The Doctors

I wrote to The Doctors today.

It occurred to me, as I was watching the show and listening to them say how important it was for them to inform the public of health risks... who better to take up our cause?

So I wrote them a letter, and I'd like to encourage every baby-loss mama who reads this to write them as well. Tell them your story. We all know how much we hate getting new "members" to this little club of ours. Let them know there are women out here who are suffering, and maybe, just maybe we can get The Doctors to talk about stillbirth/antenatal death awareness and prevention and help us keep our numbers down. That would be a blessing, wouldn't it?

You can write them here.

This is the letter I wrote:

I'm the mother of four healthy living children, but on April 1, 2009, when I was 39 weeks pregnant, the baby I was carrying died.

And then he was born.

Our little stillborn boy, William George, was perfect. There was nothing genetically wrong with him. There was nothing abnormal found with the placenta or his cord and no infections were apparent. His heart simply stopped beating and he never took a breath.

I can't tell you horrible it is to carry a baby for nine months to only lose him so close to the end. But tragically, and maybe surprisingly, statistics say that a majority of stillbirth babies are, in fact, full term.

As a mother, of course I'm grieving... the pain of losing a child is beyond description. But as a doula involved in the birth community for the past twenty years, I am ashamed and appalled at how long the stillbirth facts flew under my own radar.

Why didn't I know that stillbirths claim 70 babies per day in the United States?

Why didn't I know that the risk of stillbirth is TEN TIMES that of the risk of a SIDS death?

Why didn't I know the risks? Race, obesity, advanced maternal age, a previous small for gestational age baby, etc...?

Why didn't I know that 1 in 115 deliveries in the U.S. results in a stillbirth - compared to Downs Syndrome, which accounts for 1 in 750 births?

Why didn't I know that almost half (40%) of stillbirths go unexplained, and most doctors don't recommend autopsies on babies to help decrease that statistic?

Why didn't I know that, according to a recent study, almost HALF of the women who later experienced a stillbirth noted decreased fetal movement?

Why didn't anyone tell me that EVERY woman should do kick counts starting at 28 weeks and keep track of the baby's activity at the same time every day to help reduce the stillbirth risk?

Some stillbirths are unpreventable, which is a terrible reality - but even if kick counts could save just 10% of all stillbirths in the U.S., that's still more babies lives saved than ALL of the babies that die each year of SIDS!

The medical community, it seems to me, is willing to "accept" a 1 in 115 ratio of stillbirth deaths. Why? Who would get on an airplane knowing they had a 1 in 115 chance of not arriving at their destination? And more importantly - why is nothing being done to make it safer?

Everyone knows about SIDS - the "back to sleep" campaign has been so successful, babies are wearing helmets now because the backs of their heads get flat from sleeping on their back so much.

But why does no one know about stillbirth and the risks? Why aren't kick counts being taught and encouraged?

Why don't more mothers know?!

There needs to be a movement in this country to increase awareness and prevention of stillbirth, or S.A.D.S: Sudden Antenatal Death Syndrome - and I think The Doctors can help put the spotlight on this.

I hope you take this up as a topic and do a show on it. It could really help reach women out there who are at risk, and perhaps save babies. No one told me, and my son is dead. And I'm a doula, I deal with birth and the research about it - I should have known. And if *I* didn't know - what are the odds the average first time mother is aware?

There's nothing I can do to bring my sweet, precious baby back. I can only try to reach out and increase awareness and hope that someone else won't ever have to experience the pain of birthing their baby still.

My grief/loss blog:
http://inannajourney.blogspot.com/

If you need more information:

International Stillbirth Alliance:
http://www.stillbirthalliance.org/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=14

Stillbirth in the News:
http://www.stillnomore.org/news.htm

Stillbirth Collaborative Research Network:
https://scrn.rti.org/

National Stillbirth Society:
http://www.stillnomore.org/

The MISS Foundation:
http://www.missfoundation.org/

Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep
www.nowilaymedowntosleep.org/medical

First Candle Research:
http://www.firstcandle.org/research/res_rs.html