When it comes to giving birth, of course, your baby’s well-being is the most important thing. But it’s not the only thing.

This article might push your buttons, so before we go on I want to ask you to stay calm, grab a cuppa and keep your wig on. I need to be very, very clear, because I know from experience that talking about this issue can cause an outcry. So please listen carefully. The following sentence is crucial:

When a woman gives birth, a healthy baby is absolutely completely and utterly the most important thing.

Got that? OK – do not adjust your wig, there’s more…

It is not ALL that matters.

Two things – just to repeat: a healthy baby is the most important thing, AND it is not all that matters.

Women matter too. When we tell women that a healthy baby is all that matters we often silence them. We say, or at least we very strongly imply, that their feelings do not matter, and that even though the birth may have left them feeling hurt, shocked or even violated, they should not complain because their baby is healthy and this is the only important thing.

Picture it. You’ve just given birth. You had a tough time and you’re not sure how you feel – but your body hurts and there are some memories floating around that you’d rather forget. As you hold your newborn and greet the stream of well-wishers, there’s one phrase you’re almost certain to hear: “All that matters is a healthy baby.”

This phrase is repeated so often it has almost become a cliché. New mothers hear it over and over, usually the moment they begin to open up and say that having their baby was difficult or even traumatic. Sometimes they even find they are saying it themselves: “Giving birth was awful, but at least I got my healthy baby, that’s all that matters.”

And this is wrong. Because a healthy baby is not ALL that matters.

When we say that, not only do we turn a blind eye to the woman's feelings, but by gaily proclaiming everyone 'healthy' we also ignore the complex relationship between mother and baby, and the impact of the birth experience on the future mental and physical health of both of them.

Too often women who say they care about the details of their baby's birth day are accused of wanting an 'experience', as if it is selfish to care about how their baby is born, how they feel or how they are treated. But, as the saying goes, 'when a baby is born, so is a mother'. If a mother feels broken, dispirited, depressed or traumatised, how will this affect her baby? Is this healthy?

A good birth doesn't have to be a hippy dippy 'natural' birth, all candles, knitting midwives and placenta smoothies. Many women who have hospital births that don't go the way they planned and end in interventions such as caesareans, report feeling positive about what happened. This is because how a woman is spoken to and treated as she has her baby is much much more important than the actual mode of delivery.

Women need to feel that they have been consulted, respected and given the information they need to make free choices in the best interest of themselves and their child. This allows them to begin motherhood feeling strong, capable and mentally healthy – surely the best way to be when you are about to be given another human being's fragile developing psychology to hold tenderly in the palm of your hand?

Birth matters. To be respected, to be treated with dignity, to be in control of what happens to our bodies. To really feel the power of bringing a new life into the world – no matter whether in theatre or at home in a birth pool – why is it so wrong for women to want this?

Birth, no matter how it happens, is important. It is a huge event in a woman's life that she will remember in great detail for as long as she lives. We don't have much 'spirituality' these days, but even for the most cynical of us, the moment when a new human being takes their first breath is a special and significant one. And yes, being there and being a part of it, is an 'experience'.

Some reading this might feel this is nonsense. They don't want a spiritual experience, or a rite of passage, or essential oils or a statue of a goddess. They don't want the curtain lowered so they can see either, they just want the baby out safe and sound, and that's fine too. Women are many and varied; birth can be many and varied too and should, ideally, be just as each woman wants it.

What we do know is that many women DO care about what happens to them when they have their baby, but that they find it hard to talk about these feelings in a culture which persistently tells them that they really shouldn't, and that what goes on in the delivery room is always acceptable as long as everyone survives.

A healthy baby is the most important thing, and it is not all that matters.

Respect, consent, choice, dignity – all that matters too.

Do you agree? Did you feel your feelings were forgotten when you gave birth?

Milli Hill is the founder of The Positive Birth Movement. This post originally appeared on Best Daily UK and is republished here with full permission

CLICK THROUGH to see some first baby photos following their birth, and below a video on why a healthy baby is not all that matters:

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