PREFACE
I want to start off this post by stating the obvious... I am not a doctor, I have no medical training and nothing I say should be taken as advice. In one sense this is largely a utopian view of how pregnancy and fertility should be. I am merely pointing out things that I notice, hear and read so you can do your own research with more information.
I also wish to make abundantly clear that I am not judging anyone for any decisions they have made regarding their fertility and pregnancies. The choice is yours alone to make. Again I am just aiming to introduce some information which may be overlooked or underrepresented in our modern approach.
I wish to compare our conventional modern approach with a traditional approach as I believe there is something we're missing as we seemingly move towards more infertility and childhood conditions with our modern approach.
I'm sure if I asked people who want a baby or who are already pregnant what their big hope was, all they would say is, “as long as it's healthy”.
And it's true. It's all that matters.
But it doesn't mean we should ignore what's possible and confuse our babies surviving (obviously the desired outcome) with them being healthy.
The modern history of pregnancy and birth in medicine is quite horrific. It involves experimenting with medication, tying women up, X rays, surgeries, a massive decline in breastfeeding due to formula being advertised as better than breast milk and general fear around the whole process.
Mostly we now know better. Our infant mortality is extremely low historically. We've become very good at making sure sick and weak babies survive.
But. Our children are not growing up healthy, on a more subtle level they lack connection and focus. Women are suffering from pre-natal anxiety, post-natal depression and can take months or years to recover from the labour.
Is this the best we can do? The way we are brought into the world has an impact on the rest of our lives. It is the first impression of our environment and first impressions tend to last.
Is there just a natural trade off between a few healthy babies or many unhealthy babies? I believe we have the ability to make a big difference.
Even before we think about getting pregnant we're introduced to pregnancy, labour and birth through media. It is almost always portrayed as extremely painful, high stress and often an emergency or even life threatening situation. The actual reality is hidden from us. For many the media is our only experience before we go through it. It seems quite scary, I'm certain it puts fear into many, particularly women.
From that paradigm we then find out we're pregnant. So exciting and a little bit terrifying. We probably find out first from the home test then go to the doctor to get a blood test to triple confirm. Then we book appointments, change our diets and start taking the pregnancy vitamins.
If we feel like anything is wrong we immediately go back to the doctor for more tests and/or scans.
The first action we take – changing the diet – has always seemed slightly odd to me. Of course we need to up our nutrient intake so replacing processed foods and giving up alcohol is an easy fix but if you were planning on getting pregnant, this ideally would be done well beforehand. The general guidelines are not to eat raw animal products or pretty much anything that may be 'contaminated'. Things like soft cheeses and smoked fish are on that list.
Let the fear begin!
The biggest threat for this contamination is listeria. On average there are 7 cases in pregnant women in Australia each year. There are 300,000 births. That's a 0.002% chance that your food will cause you harm, at least from that bacteria. I'm not even suggesting that we ignore the warnings, it probably still isn't worth the risk but it doesn't have to be scary every time you eat something!
If we compare that to traditional cultures they generally prepare a young couple nutritionally months before they get pregnant to give them the best chance. As a society and as individuals we need to take more responsibility with this. We can't plan every pregnancy but we need the absolute best advice for those that are.
From what info I've gathered, traditional cultures preparing for childbearing will eat foods higher in fat and obviously higher in nutrition to boost hormones and be generally healthy. Do we have a recommended preconception diet? What would it look like? Does anybody know?
Still on nutrition, I have also heard a theory that as we move towards modern industrialised foods – white flour, white sugar, etc. - our health deteriorates to the point our skeletons don't form properly. Our cheeks and nose narrow, our teeth become crowded and importantly for women, the hips narrow or flatten. Probably not ideal if you're trying to get a baby through there.
Another influence of good nutrition is the balancing of hormones. I have heard from a few female doctors and health experts that to a large extent the symptoms of PMS almost completely disappear when your hormones are balanced and you're otherwise healthy. I can only imagine this is amplified around labour in that the pain and other symptoms could potentially be significantly reduced.
I do need to say at this point that as a man I understand very well that I have no idea what I'm talking about in regards to most of this. It's something I take very seriously to always make sure I get info about women and the female body from a woman or women, preferably who have also helped other women deal with the issues I have and will discuss.
This brings me to my next point – Men's role in childbirth. I believe the overwhelming majority of obstetric and gynocological specialists are men, especially in the past, although I think that could be changing. Of course they are incredibly well trained but I really feel like it's something that men don't need to be getting involved with at that level.
No matter how caring and loving he may be, he will never truly get it. He can know everything but still know nothing.
Men in general have dominated medicine since it was first developed in it's modern form. The energy with which men approach most things is as a problem solver, breaking things down into parts until they find the part that needs fixing. If it performs the same basic functions then it's as good as fixed. Generally, men like to tinker with things, have control and assert themselves.
We can see this in a lot of the ways medicine has been and is practiced today. I think we are poorer for not having the nurturing, creative, sensitive energy of women involved since the outset and no more is this needed than surrounding childbirth.
Men still have an important role as the protector and support giver but we could take a step back from controlling the process. It is not ours.
On the subject of the masculine and feminine energies there has also been a big shift from women toward more masculine energy. How and why is another whole post but if pregnancy and birth are the most feminine processes than moving to a more masculine energy would seem to make those processes more difficult.
Of course, that is not “scientific” but I think we can sense it to a degree. The analogy that helped me was to compare the energies to animals – the height of masculinity being the wolf compared to a golden retriever as the feminine side of the wolf. The feminine equivalents are a kitten at the most feminine to a tigress on the more masculine side. All four are extremes, personally I believe most of the time we should favour our more dominant side (generally more masculine or closer to the wolf for men and more feminine or closer to the kitten for women but not always).
In the past it has been too far to the wolf and too far to the kitten so rightly it has been shifted back but now think of a relationship between a 'tigress' and a 'golden retriever'. I would say those relationships are on the increase and suggests to me that we've shifted too far the other way. Hopefully this little analogy helps you understand what I'm talking about when I say more women are moving toward masculine energy.
In such a relationship, generally the woman hates having to 'train' the retriever and the man hates being told what to do by the tigress, neither person is happy. Does this have any impact on having a baby? Maybe/maybe not, but it's never going to negatively affect conceiving, developing and birthing to have a balanced, happy, fulfilling relationship.
To summarise the masculine/feminine conversation (and again this is only my opinion based on the resources I have seen and heard and the beliefs formed from those) men need to give up control of the process of pregnancy and birth and women need to embrace their nurturing feminine side more readily.
Now back to the progression of the pregnancy. Once our nutrition has been sorted (ideally well before pregnancy) the next step is the scans and if, like us, something goes “wrong” with some bleeding or maybe feeling unusual then they happen earlier than usual. We are scared so we're eager to use the ultrasound even more than the doctor is because we need reassurance that everything is ok.
But because the practice is so universal and used without any caution you never think to ask... What are the risks? I think most people, including myself, would never even think to ask whether performing an ultrasound was necessary and whether there were any risks involved. Even thinking about the risk of ultrasound seems slightly absurd because publicly there are no warnings at all, from anyone.
Of course everything has an effect and there are no actions that have no repercussions, so what are the effects of ultrasound?
It works by producing high frequency sound waves and receiving an echo from different tissues giving it an image. It has two effects on the body – heating of the highlighted area and a process called cavitation. The heating is presumed to be non-significant but the significance of cavitation is unknown. However possible effects include miscarriage and developmental issues after birth.
So if there are potentially quite severe consequences there must be some really good reasons for using it? However a study from the Cochrane Database on the benefits of routine ultrasound would suggest not, saying there is no clear benefit in terms of birth mortality that can be seen from routine ultrasound.
Ultrasound may help inform the parents decision-making in the case of an inevitable miscarriage, whether a baby is not growing or when a breech baby or twins are expected. I know Kate certainly had a lot of relief after that first scan. But what were the consequences... The internal scan (which Kate had every time, not a pleasant experience in and of itself which apparently some women refer to as “diagnostic rape”) gives less protection to the fetus from these effects as the transducer is much closer.
The second miscarriage was proven as a chromosomal abnormality so I wouldn't suggest that an ultrasound could do that.
Was the original scan really required, what would have happened if we didn't get it? If something actually was wrong, there's a very good chance it would have become apparent in the following days and weeks. At that stage of the pregnancy there wasn't much we could gain in the way of interventions from the scan. I have to ask if things would be different had we just waited? Of course I know I can't sit around and wait for an answer.
It comes back to trust in our body and patience. They are difficult things, especially in that situation but we could certainly use more of them in our culture. Of course it's more likely that the bleeding was a forewarning of a miscarriage in our case and the first ultrasound did nothing more than give us a brief moment of absolute joy, but what if the bleeding was nothing and the close range ultrasound interrupted the development enough to stop it altogether.
Maybe I'm just bitter, I already dislike “conventional” medicine so it's easy for me to blame that. In reality I think it's unlikely but not impossible to be the cause and when it doesn't seem to be of much benefit, especially in low risk pregnancies, I think we should be asking the question. What are we doing these interventions for?
This question is not and has not been asked strongly enough. A look into recent history at some of the practices in pregnancy and birth include; anaesthetics, epidurals, routine ultrasounds, forceps, cesareans, inductions, epesiotomies, stirrups and drugs which caused birth defects. None of which produce a positive outcome in the majority of cases although some have been phased out.
Of course these practices can be the difference between life and death for the mother and/or the baby but those are extreme situations and some of these practices are becoming common. If we just cleaned up our diet and started moving more we wouldn't have to have so many of these interventions.
Before I go any further, I want to reiterate and make absolutely clear – I am not and will not ever judge anyone for how they chose/choose to bring their child into the world. Everyone does the absolute best they can with the information they have and the decision is yours alone to make. I know how scary it is, you are literally playing with lives and I don't expect you to do anything just because I said so. All I want to do is provide further information for future parents and explore all possibilities so you can do your own research.
Having said that, let me go through what I hear (and see in pop culture) is a common occurrence so I can give you a better idea of how I understand it. As I haven't experienced it first hand and the knowledge is not readily shared, it's all I have to go on.
You're in labour (or possibly even induced) and you're in more pain than anything you've ever experienced so naturally you want some relief. You get an epidural and your pain is much more manangeable but now you have little feeling in your legs so you can't really move from your bed.
Now you're lying on your back and trying to push the baby out but the baby is not budging. It's been quite a while, there hasn't been much progress and the doctor is getting worried. While constantly monitoring the baby things start to go downhill. The doctor decides they are going to need to perform a C section to ensure the baby is going to make it.
Now in reality I have no idea how common that actually is but I don't think I need to know, it simply illustrates a point. Was the C section really the medical community coming to the rescue or the result of their initial interference? Let's look at it another way.
The same woman is far more prepared. She has trained her body and mind ready for this event by exercising, getting some mindset coaching and balancing her hormones through an extremely healthy diet. When she goes into labour she is able to manage her pain enough to go without the epidural. She is able to move around, feel her baby move around and she can get in to the best position.
To oversimplify, movement and pain are hard to distinguish by the brain so more movement generally equals less pain. She can get into a squat, on all fours or any other position which allows gravity to assist the birth and opens up the pelvis (lying on your back is literally the worst position for this, unless you were upside down I guess!).
Her labour has no complications and progresses calmly and she gives birth vaginally to a healthy baby.
If we judge those two scenarios based purely on the outcome (the baby survived and is brought in to the world safely) than either scenario is fantastic but hopefully now you can understand what I mean when I say we can do better.
What would be the difference between these two babies? One was almost forced into the world while the other came when mother and child were ready. What happens after the birth as the child develops mentally, physically and spiritually?
Plenty has been written about many topics surrounding pregnancy, birth and early parenting and if I go over all of it in detail it will be another 3 posts (not to mention others are much better versed on it than I am). Just to get you thinking about everything you could be looking into here is a list of all the things that I would be thinking about with links:
Pregnancy exercises and nutrition/supplementation.
Post pregnancy: Skin to skin contact
I'm sure there are things I've missed but it still gives all of us plenty to think about. Many of these things come naturally to hunter gatherers and provide great benefit to the health and connection of the mother and child as well as the childs development, yet we have moved away from them out of fear and poor understanding.
So glossing over all of those topics, how I would like to finish off is to explore the impact on the psychology and personalities of every individual born in our current system.
If we take a look out at the world today (ignore the news, just every day work and social interactions) and you were to guess what environment most people were born in, would you say it was mostly love and connection or fear and dissociation?
Personally I see a reasonable majority towards fear and I don't feel there are many strong connections from people to themselves, others or their environment. I do see an incredible amount of love just below the surface and I think everyone just wants to love and connect, but most don't quite know how.
Our birth and even our gestation is our first impression of the world. If there is fear for the safety of the mother or baby, the mother doesn't want the baby, the baby is rushed in to the world before he or she is ready, the environment the baby is brought into is cold and clinical, these are implanted into the nervous system and the baby starts adapting to it's environment to survive.
Our brain and nervous system begins to develop as early as week 4 of pregnancy. This is how we receive signals from our environment so we are potentially receiving signals as early as then. From an evolutionary standpoint a fetus will improve its chances of survival if it adapts its development to best suit the environment the mother is in.
If during pregnancy the mother struggles to find enough food, the baby will be best served developing a mechanism to store as much fat as possible from the food they do get. If the mother doesn't speak to the child or make a strong connection during pregnancy the child may grow up with issues connecting with others.
Our society in general is self conscious, unhealthy, disconnected from pretty much everything except technology, afraid to put ourselves completely out there, anxious, depressed and/or overstimulated/hyperactive. If we individually trace these issues back far enough it's very likely it came from the first few years of life and quite possibly the experience of birth.
If we label some common personality disorder traits we can begin to see how deep this actually goes. Mistrust of others, disregard for others, detachment from social relationships, manipulative, impulsive, mood swings, attention seeking, lack of empathy, narcissism, feeling of social inadequacy, dependant, obsessive, aggressive, self defeating behaviours.
There are infinite numbers of circumstances, outcomes and levels at which all of this may occur but if we want to move toward a healthy, confident, connected society we need to be consciously aware of the impact experiences during birth and child can have on the people we become.
This is essentially the entire point of this post. The way we are born can impact our entire life. With the issues we are facing, from individual to global, we can clearly do better and must do better.
I understand I probably romanticise the hunter gatherer lifestyle but I strongly believe they have much to teach us. It's not as though we were sickly and weak until modern medicine came along. You don't survive for 200,000 years (in the wild!) as a species without being robust and extremely adapted to your environment.
If those individuals were (and still are) far more healthy in every way than it stands to reason that despite (and probably because) being born quietly, with no interventions or technology whatsoever that they may have had some things right.
Of course they also had many babies that didn't make it (although I have heard that this may be largely due to factors other than the actual birth) and this is where modern technology can step in for high risk pregnancies.
I fear for future generations as we take less care of our health and our genes become weaker and weaker. I believe this plays a major role in our lower rates of fertility and susceptability to all our modern diseases.
The lifestyle of your grandmother when she was pregnant with your mother can increase or decrease your chances of getting all types of diseases. This is epigenetics. As our lifestyles have deteriorated (more sedentary, less nutrition) over the last few generations that deterioration gets passed down in the genes. We need to treat this with enormous respect.
To finalise the series I want to bring it back to where we started with our first pregnancy.
If we had made a conscious effort to prepare from the time we got married about 9 months earlier – physically through nutrition and exercise, mentally through overcoming fears and doubts and by building a clear plan of each others hopes and expectations for how we'd look after each other and the baby. If we didn't buy into the fear surrounding the translocation and the birth experience. If we had complete trust in Kate's body to do what comes naturally. If we decided not to get the ultrasound.
Maybe our life would be very different right now.
Or we could have done all of that and more and got the same outcome but we'll never know.
I tend to go with the flow so I'll never beat myself up over what we could have done but there will always be a what if. At least until we do finally have our own child. I know it will happen for us because we will make it happen no matter what it takes and I can not wait.
The lesson I really want to pass on is not to be a passive bystander in this process. You have far more control over the outcome than you can possibly imagine. Your thinking is just as important as what you do. They both impact your physiology and that of your fetus while you're pregnant.
If you need to work on your physical health, start moving, eat better and cut back on unhealthy habits. If you lack belief in yourself or you're anxious about the whole thing, practice meditation, build confidence or even hire a birth coach.
Do the work. Do your own research.
This is a precious gift. Do not take it for granted!
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