Last week, a friend had a baby girl in a birthing tub that was in the middle of her dining room. A midwife and an assistant attended the birth, along with her husband and a couple of friends. The labor and delivery went extremely well, and everyone is healthy and happy today.
Other home births have not gone as well, and in the most extreme cases, resulted in serious complications or worse.
But what are your thoughts on having a baby at home? Do you think it's dangerous? Inspiring? Negligent? Amazing? Sound-off, Milwaukee by using the talkback feature.
I'm pro-home birth. It is a woman's right to choose where she gives birth, and having a home birth is a safe and responsible choice for healthy women who did not have a high-risk pregnancy. Some women have serious hospital phobias, and do not want to welcome their baby in a place that has negative connotations for them. Other women do not want to deliver at a hospital because they feel it's a less supportive place to attempt a natural childbirth. (Hospitals often require women to wear baby monitors that restrict the mom-to-be 's ability to move around which is crucial when managing pain.) Birth is a natural process that has been unnecessarily made into a scientific procedure.
I would never have a home birth. Having a baby at home is dangerous and barbaric. We are really lucky to live in such a medically advanced world, why wouldn't we take advantage of it? There has been too much bad press about botched home births, and I would never take this kind of risk. Plus, there is more of a chance to recover in the hospital. Recovering at home, especially when older children are around, is difficult for the mom, whereas at the hospital, she gets a couple of days to rest before diving into a very exhausting life job. Finally, who wants that kind of mess in the house?
Molly Snyder started writing and publishing her work at the age 10, when her community newspaper printed her poem, "The Unicorn.” Since then, she's expanded beyond the subject of mythical creatures and written in many different mediums but, nearest and dearest to her heart, thousands of articles for OnMilwaukee.
Molly is a regular contributor to FOX6 News and numerous radio stations as well as the co-host of "Dandelions: A Podcast For Women.” She's received five Milwaukee Press Club Awards, served as the Pfister Narrator and is the Wisconsin State Fair’s Celebrity Cream Puff Eating Champion of 2019.
