When it comes to labor and delivery, I’ve had a wide range of experiences. Just to illustrate:

#1 (Joseph) was chemically induced at the Army hospital and ended up being delivered via c-section.

#2 (Catherine) was a midwife attended VBAC at the Army hospital, with the usual interventions (IV, epidural).

#3 (Margaret) and #4 (Benjamin) and #5 (Samuel) and #6 (Susanna) were all totally natural VBAC’s and midwife attended at a free-standing birth center.

I’ve never done a home birth before, but have certainly considered it and have many friends who have been very pleased with their experiences. Fortunately, if I ever decide to go this route, we have a wonderful family doctor in the area who will sometimes attend home births, as well as many midwives who offer this service (as well as in-home prenatal care)..

A couple of things that make a home birth attractive to me:

1. I wouldn’t have to go anywhere. I’ve always hated that drive to the birth center when I’m laboring in the cramped back seat of the car and praying we don’t have an accident or collision.

2. I would be in a comfortable, familiar setting.

3. I wouldn’t have to pack any bags.

Where a woman chooses to give birth is a personal decision and (despite what many mothers militantly assert) there is no right or wrong choice.

Basically, we try to pick the setting which offers what we consider to be closest to the “ideal birth.” Our ideal is influenced by past experience, our culture, the media and things like books we read and people we talk to.

For me, the birth center and a midwife-attended delivery have come pretty close to my ideal:

1. I prefer the midwife’s birth philosophy, which is basically that birth is a natural and normal process and that most of the time, everything goes right and needs little help or interference. By contrast, an OB is trained to view birth as a medical procedure and to focus on everything that might go wrong (hence the interventions, monitors, constant examinations, etc.)

2. I prefer the hands-off approach of a midwife during labor. If I don’t need anything, nobody bothers me or comes to examine me constantly.

3. I don’t like the restrictions and red tape that I dealt with in my hospital labors. They would only let me chew on ice chips even though I was weak and ravenously hungry. I was hooked me up to monitors and IV’s “just in case.”

4. I like that my midwife is also a mother and has given birth herself. To me, this makes a difference! When she’s giving me advice or encouraging me, I know that she speaks from personal experience and can sympathize with what I’m going through.

5. I like that when I am giving birth I’m in a place that’s set up just for that. When you enter a hospital, your risk for coming in contact with pathogens or germs is much higher.

6. I like the traditional wisdom that midwives possess to help ease the pain of labor and make delivery easier.

7. I like that the midwife is never in a hurry. She knows that some babies arrive quickly, and others take their time (even a few days!). Busy physicians don’t usually have the luxury of time on their side. Women sometimes get pressured into c-sections if the doctor isn’t satisfied with their “progress.”

8. I like that there is no minimum stay required. Sometimes, my husband and I return home the same day or the next day. We are very eager to return home, introduce the baby to older siblings, and sleep in our own beds.

Now, all of that being said, there are definitely advantages to a hospital birth. It’s still the most popular way to have a baby in America. I have a very dear friend who loves her hospital deliveries, so to present the other side of the coin, here are her reasons for choosing this type of delivery:

1. She loves being able to receive an epidural for complete pain relief as soon as she checks in. Her opinion is that modern medicine has discovered an escape from the pain, so why not take advantage of it? Having zero pain relaxes her and makes labor enjoyable.

2. She likes the constant attention from the nurses, doctors, etc. as it makes her feel they are “on top of things” and looking out for her well-being and that of the baby.

3. She prefers being electronically monitored as it gives her peace of mind about how the labor is progressing.

4. She does not mind any of the restrictions or red tape, as her view is “the doctor knows what he’s doing” and so she chooses to trust his/her judgment.

5. She tends to be an over-anxious person and so being in a hospital makes her feel 100% secure should anything go wrong.

(Note: midwives are trained to provide basic emergency care to mother and baby and are also trained to know when a labor requires immediate transfer to a hospital. Infant mortality statistics are roughly the same for hospitals as they are for midwives – 1.7 per 1000 births)

6. She likes being able to stay on a few days after birth and get some rest without having to worry about her other children, laundry, etc.

So there you have two different perspectives!

What is your preference?