The Bucket List

When you are pretending to write, you take time off to scan and respond as avoidance therapy.   Copy paste and then X the things you've done and remove the X from the ones you have not, and send it to your friends (including me).  ( X ) Shot a gun - yeah, pshaw. I'm from the country. Okay, once.  (X ) Slapped a Bull--no, but I've milked a really mean cow. ( ) Gone on a blind date--No, but I married a near-deaf mate? (X) Skipped school - so often that Mom said, "sign your own notes... mine will look like forgeries." (X ) Watched someone die-- Wouldn't have missed it.  (X) Been to Canada -- 22 hours in Calgary (X ) Been to Alaska -- Slept through it, pregnant and seething.  ( ) Been to Cuba -- Isn't that illegal for Americans?  ( ) Been to Europe -- Does Paris, Idaho count?  (X) Been to Las Vegas --And it can stay in Vegas. ( ) Been to Florida -- The gateway to CruiseAmerica? No.  (X) Been on a plane -- TSA has me on their watch list-safest way to fly.  (X) Served on a jury - Never seated - guy plead out.  (X) Been lost - constantly--with my keys.  ( X) Swam in the ocean -- Cough, cough, sputter, choke, drown.  (X) Cried yourself to sleep - P.U. what's new.   ( ) Played cops and robbers - waiting for grandkids.  ( ) Played cowboys and Indians -- ditto.  ( ) Recently colored with crayons. -- What is it about the word grandkids that's confusing?  (X) Sang Karaoke - Family night around the machine - happiness!  (X) Paid for a meal with coins only - Bought groceries, $16.54 - year one marriage.  (X) Done something you told yourself you wouldn't? -- woke up today.  (X) Made prank phone calls - not since *69.  ( X) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose. -- Solid food doesn't count? ( X ) Caught a snowflake on your tongue--Caught my tongue on a flake.  ( X ) Danced in the rain - Cried in the rain. Same, same.  ( ) Written a letter to Santa Claus - Who?  That old phoney?  ( ) Been kissed under the mistletoe -- Gotta get on that-- note to self, find mistletoe immediately.  (X) Watched the sunrise with someone--After being up all night?  (X) Blown bubbles -- Out my nose.  (X ) Gone ice-skating -- Wrenched an ankle--how do they do that?  (X ) Camped out under the stars -- Too often. ( X ) Seen something so beautiful that it took your breath away? - Babies--new life---beautiful beyond words.  ( X ) Are you or have you been married? Every day in every way.  (X ) Have Children -- To check off the bucket list, why else birth them?  (X) Have a Pet - Had a plethora - not good at keeping them, but have had them.  (X) Been fishing -- Fondest memories in life have been in a boat.  (X ) Been boating -- Only as a means to fish.  (X ) Been water skiing/tubing -- Only to fish.  (X) Been hiking -- Not as recreation--only obligation. And to fish.  (X) Been camping in a trailer/RV/tent/car -- Been there, done that--to fish. (X) Flown in a small 4-seater airplane - Helicopter count? Got sick!  ( ) Flown in a glider -- Helicopter counts!!!  (X) Been flying in a hot air balloon -- Yes, but also there was that helicopter ride... (X ) Been Bungee-jumping, skydiving, Zip-lining or Para-Sailing -- ZIPPED and UNZIPPED --nothing like zipping with an open zip! (X) Gone to a drive-in movie -- Slept through Star Wars.  ( ) Done something that should have killed you-- YIKES--I've almost completed the bucket list... does that mean I'm on my last leg?  And again, still practicing avoidance.    1. Any nickname? nah 2. Favorite drink: nah 3. Body piercings: nah - not purposely anyway.  Rusty nails count?   4. Tattoos: nah  5. How much do you like your job: I'm making stuff up daily. 6. Where were you born? On earth, just to quell the constant rumors.   7. Favorite vacation spot? Hawaii --- mee tooo, who knew? 8 Been to Africa? No - so touristee.  9. Ever eaten just cookies for dinner? Yes and dessert first - not good. 10. Ever been on the T.V.? Nope, not in public anyway. My new one has such a thin screen that I don't think it could support my weight anyway. 11. Ever steal any traffic signs? Nope, but I have ignored one or two? 12. Ever been in a car accident? Yes, due to #11 11. Drive a 2-door or 4-door vehicle? 5 14. Favorite number? People have favorite numbers? How? Why? 15. Do you smoke? Nope, therefore I will live forever, a dried up crotchety old non-smoker. 16. Favorite holiday: Birthdays and un-birthdays. 17. Favorite dessert. Cream puffs because they suit my personality, flaky outside, squishy inside. 18. Where do you see yourself in 10 years? In a mirror. 19. Furthest place you will send this message? To myself, but the long way around the world. 20. Who will be first to read this? No one, the same people who read my blog. 3-11-10

Proven Way to Receive Inspiration

Imagine for a moment that a friend comes to you seeking advice on

How to improve your ability to  receive personal revelation.

You can only offer one idea.  What is it?

HINTS: 

• A General Authority (Marion Romney) asked this question to another apostle (Harold B. Lee).  He gave him this perfect suggestion.
• 
  
• Additional blessings are pledged to us if we do it.
• 
  
• Abraham used this suggestion in Genesis 19:27.
• 
  
• Moses used it in Exodus 34:4
• 
  
• Joshua did it in Joshua 6:12
• 
  
• The Lord-God followed it in Mark 1:35
• 
  
• This one advice has proven added physical health benefit. 
• 
  
• We are promised to not be weary, but be invigorated if we keep it. 
• 
  
• All of the Quorum of the Twelve live this answer daily.
• 
  
• It’s the #1 reason teens struggle with brain dysfunction.  
• 
  
• Not doing it is the #1 cause of depression. Elder Russell M. Nelson said  it will rescue those  “defeated and downtrodden.” 
• 
  
• Research at BYU proves a decline in GPA for each time this advice isn’t maintained. 
• 
  
• It is adversely affected by blue lights of screen time. 

• Aristotle recommends it as a main contributor to health, wealth and wisdom.
• 
  
• Ben Franklin said health, wealth and wisdom are consequences of this one thing.

Read the July 2015 Ensign article for the one simple change in your life that will improve it more than any other self help tip.   I promise--It's in the Scriptures.    

https://www.lds.org/ensign/2015/07/young-adults/filled-with-life-and-energy?lang=eng

Young Adults, Fill Your Life With Energy   Randal Wright 

Health Care Despair

Nope Ethopia isn't the answer either. (see the previous link)

Age is great teacher 'cause you don't have to do much but hang around with open ears for a very long time and life's lessons allow the formulation of opinion on critical issues.

 

For example: I'm just sitting listening to a return missionary (for us Mormons, that means a young person who goes away for 18 months to 2 years and lives among the natives without respite (and that means ever returning home or even calling there very often)).

So I'm debriefing a returned Missionary at dinner at my kitchen table and I asked him about his travels and what he felt was the greatest difference in America and the country he went to, Denmark.

"Well," he drawls quietly, "It's gotta be health care."

"Oh? I ask, Socialized medicine?"

"Yeah," he responds, "Everybody has it. You get sick, you just go to the doctor."

Then he goes on. "My companion had something go wrong with his back. It really hurt so he and I got an appointment and went to the doctor. The doc did an exam, then went to his computer and googled, "Sore back." I was sitting behind the doc and I was so surprised that my companion saw my expression of shock and tried to sit on the edge of his chair and crane his neck to the side so he could see what was going on."

"The doctor stopped, looked at the guy straining, and said suddenly, "I know what's wrong. You have injured your neck by holding it funny." He proceeded to treat the patient by pulling off a strip of masking tape and taping it onto the guys head and sticking the other end to his shoulder. "Do this every evening for two weeks and you should be better," the doctor tells him.

Back to the wisdom thing, I may not have read the 2700 pages of health care reform, but I hope somewhere in it there is a dumb doctor clause for preventing this happening when our medical plan settles in.

I've lived a long time and heard a lot of stuff on both sides of this issue. We are currently choosing to live the life of no medical insurance. It's a wild and edgy thing that keeps the adrenaline in tip top form and yes, having no insurance has made me skip the doctor when maybe I shoulda gone, just for safety and peace of mind.

But my running conclusion on health care (always subject to change with every new story--age has not yet set in far enough to force me to stay of the same opinion with new information,) is that the old American value of supply and demand will eventually kick in and the Free Enterprise System will once more triumph.

And when everybody has health care, nobody will really want it anyway.  

9-23-10

Physician Heal… Anybody

The word Care means worry, concern, attention, charge, protection, nurture, except when attached to the word health.

My arm is sore, kind of aching, for no reason. The ache radiates up into my jaw line at times. My hand goes numb and there is this pressure like something is sitting on my chest near my shoulder. It’s done this for about a week. No problem, just inconvenient. I should get a stress test? The internet says yes! See someone immediately!

HA.  The internet lives in dreamland.  

The pain comes and goes though, so I’m not too worried. And neither is my doctor. I called yesterday and left the symptoms with the nurse. She said she would pass on the message. I haven’t heard anything, so no worries.

Besides, I’m young, in my 40’s, active, in good health, no family history of heart attack. I really didn’t call about the heart thing anyway, I just figured that I’d tack it on because I have this lump in my breast.

I just noticed it the last couple of days, while I was massaging the pain in my arm. It’s pretty big, truthfully the lump makes one breast visibly bigger than the other, but on the up side, anything that accentuates the size of my breasts can’t be all bad.

Another call and the nurse isn’t concerned, she says she’ll add that onto the list. If she’s not worried, I’m not. Oh, and while I’m on the phone, the nurse insists, “Would you like to book your annual physical?”

Oops, the computer’s calendar must have triggered the fact that I’m not a regular patient. I believe in going to the doctor when I’m sick, but I really should accept the idea that like all corporate connections, it’s best to keep in tight with the professional by paying his retainer.

I'm sure that regular patients get in quicker, but they risk their computer trigger coming up “hypochondriac”. I wish I could tiptoe on that happy middle ground, but I only go to the doctor as last resort. The last three or four times, I’ve made the diagnosis and advised the doctor on treatment and that seems to work efficiently for both of us.

I like “new-age physicians” who acknowledge that a doctor’s twenty minutes outside the body can’t trump forty some years of living inside it.  But those are few and far between and dang sure they aren't covered on my medical insurance plan.  

My problem is that health care isn’t available ala carte off some menu. But I’m a quick thinker and I know my symptoms could benefit from an ultrasound and a stress test—both of which are part of an annual physical so if my history triggers the, “opportunity for additional income” flag, they may as well sign me up. Besides my insurance pays ZERO now, unless it's an annual physical... but let's not get into the problems with insurance.

My family seems to have a history of health care issues… first and foremost #1 finding a doctor to care about health.

My sister finally got in for a similar breast lump and was treated and then told to check back every six months for a mammogram. Six months later her doctor moved somewhere like Ethiopia and the lab needs a prescription and the physicians group won’t issue it, “We don’t need to, they should do it without.” But her insurance won’t authorize, so there she is… stuck. Once again with no worries and nothing to be concerned about.

Another sister who woke with a kinked neck, found her doctor has also moved out of town (perhaps Ethiopia) and she is driving about during lunch trying to find someone who will prescribe an anti-inflammatory and a painkiller. She knows that will work as she did her internet homework last night.. No worries though, she later found relief with a pain pill leftover from the last labor and delivery. So far, her health care alternatives are urgent care with a three hour wait or a physician who will accept new patients, but only for “sports related injuries”.

She only called me to find out how to join a soccer league for the day.

I take my physician's soonest available appointment which is the end of next week, no problem. I must be fasting twelve hours but they want me there late afternoon. Again, no problem, I’ll starve all my waking hours.

But, I interrupt with the caveat that, "If I wait two more weeks and this thing continues to grow at its current rate, I will have to come in braless." I get the same reassurance by the nurse that it's “No problem.”

What I really need is an annual reassurance that I’m fine, but that involves a voice, (not even physical contact) just a voice. But when the voice finally calls back late the next day, it says that the doctor got my message and she’ll review my issues when she sees me at my next scheduled visit.

My health care crisis really isn’t the hefty sum I pay for  insurance that insures I have no coverage. 

 My problem is with the word care.

Maybe I should move to Ethiopia.

Sept 21, 2010

Ten Embarrassing Application Mistakes that Will Keep You Out of College

So you want to go to college?

Great! Here are 10 embarrassing mistakes to avoid. 

1, Imperfect spelling and grammar. This must be FLAWLESS. Check especially for misspelling the name of the university you're applying to (also, spell it out--UCLA should be University of California, Las Angeles). Use more formal grammar--no dangling prepositions (like the one in the previous sentence--no, no!) and for pity's sake, NO text-speak. If you lol or ttyl, they will dump you like a dead fish. 

 2. Essays that are egocentric, boring, typical, obvious, overdone, immature or dripping with metaphors. Don't talk about yourself as a butterfly, and don't mention any roads or journeys. You must stand out from other essays--keep in mind how many of these things the committee is going to read. Try skimming through your essay at X5 speed and see what you come away with--and it had better not be spelling mistakes or incorrect grammar. 

3. Essays that haven't had very much review. You should have a minimum of 5 drafts and a minimum of 4 people read the FINISHED, polished essay to check for mistakes and make suggestions. Don't celebrate too early--chances are you aren't done yet. 

4. An immature or odd email address. Your entire application must say "PROFESSIONAL. READY FOR COLLEGIATE LEVEL WORK," not, "BIKINIBABE34." Make an email address that is simply your name, ie john.doe3@gmail.com. It can be an account that just forwards itself to your "real" email, but it's going to be vital for future work and other applications.

5.  Being late. This matters more than anything else you have going on right now, I guarantee it. A thrown-together application will prove that you don't have the time management skills necessary for college. 

So follow our instructions and don't be the one that the application committee laughs at--or groans over. Remember that you're PROVING that you're ready for college: a smart, put-together, professional, brilliant and ready youth. 

Women, Empowerment and Birth

College essay from 2017, please skip right past unless you want to know more about the current research into fallacies of birth practices in America today.  P.S.  My creative writing 101 professor disagreed with the thesis and consequently gave me a C.  

Photograph of my actual visit to the natural history museum in the Bronx,  New York City, NY. 

 An exhibit postulating that evolution has occurred such that babies are now too big for the birth canal and have to be helped through modern surgical methods to be born.    

 #1.  Evolution doesn't work that way.  If baby heads got bigger, mom's pelvis would too. 

 #2  What a load of crap.  

Birth has transitioned historically from a natural and organic process to a procedure that is typically accompanied by medical intervention.  This evolution of birth, its rights, its freedoms and oppressions affect women and children on a national scale.  And whether good or ill, medical intervention is a decision that should be purposeful, dictated by choice and medical necessity, not simply by physician efficacy and medical routine.  Empowered women must seek valid studies and statistics to avoid becoming victims of out-dated birth practices that risk health and which have an oppressive effect on women's ability to make educated birth choices.  

Birth practices prior to the twentieth century utilized an organic approach to birth.  Birth occurred in homes and women were aided by other women.  By the turn of the century, hospitals were replacing homes, and by 1935 half of all women living in cities were giving birth in medical facilities.  By 1950, only a quarter of births occurred outside hospitals.  As birth moved from homes to hospitals, infant deaths did not decrease, but in fact rose seventeen percent.  Deaths in hospitals did not begin to decline until the use of sulfa drugs became common and physicians finally agreed to improve their sanitation procedures (Goer, Thinking, 202).

As mothers birthed during the first years of the twentieth century, modifications on the natural process were rare.  Medical interventions in labor and delivery and pain relief were initiated by the surgical branch of specialized medicine called obstetrics and women became the test subjects for medical interventions.  Today, birth without any medicinal or physical intervention is rare and women and newborns continue to be on the cutting edge for progressive advancement in labor and delivery protocols (Gaskin p 3).

With the advent of medicine and science, the biological process of what was once a natural occurrence has transitioned.  Today most of us join the proponents of medical advancements to agree that medicine has improved many aspects of birth.  From high-risk pregnancies, and the mortality of premature babies to medical advancements that impact couples who suffer with infertility, medical innovations have assisted those who suffer with physiological birth challenges.  In addition, without the surgical specialization of the obstetric branch of medicine, life-saving, emergency surgical interventions like caesarians would be even more dangerous.  Medical intervention appears to be the wave of the future.     

Yet, within the current birth practices, we need to ask which inventions and actions are the result of sound medical advancement and which interventions can actually cause birth complications (Carroll).  Could our ignorance of these issues be contributing to an increase in the birth mortality rate of both mothers and babies in America (CIA)?  If any other medical suggested a procedure that doubled the risk of a major surgical intervention, that would be considered malpractice.  Not so with labor induction that results in c-sections. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-induced-labor-c-section/induced-labor-may-double-the-odds-of-c-section-idUSTRE65K6DW20100621 

As medicine and nature blend, it has become increasingly difficult for consumers—parents-to-be, to make informed decisions based on a full evaluation of labor and delivery options.  These decisions must include risks and benefits of birth interventions in these decisions because the method and manner of birth can affect the growth and development of children throughout life.  However, individualized childbirth decisions can be difficult to make because comprehensive studies on birth practice are complex and nuanced and many times the studies seem too complicated for a consumer to evaluate in the process of deciding the best method for childbirth (Blanchette).  

An evaluation of current birth strategies and care giver alternatives are important in taking responsibility for one’s one health choices. One of these is which professionals will attend the birth.  98% of births are now attended by obstetricians--physicians whose training is in the medicine and surgical interventions of childbirth (Goer, Thinking, 243).  Family practitioners are medical professionals trained in all aspects of family medicine and who are typically birth attendants in rural areas who have minimal options available for pain relief and surgical interventions.  The third labor class of delivery providers are certified nurse midwives—specially trained and more frequently, state certified to attend birth with minimal interventions. 

The decision of birth facility is critical to birth outcome (Van Der Hulst). Birthing facilities must be evaluated, ie., hospitals, birth centers within hospitals and births in a home environment.  An evaluation of the financial benefits and risks to the medical and insurance industries may be relevant in the birth decisions. 

The primary focus of mothers, birth professionals and this paper’s examination is a positive birth outcome—the child.  The birth process of a child has been proven to affect the growth and development throughout childhood.  As medicine and nature meld, women and children’s health can benefit from solid, statistical information that focuses on obtaining relevant education and evaluating diverse information related to the physiology of birth.  This knowledge is what empowers a personal birth experience. 

It seems that this is a simple evaluation and that by making an effort to gain knowledge, women will become informed participants rather than merely patients. But the truth is more complicated.  Less than 2% of births in America occur with no medical intervention (Gaskin, 5), and a review of the consequences of this casual acceptance of the current medical practices of birth intervention must be made to ascertain why.    

As the medical facilitation of birth has increased so have the risks to the mother and the baby. A woman in America has a greater risk of dying from childbirth than do those in the 40 other industrialized countries and that risk is increasing.  The maternal mortality rate has doubled in the last thirty years (Amnesty).  These numbers are so alarming to birth professionals that recently an industry-wide call for the formation of a National Maternal Mortality Review Committee has been made.  The request, published in the July 2017 issue of Obstetrics and Gynecology, makes the case that, “…these numbers are four to five times higher than that of the best-performing nations.”  It goes on to state that, “In fact, the United States has the highest maternal mortality rate of any high-resource country” (Clark). 

 In addition, the birth mortality of newborns in the United States has dropped below seventeen of the high-resource countries in the world (Hamilton), and caesarian rates have increased drastically in the last three decades (Osterman).  One-third to half of all babies born today (Goer, Thinking, p 202) are caesarian births. This is “in spite of the fact,” states Dr. Louis Weinstein, chair of the obstetrics and gynecology department at Thomas Jefferson University, “that a Caesarean is 6 to 20 times more dangerous than a vaginal delivery” (Donaldson).   Nearly one in four American women gives birth by cesarean section and “one-half to two-thirds of these major abdominal operations were not needed.” (Goer, Myths, 17)   

Birth is no different than any other consumer based commodity.  Supply and demand are precursors for the wave of medical birth alternatives.  Labor/delivery techniques have changed to meet the demands of a free market economy that caters to the consumer and feeds the need as it grows.  Obstetricians are aware of the prevailing trend and because their specialty is trained specifically in the surgical aspect of birth, these physicians are positioning themselves to be aptly suited to meet the market demands with labor and birth efficiency. 

To get a jump on the prevailing trend, a preemptive study on optional caesarian birth was conducted in Texas in 2006. It investigated how much on-demand caesarians (c-sections) at 39 weeks could benefit babies.  This conclusion was based on extrapolation of the number of injuries suffered by vaginal birth babies multiplied by the estimated increase of babies that would be born c-section if women were allowed to opt for an optional c-section at 39 weeks.  The conclusion was that injuries to babies that occur during vaginal birth would be greatly lessened with the optional request for caesarian birth at 39 weeks, because the baby would not be delivered vaginally (Hankins).  This study neglects to address the significantly increased dangers to the child of c-sections.  This study is used often to justify the continued overuse of this procedure.  Fully thirty-three percent of births are c-section and statistics do not support the increase with improved mother/child risk.  

In response to trends, advocates for fewer caesarians have statistics that counterbalance the positive effects of optional caesarians with studies of their own.   A 1992 Dutch study proved that over the course of one decade between 1982-1992, that c-sections caused 700% more deaths than vaginal births, 28 per 10,000 (Goer, Thinking, 23)   Henci Goer, a birth researcher and pregnancy and birth educator and the author of Obstetric Myths versus Research Realities:  A Guide to the Medical Literature, challenges studies like the optional c-section one and considers them to be spurious and merely created to promote the intervention of major surgery without valid statistics garnered from accepted birth study protocols (5).  Ms. Goer, invites women to consider that, “Cesarean section is the most common major surgery performed in this country… despite the health risks, pain, recovery time and expense.”  She also claims again in a subsequent book, The Thinking Woman’s Guide to a Better Birth that, “The consensus of medical literature is that half of these operations were not needed” (1). 

In addition, epidurals continue to be the drug of choice for birth.  Proponents minimize the risk to babies suggesting that with the large numbers being performed, that epidurals have been improved and are safe (Thorpe).  The average rate of epidurals in the US is 61% (Osterman) yet “an epidural increases the odds of cesarean for lack of progress somewhere between 2- and 8-fold, especially in first-time moms and causes fetal distress in about 10% of babies,” (Goer, Myth, 3).

In addition, numerous studies on the effects of labor analgesia and infant brain development have proved that epidural analgesia is connected to increased duration of labor, medical interventions in instrumentation related to vaginal delivery and in birth by cesarean (MacArthur; Eddleston; Thorpe). 

            Advocates for the medical industry say they are just giving women what they want, and of course it’s up to the consumer or insurance providers to ask, “At what cost?”  A hospital makes significantly more on surgeries and epidurals vs. natural birth.  Doctors also make significantly more and therefore the suggestion to limit or eliminate birth intervention is going to come from that direction.   Jenene Turley, a prenatal birth educator felt compelled to publish a peer-review paper for the Journal of Prenatal Education entitled, “How I Teach Evidence-Based Epidural Information in a Hospital and Keep My Job” (Turley).   It's obvious that there is no monetary value in a neutral advocacy group of obstetricians who would investigate safe, and non-surgical birth.  

            The two sides, medical interventionists and natural birth advocates who are debating the issue ostensibly join in empowering mothers, but each differ on what “birth empowerment,” actually means.  Medical professionals argue that empowering women is accomplished through alleviating the discomforts associated with birth, i.e., the inconvenience, pain through drug intervention and the benefits of cutting edge technology.  Natural proponents offer a biological and organic alternative to low-risk birth situations and insist that this empowers women through education and involvement. Their model of care is not based on the obstetricians “normative standards” of the progression of labor occurring on some prescribed schedule, but instead on a pattern that is individual to each patient.  Midwives follow the tenants of noted French physician, Michael Odent.  “One cannot help an involuntary process.  The point is not to disturb it” (Goer, Thinking, 199). 

More discussion on the impact of knowledge on the empowerment of the personal birth experience is called for and insight on what may happen when the patient takes an active interest and more responsibility in health care could be the subject of subsequent research.  What might be the result to the mortality of babies in America and the mortality rates of mothers if education encouraged them to transition from patients to proactive participants in evidence-based labor education?

Evidence-based education must begin at the ground-level.  For example, while strolling through the New York City Natural History Museum, one may expect to see exhibits theorizing the evolution of man.  In the children’s area is an exhibit explaining human birth with a scale model of a baby and the mother’s birth canal.  The exhibit descriptor explains that due to evolution, the human brain has evolved such that the skull is so large that medical intervention has become necessary to complete the birth process.   Aside from the inherent inaccuracies in the scientific theory of evolutionary process, (Darwin would say that if growth over time has forced an increase in skull size, then that same impetus would influence the evolution of the pelvis,) this exhibit in a prominent city museum is an indicator of the nation’s general opinion of the need for intervention in the natural process of birth as well as an indicator of the need for better birth education. 

Current methods of birth practice may reflect scientific opinion, but medical practices fail to adapt when the studies manifest negative results.  Surgical obstetrics is tradition based and has become so enmeshed in the economy of health care that any modification of these practices—even those evidence-based—does not motivate change.  The question is how can that be?  And a possible answer is offered by labor and delivery educator Henci Goer, “Obstetric practice does not reflect the research evidence because obstetricians actually base their practices on a set of predetermined beliefs.  If you start from this premise, everything about obstetrics, including the inconsistencies between research and practice, makes sense.”  (Goer, Thinking 4).      

Neither extensive studies nor grass-roots advocacy has had an effect on obstetric labor and delivery techniques, yet maternal mortality and infant mortality rates continue to stymie medical interventionists.  Kathleen Harper, an obstetrician practicing in Nevada wrote a paper calling for more obstetricians to be trained—blaming the increase in the maternal mortality rate in Nevada on the lack of obstetricians (Harper). The author of the paper failed to clarify what is causing the mother and infant mortality and is perhaps unaware of what is adding to the death statistics.   Hemorrhage is the #1 reason for delivery-related deaths—and obstetricians rely on surgical intervention to treat this problem.  Most hospitals, although mandated to provide operating facilities, are not prepared to facilitate emergency surgeries (Goer, Thinking, 206), and delivering mothers bleed out before they ever get to the surgery.

 A significant majority of the deaths--African American women—are a 3-4 times greater risk (Bond).  Substandard social structures is one contributor to the problem.  Training more obstetricians will not solve the issue of social inequality—nor can their methods become part of the answer.  The obstetrician’s traditional birth practice of vaginal delivery involves releasing the mother from the hospital within 12-24 hours and not seeing the mother again for a week.  This practice exacerbates the risk to those in difficult social circumstances.

The Maryland study of maternal mortality identified drug use as the other major source of the mortality issue. (MDOHP) This problem can be addressed with the same answer, improved home health care professionals, trained and required to attend a pregnant mother in prenatal and postnatal visits in the home.  A professional, like a midwife, identifies interventions for problems related to social inequality.  Only midwives are required by law to make extensive before and after-care visits and only those visits can reveal on-going health situations that could be resolved through existing social programs.  Until we begin to utilize the birth practitioner who is trained to address these failures, we can continue throwing doctors at the problem without ever experiencing a solution. 

There is cautious optimism about the evolution to healthier birth practices.  Smart consumers—made even wiser through clearer information and better education will grow to understand their responsibility in this issue and demand changes via the economics of supply and demand.  Just last month a newscast was finally shown by CBS TV news, which quoted an Associated Press article from December of the previous year.  It recommended to laboring mothers that they require that their doctors allow the umbilical cord to completely deliver all of the cord blood to the baby rather than clamping and cutting the cord immediately upon birth. This small change had been proven to positively affect the well-being of children as far-reaching as four years later (Andersson.) The newscast went on to say that although the new policy would cut into the hospital economics (which has a lucrative business in selling umbilical stem cell blood for research,) the long-term health of a child would benefit.  But, that study was published back in 2015.

It’s easy to get lost in the mortality numbers and caught up in the birth statistics, but there is more at risk than our national standing in the World Health Organization’s mortality standards.  Women are laboring and delivering babies along the cutting edge of technological advancement and consumers must become educated in the true facts of these medical options.  Birth cannot always be managed, scheduled and manufactured with the precision of an assembly line; humans are not machines.  Caregivers must take their focus off expediency, tradition and consideration of normative procedures and refocus on the individual’s simplistic progression through the birth processes.  If even one child or mother is at greater risk because of the expediency of medical interventions, then consumers must respond more judiciously and advocate for safer alternatives.  Safer birth demands it.  

Works Cited

Amnesty International.  “The Maternal Health Care Crisis in the United States,” March 2011, https://www.amnestyusa.org/reports/deadly-delivery-the-maternal-health-care-crisis-in-the-usa/

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dec 6 2017

Choice: Birth--Death The Morphosis of Womanhood

I just read an article makes three relevant points, that women are experiencing a revolutionary transition of personal power, that birth control is the impetus, and that womanhood is in morphosis.  I write on the cautionary genesis of that process.


I counter the basic idea of the article that society's convenience is reason enough to justify birth decisions or the end of birth--the death of life.  Although we are experiencing unprecedented  reproductive freedom,  women are still subject to what some think of as arbitrary forces of nature, subject to age, infertility and happenstance and to assume that we have gained some control over that merely because we have come into our own "womanhood" may be a fallacy.    Like a child who begins to recognize that he rules the world, then fears that he rules the world we must recognize that with increased freedom of choice comes natural, and irrevocable consequence.  I myself had to come to that untidy conclusion with the risks of some birth control that modify the body to reject future pregnancy.

Presuming that we can circumvent nature's reality with impunity is naive.  It is a contradiction to ignore the mind/body connection that ultimately requires humble supplication of self at every point--to nature, or to a God, to a world, an opinion, in relationships, or to illness and all the other ways to which we as human beings involuntarily relinquish control and are acted upon.  Even to the consequence of the humanity of the anguish of abortion.

We've come to believe--no to expect--that we have control and expecting that we exercise a sense of power over nature without consequence is at the core of this new womanhood question.  Continuing to further that argument leads us to believe that life is trivial and can be had at our own behest and on demand--further leading to the cavalier idea of humanity as a fungible and resulting in the devastation that we are now experiencing.

That being said,  my pro-life stance is that while women’s reproductive domination by man may be coming to an end, nature's control cannot be ignored.  As we become free from being acted upon we must more fully be willing to accept the ramifications of our own actions.  It is an enlightened woman who recognizes her place in the world universe and her eternal responsibility to the freedom of childbearing.  This responsibility is greater than surrendering choice, it is cautiously and carefully considering how to submit to a natural, more powerful version of nature's intent.

A responsible for life.  When we are considerate and adequately reverent of that, the lines of responsibility are more easily drawn.




Reality Bite:  Then we can more truthfully look to the added responsibilities of the choice of life--social responsibility, structure, care, nurturing, and education.