I would not particularly say that birth is a women’s “issue”, as birth, to me, is a natural process. There are, however, many issues surrounding the way that society views: the process of giving birth, how and where women should do it, and the cost of giving birth (just to name a few). Reproduction and birth, which has obviously been occurring since the beginning of human existence, has somehow turned into a sort of medical phenomenon, a business, and a human act that needs to be regulated by the law. For example, Senator Mark Obenshain tried to propose a bill to make all Virginia women “be required to report all incidences of fetal demise occurring outside a physician’s supervision to the police”. This proposal shows the immense lack of knowledge of the process of reproduction in general. Not only are miscarriages common, but this desire to tie women’s reproduction to the law connects back to the idea that a women’s body is merely a vessel for a fetus.
According to one article, “Only two percent of women experienced a set of five supportive care practices that research shows benefit mothers and babies. These practices are: labor begins on its own; the woman has the freedom to move and change positions; the woman has continuous labor support from a partner, family member, or doula; the woman does not give birth on her back; and the mother and baby are not separated after birth”. I don’t see why any of those practices are not common, as these sound like completely natural things. Why do medical professionals and researchers have to contemplate whether such simple things such as comfort, the presence of the father/spouse, and no separation after birth are beneficial to both the child and mother? To incorporate business into this, I recently saw an article online about a couple that was charged on their medical bill by the hospital for the mother holding the baby after giving birth. I cannot think of anything more ridiculous that having to pay to hold your own baby after hours of pain and labor. Perhaps, like politicians, physicians still fail to realize that birth involves two patients, but it is a natural, emotional, intense experience for both mother and child.
It appears to me that the need to control a woman’s body extends beyond abortion, but also what a woman does if she decides to keep a baby. Again, it is a natural process that is being painted as a medical situation instead of a precious experience, and it all stems from ignorance on all parts. C-sections are so commonly used that women think about it as if there’s automatically a 50-50 chance that she will give birth naturally or through c-section. I recall my sister telling me about her experience watching a c-section while she was in nursing school, and she told me that it was a surgical procedure that was more intense and invasive than she had pictured. Yet this unnatural way of giving birth has become common practice and used in unnecessary circumstances. Instead of informing women on how to take care of their bodies to avoid high-risk pregnancies, doctors medically intervene during delivery.
At the same, many women are unaware of this issue, just as many are unaware of what prenatal care is best. Why is is that women are kept in the dark about such a normal biological process? Why are women uninformed about how their chronic illnesses can affect their pregnancy and birth? Why, for the past century, have midwives been criticized for being incompetent to guide pregnancy and birth, while some doctors look(ed) at it from an objective and detached perspective, with complete disregard for the psychological and emotional implications of it? It should not be a women’s right’s “issue” because it should have never been an issue in the first place. The only concern that medical professionals and politicians should have in regards to birth is that that the child’s care is kept in mind, and that women are receiving proper prenatal care, can afford prenatal care, are informed about labor and delivery, are not taken advantage of, and that each woman’s comfort and experience of bringing forth life is as pleasant as possible.
