I support homebirth but…
There has been a tragedy in the Australian Homebirth community. A young mother has died in hospital when she transferred after the birth of her second child.
It’s the first Homebirth maternal death in Victoria in over 15 years.
It truly is tragic and my heart goes out to her family at this truly awful time.
True to form the Australian media are having an absolute field day with it from calling for homebirths to be banned to printing misleading and inaccurate ‘details’ in order to push their anti-Homebirth agenda.
But it’s not just the media.
Many members of the public are saying things like…
“I support homebirth but only with a qualified midwife,”
“I support homebirth but only if you live within a certain distance of a major hospital,”
“I support homebirth but only for low risk births,”
Or
“I support homebirth but only if it’s been approved by an OB.”
Conditional support is not true support.
It’s like saying, “sure you can get a hair cut but only if you get a bowl cut, anything else should be outlawed.”
There is a lot of fear surrounding homebirth and birth in general. I believe it’s because Homebirth is so ‘out there’ and ‘different’ that it couldn’t possibly be safe. It’s because we that hospitals are safe places and doctors can always save the day that something we deem scary could be deadly if done without them.
Yet on average 20 women a year die in births in hospital. The death after a Homebirth (which happened in hospital anyway) is the first in 15 years. I’m no mathematician but that would tell me that women die in hospital too, right? So when a woman dies after a planned Homebirth then all births at home must be outlawed, but when a woman dies in the hospital then all women must go to hospital because that’s the safest place? That logic doesn’t make sense to me. You can find out more statistics about birth in Australia at this website.
I support all women’s choices during birth.
Whether it be in hospital or at home, with or without medical assistance, every woman has the right to chose.
Of all the planned homebirths I’ve known about or read about I’ve never seen anyone say “I don’t care about mine or my baby’s life, I’m going to pop this baby out at home so there *raspberries*”
No one cares more about their babies then their mother. No one is birthing at home for the candles and the panpipes. All the homebirthers I know do it because they believe that it is best for their families.
That is why I support their choices because the choices are not mine to make.
I don’t always agree with every choice my friends make but at the end of the day I stand beside them. That is support.
I am not linking articles about the recent death in Victoria, it has had enough coverage. But here is a candle for her and her babies, may there be light in the darkness.
