homework 40

(wasnt able to copy and paste the dialouge so i just wrote the blanks) hey, thank you for writing the book Guide to Childbirth. this book was so amazing and had a lot of information in it i never knew about home births. i just thought the ideal home birth that everybody went through, which was people chill in water until the baby pops out. home births are just as safe and easy to do as in a hospital as long as both the mother and baby are safe. in the last third of the book, i realized the book mostly focused on the labor part of the pregancy and the different myths of the pregnancy. along with the whole hormon and changes a woman goes through during those eight months. one myth was the myth of sex. there was a myth of having sex while the woman is pregnant, will be harmful to the baby. but it turns out that its not. "a large collaborative study involving nearly fourty thousand women found no association between lovemaking during pregnancy and poor outcome for mother or baby. in fact human semen is the most concentrated source of prostaglandins, the substance that cervidil...intercourse during the last week of pregnancy helps the woman's body go into labor. " (215) with labor, you sometimes may think that you are going into labor, but then again you may not. "a first time mother checks into the hospital with what she feels is strong labor ward or birth room, her labor has virtually stopped...this situation is is most likely to happen in the early or latent phase of labor." (205) "no one in our care has suffered from eating or drinking during labor. occasionally, a woman who has eaten will throw up, but this is not a problem in women who are consccious. vomiting normally helps dilation of the cervix." (221) maybe for another edition of the book, you could talk more about the history of birthing at home and more history on birthing and give some tips on birthing and what to do during certain situations.

homework 38

in the book Ina May's guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskin, is a bunch of natural childbirth stories. by natural, i mean women who go through the birthing proccess with a midwife. a midwife is a woman who are highly trained to come to your home and helps you give birth of your child with out using drugs and being hooked up to machines. women feel that midwives help bring the natural feeling and connection with the baby and the birth of the baby.

in the book, mothers talk about their birth stories of having a midwife and how their experience was. for some it was thier first time giving birth, and for others it was their second time and decided to do it differently. each story unique and different in their own way. for one mother, her first birth took place in a hospital and by the time she was finished, she wished it was different, and made her decided she wanted to do a at home birth the next time around. when she got pregnant again, she went about doing the natural way and she said "i was greatful to have had such and easy pregnancy and that the birth itself was not just a psychosocial event but spiritual as well." for some other women it was their first birth, and they didnt know they were going to pick a at home birth. but in the end they went with it and she said: "pushing turned out to be the easiest part-a big relif...after he was born, i was more happy than tired."

some insights i get from the book is that when you have births at home and not druged up, the women tends to be so uplifted and anxious to see their baby for the first time rather then feel loopy and druged up and can not really comprehend what is going on. they feel more relaxed and at ease. it is such a powerful and emotional experience, the woman feels aware and fufilled about her experience.

comments on homework 36

comment on ariels post:

i think that those were both two different stories that just about a lot of people go through. for some, they dont feel like they are ready and when they are scared, they try and take the easy way out by getting rid of it. but at the same time, you have to ask yourself why should i get rid of a life. nobody should be a mistake if it was ment to be then it was ment to be. birth isnt a easy an easy thing to get rid of like anything else. and then on the other hand, a lot of people go through what your second person went through

at times you lose your social life because now you cant go out whenever you please or have just any body over. for the first couple months at least. what i learned based off these two stories is that having a baby is a life changer, and shifts your life in a direction you wouldnt imagine until it happens to you. eventhough you are ready, or not ready, you still dont know what is in store and whats ahead. birth is a powerful level in life that no matter who you are, your going to experience it one way or another.

comment on allwyn's post:

when i read the story about your mom, i laughed at first because my moms story was kind of similar. she gained a bunch of weight and got lil pimples here and there. but other then that i really enjoyed reading her story. it was very spiritual and religious. it sounded like she had her mind set of having babies for a very long time. and she was spiritually guided by God through the pregnancys. as if she was the happiest woman on the earth. but did she feel like that with every birth experienced she had?..with each child, did she have different feelings and emotions, or the same for each one?

one thing that i learned from the stories is that birth is something that is "holy". that God will accept every birth that happens in the world and when in doubt or in pain, turning to God is something positive and will always help the woman along the way to having a healthy baby. religion is always a positive answer to birth.