[TRANSCRIPT OF ANSWER]
Fear for Baby’s Health
Moms fear about their babies and their baby’s health. Even healthcare providers fear delivering babies. Everybody wants to have a healthy baby. When we hear about a baby who’s not healthy, that’s very distressing to us. The main thing for you to understand is most babies are healthy regardless. Women in war-torn countries have babies without assistance in the field. Not that that should be your choice, but understand that nature is very resilient. That regardless of what may go on physically or environmentally, your baby will be healthy.
Be Prepared and Live a Healthy Lifestyle
What you can do to prepare for this and to minimize that fear is number one, educate yourself on what your options are for your birth. Keeping yourself healthy, preparing for your birth, that’s going to help your baby. Healthy mothers have healthy babies. That’s just the way it is. We’ve done this research forever. We know that that is a fact, so if you are in that where you are healthy, suspect that your baby will be healthy.
Birth Choices
The fear sometimes (when) women make choices about where to have their baby is the “what if” factor. What if something happens? I need to be here or I need to be there. Is that an issue? Yes, but it’s not an issue that everybody should look at the same. If you have a health issue, if something has come up during your pregnancy that makes you out of the realm of what we would consider normal pregnancy or normal development, then maybe your options are for hospital birth. The misconception is that a hospital birth is safer. Hospitals are wonderful places and have facilities that many women require, but is it required? Look at the statistics. Look at global health. Look at the places where women do not have babies in hospitals and what are their statistics for the health of the baby?
Unfortunately, the United States spends the most amount of money on babies and we don’t have very good statistics. So do your research. Understand that your baby, just like your body, knows what to do. Your baby knows what to do when it’s here, and if you are associated with a professional healthcare provider that is experienced in childbirth and childbirth alternatives, then you have the best of both worlds. It’s not always medical management that you need. Sometimes it is. But being with a provider that knows how to do ongoing screening for you should make you understand that you and your baby are in safe hands and probably the safest place for your baby is in your arms right after delivery.
