C-Section Birth Photography is a thing?

 

 

 

I get this a lot, you can totally have C-Section Birth Photography. Yes, yes you can! You just have to advocate for what you want on your birth-day and having a photographer who knows the ropes makes a world of difference.

 

Roughly one in three births in the United States is via C-section, many of which are performed at a moment’s notice during true emergencies in order to keep mothers and babies safe. Even when they’re less sudden — when, say, a mother has a medical reason to schedule an operation ahead of time, or when her health care providers determine after hours of laboring that surgery is her best course of action — C-sections tend to be viewed as a strictly medical affair. A hospital procedure, rather than an intimate, life-changing event.

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Are birth photographers allowed in the OR?

 

This solely depends on your physician and your birth team. In Texas alone, there are more hospitals that are changing policy to ensure that all parents have an equal opportunity to have their birth story documented. This not only can help with healing but it helps you relive your birth story day in a better light than it may have initially happened.

 

Hospitals usually require approval before anyone can go into the OR if you are not the sole support person. This is why hiring a birth photographer who has experience shooting births in the OR ( c-sections, twin vaginal, etc ) is so crucial.

This all begins with your initial appointments early on in your pregnancy to ensure that you and your doctor are on the same page. If your doctor won’t agree then it will give you time to find a physician that will honor your birth plan. I also give all of my clients a physician’s letter to go over with their doctors which will help the conversation.

 

Why do I need birth photography for my C-section?

1. Birth photography creates normalcy.

“It’s such a simple idea. A birth photographer in the OR feels normal. It feels like your birth becomes a celebration. It helps change the narrative in the smallest of ways, it gives a mother hope that she will have a beautiful experience.  “

2. Birth photography can heal.

“Especially when there is an emergent need for cesarean birth, photography gives a family back the moments they thought they lost: remembering the moment you held your baby for the first time, hearing a first cry, capturing a weight, seeing your partner fall in love at the moment he/she has the chance to meet your child… These are moments mothers are losing to anesthesia, to pain medications, to just fear and anxiety, to sheer exhaustion. Having photographs of these moments give mothers an opportunity to celebrate again. “

3. Birth photography completes the narrative.

“When we as photographers spend hours alongside a laboring mother, invest in their birth and their story just as much as every other person in that room, it’s crushing to us when we cannot continue to follow you to the OR. Yes, we often feel like we did not finish our job we set out to do. And when a mother receives back her images… there seems to be a missing piece in her story. “

“The moment of delivery. But why does that MATTER? As mothers we are seen in our greatest weakness in labor, often lost in pain, unsure if we can keep going, defeated. But in that weakness our greatest strengths are revealed: perseverance, tenacity, the incredible ability to withstand all. That’s the end of the narrative. A mother deserves to have that memory of strength, of tenacity, of perseverance. You deserve to have the moments of your most magnanimous accomplishments recorded. And when you reflect on your birth, it’s no longer a reflection of what didn’t happen, but what did. It’s closure. “

– Birth Becomes Her

Don’t let a C-section keep you from hiring a birth photographer! You deserve to have gorgeous memories of the birth of your children.

Thinking about hiring a birth photographer for your C-section?

Lets chat!