Studies find birth trauma
can
lead to child abuse
Gentle birthing procedures
help both newborns and mothers
Birth is a life-changing
experience. Each birth brings with it a
new and different set of experiences and
feelings, but birth trauma can have serious
and long-lasting effects.
A Swedish study showed that
those who have a traumatic and painful birth
are more likely to end their life with violent
suicide. The pain the infant experiences
is an important factor. Birth trauma has
also been linked to infant crying and resultant
child abuse. In a survey of battered infants,
eighty percent of the parents reported that
excessive crying by their child triggered
the abuse and placed emphasis on birth trauma
as a source of the stress and crying. Child
Protection Service agencies receive more
than 50,000 referrals each week alleging
that children have been abused or neglected.
One
doctor says that crying is a beneficial
process that allows people to cope with
stress and can be considered an inborn healing
mechanism, but constant crying puts babies
at high risk for child abuse. This is one
possible explanation for the correlation
between birth trauma and later violent behavior.
Crying infants are frequently
drugged to keep them quiet. One survey in
England found that twenty-five percent of
babies had been given sedatives by the time
they were eighteen months old.
These drugs often make the
babies lethargic and unresponsive and babies
given sedatives for crying may be at high
risk for drug abuse as teenagers and adults.
When a child's first attempts to release
painful feelings are repressed with powerful
drugs, it would not be surprising if they
turned to drugs later on in life in order
to cope with their feelings.
A calm, quiet and gentle
environment can make all the difference.
When Tara Gerson, a fitness trainer in Malibu,
California read about how birth procedures
could affect her unborn child, she and her
husband Josh decided to provide a warm and
loving environment for the birth of their
first child.
"We
discussed various methods of birthing,"
said Tara. "This is our first child
and we wanted to take all possible positive
steps to give her the best start in life.
We decided on a water birth at home, with
a midwife trained in the silent birth method,
described by L. Ron Hubbard in the book
Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental
Health."
The sounds, noises and words
the baby hears while under stress or in
pain are a vital component of the effect
the birth will have later in life. Hubbard's
research revealed that when a person experiences
pain, or is influenced by anesthetics or
drugs, the conscious mind temporarily shuts
down. The "subconscious" or "reactive"
mind however, accurately records everything
that occurssound, sight, words, touch,
smell and pain.
"When we read about
how pain and sound can affect a baby during
birth it made sense to us and we were delighted
to find a midwife who practices silent birth,"
said Tara. "She understood the reasons
for a silent birth and had already done
this method with other couples."
During Madeleine's birth
the room was dimly lit, sound and talking
kept to a minimum and the procedure made
as gentle as possible. The result: a short
and happy birth for both mother and baby.
Madeleine came into the world in a quiet
and loving environment without drugs, force,
intervention or noise.
She was placed on her mother's
stomach right after birth and has been a
contented and happy baby from the start.
"When I see how even tempered and good-natured
she is, I know we made the right choice,"
says Tara. "I am so glad we chose to
make her birth a caring and gentle experience."
Click
here to order your copy of Dianetics:
The Modern Science of Mental Health available
in Hardcover, Compact
Disc and Audio
Cassette.
|