Mary Cronk

I think the Hanna trial came out in, it was around about the time I was a student, 99 or 2000. which basically said having a breech baby was much safer by cesarean than it was vaginally.

And if you look at any of those episodes of Call the Midwife or you've worked with anybody or met anybody or listened to stories of people who were working in that era of Call the Midwife, such as that beloved woman, Mary Cronk, breach birth skills were part of midwifery and I remember as a young midwife throughout my career I've met more senior midwives or older midwives who said yeah yeah we always used to you know breach births you know we would attend and there would be people that had the skills and the patience and trust in it they had the knowledge to be able to do that Well, after the Hanna trial came out, I don't have the link.

I'll have to put it in the notes below.

It was just almost like there was a blanket ban on breech births.

And there are a lot of words around that are used in this way that I think sometimes cloud the fact that it's a physiological process.

hormonal process and it works best when we are undisturbed undisturbed as much as I think a lot of women are choosing right now which is to be alone and that might be free birthing actually on their own without having somebody else in the room with them I had notes when I started this but I think I've gone off track slightly um But what I wanted to sort of say was in this the way that, you know, this podcast is about birth truth is that I recognize that throughout my work, which I've never really I don't know if I've really brought this in before because I've had a sort of love hate relationship with it is feminism.

and mine is absolutely an intersexual feminism inclusive of all people and especially people who don't identify as women because they're even more marginalized but obviously I'm a cisgendered white woman so I come from this experience and the privilege that it has but I do hope to explore how all groups are affected by this Oh, you know, this loss of the knowledge, skills and belief around physiological birth that that if we we we are seriously, as Michel Odont said, on the edge of an abyss.

We're seeing it all the time.