Having a baby in the United
States? Know someone who is? If you believe
that women should have some say over what
happens to them during labor and childbirth,
read on:
●Over
300 hospitals around the country insist that
once a woman has had a c-section, she may no
longer have a vaginal birth. In some case the
state has taken take control of her unborn baby
and force her to be cut open against her will.
●Not
one state has a law that prohibits a hospital
from banning VBACs (vaginal births after a
c-section.
●Only
two states, New York and Massachusetts, are
required to disclose the birth-related
statistics of hospitals, including procedures
such as c-sections, inductions, episiotomies,
and more. And even these two relatively
progressive states lack a mechanism to enforce
compliance.
●Midwives,
the most highly qualified professionals to
assist healthy women with healthy pregnancies,
are finding it increasingly hard to provide care
to women.
●Only
one state, Illinois, prohibits using restraints
on pregnant women in labor.
●
Just like
there are still women who have “back-alley”
abortions, more and more women are resorting to
“back-alley” home births when they can’t find a
provider legally able to assist them.
●Vaginal
breech birth is virtually unobtainable in the
United States. We can’t remove the organs of a
dead person without permission, explains Henci
Goer, author of Obstetric Myths vs. Research
Realities, yet we force women to have surgery against their
will. “Do we really hold a pregnant woman’s
rights lower than that of a corpse?” One of the
big unanswered questions then, is at what point
in pregnancy does a woman lose her civil rights?
These are just some of the reasons why over 300
women recently gathered in Atlanta Georgia to
take place in a groundbreaking gathering, The
National Summit to Ensure the Health and
Humanity of Pregnant and Birthing Women.
It isn’t everyday you feel that you are part
of history in the making. But that’s exactly
what it felt like to be part of this remarkable
event. I returned angry, frustrated, energized,
humbled, awe-struck, and guardedly hopeful and
optimistic. It was clearly not your everyday
conference!
A New Understanding of Reproductive Rights
One of the goals in bringing together this
diverse group of women was to help participants
understand the common threats and threads that
impact the lives of pregnant women, birthing
women, indeed, all women of reproductive age.
And it was to reduce the divisiveness and
polarization that have existed among the various
organizations and individuals who strive to make
the world safer and better for women.
Lynn Paltrow,
Executive Director of the National Advocates for
Pregnant Women, talked about the common thread
woven throughout the Summit - the need to expand
our understanding of reproductive rights.
Women’s ability to control our reproduction goes
far beyond our right not to have a child,
and fundamentally includes our right to bear
that child. The right to give birth at
home, the right to have a VBAC (vaginal birth
after Caesarean ), the right to breastfeed, the
right to dignity during labor and childbirth,
these are all reproductive rights, rights that
are increasingly under attack.
But because so much legislative focus has
centered around abortion (in 2005 alone, over
650 bills were introduced that would have an
adverse impact on the rights of pregnant women),
little attention has been paid to the erosion of
the reproductive rights of women who want
to have children.
In short,
regardless of your personal views on abortion,
the concept of fetal rights has serious
consequences for women who want to have
their babies. It’s what allows a judge to take
away a mother’s custody of the life inside her,
and instead turn it over to the state. It’s
what allows a woman to be tied down and cut open
against her consent. It’s what causes a woman
to be charged with child abuse of her unborn
child instead of being given the help she
needs.
By granting a fetus legal status, a pregnant
woman’s rights are increasingly at risk. Any
risk of harm to a fetus, however unintentional,
can end up with a charge of manslaughter. And
the same logic that is used to prosecute a
pregnant woman using drugs can be used to
prosecute a middle-class woman who wants a home
birth.
New Dialogue
Part of what made the Summit an unprecedented
event was the diversity of individuals and
organizations who participated: women
threatened with child protective services
because they chose to exercise their legal
option of giving birth at home; an obstetrician
who witnessed a 14 year old girl die six hours
after coming into his care because she couldn’t
tell her parents she’d had an unsafe abortion;
low-income moms in recovery who had been denied
treatment to overcome addiction, but either had
their children taken away or were arrested for
the still birth of their children; activists
fighting for the parenting rights of gay and
lesbians, attorneys helping mothers fight
discrimination in the work; doulas who work with
mothers in prison; and hundreds of others:
academics, attorneys, mothers, students, doulas,
midwives, journalists, doctors, and more. “Do
you think we’ll look back at this someday and
think of it as another Seneca Falls?” asked a
participant, referring to the birth place of the
women’s movement in the 1800s.
The Personal is Still Political
Paltrow, visionary force behind the summit, understands
that the personal is still political.
Partly for this reason – and unlike any other
conference I’ve ever attended - every speaker
was asked to preface her talk by starting with
her own reproductive history. Paltrow hoped
that in hearing everyone’s stories, we would see
that there aren’t two kinds of women: those who
have abortions and those who become mothers.
“We are all just women at different points in
our lives,” she asserts.
And the response? Participants talked about the
culture of the summit as a model for other
conferences. And the candor and intimacy with
which so many women spoke, powerfully revealed
that what unites us as women is indeed far
greater than what divides us. We can read all
the statistics we want, but as necessary as it
is to have this broader picture before us, it is
the story that moves us to tears, that helps us
see ourselves reflected in each others’ lives.
But there is a danger of looking at one woman’s
experience without considering the context that
shapes her options. State law, for example,
determines how easy or difficult it is for a
woman to give birth safely at home birth.
Hospital policy affects whether or not a woman
who has had a c-section will ever be allowed to
birth vaginally. One’s race or class influences
her access to resources and how she is likely to
be treated by the medical community. A fear of
being turned in to child protective services
prevents a woman from seeking treatment for
substance abuse. When we combine stories with
context we set the stage for action and
activism.
A Sampling of Stories
Tayshea Aiwohi, a shy, beautiful woman with an
almost regal bearing, shared her story of being
the first woman in Hawaii arrested for causing
the death of her newbon son. as a result of
behavior during her pregnancy.
Ostracized in her community, she overcame her
prosecution and addition and now helps other
women through recovery so they, too, can be
reunited with their children. As her eyes
filled with tears, she received a standing
ovation.
Maddy Oden, a woman of amazing presence, talked
about a devastating loss when a doctor coerced
her very healthy daughter into having an
induction to kick start labor. He used cytotec,
claiming that it was safe. The result? An
amniotic fluid ambolism causing the death of
mother and baby.
Ina May Gaskin, internationally renowned
midwife, brought with her the quilt from the
Safe Motherhood Quilt
Project. Just as the AIDS quilt
honors lives cut short by a deadly disease, each
square of the safe motherhood quilt remembers a
women who has died in pregnancy and childbirth.
Ina May knows the story behind each square.
Laura Pemberton, a soft-spoken, “pro-life”
mother of 8, talked about her inability to find
a single doctor in all of Florida who would let
her have a VBAC. Pressured into her previous
c-section and wanting to avoid it this time
around, Laura undertook extensive research and
decided to have a midwife attended home birth.
When she became dehydrated during labor, Laura
decided to go to the hospital to restore her
energy level. But when the doctor found out she
was trying to deliver at home, she refused to
give her an IV. The only way she would do it
was if Laura signed for a c-section. If she
didn’t sign? The nurse would begin a court
order and would send hospital administrators to
speak with her.
Although it is not illegal for a woman to give
birth at home, the only way Laura could escape
the hospital was to flee down a back entrance,
barefoot, at seven centimeters dilated.
Once home, Laura felt safe. The baby was
positioned properly. But before she knew it,
the sheriff and state attorney were entering her
bedroom. And when the court order came, they
forced her onto a stretcher and into the
ambulance. She pleaded. She screamed. She
felt total humiliation. But in the end, with
only one centimeter to go, with her fingers able
to feel her baby’s head, they cut her open
anyway.
After the birth, Laura argued
that her civil rights had been violated, but the
court disagreed. “I have been raped by the
system,” she says. “May God use me to see that
nobody should ever have
to go through what I did.”
Laura has since moved to another state and has
had four successful VBACs. She had them in
hiding, unassisted.
Get Involved!
Regardless of your personal views on abortion,
there are endless ways to help restore dignity
and freedom to women having babies. We need to
address the real issues of women,” Paltrow
asserts. “To say, ‘What do you need to be able
to lead healthy productive lives for you and
your families?’ And how do we keep things human
for everybody?”
Click
here to read
more about the Summit, the work of the National
Advocates for Pregnant Women, and what you can
do to help make a difference.
Click
here to read an
interview with Lynn Paltrow.
Click on the organizations below to learn about
some of the organizations participating in the
summit: |
