In the early hours of 15th January, the day the city would celebrate Pongal, twin boys were born to us. They were identical twins and their birth weights were 2 kg and 2.2 kg respectively. They came into this world seven minutes apart and the second one had been in breech position. The delivery was an unusual one in many ways. There was not a hint of modern medical equipment around. It was a home birth, assisted by Ayurveda doctors and midwives. Most remarkably, it was not a Caesarean section. But I am getting ahead of myself, so let us rewind a bit.
To begin with, we did not know that we were going to have twins up until the seventh month. We had not taken a scan in the early months of the pregnancy, as we did not think it was important or necessary. My wife was a young and healthy woman, who had delivered our first child naturally. It was only when we noticed that my wife’s stomach was growing a little too big and a little too fast that we decided to take a scan, and to our surprise and delight, we found two little babies! Our lives changed forever that day.
We had been quite certain until then that we would want the delivery to happen outside the modern hospital setup. However, with the news of the twins, the decision was not automatic anymore. I had asked the radiologist who took the scan what the chances were of the pregnancy going to term, and she told me without batting an eyelid: “Oh, with twins that would be a Caesarean section. Your doctor will schedule a date.” So we had a difficult choice to make – to go with the modern hospital route, where a normal delivery would not have been given much of a chance, or to persist with our initial aim of having a home birth, even though there were twins.
Many people thought we were mad to think of a non-hospitalized option for even a singleton (as we did for our firstborn daughter, which is another story), but with twins, the madness was certified. We had to be reckless, careless and foolhardy parents to not go to a hospital and not schedule a Caesarean section. However, as we spoke to more people, we came to realize that the choice was essentially based on one major factor: fear.
The entire modern hospital birthing process is based on fear and “reducing risk”. The literature is full of it. Websites, books, and doctors – all talk of the things that can go wrong. “Foetal distress” is a catch-all term and just about everything seems to lead the little ones to distress. The guilt that would be all-consuming “if something wrong were to happen” is unthinkable. No parent would want to go through it. That fear settles the decision for most parents, and understandably so.
In this scenario, what should a woman do, who wants to have a normal vaginal birth for her child, assisted by people who care for her, and who want to avoid unnecessary inducement, epidurals and episiotomy? What options exist in Chennai for someone who wants to go through the natural birthing process with minimal interventions? Frightfully few. It is strange that something so “normal” should become a rare and difficult thing. It is a bit like how organic food is seen as exotic and has become the privilege of the elite. One would think that food without harmful chemicals in them should really not be exotic, but the norm. So too it has become with birthing.
The Caesarean rates in the city are frightening but not surprising. In a system where about twenty deliveries need to be attended to in a day, it would hardly be possible to allocate the time and resources required for a birth to take its natural course, with its attendant starts and stops, and numerous delays. The economics of a Caesarean section can be quite compelling for a hospital. What was once an emergency intervention has now become a routine procedure.
Our final decision to go with the natural home birth was essentially a decision to not give in to fear. While there were many different things that could possibly go wrong, there was a very good chance that everything could go well. Fear has a way of feeding on itself – as we read more books and talked to more experts, we felt more out of control and scared. At one point, we decided to stop reading, not panic and instead go with the flow. And that was a blessed moment. It made the rest of the pregnancy stress-free.
At the end of 38 weeks, when the labour started, my wife was attended to by nine women and one man. There were four Ayurveda doctors, my wife’s mother, two assistants, one midwife who was a Voluntary Health Nurse and a National Award recipient for delivering hundreds of babies (including several twins) without any mortality. I was the solitary man in the room.
The birthing process took about 36 hours. There was not much progress for 26 of those hours. We had hardly slept for two nights in a row. One of the water bags had broken 15 hours earlier but labour had not progressed. The two obstetricians we consulted through the process felt we were way past the time to induce labour.
As we began to wonder whether we needed to go to a hospital after all, a couple of simple herbal interventions were used (based on Ayurveda texts) that kick-started the labour. The contractions grew steadily and the babies were born normally a few hours later. The doctors’ immaculate skill at manipulating the second child in a breech position ensured everything went smoothly.
My wife did not have a single tear. She did not need oxytocin, epidurals or episiotomy. The umbilical cords were not cut immediately. The babies were allowed to breathe through their common placenta for several minutes after their birth and a simple, short intake of breath indicated the transition of their breathing to their lungs. There was no need to slap any bottoms or place them on cold, metal trays. We had two healthy, calm babies in our hands.
I had the privilege to witness this process from close quarters, to see the commitment of the women around my wife to stay by her side and to aid her through the long birthing process, without once complaining about the obvious disruption this single event was to all their lives. Not once did they rush my wife or scold her. The delivery was a community effort and the twins belong to those women as much as to us parents. There is an African saying that it takes a village to raise a child. It takes no less to bring a life into this world.
I have written this piece for all those women who would like to have a natural birthing process and who would like to resist the ubiquitous fear surrounding birthing, to give themselves a chance to do that which nature has amply equipped them to deal with. With the right kind of support, it is definitely possible.
This was originally written in 2011 and remained unpublished until now.
Postscript (2016): Our boys are five and half years old now and if anything, this article seems as relevant today as it was five years ago.
Further Postscript (2023): The boys will turn twelve in four days, and oh my godness, how my life has changed forever with their birth!
They give meaning to my life!
It is one of my greatest regrets that I cannot be a midwife in this lifetime. The joy of bringing life into this world is unparalleled and I seem to have the patience and courage for the task. But it is an impossible pipedream. Oh well, perhaps in the next lifetime! This time around, I will resign myself to simply birthing ideas.
Featured Image: Photo by Juliane Liebermann on Unsplash
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