Thread by @Maravillandome

#WordOfTheDay #lithotomy in Spanish #litotomía or as I prefer to call it “the most absurd position to give birth in”

Lithotomy is referred to this position. And although now I’m every picture and movie is generally understood as a position of birth. It is relatively modern and now questioned by people like me. But hey there is a man in the picture and not a birthing woman.

Lithotomy from Greek for "lithos" (stone) and "tomos" (cut), is a surgical method for removal of calculi, stones formed inside certain organs, such as the urinary tract (kidney stones), bladder (bladder stones), and gallbladder (gallstones)

So that was the position used in the surgery to remove kidney stones, but how did then evolve into birth. Birth positions have always always been upright because it made instinctive, anatomical and gravitational sense

In Europe until about 1550, #midwives were the only attendants at births. When Pare, surgeon-obstetrician,practiced medicine (1517?-1590),barber-surgeons began to compete with midwives for #obstetric cases. To begin with these surgeons were poorly trained; socially they rank with

Guillemeau (the pupil and son-in-law of Pare) had advocated reclining bed birthing in 1598, supposedly for women's comfort and to facilitate labour

But what about the story of the position being demanded by the pervert Louis XIV to watch the birth properly

Well…I don’t buy it. I think it is more to do with the fact that he granted favors to a well-known lithotomist Frere Jaques ( born Jaques Beaulieuin) a friar who of course became famous in the French nursery rhyme

Frere Jacques performed the lithotomy op- erations at the same Hotel Dieu during the time period in which the new birth position was instituted. They both started at the same time and place in France s. XVII Unfortunately this became trend without asking a simple question

The best position for spontaneous birth still should be “whichever one the woman chooses” and gravity still works the same way. For complicated births that need intervention lithotomy makes sense as the control and trust (not the decision making) passes to the obstetrician.

With thanks to @mamaresiliente for the inspiration 😉💜