40's Pain Solutions (i.e., Rectal Ether)

I'm not a "warrior" as some women like to think of themselves.  I am more of a total wuss and am scare do death of childbirth causing irreparable damage to some pretty crucial parts of my body.  So I guess I am a warrior of being terrified.  I have no intention of having a natural birth.  I will not have my baby in a bath.  I will not have my baby without pain medication.  I do not like green eggs and ham.

 

But I also am glad that my options, as least as far as I know it, just include an epidural. 

 

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Check out this list of pain options in the chapter titled "PAINLESS CHILDBIRTH" from this book from the 1940's.

 

"There are a group of drugs which can be administered either by hypodermic needle or by mouth, some of which alleviate pain and others of which, either alone or in combination, abolish the memory of pain.  Let us consider both the usefulness and the drawbacks of these drugs."

 

- Morphine: That just can't be safe for a baby.

 

- Twilight Sleep: "A woman under Twilight Sleep may shriek, make grimaces and show other evidences of pain, but upon awakening from the drug will remember nothing about her labor and will vow that she experienced no pain whatsoever."  This sounds like the unfathomably unattractive version of getting drunk and blacking out and having someone film you.

 

- Rectal Ether: Just no thanks.

 

- Barbiturates: See morphine. 

 

- Paraldehyde: Like they say about food ingredients, if you can't pronounce it, don't put it in your body.  Negative ghost rider.

 

- Spinal and Continuous Causal Anesthesia: This sounds like what they use today.  And after hearing from my friend about what the administering of that drug is like, I'm wishing I didn't have friends at all.  I thought it was just a shot.

 

 

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When it comes to child birth, I think ignorance is bliss.  So I'll try to learn as little more as I can about an epidural.  I also think having something shoved up your butt or putting yourself in a temporary comma sounds pretty rough too.  So I'm glad those options are in the past.  And if I'm wrong about all this,

 

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40's Fertility Fodder...I kid you not

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How's this for a chapter opener:

 

"Clothing - The most important consideration in regard to the expectant mother's wardrobe is that it should be attractive.  This may sound like a superficial observation but it is profoundly true."

 

Ha. Ha. Ha.  Tell that to my sweat pants and t-shirt.  That I wear every night.  The exact second that I get home from work.

 

It goes on to blow my mind by saying, "Yes, more important than knowing the dangers of circular garters and high heels is the knowledge that you are well-groomed, because only then (if you are like most women) will you really enjoy entertaining your friends and meeting your husband's friends, and in turn visiting their homes."

 

"Pregnancy is no time to be a recluse."  Oh honey, no.  That's wrong.  Pregnancy is the perfect time to be a recluse.  Unless you count the company of a dog.  In which case I'm being social as shit.  Because she and I, well, we hang out a lot on my couch watching TV at night.  And we couldn't be happier.  Or more into peanut butter.

 

 

 

"To be sure, the abdominal rotundity is a handicap, but, for some reason, during the middle months of pregnancy women develop a special radiance which is most becoming and tends to offset this."

 

While I highly beg to differ about that special radiance (mine is more like a special form of adult acne), I so appreciate the new word for my "handicap" - abdominal rodtundity.  It has a really nice ring to it.

 

1940's, you so crazy.

Gender Reveal Parties Reveal My Rage

On a scale of 1-10, gender reveal parties make me want to punch a hole in the wall a 10+.  I can't tell you why, because other people's box of blue balloons or pink icing filled cupcakes don't affect me in any way directly.  But I just hate them.  They are a prime example of how every aspect of life is too commercialized and cheesy and of the dramatic decline of the simple relaying of facts.

 

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I was going to have a gender party and invite you all.  That is to say, I was going to take a picture of a piece of asparagus and two meat balls I had for dinner last week and tell you I was having a boy.  But, like usual, I forgot about my task and ate all the food instead.  But anyway, I'm having a boy.

 

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I've never seen anyone get so excited upon hearing the words "scrotal sac" as my husband did when we found out.  All he talks about now is how he is going to take our son fishing all the time. 

 

I had to break it to him that he also has to parent the child in between canoe rides.  His response: "Oh I'll spank him some too".  So, to sum up, he thinks parenting involves fishing and spanking.  End of sentence.

 

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I'm still perusing through this Expectant Motherhood book from the 40's.  And the differences between then and now continue to astound me.  For instance, now to reveal what gender baby we are having we invite over a bunch of people to watch us litter dangerous colored balloons into the atmosphere.  Back in the 40's, this is what they had to say about determination of sex:

 

"Were we to examine a large number of ova just as the spermatozoon is about to enter it, we should find that each ovum contains exactly twenty-four chromosomes; but close study would reveal that one of these differs from all the rest in appearance and is known by scientists to be a carrier of sex."

 

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So to say we have dumbed things down a bit would be a gross understatement.  Also, I heart the word spermatozoon. 

 

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I can tell by Pinterest that I am the minority in disliking these cheese-tastic gender reveal parties and subsequent Facebook posts about said parties, but can't a girl just like a good old fashioned scientific test and relation of fact to her parents and close friends?

 

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Fertility Fodder from the 40's

Did you know...

 

According to this book, "Since the very dawn of civilization efforts have been made to devise a satisfactory test for pregnancy...during the Middle Ages the omniscient physician merely gazed at the urine and in this way claimed to be able to diagnosticate not only pregnancy but many other conditions."

 

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Well, that sounds reliable.  Luckily now there are real tests like blood work and freakishly dimensional ultrasounds.

 

But back in the 40's they were "lucky" to have other methods of determining pregnancy.  Such as the following:

 

"We have at last a sound and trustworthy test for pregnancy and interestingly enough it is performed, like the tests of old, on urine.  In carrying out the test a small quantity of morning urine is injected into a mouse or rabbit.  If the urine comes from a pregnant woman, definite and characteristic changes are produced in the ovaries of the animal within forty-eight or seventy-two hour."

 

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First of all, can I get a shout out for "morning urine".  Love that term.

 

Second of all, that might sound grotesque and barbaric, but to me it's much better than the next method discussed in this chapter, "LABORATORY TESTS".

 

"During recent years a similar test which makes use of the South African toad as the test animal has gained wide popularity.  Within eight to eighteen hours after the urine of a pregnant woman has been injected into female toads of this variety, myriads of eggs are extruded which can be plainly seen on he floor of the aquarium in which the toads are kept.  This test is often loosely referred to as the "frog test".

 

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Sometimes change is a bad thing.  Like when they take the Buffalo Chicken sandwich off the menu at Hardee's.  Or when Facebook makes you manually disable a new setting that allows the world to steal your private pictures. 

 

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But when it comes to injecting toads and rabbits with our urine, I like change.  I like it a lot.  I'd rather give a lab tech my blood than a toad my morning urine any day of the week.

More from Expectant Motherhood

Ah, the good old days of the 40's.  When butter was a food group and quitting smoking was actually frowned upon during pregnancy...

 

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This brings us to what is by far my favorite excerpt from this book, and not even slightly embellished on my part.  Very fitting for the weekend too, because if you are pregnant, you might not be able to smoke or drink, you can still giggle:

 

"While most obstetrical authorities, then, disapprove of excessive smoking in pregnancy (twenty-five or more cigarettes daily), there is no reason for believing that a woman who smokes moderately, let us say ten cigarettes or less a day, need change her custom at this time.  If you have been used to smoking considerably more than this for several years, by no means try to give them up in pregnancy.  There is no surer way of upsetting the nerves at a period when you should be calm and happy, or of converting a placid, sweet-tempered girl into an intolerable shrew.  With negligible effort, even the most inveterate smoker can usually be content with a package a day or somewhat less, and if you arrange this there is no great cause for concern."

 

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So to sum up, don't you dare try to quit smoking if you currently smoke more than 10 cigs a day, just because you are pregnant!  Heaven forbid you turn into an intolerable shrew!

 

Mind = Blown

Fertility Fodder from the Forties

Move over Bossypants and Mindy Kaling.

 

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There is a new funniest book in town. 

 

It's called Expectant Motherhood by Nicholson J. Eastman and it was published in 1947.  To say things have changed since then in the world of prenatal science is an understatement.  It's also the basis for some remarkable dissection in this book, of which I have selected a few to share with you.

 

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For instance, in the chapter titled "Diet and Hydiene in Pregnancy", there is an entire good group, Group 7, called Butter and Fortified Margarine.

 

Maybe I was born in the wrong decade!  Because I love some real butter like it ain't no body's business.  This book is hilarious for a lot of reasons, but mainly for it's wicked contradictions. 

 

 

There is a whole additional chapter called "Weight Control in Pregnancy", which they hit you with after declaring that butter is a food group!  Than after they tell you the 8 steps to controlling your weight during pregnancy, and that "it is rare for expectant mothers, even though thy be of rather sedentary habits, to gain excessively if they are actually, day in and day out, on a 1900 calorie diet," they provide you with a table of a typical day's menu.  That menu, folks, adds up to a range of 2500-3600 calories. 

 

So by following these guidelines, you are sure to either lose weight during pregnancy, gain a healthy amount, or die of a heart attack from eating almost twice the amount you should actually eat.  Sound advice, 1940's.  With plenty more to come.