The judgement can be deafening.

There is a fair chance that you have travelled through your life thus far without being aware of the judgement of others.

Or maybe not.

Maybe you have been aware of office gossip, or attitudes to female size and shape… boyfriends… jobs… relationships. But maybe, although it has irritated, it hasn’t directly affected your health, either mental or physical.

But sadly, now that you are pregnant things may have changed.

I find myself weary some days of the judgement heaped upon pregnant women, birthing women and new mums. It has taught me to come off of the ‘comments’ sections of Facebook posts, or Twitter feeds and even at times Instagram, which on the whole tends to be friendlier and less judgemental.

I have seen Facebook rooms being closed down due to the vitriol being poured out over post-term birth or freebirth. The anger that a woman is refusing to comply to authority being white hot and bile heavy.

And if a woman can navigate this? Then what of her ‘care-givers’, how do they approach a desire for ‘normal birth’? With kindness? Facts & evidence? Understanding?

Sadly, not very often. Not very often at all.

Of course this is societal. In a world where a recent gender study found that 90% of people are biased against women (UN "Gender Social Norms" Index), should we really expect a maternity landscape that respects women’s desires in birth to be anything other than whimsy?

So, what to do?

Learn. Learn. Learn. Move out of the regular birth echo chamber and enter others. Use evidence as well as desire. Seek out the knowledge that you need. Stand firm. Then lift up other women, dust them off and remove the judgement from their shoulders.

Let hundreds of thousands of quiet voices roar back in defiance.