05/20/2023
I was GBS positive with my daughter. I felt disgusting after being told I had it because I thought it was something I did or caused, like it was some kind of STD but in reality a lot of people are GBS positive and would never know it. I was given antibiotics while in labor, antibiotic’s definitely have a place in hospital, however I don’t believe they are necessary for GBS and I do plan on declining if I were to test positive with another pregnancy in the future, now that I know a lot more about the topic.
Fun Fact: you can test positive for one pregnancy and not a subsequent one AND you can test positive at 36 weeks but not a few weeks later at 38 or 39.
If you test positive, take probiotics, do a yoni steam, va**nal cleanse and increase garlic in your diet!
Restesting while in labor is an option as well, if you are truly concerned about the risks!
Let’s normalize strep B and stop all this va**na sterilizing business. In the US, we test pregnant women at 35-36 weeks for Group Beta Strep. GBS (for short) is a bacteria that typically lives in your colon that has no smell, no unusual discharge and no symptoms because it is a NORMAL bacteria that lives within our bodies. If pregnant folk test positive for GBS, the obstetric model in our country recommends that all women will receive antibiotic treatment at the start of labor so to protect the fetus from getting a GBS infection. Most labors being between 12-24 hours, pregnant folks in the US are getting between 3-6 doses of antibiotics intravenously during a delivery. These antibiotics don’t know one species of bacteria from another and wipe out ALL of the beneficial microflora as well as GBS. Most healthy full term babies of moms that are untreated will be exposed to GBS and nwill not develop symptoms of an infection, in fact only 1% of babies will get sick and most have risk factors such as a prolonged rupture of membranes (over 24 hours), prematurity, or a GBS colonization in maternal urine. Some babies will get sick and infected and die from a GBS infection, there is no denying that reality. It is relevant to note, research shows that even babies whose mothers get antibiotics can still die from a GBS related infection. Pressuring every pregnant person to take antibiotics at a critical time in the biome implantation of babe ALSO has some pretty impactful side effects and deserves consideration. Also relevant: the UK, Germany, Sweden, France, Australia and Canada do not test pregnant women for GBS. They simply follow a risk-based approach. And all of these countries have far better maternal and neonatal outcomes than the US.
Babies whose mothers received antibiotics in labor at also experience risks. These include, higher incidence of an immune system issues such as asthma, antibiotic resistance, food allergies, eczema, candida, inflammation and injury to the intestines and as a result can lead to higher likelihood of childhood obesity.
