I never knew so many people cared about labor until I was pregnant. About two seconds after my husband and I announced the news, I was inundated with input on how I should give birth.
“What’s your birth plan?” one relative asked immediately after I told her I was pregnant. Uh…to get the baby out—preferably while experiencing the exact opposite of excruciating pain? She proceeded to preach to me about the benefits of natural childbirth, throwing out intense adjectives like “primal” and “empowering” while getting misty-eyed about her own birth experience. There’s really no polite way to end a conversation about how a baby should come out of me, so I just smiled, nodded, and entertained myself by reciting the lyrics to “American Pie” in my head.
I didn’t just get it from family: Some friends tried to influence my birth method, too. They e-mailed me links to the trailer for Ricki Lake’s pro-natural childbirth documentary, “The Business of Being Born” and passed on books like Childbirth Without Fear which has a photo on the cover of a baby being born while his mom screams her head off. Because nothing turns a woman on to natural childbirth like that way-too-graphic visual.
Here’s the thing: I’ve always been a little nervous about the idea of giving birth. Between watching women have meltdowns during birth scenes in movies and overhearing my mom’s friends recount their childbirth horror stories, I wasn’t exactly psyched to do it myself one day. So when I discovered epidurals were a thing, my curiosity was piqued. There was a way to get the baby out safely and save me from the worst pain of my life? Niiice.
One friend in particular knew about my nervousness and still pushed on the regular for natural childbirth. And she was good. Our conversations went something like this:
Her: “Have you thought any more about natural childbirth?
Me: “Nope! I’m getting an epidural.”
Her: “I just really feel that it’s best if you have a natural childbirth. Don’t decide just yet. Wait until you’re in labor. It’ll be worth it.”
Me: “Uh-huh, cool. I’m getting an epidural. Let’s go get ice cream!”
[Repeat every freaking time I saw her.]
It got so bad that I started to hesitate to be honest about my choice to have an epidural. When people inevitably asked if I wanted to have a natural childbirth, they wanted to know why not. I found myself cracking jokes about how I wasn’t “woman enough” to give birth without drugs to diffuse the tension, but when I had to defend my decision to our birthing class instructor—in front of the entire class—I started to get pissed off.
MORE: 16 Things Every Woman Thinks During Labor
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not anti-natural childbirth. I have friends who have gone that route and have found it to be very rewarding—and more power to them. I’m just anti-tell me how to give birth. Why was my decision to take pain medication that would make the birth process easier so offensive to others? And why did everything think they could tell me what to do?
Since I’m still stewing over this nearly two years later, I reached out to therapist Jane Greer, Ph.D., author of What About Me?, for her input. She says the way you decide to give birth should be between the mother, father, and doctor, and no one else. Besides it being completely inappropriate for someone to tell a woman how she should give birth, Greer says being persuaded to give birth the way someone else wants you to can actually make the delivery worse because you’ve gone against your instincts: “You need to feel as calm and relaxed as possible during this extremely painful process.”
If I have another baby and this comes up again, she recommends saying, “I appreciate your suggestions and concern. However, my doctor, husband, and I have chosen the procedure that we feel is best for us.” That helps convey the message that they should basically step off, without being rude.
After all of that, it ended up not being my choice to make. I had to be induced, and my doctor recommended an epidural for my situation anyway. I had an incredibly easy, fairly painless labor, unlike a woman down the hall who was screaming like Chucky was delivering her baby. Just listening to that was terrifying, and I’m glad I didn’t have that experience.
Unfortunately, the birth-shaming didn’t end after I had my baby. At a dinner party one night, I was seated next to a woman who’d had a natural childbirth (don’t ask how we got on the topic). When she learned that I didn’t, her response was, “Well, I just wanted what was best for my baby.” Because I clearly didn’t. It was like a slap to the face.
I have friends who desperately wanted to have a natural childbirth but weren’t able to because of complications. Yet they’ve gotten grief from people, too, which feels incredibly unfair.
I get that people have the best of intentions, especially when it comes to childbirth methods. But they don’t seem to understand that what they push for can, at best, annoy the crap out of a woman, and at worst, make her feel terrible about herself. Birth-shaming is no different from slut-shaming. It’s hurtful, and it’s not okay.
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