Hwk 40

Note: Because of my religious beliefs it is very unlikely for me to attend what you call a "cocktail party"...so I decided to make a few changes to the outline...

Last weekend I decided to attend a seminar where Marsden Wagner would be present. He decided to discuss his ideas regarding our flawed maternity system. Towards the end, I was lucky enough to have a conversation with him...

Me: "Hi! Nice to meet you; I would just like to persoanlly thank you for writing Born in the USA: How a Broken Maternity System Must be Fixed to Put Women and Children First. The main idea you wanted to convey to your readers was that women in the United States have lost all control over their childbirth; they are brainwashed into giving birth at hospitals unaware of all the risks they are willing to put themselves into. You want women in the United States to realize this bitter fact and open their eyes to alternatives when thinking about how they will give birth; one alternative is having a home birth with a midwife. The way you carried out your main idea throughout the book with the use of a variety of evidence really made me rethink about birth and pregnancy.

Wagner: "Really, which parts were most effective or important for you?"

Me: "Well, in the last third of the book you focused on trying to come up with alternatives to make our maternity care system better and safer for both the mother and her baby. You were able to open my eyes while providing me with the steps on how as a nation we can help women attain the power to choose how they want their childbirth to occur. You also took what is going on in reality as of now and made the reader aware of it; such as the high amount of trust women have put on doctors, unaware of how this trust is in high risk of being taken advantage of. This connected back to the first 2/3rds of the book. But let me be more specific:

1. On page 205 you stated: "In the midwifery model of care, a midwife develops a close relationship with the pregnant woman over many months and ordinarily discusses whatever is going on in their prenatal visits. With these close relationships, midwifery care is, by nature, much more transparent than obstetric care and midwives are more accountable to the women they serve in such a close, interpersonal way."

2. On page 209-210 you stated: One reason women have been so willing to give up their autonomy when it comes to childbirth is that they are afraid, and much of this fear is the result of ignorance. In modern American society, where most people live only with nuclear family members, there are rarely opportunities for young girls to actually witness childbirth and ask questions. What we have instead are a lot of childbirth books that tell women to trust doctors and turn their care over to them because birth is a medical event and demands highly trained experts."

3. The Patients rights that seem to be ignored by doctors (discussed on page 173-174)

Wagner: "But what could I have done to make this a better book - that would more effectively fulfill its mission?"

Me: "Well, let's be clear - your text sought to provide narratives, historical analysis, journalistic analysis, policy analysis from the perspective of a medical doctor, and an author of many books based on child birth and maternity care, for the book-reading-public to better understand pregnancy & birth in our culture. Given that aim, and your book, the best advice I would give for a 2nd edition of the text would be, to be keep it short and simple; don't repeat yourself. Instead, try to use strong powerful words that will get your point across once and for all. But I don't want you to feel like I'm criticizing your work. I appreciate the immense amount of labor you dedicated to this important issue and particularly for making me think about all the power which is taken away from women in the United States now a days. When comparing ourselves to other societies such as the Middle East, we tend to call their women "oppressed"; yet we don't have enough time to recall events occurring daily throughout our nation today, which seem to show that American women are also oppressed by their societies. It is almost like a burden for these females to choose their birthing plan based on what their society wants from them. In this case, women tend to be brainwashed by the media, therefore causing them to have all decisions made by the doctor with little or no consent at all. Your book has helped me view birth and our maternity care system through a new lens. In fact, I have a totally different view on my future regarding birth.

Wagner: "Thanks! Talking to you gives me hope about our future as a society!"