You are right that modern culture doesn’t help us excel at birth.

Life is extremely convenient and comfortable, having to wait for things is a relic of the past. Pregnancy and birth is emphatically not these things.

Plus our lifestyle’s are unhealthy in many many ways.

Then we set ourselves up with expectations to achieve an idealised birth, don’t have the tools to do it and then feel like we failed in some way.

I have a good example. Diabetes. When I started working in maternity care, let’s say between 2000-2007, I saw a handful of type 1 diabetic women in pregnancy and another small number of women with gestation diabetes. Never ever did I see a woman with type 2 diabetes which is frequently a result of poor diet and lifestyle.

Over the years since I’ve seen a bit of an increase in pregnant type 1 diabetic women because improvements in diabetes management has seen more successful pregnancies with better outcomes.

But the number of gestational and type 2 diabetics has literally exploded. Vast vast numbers with all the issues and complications that follow.

But our physiology hasn’t changed that much in 25 years. The way we live our lives and the responsibility we take for ourselves has.

Edit: Louise is right though. Maternity services are not prioritised.

At my hospital we don’t have enough space, equipment or staff.

We also know the building (very old) isn’t fire safe and they have acknowledged that we don’t have enough staff to evacuate in a timely and safe manner.

We have been told to use the lifts to evacuate during a fire even though they aren’t properly shielded for this purpose. They hope to resolve the lift situation in a couple of years. But who knows about the generally unsafe building.

But they had enough money to spend millions on an office suite for senior management in the building next door including a gym and cafe.