Six years later, I still feel cheated.

Content Warning: Birth trauma

Six years ago, I sat in a hospital room while they monitored my youngest, preparing to start pitocin. It was ironic in a sense, because nearly 5 years before, in the throes of labor, I begged and begged for the birth team to not give me pitocin. This time, I had chosen it.

See, the day before, I went for an ultrasound (one of many to ease the fears of my birth team about the size of my baby) only to set my providers into a tailspin. My littlest measured at 12 lbs (13 at first, but the nice tech did some remeasuring to get it lower for me). But the issue to them was not the weight, it was that the amount of fluid I had was over some threshold. 

What does that mean? I asked. 

They told me it could mean that the baby’s kidneys weren't functioning properly. And it also meant that they didn’t want me to go past 39 weeks because there was a risk of a cord prolapse if my water broke at home. 

They gave me two options - either schedule a c-section or schedule an induction. 

I looked at the OB and asked if an induction would work. Her response was you’ve done this before with a big baby, there’s no reason to think you couldn’t do it again.

So I scheduled the induction for the next morning. I picked the earliest time I could get because I also knew this babe was big and I wanted to give myself a chance. At least I told myself as such…

After I gave birth by c-section the following day, I wrote about it. It was my attempt to heal from all of the mess I had been through. It’s a beautiful piece and so many have loved it. I read it now and appreciate that I could see so much good in there. 

I no longer have fear, or too much sadness, but I do feel cheated. And I’m pissed. This time of year, my birth trauma rears its head. And the feelings have continued to develop over the years. My therapist reminded me how no one was there for me afterwards to process it all. And she doesn’t mean family and friends, but professionals. To me, that means the providers who cared for me those few days. I want to sit down with them. I want to hear their reflection. Do they have regrets? Do they wish they had done differently? Treated me differently?

The way that the medical industrial complex works is to tell them to keep moving. To not look back. To focus on what’s in front of them. But I still hope they learned something. Because they sure as hell needed to. 

My anger today is all about what could have been. I am pissed at not knowing what was available to me then. At not being given all of the options that were available. See, I did all that I knew. I took the time to decide, weighing the options I was given. I kept making decisions based on my intuition and with intention. 

Yet, I still feel so cheated. 

Many have tried to help me move beyond this. I hear my partner talk about how we have a beautiful little babe, that everything turned out okay even though the entire process was so fucked up. My mom likes to tell me that I was where I needed to be because of the complications. She is a product of emergency medicine care, I get it. But it doesn’t help. None of it helps. 

What I do need is someone to tell me, to look me in the eye, and to truly believe it when they say you could have done it. That if the right options were presented from the very start, you could have birthed that baby vaginally. You could have caught him yourself. And, you could have held him immediately after he was delivered, taking in the fresh smell of birth rather than the fresh smell of baby hats and diapers. 

Over the years, I’ve tried to tell myself some stories to make it feel better. That his head was much bigger than average, there is no way he would’ve fit. That he wasn’t engaging in the pelvis so he was telling me it wouldn't work. That the fact that a retired provider who I adored and trusted walked into that hospital in order to save me from the pain and trauma of it all - so it would all feel safer. That the retired midwife who delivered my daughter, and just happened to be on call over at the birth center, visited in order to ease my pain - to create some familiarity in what was to come. 

These are good stories. They help sometimes. 

But I still feel cheated. 

Today, as a doula I know so much more than I ever knew as a birthing person. When I became pregnant with my first, I knew I was going to use the birth center. I was a little leery about homebirth, but only because I have a history of having weird and rare complications so I was worried about that. I forgot to tell myself that I’ve always been okay despite those complications, that they’ve never been life threatening and more so just annoying to deal with. 

I had to convince my partner about the birth center. He wasn’t so sure. He didn’t know any different. He was acting from a place of wanting me to be safe and the baby to be safe. He couldn’t possibly know that the safest place was far away from that hospital and birthing center. 

See I gave birth in the hospital system that I worked in. I worked with these providers on a regular basis. I knew them. So much so that I knew if certain ones were the doc on duty, that I would cross my legs and wait for the next shift. I thought this kept me safe.

But now I know what could've been. That might be the hardest part for me in birthwork. That I can see over and over what I could’ve had if I just knew. It’s easy to blame myself for not knowing. It is the quickest fix after all. Expecting the entire birth system to be better is a much bigger ask- and it’s damn hard to imagine.

If I had access to people like Bad Ass Mother Birther and could see how should dystocia can be handled at home, that hemorrhages can be treated at home, that you can 100% birth a 10 plus pound breech baby at home.

If I had just known.

This year, I’m trying to remember my birth story through the lens of an observer. It’s hard, because my body still feels it. I know all of the good. And I can see and feel all of the good because it was so very good. 

But I also see where changes could’ve been made. I would have said no to the ECV and found a provider who would deliver my breech baby. I would have declined the glucose test and monitored my own sugars. And if I had ended up at the induction anyhow, when backed into a corner I would have walked out instead. I would’ve gone home and gotten another opinion. I would have said no, those options don’t work for me.

Tomorrow, my littlest turns 6 years old. This babe is absolutely perfect and beautiful and fun and loving and damn good at math. I find absolute joy in celebrating them. But I still walk through the day carrying the extra weight of the trauma. 

I still feel cheated.