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In 1965, the rate of Cesarean Section (C-section) in the United States was 4.5%. In 2007, it was 31.8%. If that rate of increase isn’t shocking enough, a friend of mine who lives in Sarasota County FL, one of the wealthiest counties in the entire state, told me that the C-Section rate for that community currently stands at 46%!
How can this be? Nearly 1 in 2 babies born in Sarasota County was cut out of the Mother’s belly. The procedure is considered major abdominal surgery requiring weeks of convalescence. This instead of being born the simple way nature intended? A vaginal birth where Mom can literally get out of bed minutes after birth and take a shower!
How did this happen? It seems in a growing number of cases, elective Cesareans have become the norm. While C-section is a lifesaving procedure in some cases, using it to more conveniently schedule a birth is a decision fraught with potentially lifelong complications for the baby.
Dangers of Cesarean Birth
When a baby is born vaginally, exposure to the probiotics in the birth canal helps to colonize the baby’s intestines. This “seeds” the developing immune system for a lifetime of health. Babies born via emergency C-section especially if the bag of waters has already broken with labor underway for some time, do get at least some exposure to these helpful flora before surgical birth.
Elective (i.e., “sterile”) Cesareans where labor never starts provide no such opportunity for exposure. It is critical that a baby born in this manner get skin to skin contact with the mother immediately after birth. Immediate breastfeeding also is beneficial. Human breastmilk and colostrum “first” milk contain an abundance of these friendly bacterial strains to seed the gut properly.
Formula Feeding and Cesarean a Double Whammy to a Child’s Health
Babies born by elective C-section who are formula fed have the greatest risk to health as their guts are seeded with bacteria from the hospital environment, not Mom. In those situations, a homemade formula is critical as this provides probiotics and enzymes with every feeding much like nursing would. Note that donated breastmilk is almost always pasteurized and so does not confer this benefit.
The July 2009 issue of Acta Pediatrica found that babies born by C-section experienced changes to the DNA of their leukocytes (white blood cells). The extreme stress to babies from a “cold cut” Cesarean birth is thought to be related to these DNA changes. This experience has the potential to forever alter how the immune system responds to stimuli. Babies born vaginally do not experience such a stress shock. The vaginal birth process involves a gradual increase in stress response for the baby followed by a gradual decline says Hannah Dahlen, Vice President of the Australian College of Midwives.
This small study could help explain why children born by C-section suffer from a dramatic increase in the rates of diabetes, testicular cancer, leukemia, and asthma among other autoimmune disorders. Babies born by C-section have a 20% increased risk of developing type 1 diabetes, for example, than children born vaginally.
How to Avoid a Cesarean
It seems clear that protecting your child from developing autoimmune disease begins before labor even starts. Avoiding doctors who prefer elective C-sections and finding an out of the hospital birthing environment with a lay or nurse midwife can reduce a woman’s C-section rate from about 1 in 3 to around 5%. A hospital birth with a midwife attending has a C-section rate of about 10%.
It is also important to understand how to induce labor naturally and avoid epidurals as much as possible. Each of these interventions increases a woman’s odds of a Cesarean birth. Note: I realize there are some studies indicating that epidurals do not increase C-section risk. However, the studies that demonstrate a link are more compelling, in my opinion.
The health benefits to baby from allowing the birth process to unfold as nature intended reminds me of a butterfly emerging from a cocoon. If you help the butterfly out of the cocoon, it dies. If you stand back and let it work its way out naturally, it lives. Same with a chick pecking its way out of an egg. Helping the chick out can make it very sick and even kill it. Letting it scratch and claw its way out and it lives.
Can’t we humans take our cues from nature?
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
This article makes me even more sad that i couldn’t have a natural birth…thanks. My daughter was transverse, with her feet and the cord down in my pelvis. We tried an ECV twice, with no movement. and so it was a choice, of one or both of us die, or we both live with a cesarean birth. Needless to say my water did start leaking out two days before the planned cesarean, but led to an emergency cesarean. I would like to see more articles on how to overcome sadness about having to have a cesarean, as apposed to the natural home birth i was planning.
I am grateful that there is evidence to show that intervention in natural processes has a cost!
I just read this article and immediately thought of you! “Allergies linked to baby’s birthplace, gut bugs” http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/30/us-allergies-linked-idUSTRE78T3FK20110930
Besides breastfeeding and only serving whole REAL foods to babies is there anything else one can do to counteract the possible gut flora altering effects of a C-section? I had an emergency c-section too. My son is 6 months old.
When he gets on table food and is weaned, be sure he is eating fermented foods and drinks frequently to keep that gut flora strong. Eating only whole food is not enough. Some of the food must be loaded with probiotics. If you haven’t fermented foods or drinks before, click above on the Video Classes section of this blog and you will see where there are well over 15 videos on this topic.
probiotics, I read that every c/s baby should be required to be given probiotics. helped us with spitting up as well
Since I recently had to have an emergency c-section to save my baby’s life, I am glad to read now about the issues I should be aware of for her in the future. (Even here in the UK where midwives attend every birth, we still have to succumb to the medical establishment in emergencies).
To the first anonymous poster, while I don't think our processed diets are helping us out, there doesn't seem to be any evidence that there is an increase in pelvic deformity. There are some great books (The Silent Knife, Born in the USA by Marsden Wagner, etc) and blogs that show the changes that have promoted an increase in cesareans. As a doula and ICAN chapter leader I'm exposed to birth stories, and frequently cesarean stories, all the time. There's not a huge difference between the low-risk women who choose homebirth and those who give birth in a hospital. And yet the cesarean rate for homebirthing mothers is, on average arount 5%-15%, much lower than the upwards of 40% that we have at the local hospitals. If a woman has a supportive care provider and avoids interventions such as induction, she has a 63% chance of having a VBAC. Also, interventions like continuous fetal monitoring, epidurals, and induction (which almost always includes an epidural) are all documented risks for increased cesarean. Simply getting an epidural means that the mother's movement and motion which help the baby navigate into an ideal position for entering the birth canal is now extremely limited. Also the muscle tone of the pelvic floor is lax and is no longer able to assist the baby's movement.
Often a woman's surgical report will indicate that the cesarean was elective, even though the information given to the mother left her feeling she had no choice if she was going to keep her child safe. That is much different than a woman going in and requesting a cesarean without medical indication. That actually happens relatively infrequently.
I could go on and on about the misconceptions surrounding the increase cesareans in our country, but I'll just finish up saying that a woman's best chance of avoiding cesarean is for her to do her homework and become informed. She needs to understand her options and understand the interventions and their risks and benefits, ask potential care givers "hard" questions about their philosophy of birth and their own statistics, surround with positive and supportive people/birth team and information knowing that her body was made to do this.
i want to weep as i read this. my first child was born by emergency c-section. with my 2nd i had a difficult, but successful vbac. my 3rd child was a “failed vbac” but think the doctors tried rushing my labor too much and then just brushed it off as “failed”. with my 4th, i fought so hard for another vbac, and my dr supported me up until the end, then due to a late ultrasound (i was overdue, as i have been for all 4 of my kids) showing a large baby, he decided a vbac was out of the question. his verdict, plus pressure from my familiy to have a c-section, was enough to make me fold and go against my better instincts, so baby 4 became an “elective” c-section. but as you wrote, many electives are more pressured or forced c-sections really. i bawled the whole way through the procedure, and today ( 2 1/2 months later) i still am fighting my way through anger and a sense of betrayal by my dr. by the way, my baby was under 8 pounds- not large at all. a part of me will always regret that i gave in to the pressure, but i was so afraid of fighting for the vbac (being completely stubborn and unreasonable by everyone else’s opinion) and then faling and having to have an emergency c-section, then getting the “we told you so” treatment. i gave in because of the lack of support, so was it elective? not really.
Although I had a great OB and nurse, my firstborn and I still suffered unnecessary intervention in the hospital — thankfully not C-section though. After her birth, I researched like crazy, to find out a hospital is generally a very unsafe place for a healthy mother to birth her baby. I went on to have two beautiful, gentle, safe homebirths with no intervention. I highly recommend homebirth to every low-risk woman who's willing to educate herself and eat well before and during birth, to ensure the best possible birth outcome.
I was quite determined to avoid the supposed requisite medication-interventions.
I had an 8lb 3oz girl – water birth, natural.
The joy of it is that now, she's 4 years old, and I get to tell her the story of her birth – what child doesn't like to hear all about themselves?
I get to tell her what an incredible experience it was – it was a journey to myself that was intense, scary at times, exciting, and deeply healing. Edited for a 4 yr-old, of course! 🙂
I hope my joyful talk of her birth will counter all the negatives we so often see and hear about childbirth. I simply wanted to be there, fully present for her arrival. I wanted that experience, like an initiation into a deeper mystery linking all mothers throughout history. She loves the story and I call her my little dolphin, among many other terms of endearment!
Thank God for the medical abilities we have to assist with childbirth now – they have saved so many lives, mother and child . But they are increasingly being used to 'treat the disease' of childbirth.
Having had an emergency c-section I appreciate that they have place and I thank God that we have the medical ability to do them. My son might not be here if it were not for it. What scares the heck out of me is the less than 3% chance I have at a successful VBAC if I have another child at the hospital. 40 hours of labor including 6 hours of pushing don't deter me from a vaginal birth next time. What I went through at the hospital and recovering from the cesarean do frighten me as do the possible effects my son may live with.
The Sarasota statistic isn't only from patient requested c-sections. A lot of it is from litigation fearing doctors. Minutes after first reading this post I heard a commercial on the radio for a big law firm encouraging parents whose "children suffered brain damage because a c-section was not performed in a timely manner" to call them to find out if they are eligible to sue. There is so much fear that although many of the area's doctors SAY they do VBACs only a couple actually will, most of them require that you were their patient previous to the surgery. I was told by the doc that I needed a c-section before I was ever examined by him or anyone at the hospital. The only reason I consented was because my midwife and I had already come to the conclusion it was necessary.
We live in a culture where many people blindly follow doctor's orders. We have been so conditioned that pregnancy is something any woman can do often women neither prepare for it or the birth through nutrition, exercise, labor preperation or proper emotional support. Instead we listen to complaints of pregnancy symptoms and birth horror stories and absorb the message that we CAN'T do this without the aid of modern medicine. We are programmed from our first period that pregnancy is awful, labor unbarable and all of it is impossible without the good doc. When we replaced midwives with doctors hundreds of generations of knowledge was lost. Not just knowledge of normal pregnancy and birth, but in preparing women for the monumental change that is about to occur and the support to make that experience incredibly positive.
As a mom who just delivered an 11 lb. 3 oz. baby vaginally and naturally 10 days ago I can definitely attest to being able to deliver and then get up and out of bed. We delivered at a hospital that happens to have a 5% C-section rate an even lower rate for 2nd or beyond babies, and that has a great group of midwives. After having my first daughter and joining a mom's group I could not believe all the procedures most of the other moms had to endure druing labor and then most them had to have a c-section anyway. I feel very fortunate to have had the birthing experiences I have had. By the way, I didn't have gestational diabetes with my 11 pounder, I only gained the 25-35 pounds, and I measured accurately through out my pregnancy. I think the WAPF principles just helped me grow a big and healthy baby.