Having a Cesarean Birth: the Emotional Point of View

By Connie Livingston

There has been a lot of attention directed toward women having babies by cesarean section.  Women who experience a cesarean respond in different ways. For some women, the surgery is not an issue, and they move through the experience with little difficulty. Some women even experience a cesarean as a relief from a long or stalled labor, or a rescue from a life-threatening situation.

Other women find a cesarean difficult to deal with emotionally. They are happy to have their babies here and healthy, but they just can't move through the experience as easily. For some, the lost dream of the way they had wanted to give birth takes real grieving; and for others, the pain of the physical recovery (from what is, after all, major abdominal surgery) is difficult emotionally as well. Still other women experience their cesarean as a deeply traumatic event.  

A woman's response to a cesarean depends on several factors, including: how she was treated by medical staff, the part she played in the decision making process, factors involved in the actual surgery, the support she received from family and friends, the fears she brought to labor and birth, and her own emotional history. It is logical that different women would experience and interpret a similar event—surgical birth—differently. This is completely normal.

How can you make the experience easier, if it should happen to you? First, be informed about all aspects of birth. Second, have a doula (professional labor support assistant) at your birth to help fill in information gaps. Finally, build in flexibility to the birth plan, and the key to flexibility is education!

Connie Livingston, RN, BS, FACCE, LCCE, CPCE, CD(DONA), CHBE,  owns www.birthsource.com, one of the largest birth information websites, and www.thebirthfacts.com, a research-based website. She is the coordinator of The Midewin Center (www.themidewincenter.com) in Vandalia Ohio, where she teaches all types of childbirth education classes. Contact her at info@birthsource.com.