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Post by AustinAvery on Jun 23, 2009 11:38:16 GMT -5
New here - came over from the FJ blog. I am one of the snarkers... and proudly so. Sorry I'm missing something: what is the FJ blog?
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calulu
Junior Member
Posts: 76
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Post by calulu on Jun 23, 2009 11:39:58 GMT -5
I think you hit it on the head, it is 'group think', which, as we all know from extreme examples like Hale-Bopp and Hitler, can be very dangerous.
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Post by jemand on Jun 23, 2009 11:41:45 GMT -5
New here - came over from the FJ blog. I am one of the snarkers... and proudly so. Sorry I'm missing something: what is the FJ blog? I believe it is "free Jinger" because she seems to be one of the Duggar girls who may prefer to have more freedom of choice than she currently does.
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Post by yooper on Jun 23, 2009 11:43:32 GMT -5
It's awful, isn't it! So, so tragic. The sad and scary thing is, it's not just religious fundies doing this. If any of you have spent time at the forums at mothering.com, it is almost shunned to have a hospital birth. Heaven forbid you have a hospital birth with pain meds or other interventions. C-section is the ultimate in shunning. Planned c-section is even worse! I used to spend a lot of time there because I breastfeed my kids and for a while used cloth diapers. I was not able to birth my kids without a lot of help and boy, people there don't like that. I rarely hang out there anymore but it was almost like a competition, to see whose birth was the most crunchy and intervention-free. Scary stuff.
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Post by jemand on Jun 23, 2009 12:08:34 GMT -5
yooper, you can take anything to extremes, but the truth is that over-intervention causes a lot of problems with women who have no risk factors in their pregnancies... but it's very common many of them will have interventions such as induction, or C-sections, anyway. Those may be very necessary in some cases, but they ARE way overused in this country...
The US has an infant mortality rate nearly double other developed countries, and also higher maternal mortality rates-- but going along with that are vastly higher numbers if C-sections and inductions. It generally goes the doctor is impatient, wants to schedule a birth at a convenient hour for his schedule, starts the induction, something goes wrong, and then they do a C-section and "save the day."
But they ruin the year 'cuz often as not, a little patience and the baby would be fine, the mother would be fine, and there would have been no invasive abdominal surgery.
Yes, they can be LIFESAVING techniques, but people come to view them s having no inherent risk of their own, and fact is, they do. Sometimes the balance is to have a C-section anyway-- but it shouldn't be assumed that the C-section will not create it's own problems down the line, as I think it often is. I mean, look at Vykie, her first C-section was completely unnecessary, and much of her later pregnancy related health problems stemmed directly from that.
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Post by yooper on Jun 23, 2009 12:11:41 GMT -5
Jemand - I agree with you!!! It's just that people take things too far. I agree that there have been too many interventions... unnecessary c-sections, unnecessary inductions... all of that!
But please understand that some of us cannot birth without help. Some c-sections are necessary. I don't want to debate this, I agree with what you are saying. I'm just saying that there are people who take it too far.
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Post by jemand on Jun 23, 2009 12:22:42 GMT -5
Jemand - I agree with you!!! It's just that people take things too far. I agree that there have been too many interventions... unnecessary c-sections, unnecessary inductions... all of that! But please understand that some of us cannot birth without help. Some c-sections are necessary. I don't want to debate this, I agree with what you are saying. I'm just saying that there are people who take it too far. Of course! I think we are saying the same things!
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Post by yooper on Jun 23, 2009 12:32:50 GMT -5
Jemand - I agree with you!!! It's just that people take things too far. I agree that there have been too many interventions... unnecessary c-sections, unnecessary inductions... all of that! But please understand that some of us cannot birth without help. Some c-sections are necessary. I don't want to debate this, I agree with what you are saying. I'm just saying that there are people who take it too far. Of course! I think we are saying the same things! Yes, I think so too.
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Post by rosa on Jun 23, 2009 13:24:33 GMT -5
Yeah, i got that attitude too - not online, i was on bed rest wtih no internet for a chunk of my pregnancy - but afterwards a lot of people offered me judgemental sympathy for how "medicalized' my birth experience was - except, if you don't medicalize it, early-onset pre-eclampsia will KILL you. It has a hideous death rate in the developing world. I've noticed this weird pushback lately against breastfeeding advocacy, which strikes me as odd since such a minority actually breastfeed very long - but among the exact same circles that are heavily pro-breastfeeding there's a lot of anti-c-section guilting (which is really a mistake because really women who want VBAC or just to avoid c-sections need support and medical research at the hospital/institutional level, not on a personal how-you-should-do-it level) and all-organic food and a number of other issues that I'm not seeing any pushback on.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jun 23, 2009 13:29:03 GMT -5
Why do we as women guilt each other like this? Why can't we let each other make decisions? Why all the pressure to conform to this or that or the other standard? Honestly, we don't need men to oppress us, when we can do it quite well to ourselves.
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Post by jadehawk on Jun 23, 2009 14:35:42 GMT -5
bah, now I feel like I need to point out that this sort of intra-gender pressure is not unique to women, either.
Men pressure other men into conformity, as well. I actually read about an experiment performed by a (lesbian) woman once, to see how the men's world feels like. She dressed up as a guy and lived her life as a man for a while, and she reported that the amount of "keeping up appearances", mutual reinforcement of gender-stereotypes, etc. was immense and exhausting. I can't remember the exact wording, but she described it as being this tiny insecure person (insecure, because you were in constant competition with all other men), who was at all times forced to create and wear an impenetrable armor of macho self-confidence.
Anyway, the reason I bring this up is to point out that we as a society still suffer greatly from self-reinforcing gender-stereotyping. This is the legacy of patriarchy, that we still see human individuals as part of two groups which are competing against each other; and because of that, what one member of "your team" does seems to affect "your team"s chances at "winning". so we instantly feel the need to make people conform. This permeates every subject there is. On the women's side, there's: breastfeeding vs formula; natural birth vs. induced/voluntary c-sections; keeping your name vs. having your husband's name; being stiyled up& girly vs. being a tomboy On the men's side*, there's: "bringing home the bacon" vs. stay-at-home daddies; being macho vs. being "metrosexual"; being the strong shoulder to lean on vs. being in touch with one's feelings;
basically, the language of gender-warfare is keeping us from really creating choices, because we perceive some choices as "losing a battle". for example, 2nd generation feminists bad-mouthing women who chose to be stay-at-home moms, or to take their husband's last name, for fear of slipping back into a time when those where the ONLY options; or, conservative men pressuring each other into the "provider" role, for fear that stay-at-home dads will bring about times when those will be the only options for men. we need to get away from that thinking, and start thinking in terms of coexistence and cooperation, in terms of giving everyone the full range of options as well as the information necessary to choose the right options for themselves.
-----
*my experience of this side is somewhat limited, so the men on here are welcome to expand on this a bit :-p
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Post by krwordgazer on Jun 23, 2009 15:05:10 GMT -5
Good point, Jadehawk. Thank you.
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Post by phoenix on Jun 23, 2009 15:29:20 GMT -5
I’m just as livid as the rest of you. This reminds me of when I was expecting my last child/ren. Another QF mom was due shortly before me. She had “competent midwife” for her previous baby who after the delivery of that baby due to some complications told her she should see a physician if she were to have another child. But being hard core enough when she was expecting again went to “wacko midwife” who believed “medical deities” were akin to Baal etc. Well when the time came, things went badly and as mom was bleeding out on the kitchen floor with everyone praying something came over the husband –I remember him saying something like, “I didn’t want to lose my wife…” and he grabbed the phone to call 911. It was close but she made it.
So, my baby turned out to be “babies” (twins). I was seeing “competent midwife” who was respectful when I chose to transfer my care to an OB. Yes, “wacko midwife” and her husband tried to suggest to others that we needed to trust God blah blah.
I’m using this story to illustrate what I have come to call “half-thinking”. The husband above was able to override the programming enough to call 911. Vyckie was able to go to the hospital when her little guy was born. It was a good thing we went to an OB with the twins—it turned into a prolapsed cord/emergency C-section among other things. The whole QF/P thing is not always all or nothing. I believe many folks half-think and waffle for sometimes years. Then, for some of us, one day you can finally walk away.
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Post by buzzard on Jun 23, 2009 20:17:31 GMT -5
At the core of this whole issue is the "yet to be fully had" discussion on where this set of circumstances fits into our society as a whole. We, as a community, value life. Many of us have drastically differing views on when life begins. Thats fine - and I'm not trying to go there. The question that is left to be answered is: as a society, are we willing to allow more Carries and more Benniniahs to suffer the same fate?
When answering any question that requires a "balancing test" we must determine what it is that we are balancing. In this case, I believe it is the womans constitutionally protected right to choose what happens to her body vs. the right a child/fetus may have to live - even if that requires medical care contrary to a mother's choice. Its a tough one!
I will state, for the record, that I am pro choice. I do believe, though, that that "choice" is not absolute. I cannot accept that a legally protected entity emerges at the moment he takes his first breath and not a second before. As has been mentioned on other sites, we prosecute women for using drugs while pregnant and the like. That is because our society has determined that such reckless behavior is unreasonable in context with our values, regardless of the woman's right to her body. Perhaps this is because the woman had no "right" to use illegal drugs, or perhaps because of the harm to the fetus.
So, the true dilemna that needs to be hashed out within our legislative entities is - does a woman have a right to refuse ALL medical treatment even at the risk of a child's life? Does her right trump his? And when does "it" become "him"? These are DEEP and complex matters - these are politically incorrect questions. But they are essential questions to determine where we AS A SOCIETY take a stand for children.
I believe that a baby becomes a "baby" at viability. At the point the infant can reasonably survive outside his mother I believe he should be granted some rights of protection - the right to be born in a manner that is in HIS best interest.
One of the most distressing points in carri's story was where she referred to "her" birth. I posted over on FJ that this birth was NOT just "hers". It was his too.
I have no answers to give. They are well above my paygrade. But I think a start is to have an open discussion about what we really desire when it comes to bringing children into the world. If a woman wants to go unassisted, then fine - so long as she understands the risks and she has been checked out to ensure that the baby has a fighting chance. The thought of forcing women into stirrups scares me - but so do dead babies.
So sad...
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Post by Vyckie D. Garrison on Jun 23, 2009 22:35:38 GMT -5
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chloe
New Member
Posts: 37
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Post by chloe on Jun 23, 2009 22:41:14 GMT -5
Now I feel worse. I dug this out of one of Carri's old posts: "I watched last night on TLC twins by surprised and I was so blessed they had one women birthing at home with a midwife and another woman who had a double footling breech unassisted. I was amazed and inspired that I was able to watch that." Anyone want to forward that one to the TLC execs?
I also read an article this morning, written six or seven years ago, about the kinds of birth stories on TLC. They had one called "A Baby's Story" with all happy ending tales, always about middle class, almost exclusive white or asian families. Then they had an emergency room birth series--almost entirely featuring poor, teens, often minorities and/or drug addicted mothers. Few happy endings. These new shows are merely updated, slightly more subtle versions of the same.
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Post by luneargentee on Jun 23, 2009 23:59:53 GMT -5
The problem with the rejection of medical care in religious groups is because it affects women and children much more than men. Many more women and children die in these groups than men.
One of the reasons for all the intervention in birth in the U.S. is the poor prenatal care many women receive as a result of our horrible medical system. Insurance companies limit the number of visits, they limit the number of tests that can be done, they limit the doctors and hospitals in what they provide.
Doctors often resort to c-sections and forceps deliveries because they are worried about risks, including the risk of being sued. Chloe's post about the TLC shows brings this out. Poor women don't have medical care or have minimal government medical care. They often have poor diets. They can't afford or don't take vitamins during the pregnancy. They are more likely to be exposed to harmful conditions, including pollution. They are at greater risk.
IMHO, any woman who says she didn't know she was pregnant was in complete denial. There is an extremely small number of women who gain only a few pounds, continue to menstruate and don't suffer from morning sickness. Extremely small. Any time I am amazed at what people will believe, I remind myself about these women.
I'd totally fail the crunchy birth thing. I had an emergency c-section after two days of labor. The second pregnancy I chose a different OB/GYN and had a c-section scheduled a couple of months before I was due.
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Post by rosa on Jun 24, 2009 0:38:13 GMT -5
I just went and read that Broadsheet, and I have to say I'm on the side of the writer (i'm sorry, i couldn't wade through all the comments. Salon's just one step above a newspaper for their "moderation" policies.) I have to say not only do I not think unassisted home birth should be illegal, I think we shouldn't be prosecuting addicted mothers. The problem of women deciding their pastor or husband (excuse me, God) should be in charge of their birth isn't going to get better just because some *other* group of men decide she's not competent to be in charge of her own body.
But I was thinking - is there a way to put Unassisted Home Birth or any of those other key words on your blog so it's something people might find when they're looking for information about it? It should probably go in the FAQ, too, since it's apparently encouraged by QF types and it's something you tried to do, Vyckie.
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jlp
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Posts: 54
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Post by jlp on Jun 24, 2009 1:58:54 GMT -5
I always thought modern medicine was a gift from God. I just assumed all Christians felt that way. Guess I was wrong.
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Post by jadehawk on Jun 24, 2009 2:28:25 GMT -5
excellent article. you're getting quite famous
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anne2
New Member
Posts: 11
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Post by anne2 on Jun 24, 2009 4:33:39 GMT -5
New to posting here. Reading it all for a while. This is just heartbreaking. How awful for them. I see the Carrie blog is now down.
Do quiverful folk do their own dentistry too?
I was under pressure to not have an epidural by some quivering types in our old church. But I reasoned that I took a needle to have dental work done, why wouldn't I do the same for childbirth? I said that to them and they had no reply, but distanced themselves from me after that.
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calulu
Junior Member
Posts: 76
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Post by calulu on Jun 24, 2009 7:19:18 GMT -5
Well I almost regret writing that rant now. Fundamentalists have poured into the Free Jinger board willynilly to either try to point out the error of our ways and convert us to Jesus or to share in excruciatingly horrid detail their lives, births, and beliefs. I have to resist the urge to tell them to shut up every time I visit.
The problem with the Carri situation is the midwife imho. The bad midwife gave her misinformation, bad advice and antiquated treatment at a time when Carri seemed like she was quavering on what she should do. Midwives are not legally allowed to practice medicine or attend births in Indiana without the oversight of a MD or a registered nurse. It doesn't seem like her midwife was overseen by anyone or even had must training. Of all the people who's poor choices led to this tragedy it is the midwife who should be held legally culpable. If not for the crap info she was spoonfeeding Carri, Carri might have actually gone to a real doctor or nurse and had a safer birth experience.
The situation with Carri's midwife reminds me a great deal of the midwife experience of her own that Vyckie posted.
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Post by jemand on Jun 24, 2009 8:52:21 GMT -5
At the core of this whole issue is the "yet to be fully had" discussion on where this set of circumstances fits into our society as a whole. We, as a community, value life. Many of us have drastically differing views on when life begins. Thats fine - and I'm not trying to go there. The question that is left to be answered is: as a society, are we willing to allow more Carries and more Benniniahs to suffer the same fate? When answering any question that requires a "balancing test" we must determine what it is that we are balancing. In this case, I believe it is the womans constitutionally protected right to choose what happens to her body vs. the right a child/fetus may have to live - even if that requires medical care contrary to a mother's choice. Its a tough one! I will state, for the record, that I am pro choice. I do believe, though, that that "choice" is not absolute. I cannot accept that a legally protected entity emerges at the moment he takes his first breath and not a second before. As has been mentioned on other sites, we prosecute women for using drugs while pregnant and the like. That is because our society has determined that such reckless behavior is unreasonable in context with our values, regardless of the woman's right to her body. Perhaps this is because the woman had no "right" to use illegal drugs, or perhaps because of the harm to the fetus. So, the true dilemna that needs to be hashed out within our legislative entities is - does a woman have a right to refuse ALL medical treatment even at the risk of a child's life? Does her right trump his? And when does "it" become "him"? These are DEEP and complex matters - these are politically incorrect questions. But they are essential questions to determine where we AS A SOCIETY take a stand for children. I believe that a baby becomes a "baby" at viability. At the point the infant can reasonably survive outside his mother I believe he should be granted some rights of protection - the right to be born in a manner that is in HIS best interest. One of the most distressing points in carri's story was where she referred to "her" birth. I posted over on FJ that this birth was NOT just "hers". It was his too. I have no answers to give. They are well above my paygrade. But I think a start is to have an open discussion about what we really desire when it comes to bringing children into the world. If a woman wants to go unassisted, then fine - so long as she understands the risks and she has been checked out to ensure that the baby has a fighting chance. The thought of forcing women into stirrups scares me - but so do dead babies. So sad... Don't you see?? This attitude DRIVES women who are already suspicious of the "outside world" to isolate themselves so much they may not even tell anyone they are pregnant! They are so scared of your attitude, and the doctors attitude, that they will be handcuffed to the bed, they take GREATER medical risks to secure their freedom of choice! If women are ASSURED they will have INFORMED CONSENT of the things done to THEIR BODIES, fewer of them will be scared into the woods to give birth!! NO ONE forces ANY parent to donate a kidney or liver or any other live-donor organ to their child, unless they CONSENT. Women giving birth are NO DIFFERENT!! This attitude of tie them down and doctor as god... that causes more dead babies than anything else... because it fosters a justifiable fear in people who are already unreasonably afraid of "the world."
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Post by jemand on Jun 24, 2009 8:57:09 GMT -5
The problem of women deciding their pastor or husband (excuse me, God) should be in charge of their birth isn't going to get better just because some *other* group of men decide she's not competent to be in charge of her own body. THIS too!
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Post by rosa on Jun 24, 2009 9:40:39 GMT -5
Anne2, what an awesome rejoinder.
I do think at base, there is a real disregard for women's lives and basic cruelty in the idea that natural birth is more "godly".
I do wonder if it's restrictive policies on midwifery and doulas that allow these untrained "midwives" to thrive - if there's a legitimate, helpful, licensing procedure for midwives, it seems like it ought to weed out the really awful ones. Among other things, then you could prosecute untrained, unlicensed practitioners for fraud.
There are some really good doula programs around here but I don't know if they are official.
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