"I doubted myself and left ashamed": they told her that she was not in labor and to go home. An hour later the baby was born in the bathroom of his house

There is news that surprises you because of how amazing the situation that its protagonists are experiencing is. Giving birth at home because the baby can’t wait could be one of them, but when we look more closely, we find a scenario that is anything but idyllic.

This is the case of Beatriz Galán, a 41-year-old Andalusian who gave birth on September 6, precisely in her bathroom, after the hospital where the birth was planned told her that she was not in labor and that come back later because “there was still left”. An hour passed between hearing this phrase from his midwife and Daniel crying on the bathroom floor of his house.

The drama of admission when you are in labor

It’s not uncommon that when you go into labor (or so you sense), but the pace is a bit slow, you’ll be sent home until your contractions are stronger or more consistent. In the case of Beatriz there was a turning point, and that is that they stopped when she was still in the emergency room . However, taking into account her history (low blood pressure and intrauterine growth arrest), and the fact that it was a 38-week pregnancy at risk, perhaps the procedure should have been different.

“When the midwife told me there was still time left, we went downstairs, but when we were at the door (of the hospital), I felt like I was in labor. We went back upstairs and the midwife told me exactly the same thing, to come back later. myself and left embarrassed. I know he didn’t do it meanly, but maybe he should have taken into account that it was a second birth and my history.”

This is how Beatriz tells it to Babies and more. When I got home, everything went very quickly: “in the middle of my nerves, when I told my husband that he was being born and that there was no way to stop him, he changed his attitude completely, called 061 and we acted incredibly concentrated together with Elena, the person who answered the call and who was the best support we could have had”.

Shortly after the medical service arrived at his house, who were in charge of cutting the baby’s umbilical cord and transferring him together with his mother to the Valme hospital.

Many women have gone through the experience of having to return home when childbirth is not yet imminent, and despite the fact that it is the procedure that must be followed, for a woman in this situation it is very important to feel empathy on the part of the health workers who they are serving her. It is one of the most complex moments that women live and the least we need is that. In Beatriz’s words: “fewer rules, more empathy, more sensitivity… we don’t have to know everything or be treated as if we didn’t have a clue” .

Each body, each case and each birth is different

Humanizing childbirth is something that has been talked about a lot for some years. Although it is true that progress has been made in this regard, it is important to cover the entire process (the WHO has finally included the postpartum period), including the moment in which a pregnant woman arrives at the hospital with signs of labor.

Talking with Beatriz, I realized that many times, when you go to a hospital, whether you are pregnant or with a newborn, you are afraid of being branded as exaggerated for giving too much importance to something that theoretically doesn’t have it -or saying that we are in labor when in fact the time has not yet come – because they may or may not be right. In the case of Beatriz, we can celebrate the birth of Daniel thanks to her poise, that of her husband, the support of the 061 professionals and especially the fact that there were no complications during the delivery , but what if it had not been so?

Photos | Reproduced with permission.