Birth Perception Analysis

Alexandra Tsiaras came up with a phenomenal way of describing conception to birth in his interview he did for Ted Talk. There were several things and little details that I truthfully did not know happened so fast during a woman’s pregnancy. It amazes me how people can go through with abortion after watching a video like Conception to Birth. Alexandra Tsiara’s visuals on conception to birth show a whole new outline of how fast a baby becomes a human, and that makes it that much more precious.

Abby Epstein is a producer and director, famous for The Business Of Being Born, Until the Violence Stops, and Sweetening the Pill. The Business of Being Born is a documentary about giving birth at hospital versus giving birth a home by help of a midwife and a doula. A midwife is a person (generally a woman) prepared to help and support women in childbirth. A doula is a woman who is prepared to help another woman throughout childbirth and who may give a support, relief, and guidance to the family after the baby is born. Furthermore, this documentary analyzes the styles that the American health care system accesses childbirth. The usual way of United States, includes hospitals, drugs, and obstetricians, in the same time, birth in many other countries

Carleen’s first pregnancy, starting in 1979 and ending in 1980, was out of wedlock and happened before meeting her ex-husband. During this pregnancy, she was a lower class, sixteen-year-old high schooler that resided in Detroit, Michigan. As of now and at the time of her interview, Carleen is a Christian, African American fifty-two-year-old woman with a Master’s Degree who is divorced with five daughters. She resides in Warren, Michigan and works at St. John Hospital as a parenting teacher. Given how long ago her first pregnancy was and that she had four pregnancies afterward, I was surprised by the amount of detail she recollected. Carleen had explained the level of ambiguity that came with being pregnant for the first time. Her body had changed, and she was unsure of how her mother would take the news. This fear of the unknown had led her to live with her older sister for three months before telling her mother the news. Thankfully, her mother took the news better than expected and assisted Carleen with prenatal responsibilities such as helping her maintain a healthy diet and moving her to a school for pregnant teens because she had physically struggled with the stairs at her traditional high

According to “Human Sexuality: Diversity in Contemporary America,” women and couples planning the birth of a child have decisions to make in variety of areas: place of birth, birth attendant(s), medication, preparedness classes, circumcision, breast feeding, etc. The “childbirth market” has responded to consumer concerns, so its’ important for prospective consumers to fully understand their options. With that being said, a woman has the choice to birth her child either at a hospital or at home. There are several differences when it comes to hospital births and non-hospital births.

In this week’s response we are given the choice to choose to respond on the topic about a type of “non-traditional” childbirth (i.e. hospital) of our choice that we would want to know more about and “What we learn before we’re born” from TED talk by Annie Murphy Paul . This week I am choosing to respond to a type of “non-traditional” childbirth (i.e. hospital). The type of childbirth I chose to talk about is a water birth. As interesting as this topic may be and all of the possible childbirths there are this stood out for me because I believe that it is amazing that a child can be born in a little pool.

For hundred of years, women have wrestled with their womanhood, bodies, and what it means to be a woman in our society. Being a woman comes with a wonderful and empowering responsibility--giving birth. What sets us aside from other countries is that the process and expectations of giving birth has changed in our society; coming from midwifery, as it has always been since the early times, to hospitals where it is now expected to give birth at. Midwifery was a common practice in delivering babies in

Birth and death practices in Somalia are both based on longstanding religious practices and cultural traditions, but the birth experience is largely the domain of women. For instance, Hernlund and Shell-Duncan (2007) report that, "In Somalia, giving birth is an activity exclusively restricted to the women's sphere" (p. 122). A study on birthing experiences of Somalia women conducted in Sweden, though, found that when given the opportunity, most Somalia women preferred the nontraditional approach to delivery in which the husband was present. In this regard, Hernlund and Shell-Duncan (2007) report that, "Practically all the Somali women who had given birth in Sweden stated that their husbands were present at delivery" (p. 123). The majority of the Somalia women in this study characterized the birthing experience as being positive, and some of the subjects indicated that more Somali men should be present during deliveries because it would help them understand the rigors and ordeals that are involved in the process as this would make their husbands more attentive to their needs in the future (Hernland & Shell-Duncan, 2007).

After watching The Business of Being Born I was very shocked at the statistics stated throughout the link. One of the most shocking things from the link is that the United States is one of the less developed countries when it comes to childbirth and the health of the child. In Europe and Japan, midwives attend over seventy percent of the births, while in the United States, less than eight percent attend midwives. Maternity care in the United States is in crisis and midwives are trying to change the birthing process. Women in the United States are convinced that the vast majority of them do not know how to birth a child. One term that I thought was interesting was the term designer birth, which makes me directly think of women in New York City.

This article Ways of Knowing about Birth in Three Cultures examines the concept of authoritative knowledge elaborated by Brigitte Jordan, using examples of birthing systems in Mexico, Texas, and Jamaica. In this article Carolyn Sargent and Grace Bacope explores the linkages between the distribution of knowledge about birth and the use of technology. It also demonstrates the valuation of biomedical and alternative “ways of knowing” about birth; the production of authoritative knowledge through interaction; and the relationship between authoritative knowledge and social status. In the Maya low-technology, collaborative birthing system in Mexico, the midwife and other adult women share knowledge about birth. In Spanish-speaking women are undergoing

After the exercise, the women in the group felt safe and well informed, they expressed how the class alleviated their fears by giving them various options. Some of the women expressed their concerns. They feel women are vulnerable to making irrational decisions. The instructor encouraged them to make the decision with the gynecologist before the labor begins and most importantly, their partner should support them through the labor stages. After the end of the session, the instructor asked the participants to take an online survey to evaluate her performance and their understanding of the material.

As it is well-understood, birth is an act or process of bearing or bringing forth offspring. This can be done naturally or through it medicalized process. Most women in developing countries of third world countries still carry out birth naturally, when some even bearing children without even going through any medical procedure from pregnancy to birth. Whereas their counterpart in developed nations had to undone all kind of medical attention from pregnancy to birth, and may even given via the medicalized procedure.

This study used a mixed methods approach to identify factors associated with confidence and positive experiences during birth in US mothers. The authors used a qualitative approach and found that patients with positive experiences sometimes depended on prior birth experiences. The study found that women who were confident prior to giving birth were much more

Martin finds this fragmentation in childbirth procedures such as Cesareans and epidurals which leave women feeling alienated and sectioned off from their bodies and their babies. (reference “Wombs in Labor” this ideology may be a reason some women are be able to fracture themselves off as surrogates and easily give into the process of gestational surrogacy and quickly give the baby to the egg and sperm donating parents).

Childbirth is a beautiful thing. After the hours of labor, there is nothing more special than having the newly mother able to hold her child the minute after it’s born. It makes the pain that you had just experienced go away because all that matters in the world is that newborn child in your arms. During labor, every woman has her own experience but one common experience is the pain. According to Kitzinger (1978) “Labor pain can have negative or positive meaning, depending on whether the child is wanted, the interaction of the laboring woman with those attending her, her sense of ease or dis-ease in the environment provided for birth, her relationship with the father of her child and her attitude to her body throughout the reproductive

In the western world, the process of labour and birth is becoming highly medicalised with a greater number of interventions and a rise in the number of caesarean sections performed (Walsh & Devane, 2012). With this in mind, it is important to examine the reasons behind this, and whether particular models of care demonstrate differences in the safety, rights and self-determination of the woman. This paper will also consider the influence of environmental and cultural factors and the impact of these in labour and birth.