Belly Tales

Seems like everywhere I look lately, there’s a pregnant woman, which just makes me ridiculously happy. Today I was wandering around the West Village with a good friend (who also happens to be a Labor and Delivery nurse), and we both caught ourselves staring at a gorgeous woman walking right towards us, with a proud, ripe watermelon belly. She was wearing a creamy lemon yellow tank top over it and she just looked like pure sunshine. If I had to guess, I’d say she was about 36 weeks, give or take a few, although I’ve worked with enough pregnant women by now to know that size of belly is only a very rough predictor of gestational age. The point being, she was beautiful.

It was about five summers ago, right around this time, that I first began to notice that there seemed to be pregnant women everywhere, and I found that I couldn’t take my eyes off of them. I just stared and stared—they absolutely captivated me. I couldn’t explain it, but I was inexplicably drawn towards them. I wanted to touch their bellies (although I never did). I wanted to introduce myself and ask them all about their pregnancy, and what they were most looking forward to about birth, and whether it was a boy or a girl, and how did it feel to have a baby in there squirming around, etc. etc., but I was often too shy to do so. So I just stared, and pondered pregnant thoughts. Something had clicked. It was as if a switch had been turned on inside of me; I was at a crossroads anyway, and definitely ready for a new direction. Once I discovered midwifery, I never looked back.

… John G. Roberts.

To quote from Todd S. Purdum’s NY Times article (President’s Choice of Roberts, 50, Ends a Day of Speculation):

“Abortion rights groups fault [Roberts] for arguing, as deputy solicitor general for the first Bush administration in 1990, in favor of a government regulation banning abortion-related counseling in federally financed family planning programs.

He also helped write a brief then that restated the administration’s opposition to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that established the constitutional right to abortion, contending, “We continue to believe that Roe was wrongly decided and should be overruled.”

But when pressed in his 2003 confirmation hearings for his own views, he said: “Roe v. Wade is the settled law of the land,” and added, “There’s nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent.”

That doesn’t exactly fill a woman with confidence, but it doesn’t make you run for your shot-gun, either. We’ll have to watch, and keep our fingers crossed.

Public Advocate and outraged citizen Betsy Gotbaum released a report on Wednesday (7.13.05) about the soaring Cesarean Section (CS) rate in New York City, which she called “alarmingly high”, noting that in some hospitals the number was nearly twice the rate recommended by the World Heath Organization and the CDC.

She also noted that only 1 hospital out of the 44 contacted could provide current statistics and information about their CS rate, even though all hospitals are required by law, under the Maternity Information Act (MIA), to not only provide this data but also make it publicly accessible in the form of a pamphlet, or on their website. As Gotbaum succinclty put it: “The City’s hospitals should be recommending what is best for the health of the mother and newborn, so when 43 of 44 hospitals surveyed by my office fail to provide this data, we have to ask ‘What are they trying to hide.’” It’s also sad to note that the material provided by the lone hospital that complied with the request was dated from 1998.

C-sections are major abdominal surgery, a fact which is often overlooked in our country; a woman undergoing a c-section is at risk for many of the same complications which attend any surgery, such as increased risk of infection, damage to internal organs, hemorrhage and anesthesia complications—risks which are often downplayed in the hospital, or not even discussed at all. Gotbaum also added infertility and psychological trauma to the list of potential health risks associated with c-sections, as well as an increased risk of respiratory distress and premature birth in infants. C-sections are sadly the most commonly performed surgery in America right now, but for some reason, c-section surgery is not treated with the same gravity as other surgeries. Could you imagine a man four days after obstructive bowel surgery to be up at all hours of the night and on his feet and taking care of a newborn? It’s unthinkable. I’ve never understood why c-sections are often thought of as if they’re minor surgery (they’re not!). Maybe the fact that c-sections are done under epidural or spinal anesthesia (where the patient is awake and alert during the procedure), instead of general (where the patient is completely out), makes it seem less serious? Who knows.

The CS rate in NYC right now is 26.4%. To quote Gotbaum again: “This is unacceptable. We’ve got hospitals all over the city that are delivering a third of their babies by c-section. The Department of Health has to get to the bottom of why this is the case. I also want to know why not one hospital out of 44 could provide the information they are required by law to provide.” Pithy, blunt, and to the point.

Johnson, K.C. and Daviss, B.A. (2005) Outcomes of planned home births with certified professional midwives: large prospective study in North America. British Medical Journal (BMJ), 330: 1416.

This study was published in June and is a welcome addition to the homebirth v. hospitals debate which has been raging in this country for years. Some of the biggest arguments against homebirth studies so far have been that they’ve been predominantly retrospective, which brings up issues of selective reporting and potential bias, and few studies can distinguish between planned and unplanned home births. Well, no longer! This study measures only planned homebirths, and is prospective in nature, which provides a rather conclusive wallop to the ongoing debate. (Read on …)

Slate has put together a very amusing slide show on the history of vibrators. For centuries, women were treated for “hysteria”, which, as it turns out, was just a glorified term for the expression of female sexual needs outside of the penetration alone paradigm. Touch-starved well-bred Victorian women who weren’t getting off on their husband’s idea of sex, but who were all hot and bothered anyway, with no release (especially when masturbation was unthinkable for women), were often labeled “hysteric” and sent to the doctor’s office for treatment. Treatment was vulvular massage to the point of “paroxysm”, and was often viewed as a lucrative but menial chore by many doctors. Fed up with the time-consuming tedium of stimulating a woman to paroxysm (which could sometimes take over an hour—how dull and difficult!), an enterprising British doctor invented the first vibrator in the 1880s, which mechanized the entire process and made it a whole lot faster, allowing the doctor to relieve more patients in less time. And thus the first female sex toy was born.

It’s a great slide show, check it out. The book mentioned in the slide show (The Technology of Orgasm : “Hysteria,” the Vibrator, and Women’s Sexual Satisfaction, by Rachel P. Maines) looks pretty interesting, as well.

The terror of the upcoming Supreme Court nomination has been keeping me awake at night. No joke. I’d like to believe that the Supreme Court would never overturn Roe v. Wade, if only because the political backlash from such an act would devastate conservative hopes for re-election, and the Republican party would never let that happen. Instead, it would be far easier (and much more nefarious) to simply chip away at women’s rights one small decision at a time, without ever going for the Roe v. Wade jugular. Which is not really a comforting thought after all. On the other hand, I guess if the Supreme Court ever DID overturn Roe v. Wade, we’d be practically gauranteed a liberal president and Congress for the next 16 years.

NARAL Pro-Choice has put together a pretty thorough list of potential nominees, and from a pro-choice point of view, it looks pretty bleak. You can view their bios here. And, by the way, if you’re pro-choice or give half a damn about your reproductive rights, now might be a good time to join NARAL.

I’ve just noticed that all of the recent New York Times articles I’ve linked to in my last few posts have since been archived, and you now have to pay for them if you want to read them. Damn. I had no idea the NY Times was so quick when it came to archiving its material. I wonder if they really turn a profit off of the $3.95 they want for each archived online article you access.

Anyway, from here on out I’ll try to post the full text of the articles I link to somewhere on this site. First I’ll find out if that’s legal or not, although I don’t see why it wouldn’t be, since I’ll be crediting both the author and the newspaper it came from. I’ll do some research and get back to you about it.

In the meantime, happy Fourth of July!