Judgement

When you care deeply about something (like I do, about birth), it's hard not to have big feelings about it.  I jump up and down with joy when I hear a birth story where a mama gets exactly what she wants, like this morning when I got a text from a doula friend who had her beloved baby boy last night at a birth center and went home a few hours later, feeling like the whole experience was perfect.  How can that not make you happy, right?

And I'm sad, deeply sad when a mother wants something so much, very often just as much for her baby's benefit as for her own, and every single thing goes wrong.  She feels helpless as one intervention is piled upon the other, as every single thing she doesn't want is offered in a last ditch attempt to avoid the seemingly inevitable cesarean at the end of train wreck births like this.  She hasn't done anything wrong, she's not an idiot who bobs her head and does whatever her OB suggests- she's just the mom with the baby that for whatever reason needs to be born another way than the quiet, gentle, non-interventive way that she had planned.

If you are a midwife, or a doula you probably get this - how disappointed and profoundly sad a mother can be when everything goes wrong.  But I notice a lot of other women don't get it.  I hear a lot of "at least your baby is ok," "a healthy baby is all that matters," "the most important thing is getting your baby."  I'm not disputing that a healthy baby is the most important thing to any mother.  I'm definitely arguing that it's not the ONLY thing important to some mothers.

If you are a mother who really doesn't care how her baby came out, fine.  I don't have judgement for that.  If you are a mom who had a traumatic birth but were able to just pick yourself up immediately and never had a single tear over her birth, fine.  Or you had the worst imaginable birth but you could just breathe and let it all go with no disappointment, good for you.  Seriously, good for you.  I think you must have many many gifts to allow you that kind of acceptance and resiliance, and that is a wonderful thing.

But for anyone out there who doesn't get it why a mother would feel sad about her cesarean, or her homebirth transport ending in every drug under the sun, please stop judging.  You don't have to understand how she can be sad and disappointed and over the moon happy in love with her newborn all at the same time.  But please don't judge her, or nudge her to move on, or get over it.  And please don't say any of those statements above dismissing her feelings.

If you really care about her or love her, just listen to her story, without your own judgements and when she says she feels sad or disappointed or angry, tell her it's ok to share her feelings with you and that it's ok for her to have them.  If you really want to help her, let her know that you accept her, that she is a good mom and that you are willing to listen.  When mothers receive empathy instead of judgement they are much more likely to heal from their traumatic experiences, and the painful feelings become less acute over time.

The love that new mothers receive is passed right along to their babies.  When we judge and dismiss, we are missing a beautiful opportunity to fill a mother up with love, to help in her healing and to give her the kind of unconditionally loving acceptance that we all hope she can give to her baby.

A few more hugs and a lot less judgement for the mothers please.