The Other Side of the Glass

Part One was officially released June 2013 in digital distribution format. To purchase to to www.theothersideoftheglass.com If you were a donor and want to download your copy send an email to theothersideoftheglassfilm@gmail.com.

The trailer

Go to YouTube

Monday, November 20, 2006

What is the risk of interventions for the birthing baby?


From Homebirthdebate.blogspot.com:

Meribeth:
"And yet still you haven't even touched the subject of the fetal and maternal deaths that happen as a direct result of hospital error or misdiagnosis. And what about the neonatal deaths that are a result of trauma due to forced deliveries or drug reactions."

Blogger Dr:

"If you want to know why, do some research to find out what the actual numbers are for maternal and neonatal deaths caused by interventions. I suspect that you will be surprised to find that the real numbers are extremely small, certainly smaller than the excess risk of neonatal death at homebirth."

Safe Baby Partner:

First of all, there is NO SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH to indicate that the human baby is NOT adversely affected by drugs, medical technology, interventions, and surgical birth. The burden of proof is on the medical establishment to prove that what they are doing is safe in the moment and for the lifelong physiological system of the human being.

Secondly, the refusal or inability of obstetrics and lack of research from the obstetric and medical field does NOT mean that there is no danger or long term effects of interventions. It is not in their interest to study the effects of an intervention before using it, and certainly not afterward. For example, forceps were never studied before using, and never IN the field of obstetrics do they study the long term effects. Nor, has main stream psychology looked at the use of drugs and interventions at birth as a contributor to life long mental, emotionl, or personality issues.

Was the vacuum extraction device created with the long term effects in mind (no pun intended)? It is known to severely distort the baby's scull and therefore brain. NO research has clearly looked at the long term impact to the human. Off-label drugs like scopalamine, demerol, and cytotec were used without any research to show they were safe as are the current drugs for mental illness and depression used prenatally. NOW, researchers are comparing groups of babies who had different narcotics during labor. NOW they are comparing groups of babies whose mother's took prozac prenatally with those who did not. and concluding no significant differences and"no major malfunctions." However, no studies show safety before using, nor is there a long time follow-up to show us there are no SYSTEMIC and LONG TERM effects of the drugs on the brain and liver of the baby. In every field of medicine and drug research there IS every reason to suspect very serious consequences for drug use during labor and birth.

Unfortunately, the documentation of deaths because of drug use and interventions is very hush-hush, as is the trauma to a baby who survives -- as in the photo above. Physically and emotionally, the effects of birth trauma is said to just magically "go away" when the outward evidence (ie., bruises) does - even when there are dire warnings to physicians. Some how our perceptions of just how "resilient" baby's and children are doesn't apply to us as adults. We would not believe that a trauma to cause such bruising was nothing to talk or fuss about. When a child falls and hits his head so hard it can be heard in another room, well meaning adults shhhhush the child and say, "you are ok, you're ok, shhusssh." As a adult we would be crying, swearing, and/or making sounds and jumping around. Imagine if your head was so abused that it created a malformation of your head that looked like a chignon bun -- a common occurrence with vacuum extraction. Why do educated, nice, compassionate people believe that the baby's brain is UNAFFECTED by this AS a baby is birth drug-impaired?? The birthing brain is "resilient" to the point of being unaffected by what would bring an adult to their knees? How is it that psychological research does not look at this? And, it's known to doctors.

Below is an example of a warning to physicians

FDA Public Health Advisory: Need for CAUTION When Using Vacuum Assisted Delivery Devices (You are encouraged to copy and distribute this advisory.)

May 21, 1998 --- EIGHT YEARS AGO!!!

To:
Obstetricians, Birthing Centers, Nurse Mid-Wives,Pediatricians, Ultrasonographers, ObGyn Nurses, Family Practitioners, Radiologists, Hospital Risk Managers, Hospital ObGyn Departments. (DIRECT ENTRY and LAY MIDWIVES and DOULAS and PRE and PERINATAL THERAPISTS HAVE KNOWN THIS A LONG TIME!!)

PURPOSE
This is to advise you that vacuum assisted delivery devices may cause serious or fatal complications, and to provide guidance to minimize the risk. While no instrumented delivery is risk free, we are concerned that some health care professionals who use vacuum assisted delivery devices, or those who care for these infants following delivery, may not be aware that the device may produce life-threatening complications (see attached list for sample of references). We are also concerned that if health care professionals responsible for the care of neonates are not alerted when a vacuum assisted delivery device has been used on a particular infant, they may not adequately monitor for the signs and symptoms of device-related injuries.

Article continues at: http://www.fda.gov/cdrh/fetal598.html

The following sites are of researchers and practitioners who have been studying the lifelong traumatic effects of interventions at birth. A live baby does not mean uninjured baby.

Association for Pre and Perinatal Psychology and Health is the United States version of an international organization of multi-disciplinary fields of study looking at the period of preconception through early infancy. www.BirthPsychology.com. APPPAH was cofounded by David Chamberlain, PhD. www.bepe.info and Thomas Verney, MD at www.trvernymd.com

Other leaders in the field are:
William Emerson, PhD at www.emersonbirthrx.com
Wendy McCarty, RN, PhD at www.wondrousbeginnings.com
Raymond Castellino, DC at www.castellinotraining.com
and www.beba.org org
featured on the documentary narrated by Noah Wiley
www.whatbabieswant.com
Gerald Vind, PhD (neurobiology) www.pnri.net
Frederick Wirth, PhD. (neonatologist) at www.prenatalparenting.com

Basic science researchers whose work supports the primal period as critical are:
Peter Nathanielsz, PhD. MD
Michel Odent, MD at www.wombecology.com
Candace Pert, PhD at www.candacepert.com
Bruce Lipton, PhD at www.brucelipton.com

All of these sites were posted on the homebirthdebate blog and removed.

The burden must be on obstetric medicine and psychology to show us that what they do IS SAFE.
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"Soft is the heart of a child. Do not harden it."

A public awareness reminder that things that happen behind the scenes, out of our sight, aren't always as rosy as we might think them to be. Perhaps its a restaurant cook who accidentally drops your burger on the floor before placing it on the bun and serving it to you. Here it's an overworked apathetic (pathetic) nurse giving my newborn daughter her first bath. Please comment and rate this video, so as to insure that it is viewed as widely as possible, perhaps to prevent other such abuse. -- The mother who posted this YouTube. How NOT to wash a baby on YouTube Are you going to try to tell me that "babies don't remember?" There is no difference to this baby's experience and the imprinting of her nervous system/brain and one that is held and cleaned by the mother or father either at the hospital or at home? By the way, this is probably NOT the baby's first bath. The nurse is ungloved. Medical staff protocol is that they can't handle a baby ungloved until is has been bathed (scrubbed if you've seen it) because the baby is a BIO-HAZARD -- for them. Never mind that the bio-hazard IS the baby's first line of defense against hospital germs.

Missouri Senator Louden Speaks

Finally, A Birth Film for Fathers

Part One of the "The Other Side of the Glass: Finally, A Birth Film for and about Men" was released June, 2013.

Through presentation of the current research and stories of fathers, the routine use of interventions are questioned. How we protect and support the physiological need of the human newborn attachment sequence is the foundation for creating safe birth wherever birth happens.

Based on knowing that babies are sentient beings and the experience of birth is remembered in the body, mind, and soul, fathers are asked to research for themselves what is best for their partner and baby and to prepare to protect their baby.

The film is designed for midwives, doulas, and couples, particularly fathers to work with their caregivers. Doctors and nurses in the medical environment are asked to "be kind" to the laboring, birthing baby, and newborn. They are called to be accountable for doing what science has been so clear about for decades. The mother-baby relationship is core for life. Doctors and nurses and hospital caregivers and administrators are asked to create protocols that protect the mother-baby relationship.

Men are asked to join together to address the vagaries of the medical system that harm their partner, baby and self in the process of the most defining moments of their lives. Men are asked to begin to challenge the system BEFORE they even conceive babies as there is no way to be assured of being able to protect his loved ones once they are in the medical machine, the war zone, on the conveyor belt -- some of the ways that men describe their journey into fatherhood in the medicine culture.

Donors can email theothersideoftheglassfilm@gmail.com to get a digital copy.
Buy the film at www.theothersideoftheglass.com.

The film focuses on the male baby, his journey from the womb to the world and reveals healing and integrating the mother, father, and baby's wounded birth experience. The film is about the restoring of our families, society, and world through birthing loved, protected, and nurtured males (and females, of course). It's about empowering males to support the females to birth humanity safely, lovingly, and consciously.

Finally, a birth film for fathers.

What People Are Saying About the FIlm

Well, I finally had a chance to check out the trailer and .. wow! It's nice that they're acknowledging the father has more than just cursory rights (of course mom's rights are rarely acknowledged either) and it's great that they're bringing out the impact of the experience on the newborn, but I'm really impressed that they're not shying away from the political side.

They are rightly calling what happens in every American maternity unit, every day, by its rightful name - abuse. Abuse of the newborn, abuse of the parents and their rights, abuse of the supposedly sacrosanct ethical principal of patient autonomy and the medico-legal doctrine of informed consent, which has been long ago discarded in all but name. I love it!

In the immortal words of the "shrub", "bring it on!" This film needs to be shown and if I can help facilitate or promote it, let me know.

Father in Asheville, NC


OMG'ess, I just saw the trailer and am in tears. This is so needed. I watch over and over and over as fathers get swallowed in the fear of hospitals birth practice. I need a tool like this to help fathers see how very vital it is for them to protect their partner and baby. I am torn apart every time I see a father stand back and chew his knuckle while his wife is essentially assaulted or his baby is left to lie there screaming.
Please send me more info!!!!
Carrie Hankins
CD(DONA), CCCE, Aspiring Midwife
720-936-3609


Thanks for sharing this. It was very touching to me. I thought of my brother-in-law standing on the other side of the glass when my sister had to have a C-section with her first child because the doctor was missing his golf date. I'll never forget his pacing back and forth and my realizing that he was already a father, even though he hadn't been allowed to be with his son yet.

Margaret, Columbia, MO

In case you don't find me here

Soon, I'll be back to heavy-duty editing and it will be quiet here again. I keep thinking this blog is winding down, and then it revives. It is so important to me.

I wish I'd kept a blog of my journey with this film this past 10 months. It's been amazing.

I have a new blog address for the film, and will keep a journal of simple reporting of the journey for the rest of the film.

www.theothersideoftheglassthefilm.blogspot.com

I'll be heading east this week to meet with a group of men. I plan to post pictures and clips on the film blog.

I'll keep up here when I can -- when I learn something juicy, outrageous, or inspiring related to making birth safer for the birthing baby.

Review of the film

Most of us were born surrounded by people who had no clue about how aware and feeling we were. This trailer triggers a lot of emotions for people if they have not considered the baby's needs and were not considered as a baby. Most of us born in the US were not. The final film will include detailed and profound information about the science-based, cutting-edge therapies for healing birth trauma.

The full film will have the interviews of a wider spectrum of professionals and fathers, and will include a third birth, at home, where the caregivers do a necessary intervention, suctioning, while being conscious of the baby.

The final version will feature OBs, RNs, CNMs, LM, CPM, Doulas, childbirth educators, pre and perinatal psychologists and trauma healing therapists, physiologists, neurologists, speech therapists and lots and lots of fathers -- will hopefully be done in early 2009.

The final version will include the science needed to advocated for delayed cord clamping, and the science that shows when a baby needs to be suctioned and addresses other interventions. Experts in conscious parenting will teach how to be present with a sentient newborn in a conscious, gentle way -- especially when administering life-saving techniques.

The goal is to keep the baby in the mother's arms so that the baby gets all of his or her placental blood and to avoid unnecessary, violating, and abusive touch and interactions. When we do that, whether at home or hospital, with doctor or midwife, the birth is safe for the father. The "trick" for birthing men and women is how to make it happen in the hospital.

Birth Trauma Healing

  • Read Miracle Boy's story

    • Ani DeFranco Speaks About Her Homebirth

    Ani DiFranco Interview with Mindful Mama Magazine from Mindful Mama Magazine on Vimeo.

    "Self-Evident" by Ani DeFranco

    Patrick Houser at www.Fatherstobe.org

    Colin speaks out about interventions at birth

    Dolphins