Thoughts about labor and birth

In reading some books about labor and delivery (specifically, Ina May's Guide to Childbirth and The Hypnobirthing Book), I have started to think a lot about how attitudes about childbirth have changed in the last 100 years or so. Lots of statistics back up the idea that childbirth has been sort of usurped by the medical industry, putting forth a belief that most women need lots of medical support and intervention in order to safely deliver a baby (or two).

I'm not so sure I buy that: why would it be that my body and my baby have behaved exactly the way they were supposed to, all through this pregnancy, only to fail at the end? Being a climber, I've learned to trust my muscles - when I train them, they work properly. Why would I assume my uterine muscles wouldn't function as well?

My husband is behind my desire to have a natural childbirth, and the closest hospital happens to be known in our city for providing minimal intervention and midwives instead of doctors as the status quo. In fact, I was told recently that I won't even be scheduled to see an MD unless there's an unexpected complication. The first doctor I will speak to will be the pediatrician who comes to check the baby after she's born.

The interesting thing is the study of pain during labor - as a society we have developed a belief that labor is inherently painful, and I've seen so many comments on message boards from women who are fearful about the pain of labor. Guess what? Fear kicks in your autonomic nervous system, which makes you tense, uterine muscles work against instead of with each other, and it hurts! I was flipping through three books a friend gave me, and saw chapter headings like "Coping with Childbirth". I didn't even bother to read 'em - no wonder so many women get epidurals and end up with C-sections!

Here are some things I've learned recently:

Induction via pitocin accelerates labor contractions to the point where the body cannot naturally produce endorphins to match the intensity of the contractions. This makes them hurt more. In natural labor, which progresses more slowly, endorphin rates increase with the intensity of contractions.

Epidurals limit a woman's ability to use her lower body, which makes pushes less effective and also makes it impossible for a women to use certain labor positions (squatting, for example) which enlarge the pelvis.

Midwives at birthing centers have been able to achieve a 2% C-section rate, compared to the national average of 35%.

Women in other cultures who don't expect labor to be painful typically have shorter labors and uneventful births.

Doctors tend to have more painful labors than non-medical professionals.