Parking Lot Babies

Washington State Patrol troopers might want to start wearing scrubs when they work because more babies are being born on Seattle-area freeways -- at least in recent months.

The newest member to the club -- a baby girl -- entered the world Tuesday morning in the northbound lanes of Interstate 5 near Spokane Street, the Washington State Patrol reported.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/309154_baby27ww.html

Tim Scheufele gave his mother-in-law some bad directions Tuesday morning, causing her to miss the turn to Avista Adventist Hospital. But cut the guy some slack, he was busy delivering his son in the back seat.

Tim Scheufele Jr. was born just after 5 a.m. in the Louisville hospital parking lot, minutes after his grandmother overshot the hospital exit and ended up on McCaslin Boulevard.

In September, Dalton Hanson was welcomed into the world in the front seat of a Ford F-150 at the intersection of Foothills Parkway and Baseline Road. His mom, Kim Edwards, of Thornton, had been sent home from Boulder Community Hospital earlier in the day because she wasn't far enough into labor.
http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2006/nov/01/baby-born-in-car-in-louisville-parking-lot/

And, this week in the news in Utah a mother gave birth in the parking lot before the midwife arrived.
http://www.parentdish.com/2007/05/09/mom-gives-birth-alone-in-birthing-center-parking-lot/

The baby is said to be fine, so why in NICU? Standard care. The baby could be in NICU for no medical reason, but to be "OBSERVED" because the BELIEF is that being born with only the mother and no caregiver the baby is damaged and distressed. Very likely the baby unwent extensive interventions to "check him/her out." My friend gave birth to her baby on the beach in Hawaii -- he was a footling breech so she could not be in the ocean as planned. Several days later DCFS took him and flew him to another island and he went through brutal treatments. She totally believes that they tried to kill to prove how wrong it was. She got him back weeks later but the ordeal dragged on and on and it opened the door for the father to take the baby -- after he "babynapped" the baby at about 11 months and took him out of the country. The mother didn't see her child for eleven years.

We had a couple of close calls at the Birth center here. One of my VBAC clients gave birth in the birth center -- had wanted to do homebirth, but house was a mess under construction. She had the urge to birth outside with trees -- we talked about it numerous times. Babies whisper their wishes to the mother. I told her to get clear within herself and with the baby about where. She arrived at the birth center and was waiting for the midwife and fought an urge to go into the trees to birth. She was just about to go and the midwife showed up -- she was thinking about my words to make sure of where you deeply want to birth. After the birth she regreted not giving birth outside. (That midwife might have supported it if she'd said somethng.) She continued to have that urge to birth in the trees. One baby was born enroute -- they lived an hour away, third baby, first non-hospital birth. Another friend's wife gave birth on the corner of College and Stadium in sight of the MU Tigers football stadium enroute back to the birth center. Doctor had sent her home, got half way there and turned around to come back.

I observed that women who birthed in the hospital previously and were used to the delays, drugs, interruptions, and pain did not have a sense of normal labor. Usually they think they have awhile to go because they are not in delibitating, excruciating pain. They don't realize that they are so far progressed as they are waiting for the hard part. The unpredictability of birth is the reason doctors and hospitals control it.

This will be interesting to watch. Rather than seeing how easy birth can be the media and medical focus will be on showing the danger. So many perspectives --- mine is that babies are participants in the process. They choose what happens (on a soul level before conception even) in order to live the life they intended and as "teachers" as they enter the mix of the family. It's the baby's birth -- the baby has a lot to do with what happens.

In the most recent story, AGAIN, it is person other than the parents going after the midwife. Grandma probably wasn't too keen on the idea in the first place. Unfortunately, she is of the majority and this one case will be used to further discredit midwifery and to encourage naysayers and legislators to further take away women's choices and responsibility for their birth. Besides that, Grandma is not honoring her grandchild's grand and independent entrance to their lives.

Here's another possible perspective. Similar story, different perspectives of the experience.

Last fall, Cindy Meza gave birth to her second daughter, Isabel, under a eucalyptus tree in the parking lot of her birth center. And while it wasn't exactly what she had planned, Meza, who caught her own baby, says the care and information she had received from her midwives over the course of both of her pregnancies allowed her to stay calm throughout her surprisingly quick labor and delivery.

Cindy tells her story like this, "My labor with Isabel was going very fast. My husband called the birth center and said, 'I think she's going to start pushing.' They said, 'Don't let her do that! Drive her here immediately.' We drove so fast, we beat the midwife there. I managed to get halfway across the parking lot when I felt the baby crowning. I made it to a tree about 5 feet from the center's front door."

Her husband was busy consoling their toddler, since they hadn't had time to get a babysitter, so Cindy was on her own. "But," she recounts, "because of the confidence instilled in me by my midwives, Sharon Milan and Janice Rodenberg, I knew exactly what to do and was never afraid. I knew how to support the head. I knew to stop pushing at the crowning. I remembered to wipe down her nose for mucus. Actually, she was born with the sac over her head, so, first, I had to pull it back off her face. I rubbed up her back, because that was something Sharon had told me would induce her to breathe. I trusted my body and my instincts, and delivered a perfect nine pound baby." Now, she reports, "I trust myself much more in all aspects of my life. I am proud to be a woman, and I owe so much to the two midwives who helped me achieve this."

While Cindy's story is an inspirational one, her tree-shaded birthing place was one few women would, or could, choose. Cindy herself had not actually chosen the birth center for its back-to-nature charm. In fact, she says, "As a technical writer and Web publisher at a software company, I work in a field of technological advances and, although I wanted my pregnancy and childbirth to be as natural as possible, I was not sure I wanted to give up medical technology. I decided to go to the Birth and Women's Health Center here in Tucson, Arizona, because the birth center is across the street from a hospital, and was a perfect compromise for my desire for natural childbirth and my fear that I might need medical assistance. It was the right choice. I had my first daughter, Astrid, there without medication and it was an incredible, empowering experience."

http://www.realsavvymoms.com/pregnancy/article.php?category2=7&article=42