Dear all:

I just had the priviledge of listening to Diane Weisseninger (sorry Diane, I can never spell your 
name properly) talk about other mammals and how intervening in the birthing process interferes 
with bonding.  Anyone who has raised animals that have given birth knows this simple fact.  So, 
she beautifully illustrated why she is now going back to the birth itself..  

Now, when it comes to epidurals, the comparisons I saw in a couple of articles that were sent to 
me were merely comparisons of births within the hospital setting of multiple interventions. I agree 
with those that feel we must compare births in the home setting to get a true comparison.  And 
there is a built in bias here - if we compare births in the home setting to "normal" births in the 
hospital setting as opposed to complications, one could always argue that some of the 
interventions used complicate the birthing process and so therefore they aren't normal anymore.  

But, here's the rub.  Remember when we were all discussing alchohol and where to set the limits 
on excessive drinking?  Rachel Myr came up with a good way of describing it for parents so it 
would not seem that breastfeeding mothers were at a disadvantage and formula feeding moms 
had free range to party.  We ruln the risk here of sending the message that if you do have an 
epidural your breastfeeding wil go wrong, just like the often repeated message I get that "I didn't 
try to breastfeed after my C-section because I was told me milk wouldn't come in."  So mom gets 
an additional insult to the process of breastfeeding after a C-section because she wasn't draining 
her breasts because she felt "what's the point?" .

So, Rachel, for those of us in the land of high intervention, which is going to take one of those 
major cultural shifts in thinking to turn around, how would one approach the issue?

Best, Susan Burger

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