have to monitor him.” With my first homebirth baby, the main reason I chose to birth alone at home is because I did not want anyone taking him away from me after the birth. Because of the way things went, I did not get him back in my arms until he was 28 hours old, and we had a very, very difficult time bonding.
The easiest bonding came with my fifth child. Benjamin, born at home after a six hour labor, in my arms the minute he was born and happily carried in a sling the first months of his life. I trained him to take his naps in the sling, nestled in my arms, so I had the freedom to go and do whatever I needed while he napped. Mostly I typed on the computer during these hours – writing various things as I nursed him and he slept.
I wonder if the apostle Pauls prediction that our times would be without natural affection for our children was somehow tied to last days birthing practices? These timely studies seem to indicate something is off in the brains of mothers who opt for surgical birth and that is a sad comment on our world today, where the c-section numbers jump exponentially every year. But I suppose we are collectively birthing armageddon, and that was prophesied too.

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Here is some of the text from the article:

“Mothers who push to give birth may be more responsive to the cry of their babies than those mothers who elect to have a caesarean birth, a brain-scanning study suggests.

When U.S. researchers looked at functional MRI brain scans taken up to a month after mothers gave birth and heard their own babies’ cries, they found more activity in areas linked to motivation and emotion among the six who had vaginal deliveries compared with six who had caesarean sections.

“We wondered which brain areas would be less active in parents who delivered by caesarean section, given that this mode of delivery has been associated with decreased maternal behaviours in animal models, and a trend for increased postpartum depression in humans,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. James Swain of the Child Study Centre at Yale University in Connecticut.

“Our results support the theory that variations in delivery conditions such as with caesarean section, which alters the neurohormonal experiences of childbirth, might decrease the responsiveness of the human maternal brain in the early postpartum.”

The differences in brain activity were found in regions that seem to affect how a mother responds to her child and regulate her mood.

Postpartum depression risk

In natural birth, contractions help trigger the release of the hormone oxytocin, which is thought to shape a mother’s behaviour. Hormones are not released in the same way during a caesarean section.

Obstetricians have long known that women who have a caesarean section sometimes have problems bonding with their baby.”

Jenny Hatch

The Natural Family BLOG
The Natural Family Company
“Healthy Families Make A Healthy World!”

Last night my friend Laura Shanley came over and we spent hours pouring over this little gem from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. We were smoking cigars and plotting and planning how to respond to this diatribe against homebirth…. After 7 hours of non-stop focused back and forth on how to prepare for this blog entry, I finally decided to just lay it on the line. Disbelief, sarcasm, and humor…the only way to deal with the Dinos from the Medical Establishment.
Actually Laura spent about four seconds forwarding me this little ditty and I spent about three minutes writing her back and writing my responses to the statement just took a little over 20 mintues. Don’t you just love the web??? Blogging, Email, and Links…a birth activists best friend.

Jenny Hatch

The Natural Family BLOG
The Natural Family Company
“Healthy Families Make A Healthy World!”
My responses to the ACOG 2007 Review are BOLDED and in ITALICS.
‘Lay’ Midwives & Home Birth
Troubling Trends in State Legislation:
■ Home birth bills on the rise.
■ Least qualified direct-entry midwives gaining licensure.
■ The midwives’ advantage.
■ ACOG on the defensive.
Home Birth Bills on the Rise
We are seeing an increase in ‘lay’ midwifery bills in the states. Backed by individual
State Midwifery Guilds and by the Midwives Alliance of North America (MANA) and its
credentialing unit, the North American Registry of Midwives (NARM), these bills are
being introduced – and passed – in more and more states.
For example, in Virginia in 2005, certified professional midwives (CPMs) finally
prevailed in what had been a decade-long campaign for licensure and legalization of
home birth. New Republican majorities in the Virginia General Assembly helped assure
the midwives’ victory. This year, it was the Missouri midwives who prevailed in their
perennial battle for licensure.
(A lawsuit has been filed to block the new Missouri law.)
We just can’t lose the one state in the union that has the most “Progressive” (bass ack ward) legislation on homebirth and was going to be our model for the rest of the country!!!
What’s behind this trend?
A legislative handbook developed by MANA provides insight into the midwives’
strategy. The 96-page handbook is full of lobbying advice, tactics and propaganda. It
includes a detailed step-by-step primer on getting a home birth bill passed.
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), an influential 2,400 member
organization of conservative state lawmakers, recently endorsed a model bill for the
licensure of certified professional midwives (CPMs) which was crafted by
MANA/NARM. Model legislation developed by ALEC gets wide attention in state
legislatures across the country.
The ‘lay’ midwives’ internal philosophy on state regulation and licensure appears to have
shifted. In the past, their position on licensure reflected the dominance of midwives who
did not want to be regulated, opposed state licensure, and defended within their
individual guilds the right to stay unlicensed and practice underground. While there are
midwives who still do not want to be regulated and who do not support the current
licensure campaign, for the most part you don’t see them speaking publicly against
licensure in the legislature or elsewhere. Even the nurse-midwives no longer can be
counted on to speak publicly against home birth or lesser trained midwives.

Continue reading “ACOG year in review statement 2007” →

Last night my dear friend Lauren and I attended the Boulder screening for the new birth film, Orgasmic Birth, in Boulder.
I was able to chat with my friends Laura Shanley and Sarah Clymer, who have been part of my birthing life for many years, and meet Lauras Daughter, Joy Shanley, who is a model and more beautiful in person than she is in print.
My friend Lauren is not a birth junkie like so many of us who attended and it was so fun to watch the film through her eyes. She just wept as each child was born, and at certain points in the film grabbed my arm, and just looked into my eyes with eternal understanding in the depths of her being.
We have had several conversations about birth over the years and I have tried to explain to her several times why I am a birth activist. Most of our birth chats ended with me feeling somewhat frustrated that she was not really hearing what I was trying to say, and her kind, but firm dismissal that home birth was fine for me, but it was not really her thing.
Our friendship is tied up in our love for Jesus Christ, music, and a deep desire to see high quality musical theatre produced in Boulder County. Lauren was one of the few who attended my 40th birthday party where I had obtained and shared a copy of The Business of Being Born with my friends. Although I had invited many, many friends to this party, most were not interested in hearing what Ricki Lake had to say about birth, and Lauren left early before the movie was even half way over.
I was thrilled when she said she would attend the Orgasmic Birth Screening with me. She did admit that she and her husband had a few good laughs before I picked her up. Greg said to her, “What ELSE don’t I know about Jenny???” He is a lovable liberal, and she has not shared with him my political conservative activism and I’ve been vague about my political views when we get together socially. I’ve learned with new friends over the years that I have to be somewhat gentle and a little bit circumspect as I share with them my political and activist sides.
Certain people have warmed to my birth activism but shudder in horror when they realize I am a Neo-Con. Others have loved my political involvement but don’t get why our family eats organic food and stay away from doctors, drugs, and hospitals.
I figured Lauren was grown up enought to “get” the movie and understand the implications of how truly revolutionary and threatening it is to the medical status quo.
I was unprepared for her sheer emotional and spiritual response as she continued to weep when we went out to the car and drove home. She told me that she was the most touched by the mother in the film who was a sexual abuse survivor, who shared the fact that her home birth helped her to heal from past hurts and gave her a new focus and view as a woman and as a Mother.
Because I have also experienced the tremendous power that fills a womans heart when she thrusts off her abusive past and grasps her spiritual strength as a woman capable of birthing a child without anyone telling her how to do it, that portion of the movie also touched me deeply.
I particularly enjoyed meeting Debra Pascali-Bonaro, the director and producer of the film. And hearing the back story of how the film was produced and directed, as well as how it is currently being promoted. I took a couple of pictures with my digital camera.

Debra spent some quality time explaining why she chose the title that she did, and also shared how the film is being received by film festivals around the world. She will be on The View, 20/20, and Dr. Phil has been calling – so we should see some great birth information in the media over the next few months. I have no doubt that ACOG is freaking that yet another popular film is making its way around the globe and expect a full frontal assault from the pathetic losers who make up that organization. Debra shared the fact that the AMA has bumped the outlawing of home birth up to number two on their list of legislative goals.
Can anyone spell DESPERATION???

The most touching story that Debra shared was when she was talking about people who had been touched by the movie who were not a part of her original target audience. She said she made the film for young people; seniors in high school and college students. But when a obstetrician from South America asked to show the film at a medical conference for his colleagues she readily agreed to let him. He told her that when the movie was over the audience was silent, no applause…nothing. Then he turned up the lights and realized that the doctors were crying. He told her that they all felt a deep desire to normalize birth on a continent that has some of the highest c-section rates in the world.
I wonder if the bullies and assassins of the New World Order will let them try to change the birth machine with its various tentacles and webs of deceit and control infesting every corner of the globe. I guess if a whole group of doctors make the decision to dump the medical birth model, they can’t kill/discredit/threaten all of them… can they???
After Deborah was finished with her presentation, Laura and I went up to talk to her. I took this picture of them meeting for the first time.

Then I handed the camera to Laura and she took a picture of Debra and I:

As we left the event, Lauren took a picture of Laura and I in the lobby:

Laura and I thought it was fun that the Business of Being Born came out on my 40th birthday and this movie was shown in our home town on her 51st birthday. It was fun to celebrate our birthdays with these two amazing and timely films. I look forward to many wonderful films in the future that will help educate and inspire the mothers and fathers who will be birthing the next few generations of babes during these perilous times when the power is so strongly grasped by those doctors who earn the money, reputations, and control off of the wombs of the innocent in our society.
It will be fun to watch that whole behemoth come crashing down as truth floods the earth.
Jenny Hatch

I’m planning to attend this screening with some friends tomorow! This is the information that will rock the medical establishment and turn the allopathic birth world upside down. It is time for the families of the world to understand the potential for birth to strengthen marriages, gently and happily welcome babies, and ecstatically reach our potential as sexual beings. I can’t wait to see it!
Jenny Hatch
Boulder Orgasmic Birth Screening
When: Wednesday September 3rd, 2008
Please join us for a pre-screening reception, doors open at 5:30pm.
Screening starts at 7:00pm and will be followed by a question and answer session with the filmmaker Debra Pascali-Bonaro.
Advanced ticket purchase is recommended as space is limited and this is sure to be a popular event.
$15 purchased in advance and $17 at the door the day of the event.
Nomad Theater
http://www.nomadstage.com
1410 Quince Ave
Boulder, Colorado 80306
Babies in arms or slings welcome.

Continue reading “Belly Bliss: Orgasmic Birth Documentary Screening in Boulder Tomorow!” →

Abbotsford, B.C. woman gives birth to 18th child
Really sweet story.
Jenny Hatch