How do you deal with the risk involved with pregnancy?

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HerCrazierHalf

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I’m engaged and of course she is not pregnant right now. But among the things we discussed is that one day she very likely will be. While I’m happy about her being the future mother of my child I am perplexed about the changes and risks I am asking of her (even though she seems to welcome it).

In my mind, I see pregnancy as an inherently dangerous undertaking even in good conditions. Just a few centuries ago it wouldn’t be uncommon for a woman to expire during childbirth. For lack of a better phrase the mechanics of it seems risky and troubling. It is almost like I’m saying to her “Let’s cause your internal organs to be crushed to half it’s original size for half a year while limiting your mobility and occasionally giving you nausea. And if something goes really wrong you might expire or end up with life long conditions.” (A few family members became diabetic during our shortly after pregnancy) My fiancé simply says her body is designed for it, but that doesn’t make it feel like I’ll be contributing to endangering her life to create life.

Since a few of you here have had children or are open to it, how do you handle those concerns?
 
Unless your fiance has a medical condition, your fears are pretty unfounded. The vast majority of pregnancies are uneventful and these day, pregnant women are monitored diligently in order to forsee and prepare for complications. Even more common complications like gestational diabetes and hyperclampsia are easily controlled by doctors and rarely have a lasting effect. Your fiance is correct that a woman’s body is designed for pregnancy and childbirth and it is unlikely that any harm will come to her. That being said, there are some women who have medical reasons that a pregnancy could be more risky and I imagine the way they handle it depends on their faith, their outlook on life, and their desire to have a family.
 
For starters, you could do some research on maternal mortality rates in your country/state. Such deaths, although they still occur, are very infrequent in first world countries today. If you are in California, based on your listed location, I expect the rates are incredibly low. You should probably hold greater fear that your wife will die in a car accident than suffer a pregnancy related death.

Secondly, I’m not sure what the alternatives are. If you intend to enter marriage with this woman, but do not intend to have children with her, she needs to know this before entering the marriage. For many people that would be a deal-breaker, and in the Catholic faith it’s basically (in almost all cases) unacceptable.

There are risks in everything we do in life. I’m about to go get some lunch. Maybe I’ll get hit by a car crossing the road. Maybe I’ll choke on my meal. But I’m going to go have some lunch regardless.
 
Thing can and do go wrong, but the vast majority of pregnancies end in a happy healthy Mom with a new baby. Put your Faith in God as you do every time you drive a car, fly in an airplane, cross the street, or go to bed at night. Your fiance is right her body is designed to grow and deliver a baby. Many risks are managed very well when they arise, but dont borrow trouble. Is there some reason why you think she may be at greater risk?
 
Shorty after I had our first hubs had told me that he wasn’t sure he could bear to see me go through that again.

To be honest the sentiment really rubs me the wrong way. I know he means well. But it’s a bit of a backwards way of showing support. I had a fantastic pregnancy. No morning sickness. No sending him out in the middle of the night for a burger. You’d think he’d be thanking his lucky stars. It bothers me to the point of being angry. I didn’t show it . His intentions are good and don’t deserve my anger. But thoughts of “who asked you? I’M the one who experiences all that. Who asked you to be scared for me?” immediately come into my head.

If II want to have kids of my own someday, that means putting up with the joys of pregnancy. I don’t need to hear how horrible pregnancy is and the risks involved. I’ve already made up my mind that the potential good far outweighs the bad.

It’s like when I decided to do a marathon. Some people’s idea of support was to caution me that I could get seriously hurt and that people have died trying to go that distance. I know they mean well but still…

Like people have said before. It’s a risk. We take risks every day. Is it worth not ever driving your car or walk along the side of the road because of the potential for someone else to hit you?
 
HerCrazierHalf said:
I’m engaged and of course she is not pregnant right now. But among the things we discussed is that one day she very likely will be. While I’m happy about her being the future mother of my child I am perplexed about the changes and risks I am asking of her (even though she seems to welcome it).

In my mind, I see pregnancy as an inherently dangerous undertaking even in good conditions. Just a few centuries ago it wouldn’t be uncommon for a woman to expire during childbirth. For lack of a better phrase the mechanics of it seems risky and troubling. It is almost like I’m saying to her “Let’s cause your internal organs to be crushed to half it’s original size for half a year while limiting your mobility and occasionally giving you nausea. And if something goes really wrong you might expire or end up with life long conditions.” (A few family members became diabetic during our shortly after pregnancy) My fiancé simply says her body is designed for it, but that doesn’t make it feel like I’ll be contributing to endangering her life to create life.

Since a few of you here have had children or are open to it, how do you handle those concerns?
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Take your concerns to God in prayer. Your worries are rather unfounded and God is not the author of fear. Pray the rosary every day concerning any future pregnancy. God designed the woman’s body to handle a pregnancy and all that it entails. Trust God and stop listening to your fears.
 
Worry a little but not a ton. It’s truly amazing the way God designed a woman’s body. Most things that can go wrong are completely controllable , just find a good doctor and make sure she is supported with good nutrition and physical help by you. If she marries you in the church she already understands procreation is a part of mrriage so you are not asking her to do something for you. You are making a mutual decision to improve the world by raising a gift from God whi you will teach to help others and spread the good word.
 
This guy is a non believer so I don’t think he is going to say the Rosary, he might not even know how to say a Rosary, all we can do on the Forum is for all the Forum member to pray for him as he wont pray for himself that God who is a Loving Father will look after his future wife when she is pregnant and that all his fears will be dissolved when he sees his first born.

You know the saying.

Thank God I am an Atheist.
 
Unless the pregnancy is an ecoptic pregnancy (which needs surgery immediately)…very few pregnancies are extremely dangerous.
 
The US actually has a pretty high mortality rate for both the mother and child for a developed country. (This is mostly due to the interventions which cause us to have a c-section rate of around 33%, IMHO)

Pregnancy itself is completely normal and if not viewed as a health problem or an aberration, which surely it isn’t or the population would have died off long before now, healthy and exciting.

I had a lovely pregnancy two years ago. A natural birth outside of a hospital with a midwife and it was a lovely experience. I enjoyed labor and childbirth, and it was far easier than actually having a baby who may or may not have colic 😉

Take a Bradley class. Educate yourself. Education is the antidote to fear and it will enable you both to have a healthy baby and healthy mom!
 
Celtic_Maiden said:
This guy is a non believer so I don’t think he is going to say the Rosary, he might not even know how to say a Rosary, all we can do on the Forum is for all the Forum member to pray for him as he wont pray for himself that God who is a Loving Father will look after his future wife when she is pregnant and that all his fears will be dissolved when he sees his first born.

You know the saying.

Thank God I am an Atheist.
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Sometimes all it takes is a kind invitation to prayer to start. I think Op was asking for help with his fears and the best answer is prayer whether he believes totally or not. Op, I am praying for you.
 
The natural death rate for mothers is something like 1% per pregnancy, I believe. Fortunately, modern medicine can do substantially better than that.

For more exact, expert advice, skepticalob.com (it’s an anti-homebirth site run by a retired OB/GYN) has a lot of doctors, nurses and actual nurse midwives commenting, as well as lay people. (In the US, we unfortunately have a lot of practitioners called certified professional midwives who often have very dubious credentials–they are generally the people you find doing homebirths in the US. Certified nurse midwives are highly trained professionals, while certified professional midwives are not at all and are not allowed to do births in hospitals. It’s tricky!) The issue of intervention versus non-intervention is discussed quite exhaustively at skepticalob.com.

When the time comes, be supportive without being bossy, and try to come to a number of OB or midwife visits.
 
HerCrazierHalf said:
I’m engaged and of course she is not pregnant right now. But among the things we discussed is that one day she very likely will be. While I’m happy about her being the future mother of my child I am perplexed about the changes and risks I am asking of her (even though she seems to welcome it).

In my mind, I see pregnancy as an inherently dangerous undertaking even in good conditions. Just a few centuries ago it wouldn’t be uncommon for a woman to expire during childbirth. For lack of a better phrase the mechanics of it seems risky and troubling. It is almost like I’m saying to her “Let’s cause your internal organs to be crushed to half it’s original size for half a year while limiting your mobility and occasionally giving you nausea. And if something goes really wrong you might expire or end up with life long conditions.” (A few family members became diabetic during our shortly after pregnancy) My fiancé simply says her body is designed for it, but that doesn’t make it feel like I’ll be contributing to endangering her life to create life.

Since a few of you here have had children or are open to it, how do you handle those concerns?
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Keeping the risks in mind helps give one the proper respect for sexual relations. Sex involves life and death issues. When you engage in sexual relations with a woman, pregnancy is a possibility. I think we have forgotten all of those things as a culture, and I think your are wise to remember them. It should not cause you to fear having children but rather help you to have sincere respect for your future wife who will be potentially be the mother of any childen you may have together in the future. Treat her well. When she says she loves you with her body, she may literally be giving you her life.
 
A woman’s body is not naturally designed for childbirth. The birth canal is way too small in many cases and the infant’s head is way too large in many cases. At one time that resulted in woman having to labor literally to death trying to deliver a child that could not pass.

Fortunately, with modern medicine, we can do much better. Caesarian sections can fix the problem of a narrow birth canal quite nicely.

There are still risks, however, and the more pregnancies carried, the greater the lifetime risk. In addition, while C-Sections solve the problem of natural fit, it adds the problem of anaesthesia which comes with its own risks.

Both of you need to sit down and take a look at the mortality rates, her own biology, etc. and decide together whether or not to take that risk. Most people decide the amount of risk is worth their bundle of joy, but it really is worth an investigation and coming to consensus together.
 
Fathers often worry about the safety of their wives and about how they are going to provide for their families. Your worries are typical, but typically the fellows who worry are the ones that everyone else ought to worry about the least!

A maternal death rate of 16 per 100,000 pregnancies in the United States is high among the developed nations, but let us keep this in perspective. The death rate per 100,000* in the population* by vehicle deaths is about 10, twice the rate of the safest countries. The mortality rate is improving for persons inside American cars during accidents, but rising for American pedestrians, motorcyclists and bicyclists. Does this mean you are now afraid to travel near an American road? I hope it means you wear a seatbelt while driving carefully, and make certain you make yourself as visible as possible when you are walking or riding near a road.
wnyc.org/story/294888-global-road-deaths-reach-all-time-low-car-carnage-not-dropping-everywhere/

For both mother and child, it is the safest time in the history of the world to go through a pregnancy, and the things that make pregnancy and birth less safe are well-known: obesity, poor nutrition, lack of prenatal care, smoking, drinking, and so on. Patients who do what they can to have safe pregnancies face risks that are much lower than patients who do not take similar measures.

Your wife’s pregnancy will go better for both of you if you regularly remind yourself to avoid hyperventilating about the dangers. As with all the other dangers in your life, know what the sensible precautions are, take those without fail, and trust in God to get you through those perils that due vigilance could not prevent. Pregnancy is a more emotional journey than the other dangerous things we do in life, but there is no reason to let fear take away the joy of it.

Oh, and I knew a guy who was so protective that he would not allow his wife to eat* a piece of rum cake* while she was pregnant, even though her physician would have allowed it. Keep a grip on yourself, and don’t be that guy.

(Just another piece of perspective: One source I found estimated the maternal death rate in eighteenth-century rural England, to be about 2500 per 100,000 births. That tells us about the kind of improvement that current knowledge and technology provides.)
 
My husband and I have 6 children, and one on the way. I can tell you that the joys of pregnancy generally outweigh the risks and the negative aspects (even with all-day “morning” sickness). Especially for the mother.

It’s good that you are worried about her health and well-being, but at the same time, if/when she gets pregnant, don’t get so involved in the details and the risks that you missing sharing the joys with her. Don’t forget that she is not just a physical body, but she also has a heart that needs to know you love her and trust her and believe in her and want to build a future (and probably, a family) with her. 🙂
 
UbiCaritas15 said:
The US actually has a pretty high mortality rate for both the mother and child for a developed country. (This is mostly due to the interventions which cause us to have a c-section rate of around 33%, IMHO)
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This isn’t true at all.

The stats that show this are severely and fundamentally flawed. The reason is that in the US,any birth of a baby who takes even one breath is considered a “live birth”, and this is not the case in most of the rest of the world. Most countries don’t consider it a “live birth” if the baby dies shortly after being born, and some countries extend this period by hours or even days. They do this to improve their stats, but it does nothing to improve the quality of medicine they practice.

What they are doing is ignoring preemies and high risk babies, and then declaring the superiority of their medical system. Meanwhile, the US includes ALL babies, and our rate of success in keeping high risk babies alive is outstanding compared to the rest of the world. They simply aren’t in the same ballpark.
 
I suppose it is one of those things I’ll have to just have trust about.

I guess I’ll just ask her to talk it over with her doc at some point and just shut up about it from them on. Well that and a light hearted “what have I done?” if she becomes pregnant to defuse my issues.

Perhaps this is one of those things that maybe women are more likely to understand. I think it could be me trying to apply “do unto others…” when I don’t have a good frame of reference being a guy and all.
 
HerCrazierHalf said:
Perhaps this is one of those things that maybe women are more likely to understand. I think it could be me trying to apply “do unto others…” when I don’t have a good frame of reference being a guy and all.
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There is no act that my husband had ever “done unto me” that I charish more than giving me my daughter.
 
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