Civilizing the Body Continued...Birth and Death

Social Constructions of Birth and Death (interesting article linked here)

Laboring Now: Rothman's Comment on "Laboring On"

• the FETUS is real...it is the patient
• ultrasound: gets through the maternal barrier and looks directly at the fetus trapped there
• attachment moment: the baby on the screen is thought tio be realer than the baby within?
• sexing with ultrasound
• the pregnant woman has become an abstraction
• Before ultrasound there were PREGNANCIES which resulted in BABIES, not FETUSES
• technicians "babycize" the images on the screen to give the fetus personhood

• PRENATAL CARE
• medicine emphasizes the disease-like nature of pregnancy
• riskiness=justifies medical management
• fetal parasite-disease-like state  (focus)
• maintain the normalcy of the mother throughout the stress of the pregnancy
• morning sickness
• weight gain
• fatigue

• Prenatal care is still only a SCREENING PROGRAM. (sold as health regimen)
• screen for pathologies most of which they can do absolutely nothing about

• midwifery: pregnancy is normal and healthy-psychological and physical growth and development
• same symptoms seen as indicating health of the mother

• Medical conceptions of labor
• FALSE LABOR (does not result in dilation)
• labor time is determined by doctors as is admission to hospital
• STAGES OF LABOR
• latent
• active
• time to push
• birth phase

• Medical gaze: Woman's pregnant boy is objectified as a vessel for the fetus.
• may be poked and prodded at will
• may be kept alive to host a fetus
• may be forced to birth a baby in certain ways less they be held in violation of laws
• Midwives were taken out of authority by the medical establishment and capitalist medical system 

AVERAGE COSTS BY STATE

• C-SECTIONS, INDUCEMENT and NATURAL BIRTH  (Giving Birth or Being DeliverED)
• Births — Method of Delivery (Data are for the U.S.)

• Number of vaginal deliveries: 2,650,744
• Number of Cesarean deliveries: 1,296,070
• Percent of all deliveries by Cesarean: 32.8%

• Routine inductions at 41 weeks (Pitocin)
•  makes likelihood of C-Section twice as high
• The problem with augmentation is that it produces an abnormal labor. Synthetic oxytocin can interfere with the delicate orchestration of the mother’s natural hormones during birth, and according to some research, with the baby’s brain and hormones as well.
  It’s crucial to understand that the effect of synthetic oxytocin is not the same as that of natural oxytocin produced by a laboring woman.
  
  • The uterine contractions produced by synthetic oxytocin (Pitocin) are different than the contractions which are stimulated by natural oxytocin – probably because Pitocin is administered continuously via IV whereas natural oxytocin is released in pulses.
  • Pitocin-induced contractions will be longer, more forceful and much closer together than a woman’s natural contractions. This can cause significant stress to the baby, because there’s not enough time to recover from the reduced blood flow that happens when the placenta is compressed with each contraction. The net effect of this is to deprive the baby of necessary supplies of blood and oxygen, which can in turn lead to abnormal fetal heart rate patterns and fetal distress.