HW 39 - Insights from Book - Part 2

Cassidy, Tina. Birth The Surprising History of How We Are Born. New York: Grove Press, 2006. Press.

In Birth Tina Cassidy heavily discusses the historical aspects surrounding birth such as the tools, doctors and popular doctor practices. In "Business of Being Born" there is very little discussion about the historical aspect of birth specifically the tools used, The reason i find this to be important is because it poses the question can you truely understand the methods these doctors used to give birth without understanding what they used to engage these methods. The major insight the book attempts to to communicate is again, what are the historical aspects of birth and the process of giving birth. After learning about all the methods doctors would use to encourage childbirth i was astonished and astounded, some of these methods seemed very similar to torcher methods; the pumping of drugs, and the restraining of the pregnant mother with bed sheets. This major insight allowed me to pose the question how does this new information regarding the historical methods depicted in the book and the present methods depicted in the movie affect our interpretation of the birthing process? what can we see now that we were unable to see before.

1. Cesarean sections when preformed in other countries and the historical change in c-sections throughout time. (page 103)
2. The birth of the modern day doctor. How they came to be and how our view on them has changed and how they have changed. (131)
3. What tools do both midwives and doctors use throughout the birthing process, similarities and differences, pros-cons. (161)
4. Inductions, how it developed and how it has changed and become what it is today. (174)
5. Labor positions, which position is optimal and how has has labor positioning played an important role in birth (other than the obvious). Also how have different cultures used labor positions. (181)

A crucial factual claim that Tina Cassidy made was that around the 1960's Elizabeth Bing made child birthing education become a very popular and widely demanded topic to explore, i wanted to make sure this was true considering the fact that even today some people have trouble discussing birth with others let Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
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one letting others discuss birth with them.  Doing independent research i discovered that Tina Cassidy was right, although not very popular with the obstetricians Elizabeth Bing is a co-founder along with Marjorie Karmel of the Lamaze Child Birth Preparation Method in the USA and also was a major contributor for achieving "family centered maternity", on Ourbodiesourblog.org i discovered even more information, Its supports my factual claim and tells you even more about Elizabeth bing's incredible story, "Elisabeth Bing, co-founder of the Lamaze Childbirth Preparation Method in the USA almost 50 years ago, made a major contribution in achieving Family Centered Maternity and changed birth in America for the better  for all time. Birth in the 19th and 20th centuries went from the home to the hospital and was characterized by routine intervention with women being heavily drugged, restrained and isolated. By 1960, with co-founder Marjorie Karmel, Elisabeth Bing developed a grassroots movement with the support of only a few obstetricians, and showed that medical management was not necessarily safer." (http://www.ourbodiesourblog.org/blog/2009/04/lamaze-childbirth-preparation-method-elisabeth-bing) and for even more information regarding women and birth health stories visit http://www.ourbodiesourblog.org/blog/category/womens-health-heroes. However as convinvcing as this is it begs the question how can we be so interested and open about birth but be so scared and taboo when the topic of discussing of sex comes up, these two go hand in hand yet we don't treat them like they do?