Wedding Disasters and Bad Births, you might wonder what they have in common. But this post points out how supportive others are if a woman has a bad wedding experience (photographer doesn’t come, etc) but gets little sympathy if their birth doesn’t go as hoped for. They hear, you have your baby. That is all that matters.
Well, you could say to the woman with a wedding disaster, “Well you are married, that is all that matters.”
I do find it ironic that women will spend thousands and thousands of dollars and spend MONTHS planning for their wedding. Yet most women will then spend as little as possible to have a baby, many women want homebirth, but are unwilling to pay a few thousand dollars out of pocket for it. Or moms who want a doula, but are unwilling to spend the money on that. I am always curious how much they spent on their wedding. I feel for moms who are struggling financially. But after seeing my student G. who was struggling financially, made choices to take my class (which I gave her a discount on, because she asked) and then they chose to have a homebirth midwife last minute, despite the cost, I thought if SHE can do it, because it means that much to her, anyone can do it. It is about choices, priorities.
Most women spend relatively little time (compared to the time they spend on preparing for a wedding) on preparing for birth, choosing a care provider and birth location.
A wedding is a special day, something most little girls dream about their whole lives and they usually only have one wedding day. So it is certainly well worth the time and money.
A birthing day should be a special day too, a woman will probably have only 1-4 of these days in her life. I wish all little girls dreamed about these days their whole life, some probably do, but many probably fear it. Which makes me very sad. I have seen many moms who fear birth, take Hypnobabies and it helps them to change their perceptions about birth and look forward to their birthing day! That of course makes me happy.
A birthing day should be a day in which a mother is respected and honored, one in which she should get the best care possible. It is certainly worth the time and money.
If you are an expecting mom, think about what you did to create the best wedding possible. What are you willing to do to create the best birth possible? It doesn’t have to cost money, check some books out of the library, learn about your choices, find a doula in training. But it will take time and effort. I know it will be worth it.
Enjoy Birth's Old Blog :) 
That’s so funny–I always think that, too! When people complain about what doulas or midwives or childbirth educators charge, or say they don’t have time to take a breastfeeding class or read a book or whatever, I wonder (or remember, if I know them) how much time and money they’d happily spend on a wedding, without even questioning it …
at a recent lll meeting one of the leaders said it always blows her mind when she hears women talk and talk and talk and prepare for their births, and then don’t even give breastfeeding a try.
This is a great blog. Love it. It is so true and I am amazed at how little people I know prepare for their birth. I’m only 2 days over and my sister in law asked if they have talked about a induction date. It seems so normal for most people and to me it’s NOT AN OPTION, unless I know it’s medically necessary, and if you get informed you can KNOW if it is necessary which is usually not the case. I love the comparison between the two. I just feel blessed I live in a place where there are a bunch of hippies and that 60% of women birth unmedicated at the hospital I will be at.
I completely understand on what you mean about women who spend money on weddings, yet do not give that much effort on researching and planning for a homebirth, let alone spending the money to make it happen. Or spending money on a doula and time and resources on classes. However, I take issue with comparing one woman’s situation to another. I think it’s a little off putting when someone says to me, if so and so can do it, you can too. When I became pregnant with my 3rd son, I had no job, no money, and I moved in briefly with my mother after having a huge blow out with my boyfriend. I already had two boys with me. I researched my options in the bay area (where I was with my mother), and found a birth center that would bill to medical. But I soon reconciled with my boyfriend and moved back into our house. I was told by more than one resource that I would not be able to use medical for a midwife back home and instead of researching further I listened to them. (That was my biggest regret, making a judgment out ignorance) As I grew in my pregnancy, I grew uneasy with the idea of another hospital birth and I thought I had to find someone who could help me. Then I watched The Business of Being Born and a real fire burning for a home birth.I searched high and low for a midwife who would take me so late in the game, none of them either could or would bill to Medical. The ONLY free standing birth center in my area would not as well. I was stuck, unless I could come up with the $4500 myself. I had NO income, and my boyfriend was using our savings to get by (he’d been out of work since the beginning of my pregnancy). We ask to borrow the money, but the family members didn’t want to contribute to something that put the babies life in danger. IN hindsight we should have said it was for something else, but I honestly didn’t think I’d get the reactions I did. My mother wanted to help, but was out of work on comp a and having surgery soon. The bottom line is, I could not come up with the money. It made me super sad, because really it’s such a small amount of money, but was desperately out of reach for me. The difference between me and your friend could be help from a family member, a less expensive mortgage (mines was 2200), no other kids (I had two), and the list goes on and on. I think the point we should be making to women is showing them all the different ways they can perhaps make the home birth happen as oppose to comparing them to other women. For instance, lots and lots of women don’t know there are traveling midwives. Lots of women don’t know you can find midwives who take payment plans. Giving women alternatives to their issues is much more of productive way to address this issue.
I really like this analogy. My own UC baby is now a wedding coordinator, so I have a special connection to the similarities.
As a midwife, I feel compelled to defend our need for payment. Doctors, the utility company, the grocery store and the insurance companies do not accept deferred or dismissed charges if we can’t afford them. If women don’t pay a midwife, we can’t pay our bills. Many midwives live hand to mouth, just as the women who utilize them do.
We’ve tried to be allowed to take MediCal for a decade, but our government here in CA deems a CPM not qualified to do so unless we have a doctor to sign off on our charts -and the doctors’ insurance company will cancel their insurance if they sign off on our charts.
I have traveled as a midwife, but charge more for traveling costs plus living there during the end of pregnancy and the first week postpartum. In my case, I am almost double the cost of a local birth, so asking a midwife to come to you from afar for free would require the midwife to be independently wealthy to fund her faraway birth. By taking the distant client, she also closes off her opportunities to make money by clearing her local calendar which, in a typical midwife’s practice, would be 4-6 clients.
I had my daughter UC 25 years ago because I couldn’t find a midwife to take me for no money and late in my pregnancy. It sucked and, having a serious complication, she could have died if EMS hadn’t gotten there quickly to help. I was indignant that midwives, who I’d previously thought were in a noble (read: giving all of themselves) profession yet could turn away someone in need. Once I started doing birth work myself, I realized childcare costs money, gas costs money, eating at the hospital costs money… and then, as a midwife… sutures, oxygen, instruments, on-going education, NRP re-training, CPR re-training and even our bi-annual license renewal costs money. It can be flippin’ expensive to be a midwife.
It is worth the cost. I am not whining. I am illuminating. I barter my care, I take payment plans, I take credit cards, I discount my care, but as I get older, I get braver to expect money for my extensive education and life-saving skills. Our culture runs on money; shouldn’t my business, too?
I am right there with you, sister!
http://insidethemidwifesbag.blogspot.com/2009/11/frustration-you-get-what-you-pay-for.html
I think part of the problem is those women who have lavish weddings and spend months preparing for them also have parents who are bank-rolling said extravaganza. Unfortunately, those soon-to-be grandparents are also going to be the ones buying the $600 cribs, $300 travel systems, and designer wardrobes for the grandchild, but aren’t looking to the event of the birth itself. The bride-turned-mother doesn’t have any idea that she could have a wonderful homebirth experience, but instead focuses on what HER mother did… and, what her parent will buy (and that probably doesn’t include funding a natural child birth).
That is a really good point, I hadn’t thought about before! So maybe we need to educate the grandparents as well as the parents!