Theory-Practice and Theory-Theory Gap

I've been thinking a lot recently about the 'theory-practice gap'. It's been discussed on one of the midwifery forums, and the general consensus is that it isn't so much of a gap, as a chasm. I'm afraid I have to go against the flow on this because this has not been my experience of the course so far. I'm not saying that there is 100% correlation between the theoretical and practical aspects of the course. There are gaps; there are some things that my mentor says to women that I would not, and vice versa. However, I feel that I'm able to bridge these gaps. And so they aren't really gaps, because I can bridge them. Does that make any sense? If there was such a huge differential in the philosophy and pracice of my mentor and my ideals of what midwiery practice should be that no amount of discussion could reconcile these differences, then there would be a gap. But that hasn't happened. I have thought and worried about this a lot, as I thought that I might have missed something. Maybe I have, or maybe I've just been lucky so far. I don't want there to be a chasm between the theoretical and practical aspects of the course, it's not helpful and I've seen it make people very unhappy. So I'll be working hard to bridge any gaps that become apparent.

Actually, there appears to be significant differences in the midwifery philosophies of some of our cohort members. I'm very much on the non interventionist side of midwifery; I come from a farming family and birth is a normal, natural everyday occurrance to me. Sheep and cows can usually birth perfectly well without the vet rushing in at every given opportunity, thank you very much! I worry about the medicalisation of childbirth, and the technocratic, patriarchal birth culture that we have in this country. I worry because the baseline that women have is not that birth is a normal physiological process, but that it is a disaster waiting to happen. I worry about the psychological effects that antenatal screening has on women. Also the psychological effects of giving birth in a culture that gives the strong impression that women are not capable of giving birth without medical intervention. I worry that at least one person in my cohort is perpetuating this philosophy. Of course there are no rights and wrongs here, only opinions. However, the philosophies are diametrically opposed, and it's difficult to see any middle ground. In other words, mind the theory-theory gap.