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ariel: i read your paper, and i thought that it was very good. it talked about how one of your little sisters were born, and the struggles that your mother went through to deliver her. it must have been really hard for her and your dad to be under that kind of pressure. but now she is a healthy girl and that is a blessing. i liked how you connected what we learned in class to a personal experience as well as talk about a side of birth we didnt really cover much on. we didnt really talk much about premature births and the complications it brings. maybe for next time, you could probably add some statistics about premature births around the U.S. and how common or uncommon they are. rigel: yours too was a personal topic that i really enjoyed. your topic was about single mothers. i felt like i could personally relate to that because my mom too is also a single mother, and she struggles everyday to make sure i have everything i need and that i grow up into a good kid. it too was a topic we didnt even bring up in class at all so to get information on that was very interesting and is a reason why i turned to your blog. i feel like there are a lot of single mothers out there in the world and the guys usually dont do anything. maybe something you coud do for next time is maybe relate it to yourself a little more and talk about a personal experience. stephen: you got me very interested in reading your paper when you made your speech. it was very engaging and caught my attention. in your paper you talked about multiple side of births in a hospital and out of a hospital. as well as with a midwife or with a doctor. it was good that you went a little deeper into what we learned about in class. but maybe for next time you could focus on maybe one part of the arguments or maybe narrow your topic down a bit. also maybe add some personal opinions you had.

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while watching the movie, and during the whole birthing unit, we only talked about the positive side of birth and pregenancy. as well as some semi bad sides. we talked about whats the difference between delivering your baby in a hospital with a doctor verses having your baby at home with a midwife. as a result, i personally came to a conclusion that it is a personal choice and i do agree that not a lot of women are aware of the information that is out there about midwifes and what they are really about. so not every women has the option of picking eaither doctor or midwife. but we were not talking about the bad sides to birthing. for example abortions. im pretty sure at least one person knows someone who has had an abortion at least once. could be teenager or adult. but the one that a lot of people are concerned about is teenage abortion. "more than 25 percent of women in the world get an abortion" (pregnentteenhelp.org) "1.38 billion women in the world who are in the childbearing years of (15-44). about 6 millon become pregnent." (pregnentteenhelp.org) with this, teens take up 19% of abortions. teenagers have different options. one is they could take responsability and take care of the child, another is to have the baby, but then give it up for adoption, and the third option is to have an abortion. but a lot of these teens now a days are going with option 3. they usually have the abortion within the first 8 weeks of the pregnency. a lot of these situations are unplanned and will strongly have a downfall for their future plans. according to a chart that i found online, back in 1994, the largest race group to have an abortion was while people with a percentage of 60.5%. 95% of abortions are preformed because of lack or birth controll. another 1% is because of rape or incest. another 3% is because of the mothers health problems and the last 1% is because of fetal abnormalities. i also found out that the number one reason why women go with abortion, is because so they could pospone childbearing. then the next highest reason is because they can not financially afford it at the moment. on average, an abortion costs about $350 to $550. there are different types of ways a women can get an abortion. depending on the stage the fetis is at. she could take a pill, get it sugerically removed, or a shot. so in conclusion there are some information about birth that is bad and all of it has good stories. there are the statistics of abortion that not a lot of people talk about, even though it is getting higer each year.

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becoming an OB/GYN: www.ehow.com www.spelman.edu www.obgyn.net www.innerbody.com www.dc-media.com www.life123.com

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(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.

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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.

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so i asked my friend what was her birth like. she said "its very life changing and painful but i do it all over again to see my baby boy and hold him again because when you see that baby you made, you are so happy." she has a 17month old baby boy. she said the hardest part was the labor. "it was very hard and painful. i was in labor for 15hours because my son wasnt coming out." but by the time he came out, she forgot about all of that pain she went through just to physically see him for the first time. she was very thrilled. so i asked would this time around, would she be more prepared then the last time, and she said "i would do it all over again and this time i'm more prepared and ready." now she is pregnant with her second child and its a little more complicated. but she cant wait until she sees it for the first time.

my moms story with me was a little similar. she was in labor with me for 17hours and it was very difficult for her. no matter how hard she would push, i was not moving. she started catching a fever, which ment that i was catching one too, so they had no choice but to do a c-section to get me out. after she couldn't see me or touch me for a couple hours because they had to make sure i was okay. but she said she has never been more excited in her whole life than to lay there in pain for 17hours trying to deliver me to the world. she wouldn't do it again but it was a life changing experience and is blessed to have given a life.

the last person i interviewed said that it was very painful, it was nerverecking and wished the pain would stop. she had birth complications. her babies feet were coming out first so they had to turn him around. all she could thimk about was her and the baby going to survive. it was a extreme mind blowing experience. she said that she would do it all over again but hopes that there will be no complications this time around.