ENDNOTES
Spontaneous
Creation:
101
Reasons Not to Have Your Baby in a Hospital, Vol. 1
A
Book about Natural Childbirth and the Birth of
Wisdom and Power
in Childbearing Women
by Jock
Doubleday
PREFACE
This is the story of how we
begin to remember. (Paul Simon, "Under
African Skies," Graceland CD)
Trembling, he plucked one,
wiped the dust away to see the berry's true color. . . . Gritting his courage,
Covenant put the berry in his mouth. . . . The world spun wildly, then sprang
straight. Cool juice filled Covenant's mouth with a savor of peach made tangy
by salt and lime. At once, new energy burst through him. Deliciousness cleansed
his throat of dirt and thirst and blood. All his nerves thrilled to a savor he
had not tasted for ten long years: the quintessential nectar of the Land. (Stephen R. Donaldson, The Wounded Land, 135-137)
For persons who wonder how someone
who is not a doctor can write with authority about childbirth, I quote John
Robbins in his 1996 work, Reclaiming Our Health: "Some people wonder how I can
presume to write with authority about these subjects, when I am not a doctor.
Many of us have been taught that doctors, by virtue of their medical training,
constitute a special class of human being, almost a priesthood. The truth is
that if I had been trained as they have been, and if I were subject to the same
financial pressures they are, I might be preoccupied with technology and drugs,
oblivious to their drawbacks and risks, and dismissive of alternative
approaches, just as many physicians today are. If I had spent six or eight
years of my life being trained to practice orthodox medicine, and had
sacrificed greatly in order to do this, as most of our doctors have, I would
hardly be in a position to consider the subject without personal bias. It is
precisely because I am not a doctor that I can more easily stand outside the
fray, and hopefully bring a measure of objectivity to the discussion." (Reclaiming
Our Health: Exploding the Medical Myth and Embracing the Source of True Healing, 7) I would say in addition that the true experts in childbirth
are, without any doubt, women. The greater part of this book is based upon
information from female authors, female midwives, and women's birth stories.
John Robbins brings doctors down to
earth: "We struggle today, as a culture, to get over the idea that M.D.
stands for "Medical Deity." It wouldn't hurt us to remember that in
Israel in 1973, doctors went on strike for a month, and the death rate dropped
50 percent. There had not been a month with so few deaths since the previous
doctors' strike, 20 years before. A few years later, in Bogota, Colombia, a
two-month-long physician strike resulted in a 35 percent drop in the death
rate. And when Los Angeles county doctors went on a work slowdown to protest
soaring malpractice insurance premiums, the death rate dropped 18 percent. But
when the slowdown ended, and the medical industry got back in gear, the death
rate jumped right back up to where it had been before." (Reclaiming Our
Health: Exploding the Medical Myth and Embracing the Source of True Healing, 7)
Spontaneous creation Sheila Kitzinger writes that "labor is essentially a
spontaneous physiological process." ("The Rhythmic Second
Stage," The Birth Center Newsletter (Summer 1978) 101 Tufnell Park Road, London, N7,
England, in Nan Koehler, Artemis Speaks: V.B.A.C. Stories & Natural
Childbirth Information, 291)
Alan Watts writes: "The
Chinese phrase which is ordinarily translated as "nature" is tzu-jan, literally "of itself
so," and thus a better equivalent might be 'spontaneity.'" (Nature,
Man, and Woman,
10)
Philosophically, the idea of
spontaneous creation is that "something can come from nothing," an
idea that both quantum physics and many religions posit. See "Cosmogony" at www.evolution.mbdojo.com/cosmogony.htm for a twist on the quantum physics
version of this idea. See "How the universe can come from nothing,"
at www.braungardt.com/Physics/Vacuum%20Fluctuation.htm
for a list of quotes on the quantum physics view of "something from
nothing." For a fascinating expose on the theory of the Big Bang, see
"The true state of the universe," at www.holoscience.com/news.php?article=0auycyew.
See "Author's Statement," at www.unifiedreality.com/statement.html
for a discussion of how Eastern religions view the idea of "something from
nothing."
spontaneous organization,
"like some dark and passing shadow within matter, spaces the notes of a
meadowlark's song in the interior of a mottled egg." (Loren Eiseley, The Immense Journey, 26)
Homeostasis stabilizes your in
utero
infant's temperature when you take a five-mile walk in 100¡ heat Diane E. Depken writes: "Normal thermoregulation
processes in humans would not cause [infant-adverse] temperature increases
during exercise." ("Exercise Physiology in Pregnancy," The
Encyclopedia of Childbirth, 133)
homeostasis brings your
pleasure-inducing endorphins back down from their 30-times-normal levels and
slowly shrinks your uterus back to its original size. (Jimenez, S. "Supportive pain
management strategies," in Childbirth Education: Practice, Research,
and Theory, F.H.
Nichols and S.S. Humenick, eds., Philadelphia: Saunders, 1988)
"the distinction between
what is biological and . . . social [in childbirth] has no ontological
status." (Brigitte Jordan, Birth in Four
Cultures: A Crosscultural Investigation of Childbirth in Yucatan, Holland,
Sweden and the United States, 1)
"It is sometimes argued
that modern women have lost the 'art' of giving birth and that culture and
beliefs have so over-ridden women's natural responses that they require
direction and assistance to birth normally. This overlooks basic innate drives
to reproduce, and reproduce successfully, common to all species, and the
ability of endogenous endorphins to create the necessary introverted and
uninhibited states that form the basis for instinctive behaviours. Successful
birth is far too important in nature for its achievement to be left to chance
or luck: inbuilt mechanisms guide the process towards a successful conclusion,
and these can be accessed provided a woman is willing to explore her hidden
capabilities, and if she is provided with an environment conducive to this
exploration."
(Andrea Robertson, Empowering Women: Teaching Active Birth in the 90s, 101)
Andrea Robertson writes: "It
is true that many women allow cultural values, fashion and personal beliefs to
inhibit their innate abilities. It is also true that the current medicalisation
of birth encourages women to forsake their own resources and embrace technology
and external guidance during labour. The folly of this approach is only now
being revealed through rigorous scientific studies. Meanwhile, many women have
discovered, to their cost in physical and emotional terms, the inherent risks
of tinkering with nature." (Empowering Women: Teaching Active Birth in
the 90s, 101)
"The whole room actually
turned pink . . . It was the dead of winter – still pitch dark outside,
so it wasn't sunrise. The doctor noticed it too and he's straight as an arrow.
. . . He didn't understand it . . . this rose colored light absolutely filling
the room." (Mother's testimonial, in Nancy
Caldwell Sorel, Ever Since Eve: Personal Reflections on Childbirth, 1)
"In their child-bearing on
some green mountain-side, sometimes not even sheltered from the rain, they face
their essential womanhood . . ." (Margaret
Mead, Male and Female: A Study of the Sexes in a Changing World, 29)
Homo sapiens, or creatures very
like Homo sapiens (those of the genus Homo), have survived the snowstorms of no
fewer than 20 ice ages in the last 2.5 million years. There is some controversy as to the time of the dawning
of the human race. Rick Gore writes that "around
seven million years ago, at least one offshoot of the Africa apes began walking
on two legs. As that bipedal ape [possibly Ardipithecus kadabba, or her ancestor] evolved into what would become us, other
mammals came and went. Most had to adapt to yet another global climate change
about 2.5 million years ago, triggered in part by the formation of the Isthmus
of Panama. Its formation blocked east-west ocean circulation and encouraged the
Gulf Stream to grow stronger. As the Gulf Stream pumped more warm water closer
to the North Pole, precipitation increased. Heavy snows became glaciers two
miles thick, which advanced and retreated in a series of more than 20 ice
ages." (Rick Gore, "The rise of mammals: adapting, evolving,
surviving," National Geographic,
April 2003, p. 31)
Her bipedalism was and still is
a novelty in the mammalian world. The first reptilian biped is believed to have been the
little-known bolosaur (www.sciam.com).
"Often a woman will say,
'Thank God I was in the hospital when I gave birth. There were complications,
but the doctor saved my baby's life.' What she may not understand is that the
interference by the doctor and the nursing staff, from the moment she entered
the hospital, may have actually caused the 'complications' in the first
place." (Laura Kaplan Shanley, Unassisted
Childbirth, 11)
"Are you anti-technology? Are you anti-science?" (Larry King (playing himself) to
spiritualist "Palmer Joss" (Matthew McConaughey) in the movie Contact, based on the novel of the same
name by Carl Sagan)
"The question that I'm
asking is: Are we happier as a human race? Is the world a fundamentally better
place because
of science and technology? We shop at home, we surf the Web. But at the same
time, we feel emptier, lonelier, and more cut off from each other than at any
other time in human history. . . . We're becoming a synthesized society. . . .
I'm not against technology. I'm against the men who deify it at the expense of
human truth."
("Palmer Joss" (Matthew McConaughey) to Larry King (playing himself)
in the movie Contact, based on the novel of the same name by Carl Sagan)
"Many doctors [believe]
that we can improve everything, even natural childbirth in a healthy woman.
This philosophy is the philosophy of people who think it deplorable that they
had not been consulted at the creation of Eve, because they would have done a
better job." (G.J. Kloosterman, M.D., "The
Midwife: Her Task and Responsibility in a Technologic World," in David
Stewart, The Five Standards for Safe Childbearing, 229)
In 1990, China's hospital
childbirth rate had already reached 51 percent. By the year 2000, it had risen
to an astonishing 76 percent. (http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200209/30/eng20020930_104171.shtml)
Marsden Wagner writes: "During
a WHO visit to China, I realized that the developing world was – and is
– in serious jeopardy of unquestioningly importing the orthodox
obstetrical model." ("Confessions of a Dissident," in
Davis-Floyd, Robbie E. and Sargent, Carolyn F., Eds. Childbirth and
Authoritative Knowledge: Cross-Cultural Perspectives, 373)
"Our attempts to wipe out
all traditional practices in one blow and start over, either by sending the
nonlocal medical personnel or by forcing women into a hospital environment, can
only . . . hasten the disintegration of a people's cultural heritage. In the
end, we will be responsible for the alienation of a people from itself, as is
the case in many areas of Western culture. And these cultural heritages are far
too precious to lose." (Grantly Dick-Read in Judith Goldsmith, Childbirth Wisdom From the
World's Oldest Societies, 205)
Some cultures resist Western
culture's techno-fetish more strongly than others. Margaret Mead writes:
"The Samoans have made one of the most effective adjustments to the impact
of Western civilization of any known people. From the European's technology
they took cloth and knives, lanterns and kerosene, soap and starch and
sewing-machines, paper and pen and ink, but they have kept their bare feet,
their cool short sarongs, their houses built of native materials fastened
together with coconut-fibre cord. When the hurricanes come, the metal roofing
sheets on the white men's house fly off and sometimes kill people, the house
itself is wrecked, but the Samoan house collapses gracefully before the storm,
later to be rebuilt of the same posts. They accepted Protestant Christianity,
but gently remoulded some of its sterner tenets. Why repent so bitterly, says
the Samoan preacher, 'when God is just waiting to forgive you all the
time'?" (Margaret Mead, Male and Female, 124)
"In the pursuit of Tao,
every day something is dropped.
Less and less is done until
non-action is achieved.
When nothing is done, nothing is
left undone.
The world is ruled by letting
things take their course.
It cannot be ruled by
interfering."
(Lao Tzu (spelled Lau Tsu in this commentatry) The Tao Te
Ching, translators
Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English)
"We have forgotten the part
we came here to play. We have lost the key to our own house. . . . Together we
embark on a quest for our own enchantment. It will take us to a place where
what is feminine is sacred . . . There we can become who we are meant to be and
live the life we are meant to live." (Marianne Williamson, A Woman's Worth, 5-6)
"Fully 75 percent of
hospital-birthing women have their babies taken from them before breastfeeding
has begun."
(Suzanne Arms, www.birthingthefuture.com/AllAboutBirth/birthMythFact.php)
Tragically, the vast majority of
Americans born since 1970 have made a primary bond with a material object
instead of with a human being. Nature could not have anticipated this state of
affairs and has no remedy for it. Joseph
Chilton Pearce writes: "At the height of this stress, the infant is
isolated, which very plainly means abandoned. There, in proximity to only
material things (the baby blanket), he must manage again to achieve some stress
reduction in order to survive; the need of physical skin stimulus to facilitate
this reduction finds only that baby blanket, a nonhuman source of stress
reduction. What is the great learning? What is being built into the very fibers
of that mind-brain-body system as the initial experiences of life? Encounters
with people are causes of severe, unbroken, unrelenting stress, and that stress
finds its only reduction through contact with material objects." (Magical
Child, 63)
Unbonded persons feel that they
have no safe place to stand. Joseph
Chilton Pearce writes: "Bonding seals a primary knowing that is the basis
for rational thought. We are never conscious of being bonded; we are conscious
only of our acute disease when we are not bonded or when we are bonded to
compulsion and material things. The unbonded person (and bonding to objects is
to be very much unbonded in a functional sense) will spend his life in a search
for what bonding was designed to give: the matrix. The intelligence can never
unfold as designed because it never gets beyond this primal need. All intellectual
activity, no matter how developed, will be used in a search for that matrix,
which will take on such guises as authenticity, making it in this world,
getting somewhere." (Magical Child, 63)
"The unbonded female might
become neurotic and be unable to bond to her [own] child properly, but the
unbonded male goes very subtly mad. Unless rooted to the mother matrix, his
other matrices cannot form, and his machinery loses its balancing mechanism,
its governor. He runs amok. What the unbonded male does is spend his life
turning back on that matrix, trying to force from it that which is lacking. And
what is lacking is his source of personal power, his possibility, and his safe
space. Lacking these, he turns and uses his strength to rape. He rapes either crudely
or with sophistication, that is, bodily, or intellectually, raping the earth
matrix with technology. . . . The rapist himself does not understand the real
hunger that drives him." (Joseph Chilton Pearce, Magical Child, 258; see also www.birthpsychology.com/violence/index.html)
"Technology is now
displacing philosophical and religious values as the dominant force in shaping
the world, and therefore in determining human fate." (RenŽ Dubos, Mirage of Health, 270)
"Gaia is a tough
bitch" (Lynn Margulis, "Gaia Is a Tough
Bitch," www.edge.org/documents/ThirdCulture/n-Ch.7.html)
INTRODUCTION
The midwifery philosophy says that the birth
of your child will probably go well, that nature will succeed in giving you a
healthy baby as it has succeeded for millennia in the perpetuation of our
species. The midwifery philosophy says that childbirth is a natural event. The medical philosophy says that nature may
fail in the birth of your child. It says that prudent expectant mothers should
enlist the help of medical professionals in case any of various emergencies
arise. The medical philosophy says that childbirth is a medical event. Andrea Robertson writes: "The single most important
decision that prospective parents will make, in terms of the outcome of the
birth and the potential future health of their child, concerns the choice of
caregiver for pregnancy, labour and birth. Research has clearly shown that the
attitudes, philosophy and practices of the main caregiver present during labour
and birth will shape the management of the event and have a huge impact on the
quality of the experience for each parent, and also for the baby. Research has
shown, for example, that a midwife, with a training and philosophy centred on
birth as a normal bodily process, approaches assisting a woman in labour
differently from a doctor, who tends to view birth from his training in the
medical model of treating illness. A midwife is more likely to assume that the
labour is going well unless it is demonstrably not the case, whereas a doctor
is more likely to assume there will be a problem, and demand proactive
intervention [like vaginal exams, electronic fetal monitoring, etc.], just in
case problems occur later." (Empowering Women: Teaching Active Birth in
the 90s, 63-64)
In Europe, 75 percent of
birthing women use midwives as their principal birth attendants.
(Midwives' Alliance of North
America, www.mana.org and Citizens for Midwifery, www.cfmidwifery.org)
Dr. Charles S. Mahan writes that
"midwifery has, like public health, been the firm foundation of the health
care pyramid for mothers and babies in most countries, except for ours. This
lets the reader with even an average imagination see some of the folly of
building a hierarchy of care as an inverted pyramid – with the majority
of pregnant women receiving care from specialists even though most of the women
are experiencing a normal physiologic event. Such is life in the U.S. health
care non-system." (Foreword to Judith Pence Rooks' Midwifery &
Childbirth in America,
xvii)
Le