In labour, shorter doesn't necessarily equate to better OR easier!
Besides the usual interventions that are pushed on labouring mothers by the medical system to rush things along, which are most of the time completely unnecessary and cause more problems and a cascade of further medical interventions, the very real fact is that rushing birth is not helping the mother or the baby (except in the rare cases of true medical emergencies).
I have written (and experienced) about all these supposedly necessary medical interventions that are pushed on mostly unknowing mothers. I will not rehash all the reasons that these interventions are dangerous and unneeded in 99% of labours.
I want to focus on the actual topic of "fast and slow", normal and unnormal, better and worse.
I, like many other mothers out there, have been green with envy when hearing that this friend or that one had a 3 hour labour... "oh you're sooooo lucky!!"
But the truth is that most of the women that I've spoken with who had super fast labours were even more traumatized by their birthing experience than many mothers I know who've laboured for 18 hours. Why? Because the suddenness and going from 0 to 100km/hr so fast did not give them the time they needed- physically, emotionally or energetically- to find their center or that balance point that can flow WITH the labour, instead of being slammed by the tidal waves of contraction on top of contraction.
Faster does NOT equal better.
As for what is perceived to be "normal" in labour, yet again we run into the wall of unrealistic expectations and the medical machine that wants to process all labouring women with a cookie cutter. What is normal for one woman and one birth is not necessarily normal for another woman or even another birth! I have one friend who's first baby was born after 10 hours of labour, 3 hours of stalled labour IN transition, then 4 hours of pushing. Her next child was almost born in the car on the way to the hospital!! Both labours were perfectly "normal" and yet if she had of had midwives, she would of been forced into an unnecessary Cesarean Section with her first child and probably into an elective C/Section with her second because,.... you know, she obviously wasn't capable of birthing naturally. lol
This is the very same in all aspects of pregnancy, labour, birth, and the beautiful babies that are born. When you try to compare and create a paradigm of "normal" or "not normal", instantaneously you are setting an unrealistic president.
I love that the studies are now proving that these cookie cutter labours are not working. Now it's up to all of us to make sure that this information gets out- not just to the public, but to the hospitals and doctors AND midwives as well!
It only by challenging the accepted "norm" that we can CHANGE it.
Study Suggests Misplaced Fears in Longer Childbirths
Launch media viewer
A
new study in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology suggests that women
in labor may be subject to unnecessary interventions by doctors who
wrongly fear labor has become prolonged.Laura Segall for The New York Times
Epidural anesthesia lengthens the second stage of labor, the one in which women push. But a study published on Wednesday
has found that epidurals are associated with an even longer duration in
the second stage than is generally recognized, suggesting that some
women may be subject to unnecessary interventions by doctors who wrongly
fear labor has become prolonged.
The
finding indicates that “clinicians might need to wait later before
intervening with oxytocin, forceps, vacuum or a cesarean,” said Dr. S.
Katherine Laughon, an investigator at the National Institutes of Health
who was not involved in the study, which was published in Obstetrics and
Gynecology. Still, she added, “clinicians and women need to balance
benefits of vaginal delivery with potential increases in risk for mom
and baby.”
The
new study suggests a normal second stage can take as long as 5.6 hours
for women who get epidurals during their first births, and as long as
3.3 hours for those who do not get epidurals.
For
women who have given birth previously, the group’s guidelines define an
unusually long second stage as two hours with an epidural, one hour
without. The new study found that the second stage for these women can
be as long as 4.25 hours and 1.35 hours, respectively.
“This
paper is very important, and ACOG needs to update its 2003 guidelines,”
said Dr. Robert L. Barbieri, chairman of obstetrics and gynecology at
Brigham and Women’s in Boston, who was not involved in the new study. He
added, “I will change my practice and feel more comfortable going to
five and a half hours with a first birth after an epidural with
reassuring fetal monitoring.”
Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco,
analyzed the records of 42,268 women who delivered vaginally without
problems between 1976 and 2008. Roughly half had epidurals.
The
investigators compared the average length of the second stage of labor
among women who had epidurals with that among women who did not. They
also compared the upper limits of duration for both groups.
Thirty-one
percent of first births and 19 percent of subsequent labors would have
been classified as abnormally long by the current ACOG definition, the
researchers found.
“It’s
time to re-examine what normal and abnormal is, and revise our
guidelines based on modern obstetric population,” said Dr. Yvonne W.
Cheng, the lead author of the study and an associate professor of
obstetrics and gynecology at the University of California, San
Francisco.
The
research is part of a growing body of evidence suggesting that a normal
second stage of labor is now longer than it was decades ago. In 2010, a study of more than 62,000 women found it was as long as 3.6 hours for first-time mothers after an epidural, and 2.8 hours for women who did not get one.
But this latest study is the first to suggest such an extended second stage may be ordinary.
“One
of the messages of this study is, sit on your hands a little longer,
don’t rush into an instrumental vaginal delivery or a cesarean, because
really everything could be fine,” said Dr. Barbara Leighton, a professor
of anesthesiology at Washington University in St. Louis School of
Medicine, who has researched the effects of epidurals on labor.
But
while Dr. Leighton supports revising ACOG recommendations, she believes
that the current study did not prove that longer labor is caused by
epidural anesthesia. Women who request anesthesia may be predisposed to
longer labor for other reasons, she said.
Dr.
Jeffrey Ecker, the chairman of the committee on obstetrics practice for
ACOG, said today’s clinicians are “increasingly recognizing there can
be healthy outcomes and vaginal deliveries of healthy babies when the
second stage extends beyond how it’s traditionally been defined.”
He
added, “Often what’s best and most appropriate — and most difficult —
during labor is patience.” He would not say whether a revision of
guidelines is in the works.
Patience
during labor is not risk-free. The new study found that babies are more
likely to have birth trauma, such as a bruise on the head or a clavicle
fracture,
after longer second-stage labor. But these infants did not have lower
scores on tests designed to measure physical health in newborns, nor did
they experience more admissions to intensive care.
The
risks of significant perineal lacerations and postpartum hemorrhage
were higher in women who experienced prolonged second-stage labor, both
by ACOG’s definition and by the upper limits of the study’s definition
of normal.
While
Dr. Laughon applauded the large number of participants in the study,
she cautioned that “they are saying we should wait longer, but we still
don’t know if that’s safe.”
A
lot has changed since the 1950s, when labor progression norms were
established. Back then, more babies were delivered by forceps and
continuous fetal monitoring was not used.
“We
are doing less interventions to facilitate a shorter second stage, and
we’re letting the power of the uterus and a mother’s pushing determine
the length of the second stage,” Dr. Barbieri said.
I don't think I really have anything to add to this article, it pretty much speaks for itself: Unvaccinated children are healthier. 8000 vaccine free children were involved in this study- something that Big Pharma and our government health agencies will NEVER do, and refuse to do, which is why their so called "studies" to try to prove the safety of their vaccines will never mean anything. The only way you can really study the effects of vaccination is to compare the the health of the vaccinated public to the health of the unvaccinated public. Which is what they've done with this graph.
New Study: Vaccinated Children Have 2 to 5 Times More Diseases and Disorders Than Unvaccinated Children Preventable Vaccine-induced DiseasesA German study released in September 2011 of about 8000 UNVACCINATED children, newborn to 19 years, show vaccinated children have at least 2 to 5 times more diseases and disorders than unvaccinated children. The results are presented in the bar chart below. The data is compared to the national German KIGGS health study of the children in the general population. Most of the respondents to the survey were from the U.S. (Click on the chart to see it better)The data was collected from parents with vaccine-free children via an internet questionnaire by vaccineinjury.info and Andreas Bachmair, a German classical homeopathic practitioner. The independent study is self-funded and is not sponsored by a large “credible” non-profit or government health organization with political and financial conflicts of interest; hence Bachmair relies on Google ads and donations for revenue. Each one of the 8000 cases are actual cases with medical documentation. Three other studies had similar results according to Bachmair and are reported below. No study of health outcomes of vaccinated people versus unvaccinated has ever been conducted in the U.S. by CDC or any other agency in the 50 years or more of an accelerating schedule of vaccinations (now over 50 doses of 14 vaccines given before kindergarten, 26 doses in the first year). Most data collected by CDC is contained in the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) database. The VAERS is generally thought to contain only 3 to 5 percent of reportable incidents. This is simply because only some immediate reactions are reported by doctors; but many are not admitted to be reactions to the vaccine. Most importantly, the VAERS numbers are only immediate reactions, which I would place with a few hours to a few weeks. Long-term vaccine-induced diseases and disorders are not recognized by parents or doctors when these conditions develop perhaps a few months to five years or more and would never be realized to come from multiple vaccinations. In other words, many children and adults have diseases and disorders that are vaccine induced and they never suspect they are from the vaccines, as this study indicates.
...for even just two minutes!!! A new study in England shows that 6 month old babies not only have the capacity to be stressed out, but that they have the ability to anticipate stress and stressful circumstances!!
Stressed out: Studies show babies become anxious if ignored for even two minutes by mother
To investigate whether six-month-olds are capable of anticipating trouble, the Canadian researchers invited 30 mothers and babies into their laboratory and divided them into two groups.
Babies were placed in car seats and their mothers played with them and talked to them as normal.
The play was then interspersed with two-minute periods in which the mother simply stared over her child's head, keeping her face free of emotion.
The next day, she took her child back to the laboratory. Levels of cortisol were measured several times on both days. Amounts of cortisol shot up when the babies were ignored.
They then fell off, before rising again when the youngsters were taken back into the laboratory, despite them not being ignored on the second day....
Researcher Dr David Haley, of the University of Toronto, said: 'The results suggest that human infants have the capacity to produce an anticipatory stress response that is based on expectations about how their parents will treat them in a specific context.'
Professor Jay Belsky, of Birbeck College, University of London, said factors such as depression could affect a mother's relationship with her baby and send cortisol levels soaring time and time again.
This could lower a baby's immune system, while a troubled upbringing may also mean the child going on to become a less than perfect parent itself.
Sadly, people still refuse to accept that ignoring their baby, letting him or her "Cry it out" , effects their child physically and emotionally. I know that on the two occasions that my baby monitor failed and I didn't hear my youngest- now just 6 months old- crying immediately, he show signs of distress every time I walked away from him for days afterwards. Seeing that panicked look on his face was just torture to me, and I'd spend hours holding and hugging him and consoling him- telling him over and over "I'm so sorry I didn't hear you!"....
Hopefully more and more studies of this type will be picked up by the mainstream media. Parents need to stop ignoring their protective instincts and answer their babies needs immediately, instead of listening to misguided so-called "parenting experts" who tell them not to allow that manipulative baby to get their own way and "be spoiled rotten"!
There is a reason that babies cry: it's because they need you.
When the medical personnel at the Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops BC wanted me to allow them to Vaccinate my newborn daughter for Hepatitis B I told them to go jump in the lake. The very thought of vaccinating my newborn with ANYTHING made me want to puke, but vaccinating against a disease that is considered a sexually transmitted disease (yes, I know, you can also get it through sharing needles....) was so beyond belief that I think I actually laughed in the public health nurses face. There is just something inherently wrong about injecting any sort of chemical into a fragile newborn baby, let alone a vaccine to protect her from a disease she most like would only be at risk for if she had unprotected sex or became a heroine addict!!! At the time that this came about I was still on the fence about vaccines. I had delayed my eldest daughters vaccines by several months but still had nagging doubts about the decision to give her the vaccinations at all. I guess I really should thank the nurses and Kamloops public health for trying to push this Hep B vax on us, because it was that push that started the stone rolling leading to several years of seriously researching vaccines and their ingredients.
My 3 youngest children are NOT vaccinated, and I oh so wish I could go back in time and unvaccinate my eldest daughter. But I digress...
This study will be followed by several others according to this article, which of course will be closely followed by the usual Big Pharma backlash of spin doctoring and creative manufactured studies to prove that these studies are all wrong and that they are perfect- Big Pharma that is.
... I'm looking forward to reading them.
New Study: Hepatitis B Vaccine Triples Risk of Autism in Infant Boys by David Kirby
Conventional wisdom holds that the autism-vaccine question has been "asked and answered," and that at least 16 large, well-constructed epidemiological studies have thoroughly addressed and debunked any hypothesis that childhood vaccination is in any way associated with an increased risk for autism spectrum disorders.
But there are several critical flaws in such an oversimplified generalization, and they are rarely given close examination by public health experts or members of the media.
To begin with, it is unscientific and perilously misleading for anyone to assert that "vaccines and autism" have been studied and that no link has been found. That's because the 16 or so studies constantly cited by critics of the hypothesis have examined just one vaccine and one vaccine ingredient.
And, the population studies themselves have had critical design flaws and limitations.
The current US childhood immunization schedule calls for 28 injections with 11 different vaccines against 15 different diseases by two years of age. Of those 11 vaccines, only the Measles-Mumps-Rubella (MMR) shot has been studied in association with autism, (although a CDC study of an MMR-plus-chickenpox vaccine did show that the risk for febrile seizures in infants was doubled.) Meanwhile, those 11 vaccines contain scores of ingredients, only one of which, thimerosal, has ever been tested in association with autism.
It is illogical to exonerate all vaccines, all vaccine ingredients, and the total US vaccine program as a whole, based solely on a handful of epidemiological studies of just one vaccine and one vaccine ingredient. It is akin to claiming that every form of animal protein is beneficial to people, when all you have studied is fish.
Now, a new study has shown that giving Hepatitis B vaccine to newborn baby boys may triple the risk of developing an autism spectrum disorder.
An abstract of the study was published in the September, 2009 issue of the respected journal Annals of Epidemiology. In it, Carolyn Gallagher and Melody Goodman of the Graduate Program in Public Health at Stony Brook University Medical Center, NY, wrote that, "Boys who received the hepatitis B vaccine during the first month of life had 2.94 greater odds for ASD compared to later- or unvaccinated boys."...
A study published last October in the journal Neurology found that children who received the Hepatitis B vaccine series were 50% more likely to develop "central nervous system inflammatory demyelination" than children who did not receive the vaccine.
Most of this increase was due to the Engerix B brand of the vaccine, manufactured by the UK's GlaxoSmithKline. That brand increased the risk of demyelination by 74%, and patients with confirmed multiple sclerosis were nearly three times more likely to develop the disorder.
"Exposing an infant to cow's milk in its first 15 days of life may protect it from a dangerous milk allergy later on, new research suggests.
The new findings are a slight departure from the recent advice of medical authorities such as Health Canada, who recommend exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months, "as it provides optimal nutritional, immunological and emotional benefits for the growth and development of infants," according to the federal department.
Researchers found that when babies were exposed to cow's milk, in the form of baby formula, in the first 15 days after birth, they seemed to be protected from developing an allergy to milk protein later in life. In a prospective cohort study, they tracked 13,019 infants and found that those who consumed formula early on were 19 times more protected from cow's milk protein allergy, or CMPA, than babies who consumed formula after the first 15 days."
WTF?!?! Every alarm bell in my head went off and I immediately went digging for a copy of the original study in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. Guess what I found....? Come on, guess?
"Supported by the Israel Dairy Board.
Disclosure of potential conflict of interest: Y. Katz has received research support from the Israel Dairy Board."
I was going to go all ballistic and rant and rave about it.... but then another friend pointed me to this blog by The Analytical Armadillo, and she said it all, so I'll leave you in her capable hands:
Mothers who feed their babies cow’s milk in the first 15 days of life may be protecting their children from dangerous allergies later on, says a new study.
Perplexed I read on:
Women who regularly (daily) introduced their babies to cow milk protein early, before 15 days of life, almost completely eliminated the incidence of allergy to cow milk protein in their babies.
says Prof. Yitzhak Katz of Tel Aviv University’s Department of Pediatrics, Sackler Faculty of Medicine.
Before he is apparently quoted as saying in one article:
Although the exact amount is still unknown, the paediatrician suggests a single bottle-feed at night for those mothers who are breastfeeding.
Now perhaps I'm overly cynical, but at this point alarm bells started ringing. Any paediatrician with a sound breastfeeding knowledge (which one would surely assume essential to make a public statement such as this) would know the well documented effects of cow's milk protein entering the gut of a breastfed baby.
Secondly, given they claim the exact amount is unknown, making a suggestion to "give a single bottle daily" is highly unusual; not least because it contradicts worldwide recommendations which are based on extensive evidence.
So I decided to dig out the study.
The first thing I noticed? The bottom of the study reads:
Supported by the Israel Dairy Board.
Aaah now thing are becoming clearer. I then discovered Prof Katz - the one up there making statements, has declared a potential conflict of interest.
Y. Katz has received research support from the Israel Dairy Board
aaaaah, bingo! Let's think who might benefit if mothers introduced a bottle of cow's milk per day- wouldn't happen to be the dairy industry would it?....
WOW!!! And you thought it was just good to feed to your baby?!
Substance in Breast Milk Kills Cancer Cells, Study Suggests
ScienceDaily (Apr. 23, 2010) — A substance found in breast milk can kill cancer cells, reveal studies carried out by researchers at Lund University and the University of Gothenburg, Sweden.
Although the special substance, known as HAMLET (Human Alpha-lactalbumin Made LEthal to Tumour cells), was discovered in breast milk several years ago, it is only now that it has been possible to test it on humans. Patients with cancer of the bladder who were treated with the substance excreted dead cancer cells in their urine after each treatment, which has given rise to hopes that it can be developed into medication for cancer care in the future.
Discovered by chance
HAMLET was discovered by chance when researchers were studying the antibacterial properties of breast milk. Further studies showed that HAMLET comprises a protein and a fatty acid that are both found naturally in breast milk. So far, however, it has not been proven that the HAMLET complex is spontaneously formed in the milk. It is speculated, however, that HAMLET can form in the acidic environment of the babies´ stomachs. Laboratory experiments have shown that HAMLET kills 40 different types of cancer, and the researchers are now going on to study its effect on skin cancer, tumours in the mucous membranes and brain tumours. Importantly, HAMLET kills only cancer cells and does not affect healthy cells.
Studying the integration of the substance
Researchers at the University of Gothenburg are focusing on how HAMLET can be taken up into tumour cells. The researchers, Roger Karlsson, Maja Puchades and Ingela Lanekoff, are attempting to gain an in-depth understanding of how the substance interacts with cell membranes, and their findings were recently published in the journal PLoS One.
