They say healthy mom/healthy baby is what matters - but who is defining health?

I'm sure you've heard the term "healthy mom/healthy baby" in reference to the main goal for birth.

This term really bothers me because it is not in fact referencing health, but is simply stating that both mom & baby SURVIVED. It doesn't take into account so many factors that go into health, including, very importantly, MENTAL HEALTH.

The trauma that happens to women is often caused by unnecessary interventions & lack of informed consent, and was avoidable. But there is never any accountability for the doctors, midwives and nurses who did this to them. We’re all just supposed to be grateful we didn’t die.

When a woman has a traumatic birth, or her birth doesn't go according to plan and she is mourning it, people often use the "healthy mom, healthy baby" line to try to make her feel better. But by doing this they are minimizing her pain and her experience, often making her feel ungrateful, further adding to her guilt.

We deserve better than having the goal of birth be only survival. That is setting the bar so incredibly, sadly low. Birth can be so, so much more.