Midwives

My five children were delivered by midwives in hospitals. That was always the standard here in Israel and also in England where my third was born.

Growing up in mid-twentieth century America, midwives were characters in quaint novels, movies and the Bible. America was very doctor oriented, and my generation was mostly delivered to unconscious women by doctors in the hospital.

In 1971, preparing for the delivery of my first child, and in a foreign country and limited by a still unknown language, I read the first glimmer of complaints about American birth procedures in the books my mother sent me.

I was happy to find myself in the old Shaare Tzedek (Jerusalem, Israel) delivery room, one room with curtained off beds, the midwives a whisper away and in full view. I was never wheeled during "transition," the most painful stage of birth, from "labor to delivery room," the norm for decades in the sadistically, insensitive doctor-planned American hosptals.

I can't say that I had any say during my children's births. It wasn't like today's births in Israel, when the laboring mother is allowed choice and "company." But I was satisfied and never tempted by the idea of a "home birth" with a private midwife. Nor did I ever think of hiring my own private doctor, which was the luxury of the time.

In recent years home births with midwives have a small and dedicated following. This is true in Israel, the United States and other countries. When something goes wrong, and the baby, mother or both die or is injured the midwife is blamed. And not only the specific midwife, the entire profession. Does this happen when a similar tragedy happens in a hospital?

I have heard of cases when the midwife insisted that a high-risk birth was no problem at home, and unfortunately she was wrong. There are also cases when the midwife is right, and there are many cases when the doctors make tragic mistakes. Yes, giving birth in a hospital doesn't guarantee that everything will be perfect.

Neither money, prayers nor modern equipment can guarantee a healthy baby nor a healthy mother. It's hard to accept, but it's true.