Being in OB and expecting a child makes me see many sides of being pregnant and labor. I see pregnancy and childbirth as a natural process and think that there are some physicians who "medicalize" it too much (C-section rates are higher than the should be, people are induced more than they should be, etc.). So, I see the why people would want "natural" childbirth, with no medical interventions (like pain control). But, the extent to which some people take it is completely, in my opinion, unreasonable.
Case in point is a woman who recently delivered at our hospital (she was not my patient, so this is second hand). Things went relatively smoothly and, except for receiving a small perineal tear, she was able to successfully go through labor without any medical interventions. The baby was born relatively quickly and was completely fine. The woman just needed the tear sutured and was otherwise fine. When the resident explained that she will numb up the region around the tear with some local anesthetic before suturing, the woman became angry and was adamant she wanted a natural birth without any "chemicals."
Kind of ridiculous. But, childbirth is a highly emotional time and whenever people are dealing with emotional events, they tend to stop thinking rationally.
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