Part I: Labor and delivery practices can look different with each woman and with each culture. Methods are constantly changing. Among the Inuit, birth was traditionally assisted by an older, experienced woman. This woman usually had gone through births herself and assisted in many other deliveries. There was a big push for safer environments and medical professionals to be present. Now, many Inuit children are born in hospitals. However, there is now an opposing movement for traditions to come back to fruition. There are many regions where midwives are now allowed to assist Inuit women with birth. In the Netherlands, 60.7% of women planned on giving birth at home. Only 30.8% of women planned on giving birth in a hospital. One study showed that there wasn’t a greater risk factor for giving birth at home or at a hospital. The risk and the reward were the same. In Vietnam, there is a large push for medical facility located births. Many women give birth at home and end up losing the baby and possibly dying themselves. There is a lot of hesitation in this movement. The hesitation isn’t really from expecting mothers. It is from their mothers and mothers-in-law. The older women do not want to break tradition. Specifically, they want to be able to bury the placenta underneath the newborn’s bed to promote health. If women do give birth in a heath clinic, they are often looked down upon and scolded.

Opposingly, it seems that the United States has the opposite problem. Most women give birth in a hospital. It does appear that homebirths, or births at a birthing center, are becoming more common. Depending on who you talk to, the push could be for either or. Although, women giving birth at home in the United States is extremely different than it would be in Vietnam. In Vietnam, many families live in villages very far from a hospital. Their houses usually have a dirt floor and they don’t have many sanitary options. When in the United States, homebirths are usually inside a house with hard floors or carpet. There are cleaning supplies available to prepare a sanitary environment. And most people do not live three hours away from the nearest hospital.

It is also apparent that women in the United States have access to more monitoring during pregnancy to see how the baby is doing. In the video about Vietnam, the woman had to travel six hours to get a sonogram. In America, most woman get a sonogram often and even have options like genetic testing. If there is a complication during birth, there are medical techniques to help that. In Vietnam, there aren’t always the tools, medications, or trained professional available to perform the life-saving operation. Even at a medical clinic, Vietnamese women are at a much higher risk than American women.

The push for medicalized births is much higher in countries like Vietnam and among the Inuit. However, it isn’t needed in the United States because that is the norm.

Part II: http://www.birthunscripted.com/pw99pp0cuzoqvvuikns8mtjh06smb4

The photo above shows a woman just giving birth in her home with her husband behind her. The image depicted challenges the dominant ideas of birth in the United States. I feel that birth in America is shown to be a medical based experience. This photo shows that it was a family-based experience. It is not perfectly beautiful or picture perfect. That momma worked hard, and you can tell by her expression of joy and relief along with the sweat on her body. Her body language shows exhaustion. This is all very normal and happens in hospitals too. Many times, the photos after birth are of a perfectly swaddled, clean baby. This shows a fresh baby that has barely been touched by a towel. To me, this is photo is the beauty of birth.