Hey there everyone. Sorry, this post has been quiet for a while but I was away and I just wanted to respond to Diana.

I fixed the link for Rowland's Support Group

The ICAN one is good too. If you have a bit of time, there is a ton of information there about "the pelvic thing". Here's a great article from Midwifery Today by Gloria LeMay, a well-known midwife, about it. Pelvises I have known and Loved

I apologize if I seemed snippy when saying the pelvis comment was "hooey." It is a very hot topic in the natural birth arena right now! The sharp vs. round is such a common belief and so often used by doctors to manipulate women into scheduling c/sections even though docs KNOW it has been largely disproven. Just like the idea that the pregnant women is neither sick nor injured so does not belong in a hospital is difficult to get through to anyone in the fear-driven culture that is medicinized birth, the pelvis thing constantly runs into brick walls. In a nutshell (ahem... : )

      The pelvic girdle is not a fixed, solid structure. During pregnancy and labour the hormone relaxin softens the ligaments that join the pelvic bones, allowing the pelvis to give and 'stretch'. The degree of pelvic expansion achieved will vary from woman to woman and from pregnancy to pregnancy. It is IMPOSSIBLE to predict the size or shape a pelvis will be for birth in early pregnancy or from one birth to the next. Pelvemetry, for this reason, is useless in measuring a pelvis for birth adequacy unless, as I mentioned before, a women has a serious deformity arising from poor nutrition or a broken pelvis.
Also, babies' heads are made up of separate bones which move relative to each other, allowing the baby's head to 'mould' and thus reduce its diameter during passage down the birth canal. No-one can predict the capacity of an individual baby's head to mould and, as this is a feature of the normal birth process, it should not adversely affect the health and well-being of the baby.

    The position that a woman adopts during labour and delivery makes a difference to pelvic dimensions. Squatting, for example, can increase pelvic measurements by up to 30%. One of the most common positions in which women give birth, that of being semi-reclined where the mother's weight is on her coccyx, restricts movement of the coccyx, which can severely compromise a below-average pelvis.

4. The position of the baby can be crucial, and whether its head is well flexed or tilted can mean the difference between an easy delivery and delivery being impossible.


I guess in many ways it just boils down to fear but, well, birth is as safe as life gets!!