VAGINA MAY!
I had the wonderful opportunity to “roast” my old friend and midwife colleague, Ina May Gaskin, this past weekend at the MANA conference in Nashville, TN. It was a blast! I did this stand-up routine after delivering a “stuck baby” on a caravan bus. I was Ina May’s alter ego, Vagina May:
“ And what was that thing that happened on the bus? That maneuver they were talking about?
Anyone who knows anything about midwifery knows that there are plenty of things about good-old-boy obstetrics that don’t make much sense. One of them is when a doctor takes simple things he’s noticed and attaches his name to it as if he “discovered” it.
I mean, did you ever notice that all the stuff in obstetrics is named after DUDES?
Longtime…dead…white dudes. For example:
Chadwick turned the cervix blue.
Hegar made the isthmus soft (ouch).
How about my favorite, Braxton-Hicks? Apparently it took TWO old white guys to discover toning contractions.
Then the old guys went on to steal ideas from midwives and call them their own. Like “Leopold’s Maneuvers.” I guess before old Leopold, no one ever thought about “feeling the baby.”
Kegels for the vagina…to tone it for who?!?
Really, what’s up with that? When’s the last time any of those guys had a baby?
And how about that Italian dude…Zavanelli? He’s the sOB who invented the method for solving shoulder dystocia by pushing the baby back IN.
WHAT?!? That’s the best they could come up with?
Did you ever hear a mother say, “Please push the baby back IN”…?
None of this stuff was ever named after a dudette.
It wasn’t until the 21 century that an obstetrical maneuver was named after a woman. The Gaskin Maneuver! Imagine that…the good old boys finally let a woman into their centuries old club…all because Stephen turned the bus too sharply to miss hitting a little rabbit.
The dudes were forced to…after Ina May’s publicity about the success of flipping the mother on all-fours for stuck shoulders.
Unfortunately, these guys are having a hard time adjusting to this maneuver. It’s difficult for them to visualize the female anatomy when it’s “upside down.” I mean, now the clitoris is…where?
Guys…better reverse the old hand positions for perineal support or you might be slapped with sexual harassment.
I mean, really. Can you imagine how boring these guys must be in bed? Have they never tried it doggy style??
Anyway, we are so incredibly proud of Ina May. She has finally garnered the respect from ACOG that a midwife of her caliber deserves. Now she is blowing the whistle on cytotec and maternal deaths from amniotic fluid embolisms. ~ Give ‘em hell, Ina May! ” (Cue in R.E.S.P.E.C.T.)
~ Carol Leonard, 10/15/2010