Today I had my first visit with my midwife. Usually I have the first visit at four months, but I wanted to tell the kids before she came, so we waited until now (I think I’m officially about 24 weeks). Since she comes to our house, my kids seeing her walk in our door would have made the announcement for us!
I really love my midwife. She’s a lay midwife, and very, very competent and experienced. Her philosophy of birth fits mine perfectly – I’m a hands off, don’t mess with a natural process kind of person if it doesn’t need anything. She has the knowledge and skill to recognize when intervention is necessary and when it’s not, something that has become very rare in the obstetrical community.
Something she did that I thought I’d share with you today is she listened to the baby’s heartbeat with a fetoscope, a skill that is almost non-existent in the US. Did you ever wonder how caregivers monitored a baby before Dopplers and ultrasounds? You probably thought that there was no way to monitor and that’s why unborn babies today are so much safer, right? Hmm, I’ll leave the second part of that absurdity for now and just explain what a fetoscope is.
Basically, it’s like a stethoscope but geared for listening to an unborn baby. (Here’s a picture – http://www.allheart.com/om13fetal.html.) The advantage is that it’s not invasive and 100% safe, while allowing the doctor or midwife to hear the baby’s heartbeat. Which is something that the FDA still can’t say about ultrasounds and Dopplers. (Did you know that? Most women believe they’re harmless.) One of my midwife’s current clients isn’t planning a homebirth, but she works for the FDA and was alarmed to learn that there’s still no approval for it, but she couldn’t find anyone else to agree to her prenatal care who wouldn’t use this technology for monitoring. The down side is it takes a couple more minutes to locate the heartbeat with a fetoscope, which means more patience on the caregiver’s part. And it requires more physical closeness (getting to about 1 – 2 feet from your abdominal area) – and the trend today is for more and more emotional and physical distance in many areas, not just obstetrics, and ultrasound technology fits in well with that sterility.
Today I asked my midwife how many of her clients she uses the fetoscope with. She told me almost none, that it’s ‘a new generation’ and they don’t even think to question ultrasounds. And since homebirthing mothers tend to be far more educated than the average mom (they have to be, to get the information and statistics that make them comfortable with a birth outside of the hospital setting which is so frowned upon), it’s really a reflection of what is going on in the general world of obstetrics, where less and less is questioned and it’s just assumed that if a doctor is doing it, it must be the best thing.
Anyway, usually when finding the heartbeat, my midwife would then put a regular stethoscope on that area, and let me listen. But because the placenta is in front, it was too faint for me to hear it at this point. (It’s amazing how much she’s able to learn just be listening – when she located the placenta, I asked her how she could tell – she said it has a whooshing sound.) But that’s okay with me – I don’t have to hear there’s a heartbeat to know I’m pregnant. 🙂 And I should be able to hear it next month.
Avivah
