What am I doing here anyway?

I got a call Wednesday about noon, my client was on her way to the hospital. She'd been contracting most of the night, though no recognizable patterns and she felt she wanted to be checked, her water broke just before she called me. I met her at Comanche County around 1:30. They had been checked in, she had her hep lock and had been checked. She was 5cm and 100% effaced. I really expected this to go pretty quick. Her doctor was sick so we were left with the back up, Dr Leep, who's bedside manor is equivalent to a drill sergeant at boot camp. She made no requests or suggestions, but demands and expectations. She let my client know right away that she was on a clock and she needed to get going on having the baby or she would be sectioned.

We walked, squatted and climbed stairs the next several hours through many contractions. S did a fantastic job, I was so impressed with how well she worked through each contraction, never really anticipating the next or getting ahead of herself. She did great. So when the nurse announced her complete at 10:30 I thought "great!! we'll have a baby in no time". Around 11:00 the nurse found some late decels and suggested more active pushing. S pushed for 2 hours when Dr Leep came in and said she was 6cm! I find this so hard to believe, I mean the nurse had her fingers in there directing her where to push, how could she not have felt her swell?? The Dr suggested an epidural and pitocin. S had asked for pitocin, hoping that it would pick her contractions up and give her more to push with. She tried the pitocin without the epidural and she just couldn't not push. She was tired, had been laboring for 24 or more hours and I think the mental blow of backing up to 6cm was more than she could take, she requested a c-section.

A healthy baby girl was born at 5:02 am Thursday November 8th at 41wks 1day weighing 6lb 14oz.

I cried when I went to get the nurse after S asked for the section. I feel like I somehow failed them, like I didn't provide them with enough support, or something. I wondered why I am doing this. My goal has always been to provide women with the knowledge they need to make decisions, to support families through the process of labor and to change the perceptions and status quo of labor and birth. I don't feel like I'm making any change, in fact I feel like maybe I'm making things worse. How can I affect change when my moms keep getting all these interventions? What am I doing here anyway?