Premature babies….

Everyone in the medical profession is always scratching their heads wondering what is up with all these preemie babies….
They used to scream…Every woman needs prenatal care…then this problem will be solved. If only all women would come to us for help, this prematurity problem would simply disapear!
Know what? More women than ever get prenatal care in this country, according to the CDC in 2003, 84% of women in America received first trimester prenatal care, and only 3.5% of women received late or no care. And yet the number of babies being born early still continues to climb.
I was one of the women in 2002 who received little or no care. I saw my MD once in the 7th month of my pregnancy. For the rest of my “care” I provided myself with what I believed would give us the best outcome. This was mostly care in the form of eating the Brewer Diet PERFECTLY, and getting prenatal massage, which we paid for out of pocket.
My therapist would come to my home, set up her table in my bedroom and give me a 90 minute massage. She had been specially trained in prenatal massage and was supportive of our decision to birth alone and at home. It was a treat to work with her during my pregnancy. No shaming, no guilt, no fear, and no paranoia.
I did work with some exceptional doctors during my first three pregnancies, and they were kind people who were working hard to help babies thrive, but not once during my many prenatal visits was I EVER asked what I was eating.
The Medical Professionals have a vested interest in parents remaining ignorant about proper nutritional needs for pregnant women. If parents were truly educated on prenatal nutrition, the whole system would collapse and tens of thousands of people would be out of work.
If you are interested in this topic, please take a few minutes to peruse the blue ribbon baby web site that the late Dr. Tom Brewer put together before he died last year. For some interesting reads go here, here, and here.
“It is a fact that nobody knows why Karen developed MTLP; not a soul in her own hospital. They could only chide her: “Why Karen, you had one of the worst cases of pre-eclampsia we’ve seen in this hospital in months.” And her baby ended up with RDS, a patient in her own neonatal intensive care unit!
What will it take to bring light into this darkness of USA obstetrics? The role of protein-calorie deficiency in etiology of MTLP was clearly recognized by Ross at Duke and Strauss at Harvard in 1935. Yet U.S.A. obstetrical and nutrition scientists rigidly reject this thesis in favor of the “NOTHING IS KNOWN’ position. We must let the people know!”
Tom Brewer, M.D.

What Is A Good, Nutritious, Balanced Diet?
Every day of the week, you and your baby must have:
One quart (4 cups) of milk. Any kind will do: whole milk, low fat, skim, powdered, or buttermilk. If you do not like milk, you can substitute one cup of yogurt for each cup of milk.
Two eggs.
One or two servings of fish, shellfish, chicken or turkey, lean beef, veal, lamb, pork, liver or kidney.
Alternative combinations include:
Rice with beans, cheese, sesame, milk
Cornmeal with beans, cheese, tofu, milk.
Beans with rice, bulgur, cornmeal, wheat noodles sesame seeds, milk.
Peanuts with: sunflower seeds, milk.
Whole wheat bread or noodles with: beans, cheese, peanut butter, milk, tofu.
For each serving of meat, you can substitute these quantities of cheese:
Brick 4 oz. Longhorn 3 oz.
Camembert 6 oz. Muenster 4 oz.
Cheddar 3 oz. Monterey Jack 4 oz.
Cottage 6 oz. Swiss 3 oz.
One or two servings of fresh, green, leafy vegetables: mustard, beet, collard, dandelion or turnip greens, spinach, lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, kale, Swiss chard.
Five servings of whole grain breads, rolls, cereals or pancakes: wheatena, 100% bran flakes, granola, shredded wheat, wheat germ, oatmeal, buckwheat or whole wheat pancakes, corn bread, corn tortillas, corn or bran or whole wheat muffins, waffles, brown rice.
Two choices from: a whole potato (any style), large green pepper, grapefruit, lemon, lime, papaya, tomato (one piece of fruit, or one large glass of juice).
Three pats of butter.
Also include in your diet, in addition to the above (i.e., don’t count one food in two categories):
A yellow- or orange-colored vegetable or fruit five times a week.
Liver once a week, if you like it.
Table salt: SALT YOUR FOOD TO TASTE
Water: Drink to thirst.
It is not healthy for you and your unborn baby to go even 24 hours without good food!
Misinformation
I was a certified Bradly Childbirth teacher for eight years and so I am biased towards this method of childbirth prep and I believe if a couple will take the time and the energy to learn this form of childbirth, read the books, practice the techniques, eat the Brewer Diet, and give birth at home, they will have an amazing experience welcoming a large healthy child, born at 40+ weeks and large enough to care for from day one without any professional help.
Many of the women I know who are into this lifestyle have the issue of those babies not wanting to be born at 40 weeks. They are so happy gestating, they don’t want to leave the womb. My longest pregnancy was 45 weeks! Andy just wanted to stay put and cook a few weeks longer!
The bible has an interesting scripture on this topic. When Jacob was blessing his children before he died at the end of the book of Genesis, he gave Joseph a wonderful promise. He said in Genesis 49:25 “Even by the God of thy Father, who shall help thee; and by the almighty, who shall bless thee with blessings from Heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth under, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb.”
I believe the greatest blessing from Heaven are blessings of the breast and of the womb.

Ben one week old, born at 42 week and 3 days after a six hour labor of love AT HOME!
Heavenly Father can give mighty miracles in regards to healing the sick, especially if complete faith in Jesus Christ is exercised, but Jesus Christ told us faith without works is dead, I believe if Mothers will take on the “work” of nourishing their bodies properly during pregnancy, they will experience the great blessing of building a healthy child and then having the reserves and resources to breastfeed that child.
Jenny Hatch
UPDATE:
Chat at Free Republic on this topic

My herb garden is growing really well this season, and yesterday I steeped up my first cup of Fresh Raspberry Leaf Tea. It was yummy!

You only need a small handful of leaves to make one cup of tea

Distress the tea leaves by crushing them in your hand and then tearing them into a tea mug

Pour boiling water over the tea and enjoy when it has cooled!

First raspberries of the season!

Raspberry leaves next to my herb planter

My two favorite cooking herbs – Rosemary and Basil
When I was expecting my oldest child in 1988 I read about the marvelous effect raspberry tea has on labor. I steeped up a concentrated thermos full of this wonderful tea and added in a couple tablespoons of honey for use as a labor drink while giving birth to my daughter. When I arrived at the hospital the nurses would not let me drink anything for a couple of hours. (I sadly had chosen to give birth to my daughter Michelle at a high risk detroit hospital that had a 50% c-section rate in the late 80’s) When my doctor arrived at the hospital he was mad at me for not allowing the staff to do contuous fetal monitoring. My labor was stalled and I had been fighting with the staff for hours on various issues.
When I asked the doctor for permission to drink my tea, he said, “oh she can have her tea…sure”.
And in reverence to all of the medical gods, the nurses bowed down low and “allowed” my husband to take my very strong, very powerful tea out of our bag, heat it up in a microwave, and hand it ceremoniously to me. I glugged down a quart of this tea, and then….stand back people this first time Momma is GIVING BIRTH!
Within a couple minutes of drinking the tea, I was in transition, then smoothly moved over to a couple hours of pushing, and what the heck do you know? My eight pound nine ounce daughter Michelle was born magically without induction, no epidural, no forceps, no episiotomy, and NO PAIN!

Expecting Michelle in 1988
I could feel the change that came over my body when the nutrients in that tea started moving through my system. I have been drinking the tea ever since. I asked a friend in my ward if I could have a couple raspberry starts from his amazing garden a few years ago and started my own raspberry patch by our back porch. (Thanks Brother Allred!)
Jenny Hatch

Every once in a while I like to go into the Web site for the CDC (Center for Disease control) and read up on their birth statistics.
The people at CDC do an excellent job of tracking all of the vital information in our country and then covering for the Medical Profession and pharma companies by telling us how fat we are as Americans, the skyrocketing diabetes rates, and that we like to sit on our bums, and watch television and eat junk food.
Nobody at CDC ever seems to connect Anti-depressant use as a potential cause for the diabetes outbreak in our nation, or that obesity is a “connect the dots” reality for those who gum up their systems with the toxic chemicals that form the ingredients for anti-depressants. No, what we get from the government is the green light for anti-depressants to now be manufactured generically, which will ensure many more Americans start to wend their way down the obesity, heart disease, diabetic, and lethargic side of the path.
The reason I go into the Birth section of the site is simply because I am often curious to know what’s up with the birth trends. It has been the habit of the CDC for the past few years since its web site really started to rock n roll, to publish preliminary data on birth, oh, usually a couple months after any given years stats are compiled.
The final report for 2002 was published in December of 2003.
The final report for 2001 was published in December of 2002.
The final report for 2000 was published in February of 2002.
My questions is, why has the CDC failed to publish a preliminary report on 2005???
We are well into the 2006 season for birth in America, and in the recent past, 2002 and 2003, not only was the preliminary report released within 12 months, but the final report was released as well.
The CDC released the preliminary 2004 data in December of 2005, but it is now seven months later and we still have yet to see a final report.
I wonder why this is?
The CDC didn’t seem to have a problem releasing preliminary data on the 2002 statistics within six months. I can only assume the computers today are faster and more equipped to process this sort of data in a timely way. Question is…Why the delay? Why the delay in the final report being published for 2004? And why the delay for the preliminary data being published for 2005?
My gut feeling is simply that they are racking their brains trying to come up with some logical no fault reason that the C-section rate has gone up yet another 4 or 5 percent in the past year. (Or did it go up a shocking 8 or 9 percent and they have no idea what to say?)
Lawsuits and evil trial lawyers? No we spun that in 2002. Women want them and are too posh to push? No, that was the message in 2003.

See, Hear, and Speak No Evil
Uh… doctors, nurses, and hospitals want them?? And every single company that has a financial tie to women having C-sections want them??? Ding ding ding, I think we have a winner.
Think about it. If you were a nurse, would you like to sit monitoring a woman in labor for 12, 18, or 24 hours? Or would you prefer to help that same mother schedule a C-section and have the baby out in less than an hour if a planned section, or less than a minute if a crash section?
If you were a doctor would you like to schedule 6 to 10 sections on any given day, or wait for those same women to spontaneously give birth with the many stops and starts of a natural labor? Perhaps disrupting your family life or golf game?
If you were a hospital administrator would you like to have the thousands of dollars a c-section magically produces in less than an hour, with dozens of staff members happily employed doing what they do best, and all those beds in the NICU filled with babies, momma resting nicely for a couple days while she recovers from a knife to her belly? $$$ cha ching $$$ cha ching…the money just keeps rolling in.
This is simply a no brainer from the medical perspective.
Recently I was talking to a fellow Bradley Childbirth teacher at a track meet. Our daughters were competing while we reconnected and chatted for a half hour or so. We both taught Natural Birth in our homes in the early 90’s here in Boulder County where I live, and became friends through our local teachers support group. I stopped teaching ten years ago in 1996 and focused all of my energies on writing and online promotion of Unassisted Childbirth. She is teaching childbirth at a local hospital. I asked her what she thought of what’s happening in birth right now.
She told me the biggest change in the past few years has been the level of fear. The couples are really afraid to give birth. She also told me that the nurses she works with are “excited” for the C-section rate to go up. Some experts are predicting the section rate to double in the next generation.
“Why are they excited?” I asked her.
“It makes their work easier,” was her reply.
And it does. The question is, what will be the repercussions on our society if most of the babies in America are born under an anesthetic haze? And what impact will this drugging of American Mothers and Babies right at the time they are supposed to be lovingly bonding with each other mean for our connectedness as families?
The Apostle Paul desribed the perilous times of the latter days in 2 Timothy 3:3 as modern families being without Natural Affection.

Do we really understand what is lost when we casually cut into the belly of a new mom and extract her child from her womb?
I believe if we did, our society would stop at nothing to promote what is normal and natural in childbirth.
Jenny Hatch
UPDATE:
ICAN – Coerced surgery major cause of rise in C-sections

This entry is an excerpt from the book I wrote in 2003 titled, A Lotus Birth
“Here we are at eight weeks post partum. Ben has been a joy and we are anticipating happy Christmas and New Years celebrations. With the success of our beautiful unassisted birth, I have been thinking much of past failures.
We have had many failures in our married life. We have had blunders of misjudgment, looking beyond the mark, and attempting to run faster than we had strength. A few specific problems that come to mind are overwhelming debt, a seven year old that had not been taught to read, who was being persecuted by peers for her deficiencies, and of course, our botched unassisted birth in 1996.
We have had some people criticize and judge us for these failures and it has been difficult to bear the load of shame and guilt, especially regarding those that pertain to our children.
I would like to comment on failure….
It was Christmas time eight years ago when I traveled home with Jeff to spend the holidays with my family. I had just given Paul my ultimatum that if he wanted to have any more children with me we would be birthing at home and alone.
When I walked into my parent’s home the tension around me was like a physical force. One of my brothers had told my family that I had drawn a line in the sand about birth with my husband and they had taken it as evidence that I was going crazy again. Having suffered from post partum psychosis after my first baby, I didn’t have too much credibility as a sane person and my family saw my obsession with unschooling, not vaccinating, and unassisted birth as evidence that I was going crazy again.
I remember talking with my siblings one afternoon about these topics. We were sitting in my parent’s living room. Most of us were married with young children and babies.
As we talked, the conversation became heated as I attempted to articulate what was in my heart to them. I had not yet coined the term Family Sovereignty, and I was passionately trying to convey the jumble of ideas and words that were rolling around in my head and on my tongue about family freedom.
My brother, who was in Law school at the time, was expressing his dismay at the idea of homeschool and the concept of un-schooling in particular and said something along the lines of, “well, who is going to hold these parents accountable if they fail? I mean, what if their children grow up as illiterate, non-contributing members of society?”
As I tried to defend my supposedly indefensible position and my own words were twisted and used against me during our debate, I just gave up in frustration with the words, “We parents are fed up with being bullied into practices and procedures that we know are harmful to our children and we are just not going to take it anymore.”
I felt a condescending tolerance from my siblings as we finished up the debate. Our parents had raised us to speak our minds and share opinions and insights in a thoughtful and articulate way. Always respecting the views of others even if they seemed wacky.
But at the end of this conversation, I felt like I had poorly communicated what was then rising up in my soul like a tidal wave of feeling. I felt as if my family was laughing at me for my heartfelt beliefs. But it went beyond laughter a few days later when my parents told me they thought I should get my tubes tied and not have any more children. My mother said she believed that I had been brainwashed by Laura Shanley and they were very concerned that I was going to ruin my marriage.
No one seemed concerned about my marriage being ruined if I had another hospital birth. No one seemed to understand that the fully documented incompetence of the public schools could potentially ruin my children academically. No one seemed to care that my children could be permanently damaged by being vaccinated.
This heated family debate was a turning point for me. I looked inward and spent the next few years reading, teaching childbirth, and formulating in my own mind the “debate”.
To me, the heart of these issues was my brother’s question. “Who is going to hold these parent’s accountable if they fail, and if society has a bunch of illiterate, sickly, unproductive, do-nothings to deal with who is going to “FORCE” these non-conformist parents to conform to societal standards of parenting in regards to birth, education and health care?”
Who indeed? I have to laugh thinking of the medical profession, the education establishment, and the governmental powers that be judging me when they are accountable to NO ONE and who research has shown are controlled and manipulated by the most powerful global companies on the earth.
Companies that live and prosper off the illiteracy, poverty, ignorance, and ill health of families the world over. I have a vested interest in the health and intelligence of my children for they will be raising my grandchildren.
I have yet to meet the parent in my home birthing, home schooling world who has the attitude, “I want to raise a bunch of sickly idiots who have no ability to care for themselves and have nothing to contribute to society.”
It just has not happened.
However, based upon my interactions with various institutions, I am not so certain that others interest in my family goes much beyond the dollars attached to my womb, my children, and my family being involved in their money making schemes.
The only way to break up the monopolies in health care and education is for enlightened parents to simply reject what they have to offer us and forge a different path.
I am nursing my sweet boy as I type this and as I look into his crystal clear blue eyes, see his smiling face and think of the daily work of nourishing, cleansing, and balancing my body with nutrition, exercise, and vast amounts of spiritual food in order to nourish him, I feel somewhat angry at those professionals who would accuse me of being a neglectful parent because I reject the overpriced birth services and educational theories and practices they would force/entice/coerce me to use.
Failure? I am less afraid of failure than I am of being deprived of my right to fail.
In a free society WE MUST HAVE THE RIGHT TO FAIL IN ORDER TO SUCCEED!!!
We cannot have it any other way. The law of opposites is not a theory, it is not wishful thinking, it is THE LAW that governs the universe.
I want to share a long passage from the Book of Mormon because it is the absolute best articulation of this truth that I have ever come across…
Lehi speaking to his son Jacob….
“For it must needs be that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my first born in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility.
Wherefore it must needs have been created for a thing of naught; wherefore there would have been no purpose in the end of its creation. Wherefore this thing must needs destroy the wisdom of God and his eternal purposes, and also the power, and the mercy, and the justice of God.
And if ye say there is no law, ye shall also say there is no sin. If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness. And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness. And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither is the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished away.
And now my sons, I speak unto you these things for your profit and learning; for there is a God, and he hath created all things, both the heavens and the earth, and all things that in them are, both things to act and things to be acted upon.
And to bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, after he had created our first parents, and the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and in fine, all things which are created, it must needs be that there was an opposition; even the forbidden fruit in opposition to the tree of life; the one being sweet and the other bitter.
Wherefore the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.
And I lehi, according to the things which I have read, must needs suppose that an angel of God, according to that which is written, had fallen from heaven; wherefore, he became a devil, having sought that which was evil before God.
And because he had fallen from heaven, and had become miserable forever, he sought also the misery of all mankind. Wherefore, he said unto Eve, yea, even that old serpent who is the devil, who is the father of all lies, wherefore he said: Partake of the forbidden fruit, and ye shall not die, but ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil.
And After Adam and Eve had partaken of the forbidden fruit they were driven out of the garden of Eden to till the earth.
And they have brought forth children, yea, even the family of all the earth.
And the days of the children of men were prolonged, according to the will of God, that they might repent while still in the flesh; wherefore, their state became a state of probation, and their time was lengthened, according to the commandments which the Lord God gave unto the children of men. For he gave commandment that all men must repent; for he showed unto all men that they were lost, because of the transgression of their parents.
And now behold, if Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the Garden of Eden. And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever and had no end.
And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.
But behold all things have been done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things.
ADAM FELL THAT MEN MIGHT BE; AND MEN ARE THAT THEY MIGHT HAVE JOY!
And the Messiah cometh in the fullness of time, that he may redeem the children of men from the fall. And because that they are redeemed from the fall they have become free forever, knowing good from evil; to act for themselves and not to be acted upon, save it be by the punishment of the law at the great and last day, according to the commandments which God hath given.
Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself.
And now my sons, I would that ye should look to that great Mediator, and hearken unto his great commandments; and be faithful unto his words, and choose eternal life, according to the will of his Holy Spirit;
And not choose eternal death, according to the will of the flesh and the evil which is therein, which giveth the spirit of the devil power to captivate, to bring you down to hell, that he may reign over you in his own kingdom.
I have spoken these few words unto you all, my sons, in the last days of my probation, and I have chosen the good part, according to the words of the prophet. And I have none other object save it be the everlasting welfare of your souls. Amen.”
2 Nephi 2:11-30

Our family one week after Ben was born
I believe we are here on the earth to learn to know good from evil. The main way we learn to know the difference is by our experiences in life. If we are forced to only live the kind of life that the corporate powers that be dictate is acceptable to them and the rest of society, then we are living a lie, and are being compelled to live the materialistic chemical lifestyle that makes lots of money for those in power, but leaves the family deprived of ultimate health, intelligence, and freedom, not to mention, financial stability.
Death…
ultimately in life, especially the sovereign life that we have chosen to live, the greatest fear for parents is the fear of death.
I had a year of death in 2001.
Early that year a dear LDS friend died of a bacterial infection after a miscarriage. She was the mother of five home schooled children, was a LLL leader, and hombirther. I can’t tell you how rare it is for me to become friends in my community with a Mormon mother who is into this lifestyle. We met at our Friday homeschool support group. Our friendship was immediate and I felt such a kinship with Michelle.
When she died, I was left spinning emotionally. I could not understand why Heavenly Father would allow this sweet and perfect mother to die so needlessly when she had so many young children to nurture.
I just saw her children last Friday at our Christmas party. Her husband has continued to homeschool and work from home – fortunately he had a computer job that enabled him to stay home – and while the whole family still looks a little sad, they are going on with life.
The summer after Michelle died three older ladies who were suffering with cancer died. I was close to one of these church friends and while the deaths were not unanticipated, they were losses just the same.
At the end of the summer I received word that my brother Dave had died. I was so dumbfounded and shocked that he was gone that I went into an emotional tail spin that only really stopped the month I conceived Ben last January.
Because of these five deaths last year I was forced to spend many hours trying to settle things in my own mind about life and death and the purpose of our time here on earth. I don’t have all the answers regarding death, but I do know that a fear of death is the one great impediment to parents claiming their sovereignty in regards to home birth.
The question we all have to ask as we prepare to birth alone at home is this, “Should we have the “failure” experience of our child dying, or even dying ourselves as mothers, does this mean that we have to throw all of these ideals out like the proverbial baby with the bathwater? Or in the name of “sovereignty” do we muster our faith and take the leap that lands us safely into the world of Freedom?”
We must have the right to fail. Fail at birth, fail at breastfeeding, fail at educating, fail at anything and everything we try….for if we don’t we are nothing more than slaves.
Those are the thought in my head this beautiful December day.

Ben a few hours after he was born.
Love, Jenny
Jenny Hatch
This was an excerpt from my book A Lotus Birth, which can be purchased here. Please note that this is an E-Book and you will not receive anything in the mail when you purchase it. The book will simply open as a file that you can read on your computer or download to print.

Birthin’ and Readin’ (Click on the image to read the article)
Doctors puzzled by the rise in C-setion rates???
“Public health officials are puzzling over a medical mystery — why thousands of young, healthy women facing low risk births are opting instead to deliver by Caesarean section.”

Maybe it is because no one in the Medical Profession is taking the time to teach these women the FACTS about Caesarean Delivery.
“In 2004, nearly 13 percent of all C-sections in Massachusetts were performed on women under the age of 30 giving birth to their first child — considered the lowest-risk birth group.”
MMMmmmmh I wonder what is going on here. This article makes me think of recent musings on the part of certain educrats wondering why the people of America are having such a difficult time reading….All these professionals, scratching their heads wondering…why, what could be causing it? Children can’t read, and the C-Section rate is out of control….hmmmmm
“Health officials say they can’t fully explain way, but suggest a range of possible explanations, from last minute medical complications to worries about malpractice and fears of a ruptured uterus to women asking for the surgery for their own reasons.”
If you people are so worried about rupture, why do you keep giving pregnant women Cytotec to induce labor???
“There are a substantial number of women with no discernible risk having C-sections,” said Bruce Cohen, director of research and epidemiology for the Department of Public Health.
“The rise in C-sections among young, healthy women mirror an overall rise in the procedure in Massachusetts, which hit an all-time high in 2004, the most recent year for which statistics are available.”
“In the past seven years the rate of C-sections has climbed from 21 percent of births in Massachusetts to 31 percent — 7 percent higher than the national average. Of 22,892 C-sections in Massachusetts in 2004, 2,948 involved lowest risk pregnancies.”
“One reason for the rise in C-sections is malpractice insurance, according to Ronald Burkman, chairman of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield.”
“A single claim can result in a $30,000-a-year hike in insurance rates, he said.”
Boo Hoo Hoo
“Another factor is the growing acceptance that C-sections are nearly as safe as vaginal births, he said.”
WHO is fueling that acceptance???
“Twenty years ago, a woman asking for a C-section without a pressing medical reason would likely be talked out of it by her doctor, Burkman said. Today, doctors are more willing to agree”.
WHY???
“Differences in risks between C-sections and vaginal births are not huge for the first (birth) so it has become more acceptable,” he said.
Differences in Birth “NOT HUGE???” Lie.
“For some working women, the chance to schedule a delivery rather than waiting to go into labor can be reason enough for opting for a C-section, he said. There are also solid medical reasons for C-sections, including the age of the mother, size of the baby and if it is a multiple birth.”
“Mary Barger, director of the midwifery education program at the Boston University School of Public Health, credits the rise of C-sections on what she calls a “cultural shift.”
“As C-sections became safer, they also became a kind of routine default option, she said.”
“Even so, she said, the vast number of C-sections have some medical explanation.”
“I think women coming in and requesting a C-section early in pregnancy even when they are healthy are still quite rare in Massachusetts.”
“Even though C-sections are relatively safe,”
LIE, LIE, and LIE!!
CULTURAL SHIFT???
SAFER???
MEDICAL EXPLANATION???
“There are reasons to encourage women to deliver vaginally, she said. Hospitals with midwife programs tend to have lower numbers of C-sections.”
“The question is how safe is safe?” she said. “Even though death is very rare, your chance of dying from a C-section is three to six times higher than a vaginal birth.”
Yeah, and lets all keep a close eye on the maternal mortality rate….as the C-section rate goes up, so does the number of mothers who die giving birth.
“The mystery isn’t limited to Massachusetts.”
What mystery??? Birth activists have been screaming for years that this is exactly what was going to happen, the question is when are American Consumers going to say “enough is enough!!!”
“Nationally, the rate of C-sections has climbed to an all-time high, with nearly 1.2 million C-sections performed in 2004, accounting for 29.1 percent of all births that year, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. In 1970, the national rate was 5 percent.”
Yeah, and hospitals would conduct an internal inquiry if the rate went over 5% to find out why the rate was SO HIGH!!
“The C-section rate increased nationally even among healthy, first-time pregnancies with a full-term, single child — that despite a 2000 national public health goal of reducing the C-section rate for such births to 15 percent by 2010. The rate now is about 24 percent.”
LIE – it is 29% and climbing…
I don’t know who the moron is at the AP who wrote this story, but they just said the rate was 29%, and then finished the article with the lie, “the rate is about 24%. So which is it??? The Medical Profession is shaking in their boots, because THEY KNOW the 2005 stats are being compiled as we speak and that when the CDC publishes the FACT that the rate has jumped another 5 or 7% IN ONE YEAR, they know they are going to have a problem on their hands in terms of Public Relations. And so the spinning, spinning, spinning has started…
Who is going to blow this story out of the water??? Come on Bloggers, take your heads out of the sand, it is time to educate our people on the true risks of C-sections to both Mother and Baby, and start holding our medical profession accountable.
WHO has the incentive to turn things around??? Only mothers and father fed up with being railroaded into surgery.

Jenny Hatch
Read the Introduction to this Blog!
UPDATE:
OK, I read through this article again, and realized that the writer was refering to the C-section rate for healthy first time mothers when they said 24%. My apologies to the author for the name calling, however, the emotion and angst that motivated me to write this Blog post are still a part of my passion to see mothers and babies have a better start than what is currently being shoved on them by the Obstetricians.