On Cows and Chickens - Guest Post from Heatherlady

For my doula certification I had to sit in on a childbirth education class for a few weeks. During the course of the class, the teacher, a midwife, shared a story that one of her first time fathers shared with her. The young man was a cattle rancher and managed a large herd owned by a man who lived out of the state. For some reason, the owner of the herd was really terrified about the cows giving birth. He was certain that things were going to go wrong and that he would loose his cows. He told this young man that he needed to bring the cows close the barn when it was time for them to give birth.

The young man refused adamantly saying, “It is gonna bug em.” But the owner insisted and so when the cows were ready to calve the young man brought them in out of the far pasture where they normally calved and into a pasture closer to the barn. They hadn’t ever had any problems with the cows calving before but that year they had to do a c-section on one of the cows who was unable to birth her baby.

That made the owner even more afraid that something was going to go wrong with the births so he insisted that the young man bring the cows in the barn when they were ready to calve. The young man refused saying, “Now that is really gonna bug em.” Yet since he didn’t want to loose his job he drove the cattle into the barn when calving time came around. That year they had to do five c-sections and numerous manual assists; it was the hardest calving season the young man had ever had in all his experience on cattle ranches.

The next year knowing that the owner was going to want the cows in the barn again during calving season the young rancher drove the entire herd up to the pasture furthest away from the barn and left them there. He purposely waited until the very end of calving season to go up and check on them. There he found that all the cows, even those who had had c-section the previous year, had all given birth safely and without assistance.

This story struck me because I couldn’t help but draw a parallel to our modern maternity system. There is so much fear surrounding birth that we have this urgent need to monitor it, observe it and control it. Yet when we start controlling it, all of the sudden things start to go wrong, making us more scared of birth, making us want to control it more, and well, you can see how things have spiraled out of control until we have nearly a 36% c-section rate in the United States.

In all honesty, women aren’t much different than these cows and being closely observed, monitored and controlled during birth just “really bugs em.” In my experience a doula, the easiest and most peaceful births have been the ones where the woman either labored at home for most of the time or was left almost completely and totally alone (except for her husband and doula) until the baby was born. The times I’ve seen the most problems is when a woman is strapped up to lots of machines and is constantly being checked by the nurse to make sure she is making progress. Don’t get me wrong, there is definitely a place and a time for interventions, monitoring and control, but in the majority of cases, women’s bodies and babies are perfectly capable of giving birth on their own power.

I can’t help but wonder how different women’s birth outcomes and experiences would be if they were allowed to just simply give birth—without all the commotion, without all the machines and without all the checking, poking, prodding, and control that goes on in many birth rooms. What if women were sent out to their “farthest pasture,” a place beautiful, full of good food, surrounded by loved ones who had faith in them, and were left by themselves to birth.

I’ve also had another experience this week that has turned my thoughts towards birth. My hen, who had been sitting on seven eggs for the last three weeks, just hatched four little beautiful babies. It was such a beautiful thing and the doula inside of me was having a hard time between knowing I should step back and let the natural process unfold and wanting to see the whole thing happen. The doula in me won and left the hen alone as much as I could.

In the end I only got to see one of the chicks hatch from its shell, and it took a really long time. I couldn’t help but think “Man, if this baby chick was in the hospital they would have given him a c-section by now.” I’ll admit that a part of me wanted to reach down and pull away part of the shell from him so he could come free. Yet, I knew from high school biology class that the motions a chick goes through pecking and wiggling out of it’s shell is vital to it’s development and therefore survival. If it isn’t allowed to do it by itself, then it won’t thrive and often dies. So, as much as I wanted to help the chick I just let things unfold and eventually that little chick did it just fine.

As I watched this little chick fluff out its feathers and run around the brooder box I couldn’t help but wonder why many people in our society seem to have so much more faith in a chicken’s ability to be born than we do a human baby. Humans are the greatest of all God’s creations. Unlike any other creatures on this earth, we are created in the image of God. We alone have the ability to reason and to make choices just as the Gods do. We are Gods and Goddesses in training and have so much divine potential. Why is it then that we mistrust women’s bodies so much? Why do we have more confidence in a cow’s ability to give birth than we do a potential Goddess’s? Why, when we know that a chick must go through the process of pecking and hatching from it’s own shell in order to thrive and live, do we assume that human babies can be cut from wombs, pulled out with forceps, or induced with drugs without having it affect them spiritually, emotionally and physically? Why do we assume that God made childbirth safe and easy for other animals, but that we, His literal children, aren’t made as well as a cow?

I have a great testimony of women’s innate divine power, physical and spiritual. I know that if we tap into this power, if we don’t allow anyone to “bug” us, and if we have faith in God’s natural plan, birth gives us an incredible opportunity to reclaim and rediscover the powerful connection between our bodies and our spirits.

Heatherlady is a contributor to the book and is mildly obsessed with chickens and babies. You can read more from her at her blog Women in the Scriptures.

What the Proclamation on the Family Says About Pregnancy and Birth

I was reading the Proclamation on the Family today and am in awe of how well it is written. It is short and succinct, yet covers everything. It is specific and leaves no room for misinterpretations. I can only describe some of the word choices as perfect. For example, the word “entitled” in paragraph seven. Normally I dislike this word, but in this case (“children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony”), it is the only correct word. Deserve wouldn’t work.

There is one line, however, that I always thought was repetitive. Let me set it up for you: In paragraph four, it says “…God has commanded that the sacred powers of procreation are only to be employed between a man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife.”

The next paragraph say:

“We declare the means by which mortal life is created to be divinely appointed.”

I always thought this was a repeat of the chastity admonishment, but I notice now that it being in its own paragraph is significant. On closer study, it is apparent that “the means by which mortal life is created” includes pregnancy and birth.

I am amazed that this sentence that has been in front of me all this time. Heavenly Father is affirming that the process of gestation and birth are divinely appointed--that we were created in the image of a Heavenly Mother, who has done it herself, and has blessed it.

Maybe this is obvious to some people, but to me it was a huge rubber bat to the head.

I have always thought of procreation, and therefore sex, as our one divine power—hence the reason Satan has attacked it so hard, and not subtly. Sex is money nowadays. It is commercial, recreational, fun, and anything but sacred. Now I see that pregnancy and birth are and extension of that divine power, and their sacred nature is being attacked/undermined in more subtle ways. The spiritual, sacred nature of the gestation and birth process has been slowly pushed into the background in favor of a more scientific, medical or mechanical focus. There are almost no books at the mainstream bookstore that speak in-depth about the spiritual journey of pregnancy. Even with the knowledge we have as Latter-Day-Saints about the divine nature of women and motherhood, when it comes to pregnancy and birth, many sisters are still floundering.

Seeing the de-sanctification of birth as a tool of the adversary shocked me a little, and put a new urgency on this project. I am not in favor of bashing all modern American maternity care, because I believe there are exceptions to everything, but it is, to put it precisely, a disaster—especially when compared to other countries. Reaffirming the sacred nature of pregnancy and birth is a slow, grassroots effort that I have often heard compared to missionary work. And after reading the last line of the Proclamation I am at it with a new zeal.

So spread the word: Our physical bodies were created after the image of our Heavenly Mother, and the process of pregnancy and birth ("the means by which mortal life is created") are divinely appointed. Amazing.