Hw#40

Hey Peggy Vincent, Thanks for writing Baby Catcher: Chronicles of a Midwife. You main argument comparing hospitals with doctors and midwifes and home birth. Your main argument made me think about pregnancy and birth and what makes women chose home births instead of birth in the hospital.

Well, in the last third of the book you focused on what you have to do and what you don't do when it comes to birth, which connects to the first 2/3rds of the book. But let me be more specific. 

1. Even though you are a licensed Midwife but you are not allowed to have any say in what happens when one of your own patients go to the hospital? You have been working with the mother the entire time but you have no voice in what happens Pg. 244

2. How come insurance has a part in what happens during a birth? Does the Midwife get paid from that insurance? Pg. 233

3. I thought that the quote in Pg.248 was very interesting "There's no money in dead baby cases" they just think about the money and not even how they lost the baby Pg.248

Well, let's be clear - your text sought to provide historical about midwifery and how it has changed over time and how it has impacted birth from the perspective of a midwife who you never really made it big or the book-reading-public to better understand pregnancy & birth in our culture. Given that aim, and your book, the best advice I would give for a 2nd edition of the text would be, to put things in your book about your peers experience and how they made it to a status of midwifery similar to yours. But I don't want you to feel like I'm criticizing. I appreciate the immense amount of labor you dedicated to this important issue and particularly for making me think about birth & pregnancy. In fact, I'm likely to do more research about home birth and I also think differently as a result of your book. The author replies, "Thanks! Talking to you gives me hope about our future as a society!"

Hw#39

The only difference between the book and the movie is that the book shows more personal experiences with babies and there mothers, the movie only shows natural normal births. For example there is a part on pg.136 where Peggy notices that the baby isn't coming out when its suppose to come out. In the movie they show natural and fast births. The book shows the same insight where it is trying to show the reader the life of a midwife and how they deal with different situations and how they deal with them. I enjoy reading the book and hearing the stories Peggy tells us through out the book so far. It is also interesting to hear that there are some kids in my class want to do midwife work because of the movie and the book. I was really interested in Spirit Babies and how that works on Pg.126 they talk about Spirit Babies and how every single mother has a Spirit Baby that will be there baby when they get pregnant and I wonder if all midwifes talk about that to the people they take care of.

http://www2.cochrane.org/reviews/en/ab000352.html


In some countries almost all births happen in hospital, whereas in other countries home birth is considered the first choice for healthy and otherwise low-risk women. The change to planned hospital birth for low-risk pregnant women in many countries during this century was not supported by good evidence. Planned hospital birth may even increase unnecessary interventions and complications without any benefit for low-risk women. The review found only one small trial, which provided no strong evidence to favour either planned hospital birth or planned home birth for low-risk pregnant women.

Hw#38

I am reading Baby Catcher by Peggy Vincent and it is organized into different parts and in each part there is a heading explaining something about the part that you are going to read. If I were to lay out a pregnancy book I would go through all my personal things in the beginning of the book so that as you read you get more into the baby stuff and not baby stuff then personal experiences and then baby stuff. So far in the book she is telling us her experience with birth and stories of when she was being a midwife. The essential question would be what do midwife experience during their job? or something similar. The book explains different things Peggy dealt with during her time as a midwife. There was one story that was sad to me in the beginning she goes into a house where a 13 year old gave birth and there were many other girls with different guys and I thought she would react and do something instead of letting it happen. I found it interesting that Peggy didn't see a lot of fathers at the pregnancy I'm wondering why. I also found it interesting how pregnant women really are uncontrollable at labor the first story about Zelda was crazy.

Hw37 Comments

Anthony said...

Rigel I also thought that the connection between the mother and child was very interesting and it really makes me think because the people I interviewed weren't really connected as much so I wonder if the people I interviewed were raised differently. Like Felipe I would like to study the connection between mother and child. I also want to ask my mom if she felt the connection your mother felt.

Anthony said...

Felipe I enjoyed reading your post because I talked to my mom about her pregnancy right now and it really compares to your mothers. Im 15 years apart from my brother so I definitely feel your sister's pain. It was good to see that you took the extra step and wanted to research and ask a different question after your interview with your mom.

Anthony said...

Kristin I thought your blog was pretty good and it was interesting that the doctor and your uncle were watching the basketball game instead of helping your aunt out with the baby. It amazes me that your aunt wanted to read books about the baby and raising the baby. Its also interesting that you say that people think they have a glow because of the baby but your aunt didn't. I don't agree with that comment either I don't understand how there is a glow to someone.

Hw#36 Pregnancy and Birth Stories

The first person I interviewed was someone very close to me, I asked her a couple questions about birth and pregnancy. She is 7 months pregnant and the first question I asked was how did pregnancy affect you physically, emotionally, or in other ways? She answered "Being pregnant definitely affected me physically and emotionally I can hardly walk and it is so difficult to sleep because I cant move a lot and I have to stay on my back. It affects me emotionally because there are times where I am extremely moody. When my husband asks me for things I get really moody." I also asked her what thoughts and feelings influenced your choice to make a baby? she said "I really thought it was the right time to have a baby, my husband and I thought we were ready for a baby we both have jobs and we bring in a lot of money enough to support each other and the baby. We also love each other and whats the best way to show our love then having a baby."


The second person I interviewed already gave birth and I asked her what feelings come back to you when you remember labor and giving birth? she said "It was the worst pain in my life but seeing my baby made the feeling even better it was just very special and I would love to have the feeling again. I love my baby and I don't regret being pregnant." I also asked how did pregnancy affect you physically, emotionally, or in other ways? she said "It affected me physically my back was in pain the whole entire pregnancy Im a really skinny, short women and it really made my back hurt a lot."


The third person I interviewed I asked my own questions I asked the third person what was there thought about pregnant teenagers and would they have gotten pregnant or kept the baby if they were pregnant. She said "I don't think girls should be getting pregnant at that age and honestly I wouldn't even put myself in that situation and if I was in that situation I would never have that baby." I also asked her about home birth and hospital births she said "I would want my baby to be born in a hospital because I don't want to take the chance of my baby getting sick I want him or her close to the hospital because I don't want to take any chances. 

Hw#35

I interviewed my 2 of my cousins and a friend of mine and I noticed that the oldest of the 3 answered the questions with more connections and answered the questions thoughtfully and actually cared about answering the questions. I asked them the question Why do you think having a baby as a teenager not socially accepted in our society? My cousin Joseph the oldest of the 3 said that "Its just the time we live in everyone judges everyone. I don't think that teenagers should have babies because they have there whole life ahead of them teenagers should have and not worry about diapers and food and raising a kid when they can be out partying and having a good time." My cousin Josh the 2nd oldest said "I think it isn't socially accepted either because it doesn't make sense to have a baby this young even if someone is nice to the pregnant girl everyone has the thought that getting pregnant this young isn't smart." 

I asked my friend Stephen what his thoughts were about birth and he said "I think of birth like death it brings everyone together to give there blessing and giving birth is a very special moment because when my sister was born a few years ago I was extremely happy and I couldn't stop thinking about being a brother. It was annoying I had to do everything for my mom I hate how you always have to be nice to pregnant there so moody." I asked them there thoughts on Home Birth vs. Hospital Births and they agreed that they rather have there kids in a hospital because they think its the safest thing they can do if something were to happen to the baby they want the baby to be as close to doctor as possible. I noticed that they all said something similar but they were also unclear and also didn't answer most of my questions because they also didn't know the answers to the questions my group and I made.

Hw#34

I always had the question on why people prefer doing a house birth instead of a hospital birth. You have to have a midwife or a nurse that is very experienced in house birth. I always thought it was a lot safer to do it in a hospital because what if something is seriously wrong with the baby and you need to go to the hospital and help the baby and potentially save the babies life. For me it doesn't make any sense for any body to give a home birth because it can harm the baby if the baby isn't healthy enough to be born. I always thought that hospitals would take care of the baby better because once you give birth it takes a few days to check the babies heartbeat and pulse before you can go home with the baby. I never thought of home births as a good idea I would want someone to explain that to me.

I also think that people can give birth at what ever age they want if they can support the baby and themselves and also be able to go to school. I always thought that if you are set in life then you are able to have a kid for example if you are 18 with parents that support you and you are financially stable and have the ability to go to school and are able to sacrifice your social time for your kid then you can have a kid. If you cant do any of those things then I don't think you should be thinking about having a kid because you aren't stable and you don't have a child friendly environment.

Questions:

• Why do people do home births instead of hospital births?
• Why are people giving birth young not socially accepted?
• What is a C-Section?
• What kind of drugs do they give women when they want them?