The Business of Being Born

So I was looking at my friend, Sherrah's blog the other day and she was talking about a documentary that she watched called "The Business of Being Born". It sounded interesting to me so I downloaded it through Netflix and watched it tonight. Wow!! It was really good. Its about hospital births and the medical interventions they use that are not always necessary, and how healthy it is to give birth naturally. When I was pregnant, some of you know that I wanted a natural birth. I studied everything I could get my hands on about natural birth, and how to cope with pain. Brian and I couldn't take a childbirth class because they were expensive and we couldn't afford it (I personally think insurance should cover that sort of thing...but oh well). When I went into labor I discovered that I had back labor...VERY painful, and I am a big wimp!!! I immediately changed my mind and asked for an epidural. I was lucky and had a great doctor and great nurses to help me, and the epidural was the only intervention that was needed during Hayden's birth. I don't really feel like having the epidural had a negative affect on mine and Hayden's bonding experience, as the documentary suggests, but maybe, if I had more knowledge and support from a midwife and possibly a doula, the experience could have been different. The next time around I am going to look more into a natural birth and midwives and stuff, and maybe I will get a natural birth afterall!! I do recommend this documentary to anyone who is planning on having children, or anyone who wasn't completely happy with previous births. It has a lot of good information :)