"Enjoy your Labor" by Gilbert Grant is GREAT!

[Schmickers]

Hi there Fat Mama, and welcome to the forum. We welcome lively debate here on all topics, as long as you stick by the forum guidelines. Be aware that this is predominantly a natural parenting and birth forum, but we welcome comers from all walks of life and all ideologies.

The picture is NOT what the natural-birthers like. It shows there are actually dangers to NOT having an epi for some women (I happen to be one! we do exist!). And it shows that they do not have the effects that they are often damned with, unless administered incompetently.

My first response to this is that I'd suggest that it may be challenging, depending on where you give birth, to find an anaesthetist who is "competent" - safe, skilled, and experienced - in administering epidurals. The problem being I have yet to meet the anaesthetist who said "Excuse me, I just don't feel confident doing this. Perhaps another form of pain relief might be a better option?"

I haven't read the book myself. However, I know for a fact that I can probably find a book to support just about any position I want to. It doesn't mean that the book is right. If this guy really has enough evidence there to overcome the large body of research that confirms the risks associated with epidural, then it must be one hell of a book.

if you want one, do NOT be scared off by the propaganda. And hey if you don't want one, just go your merry way but DON'T spread lies and deceit.

Well, I'm not sure about anything else, but as a nurse, I don't spread lies and deceit; I allow myself to be guided by the evidence. As I said above, if he has enough compelling evidence to overcome years of research to the contrary, I hope he's been nominated for some sort of award.

As far as this forum is concerned, we don't spread propaganda, and we don't lie. We're actually quite a nice bunch, if you take the time to get to know us. All we do is share - share our stories, our experiences, about birth, about families. Some of those stories are about epidurals. Most of them are negative. That's not to do with attempts to decieve or lie; it's a function of how we experience our births.

This is a book that really changed the way I saw epidurals. I used to buy all the mumbo jumbo, you know, it slows labour down, leads to c sections blah blah

*puzzled* Are you marketing this book, or recommending it?