One thing I’ve noticed recently is that since Ricki Lake and Abby Epstein’s docu-movie 'The Business of Being Born' came out, about 20-30 percent of our students are changing providers. Not necessarily to a homebirth which the movie advocates (although some are), but rather they're raising their expectations about the quality and treatment they feel they should receive from a doctor or midwife. Classes that used to begin with get-to-know everyone introductions are now a hotbed of questions, concerns, confusion and adamant opinion that didn’t used to surface until later in the series.
As an educator for almost fourteen years now I’ve never seen a piece of media have the impact that this movie is having.
The fact that parents have been slow to realize that they deserve a certain level of care is because most people are only passionate about it for an extremely short window in the last trimester of pregnancy - and then they are through it and on to the all-consuming task of parenting!
Since any area that is primarily a woman’s health or social issue has often required steady organization and commitment over a long period of time to affect change, pregnancy, birth and postpartum have often been left off the major political map. But ‘The Business of Being Born’ is having an impact on parents in a wide spectrum - especially in terms of raising the bar on the level of attention they get from visit to visit.
For many years I have heard women justify the rushed or cursory clinical care they get by saying “but he/she is a good doctor”. I find this double standard we apply to ourselves as pregnant women so odd. We would never tolerate our child’s pediatrician being rushed or cursory simply because they were thought to be a good clinician. I know so many great doctors and midwives who are great clinicians as well as being patient and nice. Why settle for just half of the equation when we are already vulnerable in pregnancy and birth?
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