"Business of Being Born"

[ChelCThe Law]

You are invited to attend a special benefit screening of

"The Business of Being Born"
Taggart Student Center Auditorium
Utah State University in Logan
February 27 at 7 p.m.

A discussion panel will follow the movie.
For more info, contact Jennetta at 435.563.8484 or Sally at 801.621.4844.

Tickets: $5 in advance; $7 at the door; FREE for USU Students
Advance tickets can be purchased via PayPal by sending payment to wisechildbearing@...
Proceeds will be donated to La Leche League Groups of Northern Utah and Logan's own Association for Wise Childbearing.
Donations are accepted.

The screening will be held as a lead into events sponsored by the Women's Center honoring Women's History Month.



Birth: it's a miracle. A rite of passage. A natural part of life. But more than anything, birth is a business. Compelled to find answers after a disappointing birth experience with her first child, actress Ricki Lake recruits filmmaker Abby Epstein to examine and question the way American women have babies.

The film interlaces intimate birth stories with surprising historical, political and scientific insights and shocking statistics about the current maternity care system. When director Epstein discovers she is pregnant during the making of the film, the journey becomes even more personal.

The film's fundamental question: should most births be viewed as a natural life process, or should every delivery be treated as a potentially catastrophic medical emergency?

A must-see movie for anyone even thinking about having a baby.

Visit http://www.thebusinessofbeingborn.comfor more information

[ChelCThe Law]

They should follow this up with a documentary on the business of the NICU, because I don't think my son needed to spend a week there racking up over $20,000 of medical bills, a story for another day...

[ChelCThe Law]

Just watched this documentary. It was pretty good. It definitely made me more upset though about the experience I had!

It is a movie about birth, so of course it gets pretty graphic at times, and a couple scenes of moms cussing like sailors through contractions.

One thing I did not realize is the link between the epidural and pitocin... pitocin of course speeds the process of labor, but makes it more painful so you get the epidural to lessen the pain and that slows labor down again. A vicious cycle. The pitocin can also have an affect on the baby and its heart rate. The part that explained that process just made me cry and want to scream because this happened to me. He had to be delivered with a vac and when that kept pulling off his head (and left a giant bruise) they had to use forceps to hurry and get him delivered. He wasn't breathing which they think was from the meds I'd been given which had caused my blood pressure to drop to extremely dangerous levels and according to them it made the baby aspirate the fluid (and scared my husband beyond belief). He spent a week in the NICU. The whole experience was just awful. I was so drugged that the three or four days I was at the hospital (I don't even know!) felt like a few hours.

Anyway, if you are not squimish about childbirth it's pretty interesting.

[AshleyBcaptain of 1,000]

I have watched this documentary twice this pregnancy. The first time I saw this and heard about this was during my current pregnancy in the beginning. My first birthing experience was horrible. I had to be induced because I had pre-eclampsia. And in my case induction was necessary but it was just such a scary and traumatic experience. By the time I got pregnant the second time I made the decision that I wanted to do a natural birth if everything went well. I prayed a lot. My second pregnancy went very well and I had no problems or complications. I was at home for most of my labor. I didn't even know I was at labor for the first part of it because I had been having lots of practice contractions for days and didn't think anything of it. This day I was also experiencing an increased amount of back pain. I just happened to have a dr's appointment scheduled that day that I went to in the afternoon. It was during my appointment while I was sitting on the table and waiting on the dr. to come in that I noticed my contractions were really getting close together and I was starting to have to work a little to breathe through them and I said so to my Dr. She checked and sure enough I was in active labor. She told me to go straight over to the hospital. But instead I went home first, took my time, grabbed my bags I had already packed in advance and then went back to the hospital. I called my husband before I left and he was on his way to the hospital. By the time I got back to the hospital I was at 6 and half centimeters dilated. And I was just ecstatic! I was smiling and just so happy to be in labor. At that point the contractions had become even more work to breathe through and were painful but no unbearable. My dr. talked me into letting her break my water at that point ( won't be letting anyone break my water this time unless its an emergency) and then after the water broke of course the contractions got really intense. I dilated VERY quickly. I was very happy to have the freedom to walk around and do what I wanted and not be stuck in the bed. Not having the drugs even though it was really painful was just so great to me because I hated being stuck in the bed the first time. We walked the halls for a bit and then we were supposed to come back after a set amount of time to get hooked up to the monitors for a few minutes just to check on the baby but by the time I went back in there it was really intense and I was starting to get the earge to push. At that point they discovered I was already dilated to a 9. So then I stayed in bed for the short duration. Once I reached a ten which was no time I pushed for less then ten minutes and then there he was. It was an amazing experience and I am hoping this one will be similar. I am excited to go drug free again and I plan to take my sweet time getting to the hospital so I only have to be there for the end. It worked out great.

Of course seeing this documentary this pregnancy makes me even more glad that I had the chance to experience things more naturally last time and just makes me more excited to do it that way again. I am praying all goes well so no intervention is needed this time. Natural births totally rock! I never would have thought I could do it but we are made for it and we women can really do anything we put our minds to.

[karend77captain of 100]

My daughter gives this documentary a thumbs up as well. It is now on you tube.

[A Random Phrasecaptain of 1,000]

I own this documentary. I, also, give it a thumbs up.