I’m on a path to becoming a midwife, and I have encountered setbacks. The school I was going to attend was closed, so now I’m searching for another way. I’m still determined to do it, but I think I need to reexamine what I want to accomplish in this career. The basic premise, I guess, is that I want to help women. This is twofold: I believe homebirth with a midwife is better for women’s health, and I believe that the rite of passage birth offers is easier to accomplish at home. I believe in the power of women to birth unaided.
I see the role of a midwife in two ways as well; one is to be there in case anything goes wrong medically, and the other is to guard the space of the birthing woman and help guide her to the discovery of her inner power, if she needs it. The typical relationship of a care provider to patient is hierarchical, with power flowing one way. I see a midwife and her client as having a mutually beneficial relationship. The client is hiring the midwife only to do what she herself might be unable to do, like most other professional relationships. A plumber doesn’t have power over you, just because she knows how to fix your pipes and you don’t. And, if you cared to, you could learn to fix pipes and do it yourself.
As your typical white woman feminist, I got pretty excited by the prospect of helping women take back the power from the hospitals and the men in white coats and claim it for their own. I still see midwifery as a feminist pursuit, though all midwives do not act in feminist ways. Therefore I was kind of surprised when I read about how the homebirthing and attachment parenting movements are almost exclusively middle-class and white.
I don’t know why I was so surprised, I mean, DUH. Hadn’t I seen many, many conversations about racism on Motheringdotcommune and seen them disintegrate as hordes of white people completely deny not only their privilege but the existence of racism? Hadn’t I seen how people of color were completely marginalized on that site, and, really, ANY parenting site?
The last straw for me came when I started trying to advocate for natural birth on a general women’s message board. I got frustrated by all the people who denied that homebirth could be safe, or that interventions could be harmful. Then I took a step back and thought: these women are white, middle-class, educated and privileged. If they really want, they can do some fucking reading, do some thinking, and hire a midwife and have a swell birth. They have all the resources at their fingertips. And while I’m worried about white women becoming enlightened and having a fabulous birth experience, black women are dying because insurance coverage and prenatal care are shit in this country. Who should I be worried about? Who should I try to take an interest in, and whose situation deserves more improving?
If I truly believe midwifery care is best for every woman, then it should be available for every woman. Here’s another big “but” though—if I want to make this care more available for disadvantaged women, poor women, women of color, I need to listen and see if this is something they want. At this point, I feel like just another white woman coming in and telling them what to do, what they ought to want. That’s no better than the hospitals doing that. After reading Dark Daughta’s blog, I see that there are black women who want the freedom to birth as they want, and that they do want midwifery assistance. However, figuring out how I can respect that and offer my services is going to be difficult. I am still the oppressor no matter how much work I do. I wouldn’t blame a woman for not wanting a white attendant, if she wants an attendant at all.
At this point in my path, these are the things I see to do. I will become a midwife because I think we need more midwives in the world. I will continue to listen to women of color and see what care they want. For those who want it, I will offer my care. I will try to reach out to and serve as many families of color as I can. When I take apprentices, I will try to choose women of color who want to work in their community. I will share any knowledge I gain freely, and I will attempt to make my services as cheap as possible. I will try to find other midwives of color and work with them. I will challenge the stereotype either that only rich white people homebirth, or that only poor people homebirth.
Should I add another white midwife to the world? I don’t know if I ‘should’, but since I’m going to, I’m going to try to make her the most humble, least oppressive midwife she can be. I’m going to try to do as much good as I can without stepping on people’s toes. And I hope when I do step on their toes, they will call me on it. I’m a work in progress, and I’m listening.
5 comments:
Thank you for asking yourself questions. I think that one of the things that's missing from the midwifery as publicly accessible paradigm is the simple act of going into people of color communities to just share info, not about midwifery which the wimmin probably know about, but maybe just strategies to support them to access the services.
Hello DarkDaughta, thanks for commenting! I apologize for talking about you before talking to you--I love reading your blog and would like to engage with you. I felt like I should put some of myself out there first so I wasn't just jumping in out of nowhere. Your posts are so fiercely real and from what I read I consider you an amazing person. I hope to talk with you some more.
Hi,
Thanks. Unnhh...I don't know if I'm an amazing person. I'm an annoyed person who has access to a lot of words and political ideas to describe in excruciating detail my various beefs. But, definitely come on by anytime. And thanks again for asking questions. I think as midwifery comes more under the control of the state, less and less questions will be asked. I'm only a newbie, very late on the scene and it's already clear to me that a lot of the collective knowing in terms of birthing lore is threatened, with the end result that birth is increasingly being outsourced to the medi-butchers. There's a lot of really polite dialogue flowing around. No one wants to critique stuff like scheduled unnecessary cesareans. People don't want mothers' decisions to be questioned. I agree with the fact that wimmin shouldn't be under scrutiny. However, this doesn't stop me from critiquing a medical establishment that offers surgical births like candy at sugar mountain to wimmin who are terrified because they've been turned off the idea of dealing with natural births and are scared of their own natural bodily sensations. It's not their fault. But a critique has to surface somewhere, no? Same with the drugs and all the interventions. Same with why wimmin of colour in north amerikkka so often have hospital births. Critiques aren't supposed to be levelled at the individual wimmin who are tricked, overwhelmed, cornered, un-educated about allopathic medicine's approach to "care". The critique has to exist and it has to be levelled against the folks who are encroaching on birth guardians. But the birth guardians need to also critique themselves, their approaches, their focus, their educations, etc...
Anyhoo!
I'm going to go make breakfast. Please keep going. Someone, maybe ever a few people or a few hundred people are going to benefit from the questions you're asking yourself on this blog.
this is all good.
I think that we, as white women, have to step back and start looking at our ingrained racism and privilege. I hear all the time instead:
"I'm not racist!"
"I never notice what color people are when I meet them!"
"Hey! I have a good friend who is ______________"
yeah.
This seems to totally be in the air these days. I certainly don't have the answers, just another white woman trying hard to unpack her napsack of white priviledge.
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