In praise of the C-Section

[skeetaboat]

SB - It sounds like you are quite at peace with your partner's birth experience - so why are you letting yourself get upset by what other people think of and say about cesareans? Whatever any one person thinks about a particular topic is just an idea among many ideas, shaped by their experiences. It's up to you if you pick up any particular idea and use it, or toss it away.

We often talk about cesareans as if they're all the same event, but they're not. Every c-section is as different to another as the mothers on which they are performed are to each other. They can be a nightmare for some, a welcome relief for others, and a life-saver for yet others still, plus everything in between. It is you guys who need to be at ease with your birth experience, and no one else. Negativity towards c-sections is primarily caused by bad experiences with them. That point of view is just as valid as your point of view. Neither is 'right', and neither is 'wrong', they're just different.

FWIW I'll put my hand up and say, thank GOD for c-sections. I can see what you're saying about c-sections - there is an air about that they are to be avoided at all costs; that they are bad; that they are an assault on women & the institution of birth; etc. And I can see how that sentiment, particularly because it is so prevalent, can be internalised by some women. Women who *do* actually end up feeling bad about their cesarean, or as though they've taken the inferior option, or that their body somehow 'failed' or that their carers somehow 'failed', etc etc, because that's what they keep reading and hearing and so think that's what they are 'supposed' to feel. And we know that what we think = what we feel.

But I can also see that in this cesarean-happy maternity system, upset, traumatised and angry is exactly how so many women *do* feel about their cesarean experience, which is why there is such a strong sentiment against the big bad C in the first place.

What we're doing now, discussing, sharing, thinking, reflecting, is all part of the birthing process. We just have to be careful of: a) owning our own experience and not projecting our own experiences onto others, and b) displacing connection and understanding and peace with our own experiences with the experiences, thoughts and feelings others'. I think in general we need to be cautious of mob mentality. Just because an idea is popular or shared or common, does not make it some kind of 'universal truth'. You don't have to feel bad about your experience just because others feel bad about their similar (but in reality very different) experience.

I'm glad that the article you posted resonated with your own truth and helped you connect with it. I'm sure it will do the same for many others.

ETA: Sazzafraz, you must have posted while I as typing. I think your experience is a perfect demonstration of what I'm trying to say - you internalised the anti-cesarean sentiment which then contributed to your cesarean experience being a bad one, in part because of your pre-concieved ideas, contructed by the information and stories you had read prior. Does that sound right?