July 18, 2012
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Attitudes on Women’s Issues
VIDEO- NSFW! A friend (a male) sent me the above video of a woman complaining her ass hurt during child birth. I was glad to see that they stopped pushing her and let her relax for a moment. I think this is a good example of how women were not designed to give birth immobilized on a table (literally 2 people holding her legs back!) for the convenience of doctors & midwives.This same friend asked, “Do you support the use of doulas, midwives, and/or traditional medicines?” Here are the replies he received.
Since my abdominal hysterectomy, I’ve had a wake-up call to how traditional medicine treats women & their reproductive system. The day after surgery, I was moved to the maternity ward. Infertile me, who’s just had the door finally slammed on fertility sent to Maternity because, “They know how to deal with women’s issues.” Yes, my external incision resembles a C-Section, but inside, nothing was like a c-section. My surgeon didn’t come check on me during his rounds “because you weren’t in your original room.” Did he care enough to inquire as to where I went? Ha. In the morning of day 3, the maternity ward supervisor who hadn’t even met me, sent a nurse-assistant in to tell me it was time for me to be released.
At 4 weeks post-op, I had my followup appointment at my doctor’s office & he did not even examine me. He told me the pain was normal & that my “eating trouble” would settle down with time. I was not hugely surprised when I had to return for a post-op infection 2 weeks later. It wasn’t until I went to the ER in month 6 that my gyno started taking me seriously at all.
When you go to the dentist, you get swabbed and injected with a numbing agent. However, gynecology does not have any of these numbing tools. Routinely women have cryo-freeze applied to their cervix, biopsies sliced from their vaginal vault and even silver nitrate applied with out the slightest consideration or regard of their pain. If you cringe, doctors will snap, “This won’t take long” or “this is usually painless.” After years of undergoing various procedures for my “women’s issues,” I never once had a doctor acknowledge pain, while monkeying around in my vagina- an area of your body rich with blood vessels and nerve endings. All these years, I thought I was just horribly over sensitive until I started reading the forums at Hystersisters.com. I wish I had found that site years ago when I first started having “women’s issues.” I wouldn’t have felt like such a freak.
Last fall, my sister-in-law opened a non-profit center in Idaho to educate women on their options at birth. The two local hospitals in her area just stopped VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarian) and she and a few others are trying to present the actual science of VBAC versus C-sections to their community. See C-section Risks Downplayed and VBAC is Usually Safer. The local medical professionals whose work is supposed to rely on science, are not listening.
Wholiedtotheblind had a good blog recently about “That Time.” For her, a little education on her options and a supportive physician made a life-altering difference.
I think in the area of “Women’s Issues” each woman deserves to hear all the options alternative and traditional, and have their choices respected by all professionals. What do you think?
Comments (3)
I think a woman should be able to hear, or learn about all the options. Different women have differnet issues, we’re not all the same, and what works for one won’t necessarily work for another. I don’t know all the science and reasons behind the medicines and procedures. Like why hospitals would refuse VBAC, and that sort of thing. I know my mum had three kids, we were all born in different towns. She had a c-section with my older bro, because he was breach. I was born natural (I guess that would be vaginal birth), and then when my younger sister was born, the doctor told mum it would have to be by c-section, because she had one before. Never mind, she’d had a natural birth in between. I always thought that was weird. And my mum didn’t like it, because she prefered the VB, as it was easier. Anyway, it doesn’t seem right that the hospitals would ban VBAC.
And what you went through sounds horrible, and somewhat mal-practice-y (if that’s a word). I’m sorry you had to go through that.
I now have a friend who is a delivery nurse and she explained that it’s in a mother’s best interest to go in to labor with a “birth plan”. Otherwise, the doctors will ignore you and the nurses will push you around. I find that you have to be very self-educated and very insistent with anything Obgyn related.
I just feel bad for people that have to have a few bad experiences before they learn to fight for what they want.
@badtimin - I hear versions of your mom’s story all the time. I think it’s about lowering the risk for the doctor so that it’s a “convenient” birth for them.