My husband returned from a trip this week with a great story. There was a woman who was working on her roof in the middle of the day wearing trousers. She attends a church that prohibits women from wearing such things (Old Order Mennonite is my best guess), but she thought that pants were best suited for the task. Her husband was sick in bed, and it was up to her to mend the roof.

Well, two menfolk from the church go riding by and spy the woman on the roof in her trousers. The men promptly report her to the church leadership for discipline for her immodesty. The wise leadership absolved the woman, and in a beautiful display of wisdom, put the two men under discipline for not helping the poor woman while her husband lay sick.

I love this story because it perfectly illustrates our tendency to strain gnats and miss the greater principle.

I tend to avoid many women’s topics because they mostly deduce to “choking on gnats” and result in women jumping on bandwagons they’d do best to avoid. That’s not to say that we should never talk about these things, just that they always ought to be done in a spirit of humility and awareness for the greater principle.

An unfortunate example I have personal experience with is the breastfeeding vs. bottle feeding discussion. Research and God’s design tell us that breastfeeding is far superior to formula. What they don’t always tell us is why some women do not have enough to nourish their babies. This doesn’t prevent some miscellaneous acquaintance from informing a young, hormonal mother about the superiority of breastmilk all the while the young mother is feeding her child some Enfamil. The poor young mother has already tried fenugreek, blessed thistle, Mother’s Milk tea by the gallon, hospital grade pumping around the clock, prescription Reglan, TSH and prolactin blood draws, SNS systems, and importing domperidone from across the border. Times five.

And so, the woman on the breastfeeding soapbox misses the greater principle of loving her neighbor while she concentrates on the fact that breastmilk really is best. (It is!) The young woman, in wisdom, feeds her child the inferior thing, as she knows that the greater thing is to make sure her baby has nourishment, even if it is painfully not her own. Oftentimes, the one being chastised isn’t unaware of the information, and in this case, she is actually more informed than her informer.

I hardly ever mention it anymore, because it seems that whomever I’m talking to is convinced that I’m just not “doing it right.” The implication is that if I loved my child, I’d get to the bottom of it.

It ought not to be this way. Motherhood is not a competition but a calling. We are too needful of one another to be so short-suffering. Sometimes we concentrate on small things and miss the greater thing; sometimes we think a perfect method is a good substitute for genuine love. In the end, older mothers will tell you that their grown, married sons who are serving the Lord didn’t much care that they were bottle-fed.

Since this entry is supposed to be about epidurals, though, allow me a paragraph or two on the subject. If I haven’t been too obscure, everything I’ve written was with the subject of epidurals in mind. To say that I’ve spent some thought on it would be an understatement. With that in mind, I’ll finally say a few sentences about why I’m not planning one this next time.

The facts on epidurals are that they are usually safe, except when they’re not. Natural childbirth advocates have safety on their side in normal circumstances. Yet, there are many reasons women choose to introduce that risk, and not all of those reasons are selfish or uneducated. For example, an epidural is the better choice when facing maternal exhaustion or something like Cephalopelvic Disproportion (CPD), which is when the baby’s head cannot or doesn’t engage the mother’s pelvis. It is often better to opt for the epidural than to venture the riskier C-section procedure.

I had an “ah-ha” moment when I read this in Dr. Grantly Dick-Read’s Childbirth Without Fear, “…it has been easier to utilize the pain-relieving discoveries of science than to investigate its complicated causes.” His tome is difficult reading, but it is the tool (science-based education) I need to face the next birth. He emphasizes the importance the mind has on birthing. I wish I could review it here, but I’m afraid I couldn’t do it justice.

I’m glad that epidurals are an option, but they essentially become the only option when obstetricians and the greater medical community do not emphasize education, doulas, better birthing options like water, and simple food, juice, and honey for long labors. We’re hoping to avoid many of these pain triggers with our plan for a homebirth this next time. It’s the right choice for us this time, but I don’t assume it is for all low-risk women.