Small Rant — Women, their preg­nan­cies, births and moth­er­ing styles are all unique. The big issue in child­bear­ing these days is con­trol. Fear of los­ing con­trol, who con­trols birth (do YOU give birth or are you deliv­ered by oth­ers?), hav­ing the self con­fi­dence and skills to know when to let go of con­trol yet be okay. It’s inter­est­ing to hear what hap­pened to some­one else, but (here’s the rant part) this can often be fright­en­ing because — let’s face it — cat­a­stro­phe gets our atten­tion. What­ever you’ve heard, you still have to do it your­self. Preg­nancy, birth and par­ent­ing cre­ate a steep learn­ing curve.

Review — Our job at the DTP Blog is to help with the learn­ing curve through evidence-based infor­ma­tion. We are mov­ing along a path­way. Here it is, in a small ver­sion (see Feb. 5 for full ver­sion):

So far, we have dealt with Pre­con­di­tions (the Green items). If you under­stand what you can and can­not con­trol along your Preg­nancy Path­way it can help pre­vent you from spin­ning your wheels or wast­ing money. Some things are worth doing (self care, good food, exer­cise) and some are not (self-indulgence, tox­ins, stress). Pre­con­di­tions to preg­nancy — genet­ics, envi­ron­ment and behav­ior — are worth pay­ing atten­tion to if you are of child­bear­ing age and think or know you are mov­ing along this pathway.

Ref­er­ences - We have used hun­dreds so far and will use many, many more, but only some of you will find the sci­ence some­thing you want to pur­sue, so please go to our DTP web­site (use the Blogroll) for more infor­ma­tion on research in this field. Here are some texts that explain much more: “Women and Exer­cise” in Varney’s Mid­wifery (edi­tions 3, 4 & 5), Jones & Bartlett Pub.; Women’s Fit­ness Pro­gram Devel­op­ment by Ann Cowlin, Human Kinet­ics Pub.; and Immunol­ogy of Preg­nancy by Gil Mor, Springer Pub.

Com­ing Attrac­tions — next, we talk about con­cep­tion. Yes, this is an excit­ing part, though not per­haps why you think (!). It turns out con­cep­tion is fraught with many twists and turns.

Humor­ous incur­sion:
Q: Why does it take a mil­lion sperm to fer­til­ize just one egg?
A: Because none of them will stop and ask direc­tions.
[Sorry, couldn’t resist.]

After that we will likely rant and review again, have more humor­ous incur­sions, pro­ceed on to the preg­nancy and birth expe­ri­ences, then dis­cuss health out­comes for mom and baby in the short and long term.

Why do we spend our time on this? From a bio­log­i­cal per­spec­tive, humans can do noth­ing more impor­tant than cre­ate healthy off­spring. Wars may be fought, the banks fail or cars become a thing of the past; we might even become post-racial; but, hav­ing babies doesn’t really change. It remains a pri­mal expe­ri­ence. It’s nes­tled in a high tech world, but its still pri­mal. Women have always had guides; we take this role seriously.

Stay tuned!!