Homebirths have been the natural way to give birth for millennia, until, in the early 20th century, the patriarchy and “medical science” thought they knew better.
Nowadays, around 98% of births in the U.S. take place in a hospital, though more and more women are opting to have their babies at home.
Advantages of a planned home birth
- It offers a safe, familiar environment that is more private, more comforting, and less stressful than the sterile, impersonal nature of a hospital.
- It focuses on your needs and not the needs and convenience of doctors and obstetricians.
- The baby can be born when it’s ready to come out and not because some doctor wants to stick to an artificial schedule.
- You don’t need to be subjected to constant monitoring.
- You can choose who will be present (e.g. partner, other family members, midwife, doula) and who will not (i.e., strangers).
- You can give birth in any position (e.g., squatting, kneeling, standing, on all fours) instead of lying on your back with your feet up in stirrups (which does not allow the natural force of gravity to assist you and does not allow the pelvis to open up, and which is the worst possible position for the woman and her baby). Any upright position tends to lead to shorter labor, less pain, fewer interventions, and a wider pelvic opening.
- You are under no pressure to cut the cord prematurely, thus denying your baby the cord blood (and stem cells) that are rightfully theirs. The placenta and cord contain 30% of a baby’s total blood volume, as well as over a million stem cells. Premature clamping causes iron deficiency anaemia, is especially harmful for preemies, and also denies them all of their white blood cells.
- There is little risk of anyone performing procedures on your baby without your consent. (Hospitals are known for circumcising, vaccinating, and performing other procedures on newborns even though the parents have explicitly told them that they do not consent to such procedures.)
- You can avoid being pressured into giving your newborn a Vitamin K shot (which carries a Black Box warning, contains more than just a vitamin, and which is unnecessary if the cord is not clamped prematurely, and no hospital procedure will be performed which would cause the baby to bleed).
- You can begin skin-to-skin bonding and breastfeeding immediately after giving birth.
- It is less disruptive for both you and your family.
- You can eat and drink whenever you want.
- It reduces the risk of MRSA and other infections.
- The need for interventions, including but not limited to C-sections and episiotomies, is reduced, with a consequently low rate of maternal morbidity.
- On that note, women who had C-sections were 80 percent more likely to have complications than those who delivered vaginally, and for women aged 35 and older who had C-sections, the risk for severe complications was nearly three times greater.[i]
- There is also a lower risk of maternal mortality. (The USA had 24 maternal deaths per 100,000 in 2020, which was three times more than most other high-income countries, and this rate is steadily increasing. By the way, the rate is decreasing in many other developed nations. And the mortality rate for black women[ii] in the USA is three times higher than that for white women.)[iii]
- The costs can be a lot lower, especially for families that do not have comprehensive medical insurance. In 2020, the average pre-insurance cost of a hospital birth was $13,024, and an additional $22,646 for a C-section (which is performed on a third of more of all birthing females). Out-of-pocket expense, assuming you have insurance, are typically $2,655 and $3,214 respectively. Homebirths, on the other hand, tend to cost from $3,000 to $8,000.
- Hospitals with low staffing levels won’t affect you.
- Perhaps most importantly, it is an empowering experience for the mother and celebrates the fact that giving birth is a natural, normal, and life-changing event.
[i] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-cesarean/c-section-complication-risk-rises-with-mothers-age-idUSKCN1RN2SN/
[ii] https://www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2022/us-maternal-mortality-crisis-continues-worsen-international-comparison
[iii] https://www.americanactionforum.org/insight/maternal-mortality-in-the-united-states/