Obtain Immediately Common Sense Pregnancy: Navigating A Healthy Pregnancy And Birth For Mother And Baby Engineered By Jeanne Faulkner Supplied As Online Book
informative without a "onefitsall" approach, Slim volume of practical information amp useful advice, Straightforward read that presented a lot of options with a combo of science, professional, and personal experience, This will likely be THE book I give to friends who discover they're expecting, Just as you would expect from the name, it's a thorough and easy to read guide that walks you through most of the important decisions you'll have to make while pregnant.
What I appreciated most was that you're given both sides of each situation there's no agenda here! You know you want an epidural She explains what you need to know.
Considering going all natural She gives tips, guidelines, suggests methods to research more and ensures that you don't feel bad if you change your mind later.
I'd recommend this as the first book any pregnant woman reads while beginning to make medical decisions about pregnancy and birth.
From here, you'll know what to focus on and research further, Great reference book with straightforward, clear advice, I love this author's voice, This isn't a book I read from cover to cover, but instead picked through it chapter by chapter, As an American living abroad I don't encounter some of the problems discussed in this book, but I still appreciate having them pointed out.
I would have liked more focus on pregnancy rather than just the birth, but maybe that's because I'm still pregnant Qualifications for a book that explains what happens before, during, and after pregnancy, and how to navigate all of those stages:
.
It uses gender neutral language when referring to the fetus/baby, Or in absence of that, often switches between using "she" and "he" when not referencing gender specifically,
. It does not insult the reader's intelligence regarding use of alcohol, unlike the vast majority of pregnancy books, The alcohol section is a litmus test for whether the author/this book trusts women to make informed, sensible decisions for a healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby, without the need to deceive in order to influence.
The book is nonjudgemental regarding "controversial" issues such as breastfeeding and use of an epidural vs, "natural" labor. Overall, the tone is conversational, without being flowery and overly optimistic, Basically, this is a highly experienced nurse telling you succinctly the things you need know and why,
Four because this book doesn't list a schedule of what happens at a doctors office, including explanations of all the blood draws and urine samples.
I'm told this can be found in the What To Expect book avoiding the What To Expect book was part of the point of purchasing this book.
Editedto add: Changed the rating to five after reading the 'What To Expect, . . ' book, which is still a decent book, but which doesn't cut through the BS like 'Common Sense' does, This book was a slow start for me, as it is based within the American medical system, I couldnt relate to a lot of the information, as a Canadian.
However, the last section on post partum care alone was enough for me to give the bookstars, Good, solid, compassionate advice. I'm enjoying Expecting Better more, but this is still a great choice, I like this book. It's just like the title says "common sense" which I really appreciated and found a relief after reading too many books with way too much information.
I got this book from the library and skipped ahead to "prenatal education and birth plans because I am atweeks and curious about delivery options.
I don't feel like I missed anything by jumping ahead and instead got some invaluable advice, Great book! This is the best pregnancy/birthing book I've read so far, When someone in my life becomes pregnant, this is absolutely the book I will recommend and/or just give them, It covers everything absolutely everythingfrom the moment you get that positive test to breastfeeding and even dealing with child loss and grief, Faulkner has experienced it all and she gives her nonjudgmental wisdom and guidance,
I especially loved the chapters on getting to the end of pregnancy and labor, She explains in detail how one small intervention can lead to another but, again, she's not judgmental about any of this, there's no right or wrong she's just laying it all out.
She offers snappy comebacks to the holierthanthou types who think they've got it all figured out and because your choice is different you must not love your baby.
Which, sidenote: can we please stop that nonsense People raise their kids in the way they believe is best for them and their family, so what if that looks different than yours
Jeanne Faulkner also has a wonderful podcast, which is actually how I found out she wrote a book.
I recommend both! This book is AMAZING like I want every pregnant woman to read it! I love how the author is real and doesnt beat around the bush on topics.
She calls on the birth industry but admits some medical interventions are lifesavings, Only complaint was I think she was too middle ground about bf and bottle, but I also like how she discouraged mom shaming.
I read this book in Blinkist,
The key message in this book:
Pregnancy and childbirth are experiences that are both beautiful and challenging, So its best to be well prepared, Get organized so that you can make your birth as easy and comfortable as possible, This is probably the best general pregnancy book that I've read so far, Though it is perhaps less helpful specifically to someone like me someone who chose midwifebased care in the US, I think that this is an amazing book and would recommend it to every pregnant womanespecially those who have chosen to deliver in the hospital.
It's great. Meh, this was fine.
I found the most valuable section to be the postpartum/"what to do with your new little blob" stuff that is, what to expect in terms of the process of recovery from giving birth, the proper care and feeding of your newborn, and the logistics of pumping breastmilk.
The labor and delivery section was also pretty helpful quite detailed in, e, g. , the stages of labor, how an epidural gets inserted, and so on, The pregnancy stuff was fine,
I didn't love the tone though, and I still WAAAY prefer Emily Oster's sitelinkExpecting Better for a number of reasons:
I have a small professional connection with Oster I did some work for her and a coauthor, but, more importantly:
We come from the same domain economics and speak the same language about risk, uncertainty, statistical significance, and hypothesis testing.
One thing I did NOT realize before getting pregnant and visiting those godawful "fourth ring of Dante's Inferno" online pregnancy forums is that there a is such a thing as "Mommy Wars" and b there are deeply entrenched ideological camps akin to the polarization in US politics related to the topics of breastfeeding, labor delivery, and most notoriously and radicalized vaccines.
I missed the memo on all of this, and I STILL don't understand why I'm supposed to despise the Csection rate in America, value a natural i.
e. pain medication free childbirth, or create a "birth plan",
A note about Csections: the rate in the US is aboutin, which is widely considered on online forums, in blogs, in this book, at the midwife meetup I went to to be very terribly bad.
I'm not a physician, but I didn't understand why: do these Csections result in bad outcomes It was often implied, but what bad things How often Why I wanted to know, and it's been hard to get straight, statistical information about it.
At the midwife meetup, they implied it was caused by a lack of widespread midwifery, and its effects were to increase maternal mortality !.
I looked it up: the Csection rate in Germany,
where midwives deliver babies, epidurals are rarer than in the US, and OBs are only on hand in emergencies, sitelinkthe rate is while, in the US, it's.
In Italy, it's. The US's maternal mortality is a lot higher than other developed countries e, g. Germany and Italy sitelink.deaths per,live births, or,, as compared to all the other European countries, which are all underper,live births,. But it sitelinksounds like some of the causes of the US's maternal mortality rates have to do with the way hospitals and staff react to complications e.
g. a hemorrhaging, rather than the prevalence of complications, I'm not a public health researcher or physician, but the way these issues are talked about is always in SCREAMING ALARM AND JUDGMENT, and it's been hard for me to get to the facts! Just the fax!
Heennnyyway.
So yeah, this book was written from the point of view of a highly experienced nurse who has worked extensively with midwives and OBs, and also maintained an online blog answering pregnant women's questions, and thus the tone of the book is geared towards addressing the online pregnant woman anxiety phenomenon: slightly skeptical of the medical mainstream, but not super granola so, and with limited statistical evaluation of the research evidence.
While the book states very often that it means no judgment of, e, g. , NOT doing a natural childbirth, or choosing to bottle instead of breastfeeding, I still felt that it had quite a bit of judgment, not enough science and not enough COLD HARD FACTS, MA'AM.
Again, I preferred Oster for that reason, Like, Oster and economics research! ahhh, cold, dismal economics! ascribes no special moral weight to breastfeeding or bottlefeeding, epidural or not, delayed cord clamping or not.
She just evaluates the medical literature, applies statistical knowhow to evaluating the believability of the research claims, and then applies decision theory from economics to evaluating what to do with those claims.
To me, that's all reassuringly rational, understandable, and clear,
I mean, I don't want to overly critique this book because it really is basically fine, and I even recommended it to some pregnant friends but some stuff just rubbed me the wrong way.
OKAY, ONE EXAMPLE: in the section on group B strep GBS a vaginal infection that can sometimes be a bit of a risk to the baby while it's on its way out Faulkner writes about how it's normally treated with antibiotics via IV.
Since some womens' birth plans forbid the use of IVs in the pursuit of as lowintervention a birth as possible, she reassures these readers that the IVs are minimally invasive, and you can still walk around/be mobile during your labor.
She then notes that the American Pregnancy Association estimates that onlyinbabies even get GBS anyway when the mom has it and doesn't take antibiotics.
But, if she takes antibiotics, this risk is reduced toin,, Fine, fine. BUT THE THING THAT DRIVES ME CRAZY is that she then notes, in the next paragraph, that for those that reeeeally wanna stay "allnatural" while ALSO addressing the GBS Faulkner writes:
"Some midwives and homeopaths offer garlic, acidophilus, or herbbased or other nondrug therapies and report good outcomes.
"
AAH. AAAAAH. LADY! You just told me the likelihood of the baby getting it IF I DO NOTHING is,it probably ain't the garlic! Oh mamma mia, MMAAAAAMMA MIA.
Anyway, it's that tone of not only propagating nonscientific claims garlic and probiotics, indeed, but of using a contradictory way of decisionmaking "your baby probably won't get it, but garlic might also help, so try that just in case!" that I find frustrating, confounding, and also overly accommodating of magical thinking behaviors.
Faulkner is very careful, I think, in only suggesting pseudomedicines that are very unlikely to HARM people no one's going to overdo the garlic, or get killed by acupuncture, but it rankles me that we're not even acknowledging that this stuff has, well, zero scientific evidence backing it up.
It's giving people a false sense of control and a dangerous opportunity for false positives and false negatives my magic garlic worked just as good as that antibiotic!.
I mean, I have a whole other rant about how these pregnancy debates are rife with claims about the "natural" pregnancy/labor/birthing methods that have been employed for "hundreds of thousands of years by humans" and, oh God, the mention of "this is how women in Africa do it" i.
e. this whole "appeal to the pregnancy sitelinknoble savage" that is, mamma mia, MAMMA MIA, so incredibly ignorant, Again, I've heard claims about how "women in Indian and African villages do it this way" uttered in reverential tones, and in the same breath as the US's terrible pregnancy industrial complex.
As a reminder: the maternal mortality rate in India is sitelinkdeaths per,births so,times the rate in the US, This glamorization of the circumstances of poverty, in service of a "cosmic motherhood" idealogy, drives me BANANAS,
Phew. What a rant. Must be those hormones, eh!
Okay, one more depressing thing about this book and this isn't Faulkner's fault at all, and AGAIN, I don't wanna overcriticize her, THE BOOK IS FINE, I am using this review to vent about the whole social whirlpools around the Modern American Pregnancy is that she spends a fair bit on the breastfeeding section coaching women on their rights to breastfeed at work.
Thanks to Obamacare, insurers now need to provide breast pumps for free, and workplaces have to allow breaks and private places not bathrooms for expressing milk.
Faulkner provides some pep talks/example retorts to women whose workplaces are NOT hospitable to, uh, having a uterus and procreating, And this is just depressing and sad, I can't believe the US is like this and I kind of wonder if the Mommy Wars are a symptom of a broken, patriarchal system that frightens and punishes women about all this stuff.
I can't believe this should even be an issue, But, of course, it seems to be and for many women, So yeah, that's a frickin' bummer,
OVERALL: Okay, if you're pregnant, though I still recommend Oster over this, The stuff about what life is like AFTER birth was the most pragmatic and helpful for me, We need Federally mandated paid parental leave in the US, .