Child Birth In Your Life And Around The World!

Choosing one birth experience was difficult for me having seven beautiful children to choose from. I gave birth personally four times. My first child was born two week late and my body refused to deliver him naturally. After 23 hours of labor my doctor sent me down stairs for an x-ray. They realized from the x-ray he was in the correct position but very long with very wide shoulders. She decided she would do a C-section. The C-section went well and I delivered a healthy 8 pound 9 ounce, 24 inches long little boy with a beautiful smile, a twinkle in his eye and a love for his mother that can never be matched.

When I woke up from the anesthetic they gave me while they were putting me back together I woke up in a room with other people and I could hear the nurses talking, laughing and eating pizza, yes eating pizza. It was the weirdest experience ever. The scary thing was I couldn’t feel my legs. I had been given a spinal tap prior to the delivery and it hadn’t worn off yet. After I woke up they wheeled me to my own room where I was able to hold my baby but I had very strong emotions about the lack of feeling in my legs and my head was pounding. I was in the hospital for three days; it took two of those days for me to regain the use of my legs, obviously this was not normal. I was only twenty years old with very little early childhood knowledge and I was taking home a beautiful human being with the understanding I would love, nurture and provide for him all with very little experience and minimal knowledge of early childhood development.

During my pregnancy with my son I was sick for 9 months straight. I vomited daily and couldn’t keep anything down. My doctor said this was normal and would go away after delivery. My first meal after delivery I threw up; they said it was probably the anesthetic. When I got home from the hospital with my newborn I ate a piece of chicken and some mashed potatoes and the pain was unbearable and I got sick with 10 staples in my stomach this pain was unlike any pain I had ever experienced. Upon returning to the hospital they discovered I had gall stones and they needed to remove my gall bladder immediately. (I wished they had discovered this during my C-section) I was rushed to another hospital emergency surgery was performed and my mom cared for my infant son.

I chose this example because it illustrated how you could plan and plan for child birth but things happen that you have no control over. And despite delivering a normal, healthy child you can still have life threatening complications. Fortunately for me and my son I had my mother to help me because the impact on his child development could have been much more traumatic. What if I did not have a support system? While I was in the hospital who would have cared for my son? Could he have had attachment issues? He is fine and this experience did not impact him in a negative way but it could have.

In Uganda most mothers give birth at home with no anesthetic and very little medical care. Had I attempted to give birth in Uganda I probably would have died and my child would have died with me if we did not have the option of a C-section. According to the latest official figures from a 2006 health survey, 16 Ugandan women a day die in childbirth, and 76 newborns in every 1,000 do not reach the age of one. The leading direct causes of these deaths are haemorrhage (26 percent), sepsis (22 percent), obstructed labour (13 percent), unsafe abortion (8 percent) and hypertensive disorders in pregnancy (6 percent), according to the International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Uganda.

My next three child birth experiences where VBAC (Vaginal Birth After C-Section) and uneventful. I gave birth to 3 happy healthy daughters. In Uganda this would not have been possible because I probably would not have survived my first birthing experience. I think that having children at home is possible but you need to plan and have a contingency plan in case there are complications. I am grateful that I live in a country where we have access to high quality medical care and facilities as well as access to knowledge that is free and helps us raise happy healthy children.