Jessa Duggar-Seewald welcomed her first child, a little boy, last week. I had a feeling that she would cover this week’s People Magazine, and here we go. Jessa, Ben Seewald and Baby Seewald got the cover because they gave People some exclusive photos and some new interviews. I wonder how much Jessa and Ben got paid? My guess is that it wasn’t seven figures, but probably low six-figures. Like, $200,000? Maybe? I was wrong about one thing though – I thought Jessa and Ben would get a People cover and announce the baby’s name. Nope. Apparently, they haven’t even settled on a name yet.
So then what does Jessa talk about in her People cover story? Her “intense” labor and how she ended up going to the hospital, which we already knew. She tried to do a home birth but she had to be rushed to the hospital.
Jessa (Duggar) Seewald is the first to admit that her labor was “very intense.” Jessa, 23, and her husband Ben, 20, welcomed their first child – a 21.5-in. son weighing 9 lb., 11 oz. – last Thursday, but the nearly 48-hour delivery was far different than what she had imagined.
“Labor is hard,” Jessa says with a laugh in this week’s issue of PEOPLE. “It was very intense, very long. Everything was different than I expected.”
Originally due to deliver on Nov. 1 (coincidentally her one-year anniversary with Ben), Jessa went through 10 hours of contractions that nearly forced her to change her plan of having an all-natural home birth.
“I said, ‘That’s it! I’m done! I am going to the hospital and I’m going to get an epidural,’ ” she says. “They asked me if I really wanted to do that and I said, ‘No, I don’t, but I do.’ I wanted to try natural if at all possible.”
During the first stage of labor, Ben admits that seeing his wife in pain “was kind of emotionally difficult. “I was trying to keep it positive … there were a few times, she was like, ‘I can’t do this.'”
But after their son finally arrived at 6:54 on Nov. 5, their joy was soon interrupted by a surprisingly scary moment as Jessa began bleeding so much that her midwife became concerned. Jessa says that “everyone stayed calm” while her mother Michelle Duggar, 49, called 911. “I tried to keep my head, I was awake and alert,” Jessa recalls.
The hardest part? Leaving her newborn: “I had dreamed about those first moments, getting to breastfeed right away, all that. And so when I had to go to the hospital, it was a shock.”
After nearly fainting, Jessa had to undergo a blood transfusion and stay overnight; at that point, her son was brought to her side. Now back – and part of a healthy, happy family of three – at her home in Springdale, Arkansas, Jessa is settling into motherhood and cherishing every minute with her child.
“I can’t believe he’s really ours,” she says. “It is so amazing. He’s a miracle.”
The stories that many of you ladies were telling about your own birth experiences made my lady parts want to close up shop for the rest of my life. Props to anyone and everyone who goes through childbirth, with or without drugs. I don’t know how you ladies do it, I really don’t. In fact, after reading so many horror stories, I do wonder why any woman in the developed world would decide on a home birth. I’m not judging, I’m simply mystified. Jessa was an entirely healthy and young woman and she still had these kinds of complications. Why risk it?
Photos courtesy of People, Instagram.
Congrats to the couple. What a beautiful, cute baby.
You know what? As much as I don’t like her I wouldn’t wish that experience on anyone. That sucks and sounds incredibly scary. I understand the idea of wanting a home birth, but there’s so much that can go wrong it would scare me.
While I don’t have children I’ve made enough emergency vet calls for livestock when calving goes wrong that I know the “oh shit, this is NOT what’s supposed to be happening!” feeling. I’m glad she’s okay now.
“The stories that many of you ladies were telling about your own birth experiences made my lady parts want to close up shop for the rest of my life.”
Yup, pretty much. I’m in my early 20s, still haven’t found The Dude Worthy of Being My Baby Father, and in reading some of your stories from the last Jessa thread I don’t know that I ever want to. Of course I’m sure it’s beautiful, but I had no idea how scary it could be. My mommy will be holding my hand the whole way when and if it happens. Props to all of you for your strength and bravery, Jessa included. I can’t imagine how frightening it must have been when the situation turned on her so quickly.
And, FWIW, I am also in the mystified, scared sh!tless, why would you risk a home birth camp.
Don’t worry it’s not that bad…honestly it’s kind of like going to the dentist Hahahaha. I was in labour for 33 hours with my first and 13 for my second and it’s just like terrible menstral cramps. It’s doable. 🙂
I’ve had pancreatitis and kidney stones, and I will say that contractions were the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced! I had an epidural, and it fell out… so right in the throes of labour, my pain medication wore off! The actual delivery was fine, with the epidural back in place – thank goodness .. but in a way I’m glad it wore off for an amount of time so I could actually feel what was happening. I had no idea!!
Definitely reminded me of terrible menstrual cramps. Take the epidural though…if you have complications (ie placenta doesn’t detach), you won’t have to do surgery without pain meds (!!).
I hated every minute of being pregnant, if all I had to do was show up and push the baby out sign me up.
12 hours from water breaking to baby. From my first practice push to baby 9 minutes. I pushed 3 times. There are some births out there. My problem was I hated being pregnant.
Epidural is king. Use that and you should be ok!
Kaiser, you never know what will happen in labour. I was 38 when I gave birth two months ago, a couple of weeks before I turned 39. I was terrified of labour, and pretty ready for an epidural and anything else they would give me for pain management. I ended up “silently labouring”, and from start to finish it was 3 hours. My doctor said I was the fastest first time mum she saw in her many years of practice, and that my body was meant to have babies. I wish I had prepped more for breastfeeding. That was difficult! But anyway, moral of the story, you never know how long these things will take or how complicated 🙂
I had a c-section so Ill never know how it would have been but honestly I wish I was more prepped for bf’ing too.. Its been 7 months of intense work and Im at a stage of pretty much pump and feed all the time, despite staying at home.. I guess some babies never really take to the breast (or so Id like to believe).
While stories like this scare the living daylight out of me, my overall first reaction to news of new parenthood has now become “welcome to hell aka the first year of your child”! LOL
Nur – I’m no expert on breastfeeding (I had trouble too, and got Mastitis with both of mine), but one thing I’ve heard about lately is, when the baby is having trouble latching on, to check for tongue tie. A lot of doctors don’t check and mothers don’t know about it, but it helped a friend of mine whose daughter was having trouble breastfeeding – she had it and they corrected it with a minor surgery and now she’s doing great. Not saying that is what your baby has, but it’s worth knowing about and checking for in case you didn’t know about it.
I feel bad for Jessa. I had major bleeding as well after birth when my first child was born (different reason, mine was do to a rupture of a hematoma) but I had to have emergency surgery and lots of blood transfusions and IV’s. I had no many wires attached to me, that just holding my son was difficult, and I didn’t get that closeness that so many women have with their babies right after birth. It’s very difficult, especially when it’s your first child. I hope that she is smart enough to realize that she’s now considered high risk for future pregnancies and that second babies often tend to be bigger than the first, and this one was already very large for a home birth with such a petite Mom. Hopefully she goes to the hospital with future babies and her crazy family doesn’t make her feel guilty for doing so, or worse…convince her to keep trying for home-births. Losing blood like she did is very dangerous and nothing to take lightly. When it happened to me, the surgeon told my husband that I had lost so much blood that they weren’t sure I’d survive the surgery, even with immediately blood transfusions. Women do still die giving birth. It’s more rare today, but it happens, and even in a hospital setting where I was able to get immediate care from a specialist, it was no sure thing (and I was young and healthy and not considered high risk at the time as well)!
Nur- Kuddos for you for working so hard!!! You should be one proud mama 🙂 This time will end & you should always & forever look back and know you kicked a$$. And when your kid is a healthy teenager and yells “I hate you!” feel free to teach them of this time over & over & over. It’s so hard & you are doing your best for you & your baby. Hugs to you.
Congratulations on your birth! I am a newborn/birth photographer and 3 weeks ago I shot an all natural, silent birth. Mama labored from 1 am and had baby at 3:40am. They used essential oils and had gentle music playing. I even caught her water breaking on the birthing ball. It was truly amazing. Even the staff were rooting her on.
If I never shot another birth ever again, I would feel my career complete after seeing that.
Good for her & you! I hear stories like that though and think “man…I wish mine could have been that easy”. Silent- hells no! I was like a rabid animal screaming, panicking & actually biting the bed, towel & probably would have bitten my husband but he stayed his distance. I think yours is one of those 1 in 100 stories. My only concern is that when women hear stories like this (my friend has a similar story as your experience & shares it ALL the time) the other women like me think that they did something wrong or “missed out” on some beautiful experience. A human coming out of your v- anything can happen & sometimes it’s great but man….sometimes it just sucks. The end result is (I think) what we should focus on & not feel bad about any experience.
This story is designed to garner sympathy for a Duggar. Here goes. Never mind I don’t have any.
Yup. Along with the 911 phone call from Mama grifter. No one can accuse these people of subtlety.
Me, neither. Stupid woman makes stupid decision to let stupid mother deliver innocent baby by stupid father. What could go wrong? Ugh, these people.
best summary of the situation…so needlessly stupid. and so much more stupid to come with jill &jessa’s new show
I don’t understand the attraction of a natural birth. It certainly gives women who do it bragging rights. And if you could stand it, good for you. I was in the “give me as many drugs as possible” camp. I’ve got plenty of time to bond with my kid. I didn’t need to do it on the first day. But that’s just me.
Having tried – and failed a natural birth (in the hospital, you would not catch me attempting a home birth, what the heck!) I can understand both sides a bit.
For me it wasn’t about bragging… I had a perfectly healthy pregnancy, but because of my age (35) I was extra careful. Not even a Tylenol passed my lips during pregnancy, never mind cheese and sushi and coffee. So I thought I would try a drug free birth. Part of the reason I was encouraged to do that was the idiotic “baby” class that I took, that was offered through a local group in my town, ran by nurses and midwives. They did not convince me to do the doula/midwife/at home in bathwater thing, but they killed us during class with the effing “birth plan” – write down what you want, bring comfort items, have a stupid music list… really? A music list?
In retrospect it is a wonder more women don’t end up with complications listening to this type of advice.
Now I know some ladies have perfectly successful home births – all natural, no doctors, just a midwife, and if to works for them, great.
My birth plan went to pot when the baby was overdue, they induced me, my doctor was on vacation, his replacement was useless – she advised me to “wait”, the stranger at the hospital who ended up assisting couldn’t care less about me, and after 17 hours of pain I ended up taking the epidural. So far so good right?
None of it did any good and I had to have a C-section after 28 hours of insanely painful labor. The other thing the idiot baby course did NOT teach me was that your milk won’t come in if you have a C section and are given morphine, so the long and the short of it is that my perfectly healthy baby almost died from dehydration because both the hospital staff and myself have been brainwashed into thinking that if you don’t do breast feeding 100% you are a failure as a mom. At least I had the excuse of no experience, but there was no excuse for their lack of knowledge. Fortunately once we ended up in NICU they pulled him through, but I would not wish that experience on anybody. Instead of my well planned birth, and a healthy baby at home n two days, I had a painful surgery, a baby lying in NICU for a week, and a complete nervous breakdown.
The other thing they don’t tell you is that if you are B strep positive it may be a problem for your baby. During pregnancy when you take the test, the doctor will tell you, no worries, it’s nothing. BUT if they induce you, that may contaminate the newborn (even if you do get a C-section like I did), or the baby can get contaminated during birth, and that is a huge problem for their non-existent immune system, because they can die from a violent infection. And most people are clueless about the fact that if the mom is B strep positive, the newborn must get antibiotics after birth. I was. And all the staff who assisted my delivery were. Only the specialist in NICU said this to us, when it was almost too late. Luckily, that did not happen to us, but while you wait for three days for the lab results not sure if your child is dying, it can feel like a lifetime.
Sorry – long post but if this helps any single person have a better experience than mine, it’s worth it.
And I thought I was prepared, smart, educated, mature – a 35 year old professional with a grad degree who had read countless books before and thought she had it all figured out.
Wow. Being B strep positive is a HUGE deal, which is why the OB is supposed to test you a few weeks before due date/birth. Both the mother and baby typically need antibiotics. It sounds like you were at the mercy of a craptastic hospital. So glad everything turned out ok!!
You know what? I can tell you are a good mother vauvert because you were careful to do what was best for your child but you made adjustments when life didn’t work out like you planned. Motherhood is the story of making plans and adjusting when your child, or your expectations, or your life doesn’t quite fit what you thought. The thing about kids (I have four of them, age 15 on down, three of them given birth to without any pain relief) is the best part is the unexpected and all of it is hard but so wonderful too. Embrace the birth story as it happened. There is no bad birth which ends with a living baby.
HeatherAnn- Great comment & I totally agree! Part of having kids imo is learning that life & birth & then life again (and people/kids) don’t always follow your plan. Even the best laid out plan. For me my boys have given me the biggest teaching of humility, patience & adaptation. Humility mainly cuz they always like peeing & pooping on me as babies but you know…..at least they grew out of it 😉
They most certainly do tell you that if you’re Strep B+ it can be a fatal disease, and the protocol for a GBS+ mother is IV antibiotics in labor; they only treat the baby afterwards if you missed the ABX or if the baby shows symptoms. I was GBS+ and had, I think, 6 doses of ABX in labor. It can be a very big deal. My kid still ended up in the NICU with presumed sepsis, which it wasn’t – lumbar puncture was clear. He was just early and still had wet lungs.
It just made sense to me to have a home birth. I HATE hospitals and i was 30 and low risk. While pregnant I was constantly aware of all the food you’re told is unsafe for the baby. Under cooked meat, unpasteurized cheese, sushi, and so many more… even deli meat is even on the list! So why would i avoid all these things then give me and my baby a bunch of drugs right before she comes out? I knew it would be extremely painful (and it was!), but you live thorough it, millions and millions of women have. At one point my midwife, who’s was an RN and been a midwife for several decades, thought i might need to be transferred to the hospital, but she monitored my baby heartbeat through every contraction and it was strong and steady. It was a short intense labor, 7 hours total, with contractions starting at 4min apart, but i never felt scared or unsafe. And not once did i think “oh i could really use some drugs right now”. To each her own, labor is not the hardest part of being a mother.
I birthed at home twice because I wanted control over my body. Too many times had I witnessed friends and family pushed into unnecessary inductions, pitocin, water breaking, early epidurals that slowed labour, etc. that then led to a c-section. All to make it convenient for the doctor. I didn’t want in IV line prepped “just in case”. I wanted to walk around, get in the shower or tub, push on my hands and knees or squat on the floor. I wanted my mother and grandmother on my bed on either side of me to hold my hands. I wanted to hold my children for as long as I chose after the birth without the “need” to weigh them or do whatever it is they do. I wanted the umbilical cord attached until it stopped pulsing. I wanted the placenta treated with respect, not treated as medical waste. My CNM had been practicing for 20 years and facilitated hundreds of births. I trusted her. She had an entire list of reasons the birth would move to the hospital, many that would be noticed before labour even began. Plus we had an oxygen tank in the room, and a pitocin injection incase of post partum bleeding. And I was only a few minutes from a hospital. Please don’t insinuate I recklessly gave birth at home just for bragging rights. I honestly felt it was the safest, most respectful place for both myself and my children. I watched my sister in law bith at home and when it was over she began bleeding. The CNM calmly administered an IV of what I think was oxytocin and sodium chloride and then called an ambulance. By the time the ambulance arrived the bleeding was under control, she didn’t go to the hospital and all was well. I think the key is to have a properly trained and experienced CNM. Not a lay midwife. I understand many women need medical intervention for a safe birth, many more do not. Most women choose a hospital birth and I respect their choice. Please respect mine.
Why is the assumption for mothers who wish to go unmedicated that they do so for “bragging rights”? I’ve had a c-section and a medicated VBAC, but I hope if I had a third it’s unmedicated. Some non-bragging rights reasons?: 1) not to have to have antibiotics for Group B Strep again (although that course would be charted by my body prior to conception) 2) fewer needles! 3) moving immediately after birth. It was only an hour I couldn’t walk, but still. 3) less engorgement when the milk comes in – that alone would practically be worth it.
Home births scare me. I am a nurse & have worked in critical care for 8 1/2 years. I have seen multiple women almost bleed to death from delivering a baby. (I have cared for them during/after the hemorrhaging) According to new protocols, most hospitals won’t give you a blood transfusion unless your hemoglobin is very low or you’re very symptomatic. She must have been pretty bad off to get a transfusion.
I’m all about women making their own choices in healthcare, I just think a lot of “midwives” (which, FYI, a midwife and a nurse midwife are two ENTIRELY different things) lead women to think that everything will be safe when there are no guarantees.
Here we go. People magazine is going to sell the hell out of this family. Her having a baby isn’t news. It’s a Wednesday. I don’t mean to be disrespectful. I just don’t feel like she or anyone in her family should be rewarded with a cover story.
Also, I’m sympathetic about blood loss. When I had my eldest, I had to have a vacuum to pull her out of me. Her cord was wrapped around her neck and shoulder. After the vacuum and 30 stitches later, I had a beautiful baby girl.
I agree aims. Congrats on the baby but I don’t see why it warrants a mag cover. I guess this sick and twisted Duggar family is never going away.
All the articles make it sound as though she gave birth in the hospital. I was surprised to read she had a successful home birth. No matter who she is; good on her. That’s hard.
I have 3 children. My first was in the hospital (epidural, threat of C-section, long labor), my last 2 were both home waterbirths. Loved the experience of both my home births and so happy I decided to do them. World of difference in the experience from a hospital birth.
However, two things made me (but especially my husband) feel more comfortable doing the home waterbirths. 1 – My midwife was a trained and certified EMT and had YEARS of experience with home births and 2 – There was a hospital 5 minutes from my house.
Fortunately, I did not have any complications. In the end, what matters is a safe, happy and healthy mama and baby.
Aside from the obvious and very scary thought of medical complications that you are unprepared to deal with at a home birth, I can’t get over the MESS of giving birth in your home! Who is in charge of clean up?
My midwife and her apprentice cleaned everything up before they left. Both of mine were water births, so there wasn’t that much that needed cleaning!
I posted this on the last thread but I agree about the mess. I know that a midwife is supposed to clean it up but after I stood up for the first time after giving birth I left a huge pool of blood on the floor. And that’s with the huge diaper thing on. The nurse assured me that it was a normal amount of blood but I would still hate to have that in my house.
No judgement on home or hospital births. Both have pros and cons. As long as precautions are taken and everyone is fully informed, with medical history things are fine. And anything can go wrong too.
In truth I’ve seen more hospital births go sideways than home births. Only a handful of home births had complications outof many. Many hospital births had pre and post complications. Although they were at the hospital for a reason.
I’m just so cynical about this family, so I shouldn’t say anything.
By all means, have at it. On another site, I suggested they name their baby Towel and call it a day.
Me too minx. But I can’t help wondering what would have happened if, because of the haemorrhaging, she was told she’d need a hysterectomy to save her life? What would her family have decide given that as a Duggar woman her only worth in life is bearing oodles of children?
I shouldn’t either, but I did anyway and felt mean. I lack your self control.
People magazine is giving publicity to the sister of an untreated and unrepentant child molestor. A sister who has yet to denounce his actions and is desperate to seek fame in any way.
The Duggar family is not the Kardashian family. As bad as the Kardashians are, they have not enabled a child molestor. The Duggars in all their forms need to be ignored and provided zero publicity. She had a baby, big deal that is what they are bred to do. Ignore the crazy family.
I don’t normally buy or read People, but regular readers should boycott any issue that has the Duggars. Then we won’t ever see them again.
^^1000
Yes, they have. They enabled Tyga to have his way with their teen sister and write disgusting song lyrics about it, too.
This teen who was going through traumatic events & was probably confused and sad. Parents divorce, Olympic Champ father transitioning into woman, all the men in her family splitting and/or having substance abuse problems. She named a stuffed animal she was carrying around “Bruce” for goodness sake…
I don’t get the need to compare the Duggars to the Kardashians, can’t they just suck independently of each other?
Oh, fabulous. More Duggar magazine covers. I don’t care what they do or go through, they should NOT be given magazine covers. Stop whitewashing this damn cult family. And a couple hundred grand compensation? Glad that will free the two of them up for at least another year of do-nothing self-promotion.
I can’t with home birth. Maybe it’s my own experience with life threatening pregnancies BUT when I hear ‘woman have been giving birth at home forever, hospitals are a new thing….’ Yeah. You know what else has happened forever? Dying in childbirth. Hospitals save people.
My daughter was an vaginal induction – 9 hours start to finish – and I ended up with a lovely episiotomy. :/ Second child (son) was born July 2014 and it was an unintentional natural birth. I started with contractions at 4:08 p.m. and they were immediately 2 minutes apart. We hopped in the car, where we promptly were stopped by rush hour traffic. One hour later, I delivered my son in the front seat of our car, as my husband rushed to a stop in front of the ER doors. Reading stories like Jessa’s make me realize how incredibly lucky we were not to have any complications.
WHOA!!!
agree – eek! For some reason, the traffic ups the fear level!
Congratulations to new parents. Maybe this will scare some sense into her and also prevent her from having 20 kids.
Sadly I doubt it.
Lots of my friends have done water birth. I live outside of town so I was so scared to do it if anything went wrong. I had the plan for a natural, dark birth. NOPE!!!!! My first contraction lasted a full hour and I said literally “F” this (did not sub the actual word) and got an epidural. Great decision!
That sucks, but this family is still trash. So…
I agree that home births come with it’s fair share of risks, but I can understand the appeal of them. Home births can give the woman more control over the form of delivery and how she handles the birth. A hospital is going to force you to give birth horizontally (which increases the difficulty of labor and makes it impossible for some), likely induce you earlier than required, and limit the time that they’ll allow you to be in labor before sending you off to surgery. It’s also more comfortable and familiar, so a woman feels safer and less anxious, which can impact the length of labor. Hospital excursions increase the potential for acquired infections and medication dosing risks. Midwives can also be more attentive and empathetic to women’s needs than doctors can be, especially given the numerous studies that suggest women are less likely to be taken seriously by their doctors.
Case in point: A friend of mine literally came within hours of dying during her second labor because her maternity doctor kept insisting she was in pre-labor when she was clearly in final labor because of her lack of dilation. This was despite the fact that her first pregnancy had shown similar complications, and she had a history of reproductive issues that could contribute to delayed labor. She wound up having to demand transfer to a different hospital and deal with a second set of doctors, who wound up dancing around the issue similarly – until a nurse came in and caught something they had missed. (All of this went on while she was clearly in AGONY from final stage contractions.) A few minutes later, she found herself being wheeled into the OR for an emergency cesarean. She was later informed that had they waited an hour or two more, her uterine walls would have ruptured, and both she and the baby would have died from internal bleeding within minutes. It turns out she really had been in the final stage of labor (AS SHE HAD STATED MORE THAN A DAY BEFORE) and simply failed to dilate, so the walls of her uterus had contracted so much that they had thinned out to the point of tearing.
Needless to say, if they wind up having any more kids, she’s seriously considering a midwife.
It’s really on a hospital by hospital basis. The doctors/hospital I birthed at we’re not going to induce until two weeks post dates, let me eat during labor, had labor balls and allowed women to birth in the position they picked (provided they didn’t have an epi).
I’m confused – if your friend isn’t dilating, what is a midwife going to do differently? Didn’t they monitor her uterus? Maybe I’m misreading you.
I snuck some snacks but they totally pushed Pitocin on me like a drug dealer would on a crackhead.
It’s not about what a midwife would have differently so much as that he or she might have LISTENED better. My friend knew something was wrong and was argued down by doctors – and almost lost her life for it. I’m glad you had a good experience, but that’s unfortunately not the case for everyone. (I won’t even get into some if the horror stories around the experience of POC mothers in hospitals.) I’m not saying hospital care is bad, per se, only that I understand why some women would prefer them.
Sometimes stuff just happens that is out of your control — and has nothing to do with the ability of the care providers around you. I was zipping along with my labor, at 10cm, thinking I was going to have a baby at 3:00 in the afternoon. Next thing you know, my little guy flips sunny-side up and gets stuck. We try changing positions and various other recommended methods for getting him to turn, but he stays stuck, and eventually starts to show signs of distress. Now it’s 11pm and I’m having to decide between attempting suction or just going straight to the C-section. The doctor (and fabulous nurse — shout-out to Denise wherever your are!) and I agreed to give it one try with suction before the C-section — thankfully, it worked and extra thankfully did not cause any further complications for my son.
My story is a lot less scary than many, but it goes to show that Mother Nature has her own mind about things. Birth is a natural act, but it’s also naturally fraught with complications.
“Sometimes stuff just happens that is out of your control”
That’s why I would only have a baby in the hospital. At least that decision is in your control, unless the baby comes early.
GNAT
Hospitals can take control away from you.
I’m just playing DA here, but it’s still true. If they feel inclined they can be in full control of all medical choices regarding you and your child.
An example. A woman came in to give birth, but her everything bagel had poppy seeds. The hospital called CPS and the local police as soon as the blood tests confirmed the levels of opiates and as she gave birth she knew her baby would be put immediately in state custody as she would be held by the authorities. It got straightened out later, but she went without that period of bonding post labor.
So many instances that are so different and similar to this.
It’s the mothers choice to have her baby as she wants where she wants without being scared or guilted into someone elses choices. As long as everyone involved is prepared and aware and willing to do whatever needed for mother and child to be safe where shouldn’t matter.
A lot of fear games here. No 2 labors are the same and no one should be guilted or scared into what another thinks is best.
In case my family starts asking again why I don’t want kids I’ll just start reading all the comments about birth experiences that have been made on this site so far. That should shut them up. (Holy sh*t, you ladies are tough!)
How much of that 200K does Jim Bob get?
I lost a lot of blood after my (drug-free, hospital) delivery, but I didn’t get a transfusion, just IV fluids. I was alert and able to get up and walk, though apparently I looked pale as a ghost. She must have been bad off to need a transfusion. I don’t care one way or another about the Duggars or home birth (not for me but do what you want!). Good for them for making the prompt hospital transfer though.
My husband and I aren’t kid people but if I was I’d prefer to have my child at home. My parents had all five of us at home with midwives, family, and no complications. My sister did have my niece in a hospital, though… Different strokes, folks.
Clearly, these young women did not receive good prenatal care. To get the point where you need a transfusion after giving birth is insane. That’s what they do for war victims and people who’ve been shot multiple times. It means she lost A LOT of blood, and she was in a very serious situation.
When The other sister gave birth, she labored at home for a really long time, only to be rushed to the hospital to find the baby was breech. She didn’t know that going into labor? Most women, living in developed countries, would know that by the time they were giving birth. And a good doctor would have warned her against laboring at home if they knew.
I think it’s just crazy. Maybe they don’t listen to medical professionals because for them, it really is in God’s hands. Well guess what, I’m pretty sure God has had something to do with all the medical advances over the past 200 years that have saved so many lives!!!
Sometimes needing a transfusion after birth is necessary no matter what prenatal care you get. A friend of mine gave birth in a hospital with good prenatal care and required a transfusion after almost dying. It happened fast and thankfully she survived. She’s still upset over it and can barely talk about the birth.
I’m a physician (surgeon) and I chose a home birth for my second child. There is good, published, peer-reviewed data that the risk of complications is equal or less in a home birth compared to a hospital birth for a low-risk pregnancy. Yes, JD needed transfer to a hospital and treatment for hemorrhage, but that same situation could happen in the hospital with the same outcomes. The risk of precipitous complications, the kinds where seconds matter, is extremely rare, especially with a good and cautious midwife who identifies warning signs and transfers early. They are also balanced out by increased risks of other complications that are higher in hospital deliveries, many iatrogenic. Homebirth is not a choice for everyone, and it isn’t a “better” or “worse” choice. It’s just a choice.
Please keep in mind that a trained midwife is not just some hippy in a peasant skirt with a bottle of lavender oil. They come with oxygen, IV fluids, medications to be used in emergencies for stabilization, instruments, etc. They are health care professionals, and they want good outcomes for mom and baby as much as anyone.
Thank you!
My surgeon said I would’ve died if I had given birth at our (wonderful) midwife center or at home, as I had to have emergency surgery following.
The risk of complications may be equal (I can’t believe it’s less) but there is always a risk of complication. In that event, I simply do not understand why anyone would rather be miles away from their doctor and a fully equipped facility. It makes no sense to me. Why risk your and the baby’s life? I have never heard a reasonable explanation.
Well a) in many places a pregnant woman won’t have an OBGYN throughout pregnancy, just a midwife. Whether you give birth in hospital or not. Access to a doctor isn’t seen as a must by a lot of people, because a midwife can do most everything. The things they can’t do, your doctor would be handing off to someone else in a hospital environment anyway, and that someone else is rarely free the second their asked for, so a short transfer period makes little difference. If you have a really catastrophic issue, you’ll likely need to go to the biggest hospital possible, so unless that happened to be the hospital you ended up in, you’ll experience being transferred anyway.
And b) not that many hospitals are fully equipped to deal with every worst case scenario or sometimes even a minor problem. If a bunch of women all require an emergency CS at the same time, some of them are going to be transferred.
When my birth went wrong I needed a brain surgeon, and that required a long-ish helicopter ride, organized in a panic after doctors finally realized my ‘headache’ was a fair bit more than that. If I’d been at home, I would have gotten there before things went really wrong. My midwife immediately flagged my ‘headache’ as a big problem. She argued with the doctors for hours trying to get me transferred. If we’d been at home, we would have been calling an ambulance and directing them towards a hospital that could actually help me within minutes of symptoms appearing, and I would have been in surgery a lot earlier.
GNAT
When i’m part of a team to deliver (Nurse or midwife) I’m near or within hospital walls. And Emergency Response is Always aware should we need them.
You had a terrible experience with home births and I can see how that scars someone. That hardly means it’s the worst choice. It means you had a bad experience with your family. It means they were not prepared. Lack of preparation and things going wrong tht are not easily fixed ddo happen within hospitals. And they are not guaranteed to happen outside of hospitals.
It’s fine whatever the choice as long as all parties are aware plans can change and can act on that. This is not a tough concept. Be prepared, be informed, have another plan should you need one. Not this madness that if you choose home birth you’re inviting the worst things on yourself and your child with no backup plan. Sweet lord that is frustrating!
My bottom line was that I wanted to be close to care for my baby should my baby need it. After two, easy births where I went home from the hospital the same day, the third was born in extreme distress and went immediately into the NICU, where they saved his life. So I don’t get it either. There are lots of appealing things about home for mom, but it depends on how risk adverse one is I suppose.
There was a study out of Europe that did show lower complication rates with homebirths, though not all studies support that and we don’t know if those results could be extrapolated to the US. (Sorry, can’t remember the reference).
The vast majority of complications are not ones where minutes matter, so even being miles away is irrelevant. It is something to consider if you live out in the boonies where the nearest healthcare facility could be an hour or more away, however. Also, many complications are predictable – a mother probably should not be having a VBAC at home, a mom or baby with other medical issues should probably not be at home.
Unfortunately, the systems and protocols set up in a hospital often compromise the birth process. There are handoffs, there is less personal monitoring and more invasive monitoring, there are incentives to get things done expediently (which leads to increased interventions which often snowball), there are increased risks of infections, there are multiple competing interests, there is a medicalized system that can interfere with the laboring mother’s sense of peace and control, which can be really really integral to a straightforward birth. Hospitals are not always benign places!
Anecdotally, my second labor was complicated by a nondilating cervix. Had I been in a hospital with an OB, there would have been pressure to go to a C-section. My midwives (I had two present with me at all times for the last several hours of labor) were cautiously patient and though it was tough, I had a successful vaginal delivery, which meant quicker recovery, less risk of infections/hernias/future placenta acreta, better breastfeeding success, proper colonization of the baby’s bacterial flora, etc.
Again, it’s not the right choice for everyone, not even every low risk mom, but it is a valid choice with data to back it up.
Both my births were in hospital but I’m not against home birth. My husband was very against it though which I understood (it would be too much stress for him). One thing that does bother me though is I think prenatal classes and books push natural birth too hard. They make women feel bad for getting an epidural or c-section, which they shouldn’t! I was the only one in my prenatal class that from the getgo said I would be getting an epidural. It’s actually really funny though I’ve only ever met one woman who said the same thing….every other first time mom has told me they are doing it natural but then 80% tell me afterwards that they did end up getting the epi! So I find that amusing but again no shame! Birth how you want just be realistic with your expectations.
My only issue with home births is that I hear so many people say that it is more natural and safer. There are NO statistics kept on home births, so there is no way that anyone should be advertising them as safer, and there is nothing particularly natural about a home birth. I agree that home may be more comfortable for mom, let’s not pretend it is any more natural, or any safer.
To share a more average/less terrifying birth story for those who have not given birth: my first was a “scheduled emergency” for overdue breech, pretty standard, but I found it really tough and the recovery was horrible. My second: I really wanted a VBAC to avoid the c-section recovery. A few weeks early, in the middle of the night, my water broke. I was GBS+, but kept checking my temp, drinking fluids. 12 hours later, still no labor, so I went to the hospital where I got my antibiotics started and waited for labor, but when they still didn’t start, I started on pitocin.
Pitocin is the devil, albeit an absolutely necessary one and the reason I got a VBAC, $?!&$*% the pain. They slowly ramp it up, but there I was, six hours into unmedicated labor having five minutes of continuous contractions. (Never having had an unaugmented labor, I can only go by what I’ve read/my doula told me: pit contractions are soooo much worse than unmedicated ones). I asked for and got an epidural, the sweet cloud of fentanyl and fell asleep. 45 minutes later they checked me and i was dilated and ready to push. 45 minutes later I had a baby! It was the hardest easy thing or the easiest hard thing I’ve ever done, and I knew in the delivery room that I could absolutely do it again. Not everyone’s birth experiences are harrowing tales of torture!
Considering Jill and Jessa both had long arduous labors, I wonder how that bodes for the rest of the women in that family? Did Michelle have relatively easy labors? Is it genetic? I’m just wondering if their experiences will lower their desire to have so many children. I feel like Jessa has said she does not want 20 kids and would rather adopt.
Didn’t read the story. Just came on to comment that I DONT CARE ABOUT THE DUGGARS. PLEASE STOP – unless it’s about scandal. Birthin’ babies is boring.
This magazine has truly bottomed out. Hard to believe it was actually a good magazine many years ago. Now, I would not pay a single cent for it.
I was a post-partum bleeder. I had an unmedicated delivery at a birthing center, staffed by nurse midwives and near a hospital. The midwives shot me up with pitocin and gave me a TREMENDOUSLY painful uterine “massage” so that my uterus would contract and stop the bleeding. It worked, but I was a few minutes away from a hospital transfer if the bleeding hadn’t stopped. Scary, but I knew I was in good hands and that there would be no hesitation to send me to the hospital if that is what was needed. A friend did a home birth with a very hands-off midwife and ended up having a traumatic birth experience that could have been avoided had they gone to the hospital earlier. Homebirth is lovely, but its best when you are near a hospital and GO if you need to. It’s not a sign of failure to start at home but end up in the hospital.
I agree. Too many people put qualifiers on birth these days. Was it “natural”? Was it “successful”? I’m sick to death of people thinking that one method or another is more natural or more brave, or more anything. And the worst part is that women are the ones who keep creating these categories. There are whole industries created to shame women into all sorts of birthing practices.
My c-section was far less natural than a vaginal birth, and I’m okay with that. I would have died of sepsis in the natural days. We all categorize things, and that’s okay, that’s how our brains sort information. Not all of us assign value judgements to these categories.
And precise language is very helpful here, which is why I like “medicated” vs. “unmedicated,” “vaginal” vs “c-section.” Also, a “successful” birth?: healthy mother, healthy babe.
I’m also in the never having a baby camp. EVER. EVER EVER EVER.
OMG, they named this little baby Spurgeon Elliott Seewald?! With a name like that, it’s a good thing he’s never going to school, the poor thing.
Oh, that poor kid, Spurgeon!
Why didn’t she just pray to God for some new blood?