What if there was talk of physiological birth in France rather than letting the pseudo-experts deal with it?

Why suffer martyrdom when you can have access to an epidural? At the time, 82.7% of French women still use this analgesic, yet more and more of them are considering physiological childbirth. Guarantor of respect for the physical and moral integrity of the parturient, it imposes itself as an attractive alternative to medical deliverystill considered essential in France and often criticized for its lack of humanity.

But, if the idea of ​​a natural birth attracts many patients, they often don’t have access to it due to a lack of suitable structures and solutions. This lack of alternatives sometimes drives the most motivated to turn interlocutors who have neither the training nor the necessary skills to adequately support them.

Physiological childbirth seduces more and more French women

According to a recently published study, 9 out of 10 women would favor the development of birth centers and 64% would consider giving birth there. These establishments, annexed to the hospital structures, offer pregnant women a less medicalized pregnancy monitoring and allow it to those who wish give birth there physiologically.

Right now, there are eight birth centers in France. Assisted home birth is also the subject of growing interest. A second study reveals that 36% of women would consider home births, even though AAD is still very little considered in our country.

A column published in The world last May it revealed that 20% of births would be induced. Extraction tools would also be used in 20% of cases and the episiotomy rate would be 15%. It is not a question of questioning the legitimacy of these practices, but of noting that they are very frequent. Faced with a medicalization sometimes perceived as outrageous, many women would like to be offered alternatives to these clinical deliveries.

If every expectant mother were to be able to choose the mode of delivery that suits her without having to justify herself, this trend reveals a growing distrust of a medical community rocked by massive allegations of obstetric violence. Physiological birth would make it possible to recover a body and a birth, traditionally annexed by medicine.

Physiological childbirth abroad, between imagination and pragmatism

Natural childbirth is not discussed everywhere. In the Netherlands, for example, pregnancy and childbirth are not perceived in the same way as in France. There, only 22% of women have an epidural and birth centers are legion. Personally, living in the Netherlands, I have made the choice, like 30% of women, to give birth to my child at home, accompanied by a midwife and childcare assistant. If I have not been spared the pains of giving birth without an epidural, I absolutely do not regret this choice which has allowed me to start this new adventure in the tranquility of my home.

However, it is not a matter of advocating the birth of the natural at all costs and above all under any conditions. Also in the Netherlands, for example, home births are subject to drastic conditions. Low-risk pregnancy, no medical history, preliminary examinations, compliant domicile and located near a hospital, if they do not meet these criteria, women are denied access to AAD as it is deemed too dangerous.

Midwives who perform home deliveries are also trained to detect the risks and never hesitate to transfer a woman to the hospital even before these risks are confirmed. What qualifies the fantasy of a land of plenty where the physiological is intended for everyone, unconditionally, and disappoints essentialist reflections of those who argue that the woman’s body “is made for that”.

The excesses of physiological movement

Many pseudo-natural experts are encroaching on the post left vacant by an unreceptive medical profession and public authorities. These “specialists” who are particularly rampant on Facebook and Instagram sometimes have no other competence than their good will and their ideology.

Transmitted speech can therefore prove to be particularly dangerous. We often find the idea that the female body knows what to do as it has been giving birth naturally for millennia “. This impression of over-medication has confused the tracks and makes some patients believe that medical intervention is systematically unnecessary and only serves to establish the caregiver’s dominance.

They may be tempted to refuse needed help or choose to give birth alone at home unaccompanied. However, for millennia, women have not been satisfied with giving birth naturally, often even dying from it.

Far from the pragmatic vision of certain European countries that see in physiological childbirth above all a good way to give birth to healthy women at not too high costs, drifts pro physio invest natural childbirth until it is transformed into a rite of passage that must be “successful” at all costs.

According to these new natural actors, a good mental and physical preparation guarantees the good progress of the birth, and without suffering please! We also prefer to avoid the term pain, such as contractions. We talk about waves, intensity and sometimes even orgasm. Absolutely. Webinars, training, material, many resources (for a fee, of course) are made available to expectant mothers to allow them to tame their childbirth in complete relaxation.

At the risk of terribly complicating those (many) who have benefited from medical care. For the personal anecdote, when I dared to point out that giving birth without an epidural was painful (understatement), I was told that I simply couldn’t let go properly. With such talk, primiparas baring contractions, sorry, waves, they do not have to fully understand what is falling upon them.

Physiological childbirth is common in countries whose perinatal mortality rate is equivalent to ours and the hexagonal model is not the only valid one. The craze for natural childbirth must prompt us to question ultra-medicalized French obstetric practices and to pave the way for controlled and safe alternatives, such as those that exist abroad. Instead of having the field exclusively occupied by pseudo-experts.

Photo credit image of one: Getty Images