Dismissal from OBGYN

[Anonymous]

not 9:41 or 15:35 here. but i know several women who had perfectly healthy babies but had traumatic births and it has affected them. some very dramatically. i have no idea how i would have handled their situations -- i thankfully had everything i wanted exactly the way i wanted it when my babies were born. but why is it so hard for others, i wonder, to accept that others see things differently? i mean, it's obvious that many of you are absolute miserable bitches and i accept that even though i don't chose that wretched route? (15:52, i understand that's a poor analogy, and per your advice, i'm still working on my analogies... but i'm hoping you get my point, you being one of the wonderful ladies to whom i refer.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:not 9:41 or 15:35 here. but i know several women who had perfectly healthy babies but had traumatic births and it has affected them. some very dramatically. i have no idea how i would have handled their situations -- i thankfully had everything i wanted exactly the way i wanted it when my babies were born. but why is it so hard for others, i wonder, to accept that others see things differently? i mean, it's obvious that many of you are absolute miserable bitches and i accept that even though i don't chose that wretched route? (15:52, i understand that's a poor analogy, and per your advice, i'm still working on my analogies... but i'm hoping you get my point, you being one of the wonderful ladies to whom i refer.)

I'm 15:35 (I think) and am not an absolute miserable bitch. Sorry to disappoint. I previously asked how if both the baby and mother leave healthy, it can be a traumatic failure. I'd still honestly like to know. What I wanted was a healthy baby and a healthy me. So I also got everything I wanted. But to say the birth of your child was a failure and to feel badly about yourself or God forbid your child because, for example, you ended up needing a C-section...well yeah, I just don't get that. And it's incredibly sad to me thinking of a beautiful healthy baby who can't just have a Mother who is grateful and happy to have him or her because she's so hung up on her specific plans for controlling every aspect of one single day. Come on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:not 9:41 or 15:35 here. but i know several women who had perfectly healthy babies but had traumatic births and it has affected them. some very dramatically. i have no idea how i would have handled their situations -- i thankfully had everything i wanted exactly the way i wanted it when my babies were born. but why is it so hard for others, i wonder, to accept that others see things differently? i mean, it's obvious that many of you are absolute miserable bitches and i accept that even though i don't chose that wretched route? (15:52, i understand that's a poor analogy, and per your advice, i'm still working on my analogies... but i'm hoping you get my point, you being one of the wonderful ladies to whom i refer.)

I'm 15:35 (I think) and am not an absolute miserable bitch. Sorry to disappoint. I previously asked how if both the baby and mother leave healthy, it can be a traumatic failure. I'd still honestly like to know. What I wanted was a healthy baby and a healthy me. So I also got everything I wanted. But to say the birth of your child was a failure and to feel badly about yourself or God forbid your child because, for example, you ended up needing a C-section...well yeah, I just don't get that. And it's incredibly sad to me thinking of a beautiful healthy baby who can't just have a Mother who is grateful and happy to have him or her because she's so hung up on her specific plans for controlling every aspect of one single day. Come on.

Totally in agreement with PP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:old thread, but apparently people are still fired up. this is precisely the reason women who have an interest in participating in their birth experience, rather than just being along for the OB's surgical ride, should find midwives. at each and every appointment (including the "boring" ones in the middle of the 2nd trimester, e.g., at 24 weeks when there's nothing but a quick measurement and doppler to do), my midwife will entertain any question or concern i have. while the OP is long since done with her birth (having posted originally in jan 2009), i do encourage women to explore non-OB options. the midwifery standard of care is far more appealing to those women who are educated about child-birth (definitely the minority here in DC where women seem to prefer inductions and C-sections -- but for the minority out there, you have many wonderful choices if you do your research).

Are you kidding me? Are you really trying to say that women who choose to birth with an OB aren't as educated about child-birth and that the majority of women in DC prefer inductions and c-sections? Exactly where do you base this assumption off of? Your own ignorant beliefs?

If you want to go with a midwife, great. But you don't need to slam the choices of women who go with OBs. You just come across as smug and self-righteous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:not 9:41 or 15:35 here. but i know several women who had perfectly healthy babies but had traumatic births and it has affected them. some very dramatically. i have no idea how i would have handled their situations -- i thankfully had everything i wanted exactly the way i wanted it when my babies were born. but why is it so hard for others, i wonder, to accept that others see things differently? i mean, it's obvious that many of you are absolute miserable bitches and i accept that even though i don't chose that wretched route? (15:52, i understand that's a poor analogy, and per your advice, i'm still working on my analogies... but i'm hoping you get my point, you being one of the wonderful ladies to whom i refer.)

What precisely was the trauma? How has it affected them, some "very dramatically"? I have a hard time imagining so many women having traumatic birth experiences yet coming home with healthy babies. Something is just not adding up there.

I'm 15:52, and not the least bit miserable, and finding it a bit ironic that you're calling posters who disagree with you "miserable bitches" - that's a real winner of a rational argument, and not at all...ya know...bitchy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:not 9:41 or 15:35 here. but i know several women who had perfectly healthy babies but had traumatic births and it has affected them. some very dramatically. i have no idea how i would have handled their situations -- i thankfully had everything i wanted exactly the way i wanted it when my babies were born. but why is it so hard for others, i wonder, to accept that others see things differently? i mean, it's obvious that many of you are absolute miserable bitches and i accept that even though i don't chose that wretched route? (15:52, i understand that's a poor analogy, and per your advice, i'm still working on my analogies... but i'm hoping you get my point, you being one of the wonderful ladies to whom i refer.)

I'm 15:35 (I think) and am not an absolute miserable bitch. Sorry to disappoint. I previously asked how if both the baby and mother leave healthy, it can be a traumatic failure. I'd still honestly like to know. What I wanted was a healthy baby and a healthy me. So I also got everything I wanted. But to say the birth of your child was a failure and to feel badly about yourself or God forbid your child because, for example, you ended up needing a C-section...well yeah, I just don't get that. And it's incredibly sad to me thinking of a beautiful healthy baby who can't just have a Mother who is grateful and happy to have him or her because she's so hung up on her specific plans for controlling every aspect of one single day. Come on.

I agree with you 15:35 about the "birth experience" and that you aren't a miserable bitch (you sound quite sensible to me). I think at the end of the day, healthy mommy, healthy baby = successful birth experience. But I will say that some birth experiences could be traumatic enough to have lasting physical ramifications on mommy. I have luckily only had great experiences so hard for me to say, but I do think that there could be a sense of disappointment if your labor/delivery was so bad that it affected your ability to recover quickly and bond with the baby. I get why women who have had these bad experiences are more preoccupied with having a better experience the next time around. Now, of course, if having a better experience starts trumping your doctor's medical advice, then I think the woman needs a little perspective. But I do get why some women aspire for a certain birth experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:old thread, but apparently people are still fired up. this is precisely the reason women who have an interest in participating in their birth experience, rather than just being along for the OB's surgical ride, should find midwives. at each and every appointment (including the "boring" ones in the middle of the 2nd trimester, e.g., at 24 weeks when there's nothing but a quick measurement and doppler to do), my midwife will entertain any question or concern i have. while the OP is long since done with her birth (having posted originally in jan 2009), i do encourage women to explore non-OB options. the midwifery standard of care is far more appealing to those women who are educated about child-birth (definitely the minority here in DC where women seem to prefer inductions and C-sections -- but for the minority out there, you have many wonderful choices if you do your research).

Are you kidding me? Are you really trying to say that women who choose to birth with an OB aren't as educated about child-birth and that the majority of women in DC prefer inductions and c-sections? Exactly where do you base this assumption off of? Your own ignorant beliefs?

If you want to go with a midwife, great. But you don't need to slam the choices of women who go with OBs. You just come across as smug and self-righteous.

I am exceedingly educated about child birth and options for care surrounding child birth. I choose an OB for many reasons - one being my own biased belief that very few people who are smart enough to be doctors would have ended up as midwives. Yes, it sounds pretty inflammatory to say I think doctors are, as a general rule, smarter and more educated than midwives, but it is my firm belief. I say this having been a nurse, having worked with more doctors and nurses than I can count, and knowing that at the end of the day, I'd 100% take the OB over the midwife. The midwife's knowledge is specialized but limited; I prefer the broader knowledge of an MD who then specialized in obstetrics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think what the last two posters are missing is that the prior poster said that the doctor advised against the VBAC. Clearly there was some risk there more so than the regular risk. The person decided not to listen to the doctor's advice. The poster didn't say she blamed her friend but that her friend blamed herself. I think the point of the post was that everyone has an ideal birth experience in their head but if things change it given circumstance know before the labor or during labor, you should be able to trust your doctor to make the right decision/suggestion regarding the care. If you don't have that relationship, change doctors.

I think what all of the posters who are commenting on this situation are missing, are the actual details of the case. We have no idea what caused the uterine rupture, or what the baby died from. We also have no idea why or to what extent the doc advised against a VBAC (could be that the doc just always advises against VBAC). Almost all of the catastrophic uterine ruptures that occur with VBACs are the result of interventions such as induction or augmentation of labor - not merely having a VBAC. Additionally, women and babies have died from repeat cesareans. Unfortunately in this profession, there is no automatic "right answer".

I do agree that if a woman and her maternity care provider have great philosophical differences, it is best if they part ways.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wish I could go to a midwife. I can't find any in my area who handle VBACs (had a c-section with my first for failure to progress) and I also have high BP which makes me "high risk" so no midwife will take me.

Where are you? If you are in the DC metro area, there are many midwives who practice both in hospital and out-of-hospital setting who do indeed handle VBACs. They also often have ways to manage BP so that you do not risk out of care.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:quote]

I think what all of the posters who are commenting on this situation are missing, are the actual details of the case. We have no idea what caused the uterine rupture, or what the baby died from. We also have no idea why or to what extent the doc advised against a VBAC (could be that the doc just always advises against VBAC). Almost all of the catastrophic uterine ruptures that occur with VBACs are the result of interventions such as induction or augmentation of labor - not merely having a VBAC. Additionally, women and babies have died from repeat cesareans. Unfortunately in this profession, there is no automatic "right answer".

I do agree that if a woman and her maternity care provider have great philosophical differences, it is best if they part ways.

What is the comparative risk between death from repeat c-section versus death from uterine rupture or similar VBAC complication? Sources?

Re: the case above, it appears from the poster's statements re: her friend's feelings of guilt that it was the uterine rupture that caused the baby's death, not something else. Where do you get your stats re: "almost all" uterine ruptures being the result of induction or augmentation of labor?

[Anonymous]

New to the discussion here, but I am astonished that there is real skepticism that a traumatic birth is impossible for women to experience. It's incredibly narrow-minded to think that every women thinks like you do. That said, if you really are curious (as one poster said she was), it's a relatively common phenomenon. A quick google search would turn up hundreds of articles, online communities and studies dedicated to trauma felt after birth -- even when both mother and baby were healthy. A recent report (2008, I believe) entitled “New Mothers Speak Out,” commissioned by not-for-profit maternity care group Childbirth Connection and published in the Wall Street Journal, suggests that nearly one in ten U.S. women who have given birth recently meet the formal criteria for post-traumatic stress disorder resulting from childbirth. If you really are curious (which I must admit that I doubt is true), do some research before you start judging and saying that someone's feelings are stupid or ridiculous or incomprehensible just because you were lucky enough not to share those feelings.

[Anonymous]

It is sad to me that so many women on here cannot accept that their perspective isn't shared by others. I understand some of you don't care about anything other than healthy mother and baby. That makes sense to me. But it also makes sense to me that a woman might care about her own childbirth experience.

I think it should be assumed that no one puts their own birth experience over the health of their baby or themselves. In fact many of us follow a particular path for birth (whether it be OB, midwife, hospital, birth center, home) because we believe that is the safest, healthiest route for our baby and ourselves. So in that sense, the experience and the outcome can be connected. I wanted to have unmedicated births because I believed they were safe and healthy for me and my baby, and also because I wanted to experience the birth process without medication. I don't see anything wrong with that, nor do I see anything wrong with a woman who chooses an epidural because she sees it as safe and healthy for herself and her baby and wants to experience the birth process with medication. I guess what I am saying is that we all have an idea in our minds of the "experience" that we want, and often it relates to what we believe is safe or healthy.

As another PP said there is real evidence that childbirth can be a traumatic experience for SOME women, that impacts their feelings about themselves and their ability to parent. You might think that is silly but it is reality. I don't understand why some of you feel the need to argue with that reality. It's great that you didn't have a traumatic experience, but are you really saying that you don't think any other woman has the "right" to have a traumatic experience, or that she should be judged for that? Sure it would be wonderful if we all could just be happy to have our healthy babies, but the experience of giving birth IS an experience, and for some women it is a traumatic one.

And for the person who seemed to ridicule the idea of birth experience and say that they can't imagine women in any other country caring about that, you obviously have not done much learning or research on this topic. There are women and providers all around the world who care about process, outcomes, and experience of birth. If you research international midwifery or international doula work or international birth work, you will find countless resources to demonstrate that women around the world do care about the childbirth experience.

I had two great births which for me were really profound and lifechanging experiences, partly because of the babies that were born from those experiences, but partly because of what I accomplished, and the type of care and support that I received. I see nothing wrong with that.

[Anonymous]

Interesting that such an old thread popped up again...

The OP most certainly has had her baby by now considering her post was made in Jan 2009!

[Anonymous]

I don't think it was unreasonable for the doctor to 'dismiss' OP, although I wouldn't use that word. I love my OB, but when I first got pregnant, I asked a bunch of questions about the Bradley method, etc. without really knowing what it was. After researching on my own later about what I was actually asking about, I realized I wanted all the painkillers I could get to make it through labor (just being honest, no need for response). In any case, my doc was very upfront with me and said that if I really wanted to do Bradley and make a detailed birth plan, etc., then I might not be very happy with him as a doc. I thought it was very refreshing, and he is a GREAT doctor. If your philosophies don't mesh, the doc should be honest! Best for everyone!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm from a family of doctors, and from these posts, I can see why none of them went into OB/GYN. What a bunch of freaking high maintenance whiners!!! And I say this as someone with two children who also had high risk pre-pregnancy issues. Listen, you only have OP's CHARACTERIZATION of her interaction with her doctor. Maybe the doctor was high-handed and dimissive, but maybe OP was the type of PITA patient who turns around and sues for the slightest thing. Doctors have to practice protective medicine. I'm a lawyer, and I can tell you that there are some types of clients who I just won't take -- too much agita. and by the way, OP, I recommend that you don't post the name of the doctor on this board. You could wind up with some real legal problems.

Amen!