How The Women and Gender Studies Minor Had an Impact on My Life

When I was a sophomore in college I took the introduction to women and gender studies class at Kutztown University. In that class, I learned so much that I had not known before. Most I probably still would not know if it had not been for that class. I learned in that class that gender was fluid and that all people should be able to live their lives how they wish to without it have to be deemed okay by others. After learning so much from this class and actually enjoying what I learned and feeling as though it could be applied to everyday life I decided to go through with adding the women and gender studies minor.

Many of the people in my life have asked how Women and Gender studies could possibly help me when I am getting a degree in biology. Personally most days I feel as though this minor has prepared me a bit more for the career path that I have chosen, which is Ob-Gyn Sonography. This minor has made me aware of many things that just studying science could not have prepared me for. For example this whole semester I have written a blog about women’s experiences through pregnancy.
I have been exposed to not just the happy side of pregnancy but also the heartbreaking experiences that women go through all the time but tend to just not speak about because of how painful and traumatizing it could be. When I chose to go for Ob-Gyn sonography I never even thought of the fact that things can and do go wrong in pregnancies. I have also learned through reading books and talking to women who have had these experiences that many times the first person to recognize that something is wrong may be the ultrasound technician. This has made me aware of the reality of the career path I have chosen and better prepare me for what I may end up experiencing.
The women and genders studies minor has also taught me that while I may have a lot of privilege in my life there are others that aren’t so fortunate. This minor has taught me that if I truly want everyone to be given the equal chances that they deserve, I need to speak up and use my privilege to help those who may not be given the voice and opportunities that I am. Through the classes I have taken and the professors I have worked with I have learned to fight for what you believe in. This can be done by setting a goal and educating myself on how to reach it and not stop until it is met.

This link is about women who had a women and gender studies minor and how it chnaged their lives. https://www.une.edu/cas/womens/life-changing

One of the professors I have looked up to since my Introduction class is Dr. Clemens. Watching her fight for what she believes in no matter what obstacles are thrown her way has shown me that as long as you stay true to who you are and what you believe in you can make a change in the world whether it is tiny or huge there can impact someone’s life. I will forever be grateful for deciding to pursue the minor in Women and Gender studies and what the classes and professors have taught me about life in general along with what can help prepare me for future careers. I would without a doubt always encourage people at Kutztown University to take the women and gender studies program.

Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality Studies

The Unexpected Loss of A Child

In the book An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination by Elizabeth McCracken, we are told the story of Elizabeth’s first pregnancy which resulted in her baby being stillborn and what she went through both during and afterward. She also explains how the unexpected loss of her first child affected her through her second pregnancy. She also tells how the experience influenced the choices she made through that pregnancy. Elizabeth and her husband were living in France when she was pregnant with their first child, she had an overall easy pregnancy for the whole nine months. That was until days before her due date she could not feel the baby moving so she was rushed to the hospital, where they had found that there was no longer a heartbeat.

https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/stillbirth/facts.html

After they had found no heartbeat she delivered the baby and had their own funeral. Once that had all been done her and her husband decided to leave France and come to America. Throughout her grieving process Elizabeth said one thing that made her feel better most of the time was just having friends, family, and colleagues reach out and express their sympathy for her which made her feel less alone, “Some people apologize for sending sympathy through the ether; some overnighted notes; it made no difference to me, I read them, reread them. They made me cry, which helped. They moved me, that is to say, they felt physical, they budged me from the sodden disintegrating lump I otherwise was.” She even explained how during her second pregnancy she went to New Orleans for a conference and those there to see her expressed their sympathy. Along with their sympathy, they told her of their own experiences with stillbirth as to let her know she was not alone.
Once her first baby, that they had referred to as “Pudding” had been stillborn, Elizabeth began to blame herself for what had happened. Eventually it was proven that there had been nothing wrong in her blood work and placenta and that something had happened that nobody could have prevented but there was still that thought lingering in the back of her head, “Still, pregnant for the second time, some days I just imagined I had done everything wrong and was doing everything wrong all over again.” With this news when Elizabeth became pregnant again she decided to do nothing of what she had done during her first pregnancy.
One of the most difficult things for Elizabeth during her second pregnancy was every nurse or doctor asking if it was her first pregnancy and then having to explain what had happened in her first pregnancy. With this most doctors would speak as if there was nothing that would happen to her baby which she did not like at all because nothing could be guaranteed. That was until she found a doctor who understood what she had gone through and decided to celebrate little milestones they made it to during the pregnancy, for example when they hit 28 weeks along the doctor was excited as they were far enough that if Elizabeth had to deliver there would be a high chance of survival.

Luckily for Elizabeth, her second pregnancy resulted in her getting to bring home a baby boy, the baby that she was holding most of the time while writing this book. Even after everything she experienced though she states how she still doesn’t know what to answer when people ask if he is her first child or how many children she has, “My first child was stillborn. I want people to know but I don’t want to say it aloud.” She also explains how she does have a happy life and could not be happier to have the child she does but none of that will ever replace her first child, “It’s a happy life, but someone is missing. It’s a happy life, and someone is missing. It’s a happy life.”

Jane: An Abortion Service. The Women Involved

There were many women involved with Jane the Abortions Service and there were also close to ten thousand women who had an abortion through the service. Sunny Chapman was one of the women who had used Jane to have an abortion. She expresses in the documentary how each women going through with an abortion is having a horribly painful procedure and they are desperate to have it done while being scared at the same time. Sunny explained how when they taught sexual education in school, that they had skimmed over it so delicately that they had not learned anything.

Jane had become so widespread that when a woman named Judith found out she was pregnant and called her friend who was a medical student to ask how to get an abortion. Her friend and all of their colleagues gave her the number to Jane. Another woman, Sabrina, who got pregnant at nineteen had a big debate if she would keep her daughter as she didn’t have any access to an abortion at the time. Because of lack of sex education and the “rule” that a woman should be married before having children she married her boyfriend and she had the baby.

When her parents found out, her mom told her that if she had known she would have helped her get an abortion while her father discussed how if she had told them sooner she could have been married quicker. Sabrina was furious when her father said that as she was confused and upset about feeling as though no matter what she would have had to be pregnant anyway and have no control over her reproductive rights.

Another woman who remained unnamed stated how before knowing about jane she wanted so badly to not be pregnant that she was running up and down the stairs, took burning hot baths, jumped off someones garage, took medicine and made herself sick. After none of these caused her to lose the pregnancy, she was given the number of someone who performed abortions and they sounds as if they didn’t know what they were talking about and didn’t care about her wellbeing. At that point she decided she would rather die than let that person give her an abortion.

When she eventually contacted, Jane they offered to help her and answered all of her questions such as if it was going to hurt, if she could bleed to death, if she would be able to have children at some point afterward, and if there would be anything permanently wrong with her after. To state how comfortable she felt getting an abortion through the service she said “I was scared to have an abortion not a Jane abortion, I trusted them, we were a team.”

https://www.npr.org/2018/01/19/578620266/before-roe-v-wade-the-women-of-jane-provided-abortions-for-the-women-of-chicago

All of the women who worked for Jane expressed how they just wanted to help women who could not afford abortions, and those who wanted abortions for their own personal reasons. The extent the workers went to make sure the women were comfortable was immeasurable, they stayed with the women during the abortions and checked up on them after, they made the place in which they procedure was performed feel comfortable and not like a clinic. They also made sure those who had an abortion were provided with antibiotics and instructions for after when they went home.

Since the workers were not doctors, they were more careful with the patients because they were afraid to hurt someone since that would be unacceptable as what they were doing was illegal. Overall, the one hundred and twenty five women who worked for Jane were more concerned with giving women what they wanted. They set out to make women aware of their rights and work towards changing the system through showing kindness and consideration when they performed their 12,000 safe illegal abortions.

Jane: An Abortion Service. How it Began and What They Did

In the documentary “Jane: An Abortion Service, the Underground Abortion Service”, they discuss how the service was created and why it was created. Women who used the service are also interviewed about their experience and how they were treated when using it. Heather Booth was the creator of Jane, which she created in Chicago in 1965. The year before she had done work in Mississippi where she saw the value in working towards a goal and she could create a change. So when one of her friend’s sister became pregnant and wanted an abortion, she was able to make calls and find a willing physician. Once she helped that for one person, the word spread and she started receiving many calls and she decided to set up a system for women to talk about what to do.

Heather first was receiving calls for the network in her dorm and she says at first it seemed to be more of a student network. The service first started helping those at Chicago based schools and then spread through the midwest. By 1967, the service got too large for her to handle herself so when she went to meetings for other organizations, she was a part of she would ask others if they were interested in helping to see her after the meeting.

When it was being started, it was around the time of the Vietnam War and police riots within America. There was the male movement occuring at the time, but abortion was not seen as a movement and in return nothing really changed for women. Jane wanted to be focused on women’s liberation concerning abortion counseling, meaning what they could expect medically, emotionally, and be there to provide support. The service also worked to maintain that if any doctor involved was in any was abusive or harmful they immediately dropped them from the list of trusted people.

When they first starting helping women get abortions they would pick them up and drop them off in different cars to wherever the procedure was happening and keep the woman blindfolded so only a select few knew where it was.The doctor would only meet with one person at a time because the believed any more than that and it would be seen as a conspiracy. The doctor at the time also was charging five hundred dollars for each abortion performed. Finally, in 1970 the women who worked for Jane started working closer with the doctor and began to learn themselves how to perform an abortion; with that the prices came down making it more accessible to women and they began training other workers in the service.

Eventually abortion became legal in New York, so the women who could afford the legal abortions were sent there; those who could not afford the travel or the abortion still were helped by the service. The women who performed the procedure told the patients upfront that they weren’t medical professionals and would explain what would happen and how it would happen. When they began they were working three to four days a week with ten to fourteen people a day and by then end they were performing twenty to twenty five a day. The procedures occurred in an apartment the workers of Jane had, where the front of the apartment was a waiting room and where they did additional counseling and the back was where the abortions occurred.

The service slowed down a bit when they had been busted by the cops and everyone there at the time had been charged with homicide, which would have resulted in 110 years for each woman involved. Eventually the charges were dropped and they went right back to helping the women they said they would help. The service only stopped when abortion had finally became legal. The women who worked for Jane said there was a reason for the service existing when abortion was illegal but once it was legal that the service was even more illegal than it already had been. Over the span of the five years the service existed and was running they helped close to ten thousand people who had been willing to risk their lives to have an abortion.

https://www.cwluherstory.org/the-jane-bust-articles/grand-jury-hears-abortion-case-this-month

Every Pregnancy and Birthing Experience is Different

It is said that no two pregnancies are the same and that statement couldn’t be more true. Pregnancy and birthing experiences can differ between women but they can also be different for each pregnancy one person has. I decided to interview a few of my family members to learn about their pregnancies and birthing experiences. Each of them have had different experiences and have also been pregnant at different times in their lives.

My cousin, Deana, was the first person I decided to ask about her pregnancies as she had her second child three months ago. When Deana was younger she was diagnosed with PCOS, Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, a hormonal disorder which can affect your ability to get pregnant. She unfortunately was told she would only ever have a 15% chance of getting pregnant. Luckily for Deana, she now has two sons but her pregnancies and birthing experiences were not the easiest. For her first pregnancy, overall, it was not too bad but she did have recurring morning sickness. When it came time to give birth, she was not able to get an epidural as there was an ingredient within it that she was allergic to.

During Deana’s second pregnancy, she had extreme pelvic pain on top of the morning sickness. When it got time for her to give birth to her second baby, she knew she would not be able to have an epidural. The doctor explained how if it came to having a C-section that she would need to be put under and with that they would have limited time to get the baby out before both her and the baby’s life could be at risk.

When Deana did give birth, she told me that when the baby came out, he made no noise and was discolored. The doctor cut the umbilical cord and the baby was rushed to a group of nurses to work on him while the doctor worked on Deana and kept asking the nurses to keep him updated. Eventually the baby began crying and they were able to hold him, but even to this day the doctor and nurses have not told her what exactly had been wrong.

The second person I discussed their pregnancy and birthing experiences with was my sister Brooke. She has been experienced three pregnancies, with her first pregnancy being easy overall; the only surprise she endured in that pregnancy was that she eventually had to have an unplanned C-section.  This happened because she was unable to dilate the last centimeter and had already been in labor for twenty two hours. In between my sister’s first and last pregnancy, she had experienced a miscarriage. Brooke’s last pregnancy went almost exactly as her first pregnancy, but this one she had beforehand decided to get a c-section again simply because she had one with her previous pregnancy.

https://www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/pregnancy/miscarriage

https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/healthyliving/caesarean-section

Finally, I asked my mom about the two pregnancies she had gone through. Her first one had been a very simple pregnancy with no complications and a natural birth. Then for her second pregnancy, with me, she was forty-two  and went into labor two months early. When I was born, I weighed a little more than four pounds, my lungs had not been fully developed, and I had to stay in the hospital after my mom was discharged. Eventually, when I was able to come home, I had all these monitors on me to alert my parents if something was going wrong; luckily there had been no further complications with me.

https://www.marchofdimes.org/complications/long-term-health-effects-of-premature-birth.aspx

The Experiences Women Have Had and How Abortion Laws Affect Them

There were many troubling stories of the experiences women had gone through in the documentary Birthright: A War Story. Most of the horrible experiences these women had gone through resulted from laws against abortion. The first story that was told was about Danielle Deaver and her husband, Robb. Danielle was twenty two weeks along in her second pregnancy when her water broke. At the hospital, they were unable to induce labor and let everything happen naturally because the state of Nebraska has just passed a twenty week fetal pain bill.

This bill meant that if the doctor would have induced Danielle, he could be convicted of a felony and lose his license to practice. Danielle then had to wait ten days for them to do anything for her and, at that point, she was extremely sick because of an infection and membranes rupturing; Danielle eventually gave birth to a baby girl, who passed away within minutes. Danielle and Robb believe that had this law not been passed, they wouldn’t have had to go through the trauma of losing their daughter, but also Danielle almost dying from not being induced.

Another woman’s story is Jennie McCormack from Idaho who is a single mom of three children and living off of child support. She got pregnant and did not realize until she started showing; there was no way for her to get an abortion as the clinics near her do not allow it once you enter the second trimester of your pregnancy. Jennie knew she would not be able to afford or provide for another child so she resorted to getting pills online to induce labor at home. Later when she told a friend about the pills, they reported her to the police which led to Jennie being investigated and charged with  a felony and homicide. She was not aware that it was considered illegal if she did it at home and induced labor herself. Eventually federal court found the law unjust for her and her family and charges were dropped. Jennie still says how she does not regret what she did but she regrets the repercussions it had for her family.

Finally, we have the story of Laurie Roberts who was twelve weeks along in her second pregnancy when she started to notice a pink discharge. Her whole life she had gone to a catholic hospital and when she went there,  she was informed that she was most likely having a miscarriage. The hospital’s response to that was to send her home because there was nothing they could do since they could detect a heartbeat. With how heavily she was bleeding, Laurie eventually went into shock and when the paramedics got to her, they realized how much her health had deteriorated when they tried to put an IV in and discovered that her veins were beginning to collapse. Laurie was then rushed to the hospital and had an emergency dilation and curettage to get the fetus out to keep her alive.

Experiences that these women had happen more often than we think. With the pro-choice and pro-life argument, I believe that people are forgetting that the woman who is pregnant should have her life as a priority. In many of the cases told in Birthright: A War Story,  the women could have gone through much less trauma if the laws against abortion took into account that it would medically beneficial for a them to be able to get the baby out of her without being on the brink of death.

Below is a video that shows how not only in the United States, but in other countries the anti-abortion laws can cause women to be arrested for having a miscarriage. This happens if it is suspected that the woman tried to attempt an abortion.

The Political Beliefs Around Abortion

The documentary Birthright: A War Story follows the division in the United States of America on the topic of abortion, contraceptives, and sex education. This documentary shows the two sides those who are pro-choice and those who are pro-life and their reasoning for their opinion, as well as why they believe their opinion is the “right” opinion. It is discussed how those who are pro-life and have been working to overturn Roe v. Wade since it was put into action, will not just be taking away women’s right to have access to legal and safe abortions, but will also take away many other rights that women have. These rights being taken away can be seen in states that have made abortion illegal, for example pregnant women suffering miscarriages can be found of trying to abort their baby and be charged for the crime when they had done nothing wrong to cause the miscarriage.

There was also the Hyde Amendment which prevented federal funding from being used to pay for abortion unless it was to save the woman or if the pregnancy occurred from rape. This amendment resulted in many women seeking unprofessional abortions leading to many deaths; for example Rosie Jimenez was a 27 year old single mother, who became pregnant and since Medicaid did not cover abortion she sought out to get one from a non-medical professional and ended going into septic shock and passing away. This situation became such a larger occurrence that hospitals started to have septic abortion wards, and a large proportion of the women in them ended up dying from infected abortions.

Along with the Hyde Amendment, the state of Texas eventually decided to cut out Planned Parenthood all together which lead to companies and pharmacists beginning to deny their patients access to contraceptives, whether it be through their insurance plans or that the pharmacists personally refused to provide it to them.  With contraceptives being harder to gain access to and sex education being taught less the amount of pregnancies and births began to rise.

Then, as women would give birth, there were hospitals that were taking what the women were saying that happened during their pregnancy and their health records and sharing it to the police without the women’s knowledge or consent. Dozens of women were dragged out of the hospital right after giving birth and were arrested for the information they had told their doctors and nurses. One woman has asked for help during her pregnancy as she knew she had an addiction to drugs and they did not help her at all until when he baby was born and they found the traces of drugs and arrested her and charged her with child abuse.

Many of these experiences continued to happen when health care systems started to be bought out by catholic hospitals and included in catholic mergers. This leads to the political and religious side of the debate intersecting and affecting the reproductive health access that women have as now abortions are being taken away and even workers are losing their insurance covering birth control. On top of that these mergers bring the religious bylaws that can keep women from getting not only abortions, but  heir routine ob gyn care, and sterilization options unless they are deemed “medically necessary.”

Below is a video that explains what happens when a woman has an abortion along with the different methods of abortion along with statistics surrounding the safety of the procedure when performed by a medical professional.

The trailer for Birthright: A War story can be seen below.

Second Thoughts About A Difficult Choice

In “Poor Your Soul” by Mira Ptacin, she was told five months into her pregnancy that her baby would not be viable outside the womb. When she was told that, she was given three choices of how she could choose to proceed with the pregnancy. Her doctors told her that for her specific situation, the three options she had were to: 1. Terminate the pregnancy within the next week of finding out, 2. Do nothing at all and possibly miscarry, or 3. Induce early and deliver within the next month.

When Mira was deciding which option she wanted to choose, the doctors told her the facts about option one. Option one, to terminate the pregnancy, which is also known “dilation and extraction” is a process where the cervix is dilated and the fetus is extracted. Dilation and extraction was the route recommended by doctors and eventually the choice that Mira made. The procedure would take three days and be painful, the first step being dilating the cervix by inserting laminaria rods. Once the cervix is dilated, the woman is put under anesthesia and then the uterine contents are removed using a curette, a surgical instrument used to remove material by a scraping action.

When Mira chose the option to terminate she asked her father, a doctor, what he knew about the procedure. He said it would be described as a “violent” experience, in the sense that a late-term abortion means a violent surgery for the pregnant woman. With it being described as this, Mira was second guessing her choices; “ While it sounded the least natural, it was what I was leaning toward, but with such a word being used to describe the end of my pregnancy, I started to look at myself as a savage. I thought my parents would start to look at me as a selfish brute and this made me defensive. Their opinion mattered too much.”

With being unsure of her decision and nobody being able to tell her if she is making the right decision, she began to do research on her procedure, and found out that the surgery has sparked debates in the country. Most debates consisted of if late-term abortion is ever necessary or needed to protect the health of the pregnant woman. Mira was essentially told that what she was going to do is wrong by what she read online, whereas if she were to continue with the pregnancy she could miscarry at any moment and, if she gave birth the baby, would suffer and be in pain for the limited time that it would be alive.

Even though the majority of abortions take place before even fourteen weeks, unless the pregnant woman’s health could be at risk, many still believe those who get abortions later just get them because they don’t want the baby. However, most of the time, late termination occurs because the patient and the doctors have thoroughly discussed the options and have decided its the safest option to move forward with. These strong opinions being thrown around, while Mira was doing what she believed was the best choice, made her feel as though she was making the wrong decision.

Percentage of 2015 Reported Abortions by Weeks of Gestation* (CDC):

≤6 wks	7 wks	8 wks	9 wks	10 wks	11 wks	12 wks	13 wks	14-15 wks	16-17 wks	18-20 wks	≥21 wks
34.2%	17.8%	13.3%	8.9%	5.6%	4.7%	3.5%	2.8%	3.5%	2.1%	2.0%	1.3%

Not too long after her procedure, Mira is at her parents house and asks her mom if she had made the right decision, and she also wants to know if her mom is okay and supports her decision. Her mother then explains to her how if she was in the same position she would have done what Mira had, and that she was strong for being able to endure what she had in her pregnancy and continue on afterward.

• Links about the medical perspective on late term abortion and stories of other women who have gone through with them.
• https://www.uvm.edu/~vlrs/doc/late_term_abortion.htm
• https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/apr/18/late-term-abortion-experience-donald-trump

The Emotions During and After Pregnancy Loss

The main feelings experienced by Mira through her loss during pregnancy would be grief, fear, and guilt. In “Poor Your Soul” by Mira Ptacin she explains in great detail all the draining emotions she went through from when she found out she was pregnant as well as during and after finding out the fate of her unborn child. When Mira initially found out she was pregnant, she was not overly excited due to the fact that her and her boyfriend, Andrew,  had only been dating for three months, and she thought it was too soon for them to be starting a family.

With all these new changes happening rapidly in her life, Mira explained how it was taking an emotional toll on her,  “As if having no control over these sudden shifts in new roles weren’t affling enough, I have no control over my body, which is now a real adult body…I’m swelling and my body isn’t under my control, and it’s leaving me more isolated and unfamiliar with this new self and its terrifying. And this fear produces, on top of everything else, an overwhelming guilt.” As she was feeling this way, she witnessed her boyfriend’s joy and excitement over the pregnancy as she experienced guilt over not being as excited as him but also feared of how they would be parents and still work on building their relationship.

Another source of guilt Mira felt came when the doctor had noticed an abnormality in a routine blood test. “I thought maybe it was my fault – maybe I forgot to take my folic acid one morning, maybe I was too stressed and cantankerous and it was poisonous to the baby. Maybe I wasn’t being sweet and motherly enough.” Eventually, when she found out there was definitely something wrong with her baby, she began to blame herself and to think of why and how this had happened to her “After the ultrasound, I began to feel that Lilly’s fate was my fault. That my fears and anger from the unplanned pregnancy had damned her.”

The guilt seemed to have come from a time very early in her pregnancy when Mira had compared the growing baby to a parasite; she had been experiencing morning sickness all day and was upset about not being able to go on with her life as she normally would. This led to her feeling an extreme guilt when she was told the horrible news because she had wanted this baby so much, but at the same time she was still working through adjusting her whole life and accepting that everything she knew was changing. After her initial shock and worries over the pregnancy and how it would affect all of her relationships, she realized she was excited about the baby and looked forward to having her own family. Fast forward to when Mira was five months pregnant, she learned her baby had many abnormalities and would not be able to survive outside the womb. Mira then had to decide whether to move forward with the pregnancy and possibly risk her health or terminate the pregnancy.

After making her decision, with guidance from medical professionals to terminate her pregnancy for her wellbeing, Mira experienced extreme guilt and depression. She felt guilty from being the one having to make the decision of how her daughter would be removed from her body, knowing she would not get a chance to live outside of her. With her decision to terminate, she feels remorse and sadness over knowing if she made the right decision. In these situations, there isn’t always a right or wrong decision, but whatever is chosen will definitely impact those affected for the rest of their lives.

Mira’s guilt eventually turns to extreme sadness and she feels alone. She eventually decides to talk to her mother about how she dealt with the loss of a child. “I am always so frustrated and angry and gloomy, like I just left a funeral or a wake, and I’m always so irritated and livid and tense, it’s getting worse. How do I make it better? I just can’t feel better.” Towards the end of the book, Mira begins going to counseling and is diagnosed with depression. For Mira, this is good news in the sense that she now knows why she is struggling to cope and move on like everybody else involved has, including Andrew. She then begins her journey of channeling her feelings into running. This ends up being Mira’s coping mechanism as she began running everyday and was able to do it alone or with her now husband and family. And finally, she began to feel somewhat normal again despite everything she had been through.

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/251666/poor-your-soul-by-mira-ptacin/9781616957667/

The Unknown Possibilities during Pregnancy

Most of the time when people think of pregnancy they think of how amazing it is that there will be a new life brought into the world. Not many people think of the negative possibilities that can occur within those nine months. As someone who is looking to work in OB/GYN sonography, even I didn’t comprehend the upsetting and life altering outcomes that  happen, and happen more often than we think. To better prepare me for my career choice I read “Poor Your Soul” by Mira Ptacin. Within this book Ptacin discusses everything she felt throughout her pregnancy from finding out she was pregnant, to learning that the baby she began to love inside her would not stand a chance living outside of her body.

There is so much that goes on during a pregnancy that a lot of the time scary traumatic things happening are not even thought of. In Mira’s case she didn’t even think about the possibility of anything going wrong until she received a phone call from her doctor saying there had been abnormal hormone levels found in her latest blood test but that there was nothing to worry about. This was the first time Mira had experienced the fear of something being off, the fear being so strong that her father, who is a doctor, could not calm her down “My father told me not to fret about the abnormal results. But even the couldn’t calm me. I was frantic.”

Reading this book surprised me, because most women who have gone through these traumatic situations don’t speak of their experiences. This allows many women to feel alone when they go through similar situations. I find it heartbreaking to read about someone’s depression because one minute they explain the excitement of watching the child grow up and the next they discuss how alone they feel and the guilt of thinking or hoping there was something preventive that could have been done.

Looking to move forward into a healthcare career, it baffles me that the doctors were referring to the baby as “it” when Mira explained just how much she would emphasize “My Daughter/Baby” or even use the name they had picked for her. “If it doesn’t die before you deliver it, the baby will have very serious problems” and “Unviable outside the womb, it is sick with zero chance of survival” were two of the statements the doctors told her when discovering her daughters state.

Mira stated in the book how the doctors, that found out her daughter would not be able to live outside the womb, treated everything very much as if it was just a procedure and as if the baby had not meant anything to her. While I understand it is important to follow protocol and not break any rules or laws, I feel as though the doctors that informing her and her baby’s situation and performing her surgery could have tried to be a bit more sympathetic with their patient. Being there with women who may be going through one of the hardest times in their lives, a little kindness and empathy towards their situation could prevent the whole experience from being more traumatic than it already may be.

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/251666/poor-your-soul-by-mira-ptacin/9781616957667/