The Breech Baby- Options, Stories, Possibilities
I LOVE the topic of breech birth. I was a planned home birth that became a hospital cesarean due to my breech presentation. I always thought that cesarean was the only option for a breech baby, but it isn't. And now, as a childbirth educator I have seen over and over women who are struggle for a VBAC with every birth because of a primary cesarean for breech.
Not a lot of babies are breech- but they matter and so do their mother's. That is why I was SO EXCITED to meet Lauren recently. Her breech baby was a catalyst and she is on a mission to start a dialogue about breech babies and all the options available. Read her stuff. Check her out. Send her your breech baby story (no matter WHAT kind of birth it was and even if that baby turned head down.) I am excited to share her with you. We can help Lauren make My Breech Baby a resource for women everywhere! I am so excited!
My daughter spent most of her gestation
kicking me in the cervix. She made a treadmill of my bladder. She was
(and is) delightful. Yeah. There's a reason they're supposed to be
head down.
In retrospect, I should have known all
along. Maybe I did know. Somewhere along the way my midwife told me
an amusing story about a woman in labor at home who found a big blob
of meconium on her pad--a sure sign of a butt-down baby and usually a
hospital transfer. This story, inexplicably, made me cry. Sometimes
we sense what's going on, even if we don't want to know what's going
on.
At 38 weeks, to risk me out of my own
long-awaited home birth, I got sent for a sonogram and I watched out
of the corner of my eye as the technician typed “breech” on the
screen. That was the beginning of the end.
After a period of exhaustive and
intensive attempts to turn her (affectionately known among my
associates as “Breech Week”), I ended up with a scheduled
cesarean at 39 weeks, feeling terrified of cord prolapse or head
entrapment and very, very alone.
Like all ends, it was also the
beginning of something new. The next day, I hobbled out of the
hospital toting my 10lb baby and a serious desire to change the
world. I set out to gather all the information I could find on breech
babies and breech birth, and put it together in one easy-to-access
place. I made the breech
website I wish I could have found on the day of the fateful
sonogram.
If I knew then what I know now, would I
have agreed to the cesarean? Probably not. Do I regret my
decision? I'm still not sure. I guess I did the best with what I had
at the time, but it really wasn't good enough. There's no excuse for
how much I felt in the dark, there's no reason I had to feel so
alone.
As a woman with a breech baby, if you
don’t want a c-section, are worried about having a vaginal
breech birth, or are just looking into the options, you are
likely to encounter a great deal of folk anxiety. There is a lot of
nameless caution circulating around vaginal breech birth. For the
most part, nobody will really say why, explain the mechanics, or give
you any options. They just believe it is dangerous. Your questions,
if you are able to ask them, may be met with indifference,
impatience, condescension, or worse.
Breech mamas,
you're not alone! And shockingly, you have options!
My goal is to create a landing place
for parents of breech babies and the people that care about them. It
brings together information, resources, and support. Primarily, I
want people to know there are safe
options for turning the baby, that vaginal
birth is available and generally safe, and that they are not
alone. The site already includes a slew of links to amazing
breech birth stories of every kind. In the great tradition of
Jill at the Unnecesarean, I hope to eventually include a list of
breech-friendly practitioners and breech birth statistics by state or
county, if not hospital.
I am trying to make a site that appeals to the masses, presents the array of information on breech, and helps people find what they are looking for. Would you help me?
I am trying to make a site that appeals to the masses, presents the array of information on breech, and helps people find what they are looking for. Would you help me?
Here are some ways you can help all the
little butt-down babies:
- If you are a midwife or OB who attends breech births or you regularly help turn babies in any modality, please let me know so I can put you on my breech-friendly map. I can keep your name and contact information to myself and only give it when women contact me, or I can post it on my site under “Find a Practitioner.” If you know someone who fits this description, you can let me know their email or phone and I will contact them to ask about inclusion on the map.Please join the facebook group to help our breech community.
- If you have had a breech baby, no matter what the outcome, I would love to publish your birth story on mybreechbaby.org to help other breech mamas. And please check out our facebook group where you can meet and support others.
- If you have a look at the website, please let me know what feedback you have. I am just one woman doing this in the whine-free hours, but I do want it to be as helpful, accurate, and comprehensive as possible.
- Feel free to share, post, and list this site on your own platforms!
www.mybreechbaby.org
www.facebook.com/MyBreechBaby
Lauren at
footlingmama@gmail.com
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