Thank you. 
Grit your teeth and pop those little tax deductions out with a smile on your face, clean up your own mess and then clear the top field.
Not gonna! 
Posted on 10/27/2006 11:31:40 AM PDT by gobucks
Recently, my wife gave birth to our daughter. We used the Bradley Method: natural childbirth, no meds, no epidural, no pitocin. In a way, childbirth is like flying....
On a recent thread, I gave a brief birth story, designed to encourage other parents considering Bradley. But here, my aim is simple: a few words to convict the hearts of cowardly men who are unwilling to help their wives, and instead, weakly lean on medications to get them through the 'trauma' of childbirth. Yes, guys, exclusively, are the source of the epidural problem.
One could argue on and on that a woman is the one who has to bear the pain, the agony, of the contractions. That for men to even discuss this subject is silly at best, arrogantly patriarchal and insensitive in the worse direction.
But hear me: for a man to back down from the reality of the childbirth he initated is folly. Epidurals, pain meds, drugs, laughing gas ... whatever. Most of these 'interventions' are designed to perfectly numb the transformative experience childbirth is supposed to be. On the surface, of course, the doctors and hospitals want to minimize the 'pain' of childbirth - which they think will maximize the 'joy'.
But the truth is plainer. While the pain is muted, yes, the joy is muted far more. True, the child to mother bonding experience doesn't depend too much upon how many meds are involved.
But, Natural childbirth is about bonding, not just child to mother, but father to child and, more importantly, husband to wife (as the norm). Eagerly sought out epidural-childbirth, however, is a message from the Father to his family: "I don't have what it takes for the childbirth, and chances are good that pattern will remain henceforth regarding fatherhood and husbandry".
Natural childbirth is hard to pull off without the Dad being there, being supportive, being strong. And the fact is clear that if the Dad starts out in a mode of being supportive to the extent required by the Bradley method, then by implication, the coming years will show a Dad whose manhood supports a degree of Fathering that is beyond effective written description, to say nothing of the husbandry!
Of course, some Mothers reading this would argue that cutting out Dad is the idea all along, and a darn good idea. But these words are not for them...
These words are for those few guys out there who suspect deep in their hearts that there has got to be something more to living besides serial guy-driven exploits....
There is more to life than making 'mom' happy, indeed. Guys, another way to say this is: God didn't create you to be a life-support-system for a sperm donation machine, that coincidentally also brings home a paycheck. Husbandry is a noble calling, and stuffing your ears to avoid the calls is what boys, by default, do.
Stand up, and be MEN, you boys encased in the bodies of MEN. Stand up, unstuff your ears, and be the man your children can look up to.
One could argue that Epidural Nation, which is known as the USA, and the door mat that was once known as the WTC towers, have no connection to each other. But the men who flew those planes had no fear of us - and why not?
The kind of Men who fear the pain of helping their wives through the pain of childbirth are the kind of American Guys the hijackers evaluated as they planned their way to 9-11. The American Guys who, as a rule, were not, and still are not, man enough to inflict the kind of pain that SHOULD HAVE deterred the WTC attacks from the start. The kind of guys, for example, who empathize deeply with the 'struggles' guys like Bill Clinton endure.
For me, this has been the nagging question all along: what did those supposedly crazy men in the planes perceive was missing in the average heart of the "American Man"?
What did they witness that was missing such that these Arabic men had no fear of us, no fear for their homelands, no fear for their families, and felt free, felt bold enough, to attack us, the strongest nation the world has ever seen?
In short, just WHERE is the starting point for an 'American Man'? Why, the the birthing rooms of our nation of course - and who, I ask, is missing from these rooms?
American MEN are missing.
Good, loving, supportive guys are now present in the millions .... but they are chicken-hearted, and lazy, eager to get back to their dens, Lazy Boys, and remote controls. It is, indeed, football season, and Tressel's men are doing a great job.
But the football watchers? Those guys are setting a bad example, and they are making us more vulnerable, not less, to the attacks we have seen up to now.
The Epidurals are not the problem - the guys who lean on them are the problem. Men are the solution.
Stand up Men - and enter the birthing room as a man. Our Future Men depend on it.
you know, if you have a healthy baby on the other end, that is reward enough. i personally thought the women screaming their guts out in natural childbirth were nuts. you do not get a GIRLSCOUT badge or other award for having done it without drugs.
hmmm. ok, I was planning of course to say to her, hey, please read this.... but I will see if she is interested in posting something.
Mrs GB has NEVER liked my time spent in Freeperville .... she claims it cheats her of time I should be spending on her.
So, why the name Motormouth? (As if I didn't know!)
Home births are all well and good until something goes tragically wrong. A pediatrician at our hospital in the 80s was completely devoted to the "natural" idea, home birth, etc. Unfortunately, the cord was around the baby's neck and the baby was born anoxic, which later was shown to have caused cerebral palsy. Odds are high they could have saved the baby's handicap with access to hospital equipment.
Thanks to Army hospitals not calling in anesthesia for "routine deliveries," I had both of mine with about 10 mL of Demerol (they usually give you a starting dose of 50 after surgeries - so during childbirth the 10 mL is diddlysquat). My husband was extremely supportive. Nonetheless, I would have enjoyed the experience much more without the pain.
A watermelon is a bit large, but I don't think any of us real men would have a problem with, let's say, a grapefruit.
The homework we did regarding the actual factors that lead up to csections astounded us...
The fact that epidurals increase the CSECTION rate is a fact little known. Thanks!
I could have been used for a Scared Straight program for teens. I doubt a girl in the room would uncross her legs until she was 40 after being with me during my first or third labors especially. :-)
By the way, if you have bathroom issues that last for 22 hours or so, I'd recommend Metamucil.
Hello fellow cult follower! LOL
I envy you, I wanted a homebirth but Mr. Voice chickened out. When I delivered the last one they had the nurses coming in and out during the labor and delivery to observe, only one had assisted in a natural delivery before!
Midwife or doctor?
I understand your POV.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Grit your teeth and pop those little tax deductions out with a smile on your face, clean up your own mess and then clear the top field.
Not gonna!
Of course, if me and the mrs were anti doctor and anti hospital we would have home birthed without a qualm...but my wife's sister had a few choice words with me regarding the subject and I realized in the low probability that if a problem actually occured, I would need some help.
So, natural childbirth in the hospital is fine too...and of course, csections are a consistent life saver.
But again, my point is non about the legitimate use of medicine ... it is the illegimate reliance on pallatives by weak guys which promote weak families ... not only in the areas of childbirth, but most especially, schooling kids and loving wives, that makes for what I view as the roots of the invitations we extend to our enemies.
We live, too many of us, like we are being watched by a TV audience....and it is a lifestyle that neuters the soul of men, women, and their children.
I wish your great post was post number 3or 4!! Thanks!
It is ok ... maybe my single experience will influence the 'plans' of a lot guys out there...
After I had my first really bad kidney stone, someone told me that this is the closest a man could get to the pain of childbirth.
My mother had died a few years earlier, and I really hated that I didn't know that before then. I did appreciate what a good mother she was, but I hadn't had the object lesson on the pain she had to go through to bring me into the world.
I can't thank my mother, but I do salute you.
what a thought ... and I had not thought of it, but am very glad you did....thank you!!
Pick any subject.....
Answer?
The same.
LOL--when you arrive at the ER with kidney stones, I want to hear about how natural and "joyful" morphine suddenly becomes...
Eh, see post #60. (LOL)
LOL!
Thank God I never had one and was blessed with trivial issues personally by only having my chest opened up, my heart removed, being placed on a bypass machine for sustenance, placed on a bed of ice to bring my body temp down to a comfortable 65 degree's body temperature and having cavities placed in my body below my chest on each side and both sides of my groin cut open for parts needed for the bypass interconnect, being zapped twice by a defibrillator to be brought back I can only imagine (thank God) the horrors of child birth or a kidney stone affliction.
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