In honour of May, 4, the day that recognizes how important midwives are worldwide, it is even more important to recognize what happens in countries without midwives or access to reliable healthcare. Tanzania, for example, has a dangerously low number of women’s health care professionals and midwives. Because of this, it is one of the ...
Women these days are taking longer to give birth than in the 1960s. According to recent research, one of the main reasons is greater levels of medical intervention, specifically the use of epidural anaesthesia. The research is based on the childbirth experiences of women in the United States. I can remember watching an episode of ...
The idea of a woman eating her placenta post-pregnancy is nothing new, but January Jones, our beloved Betty Draper (now Ms. Francis), makes it sound hip. Or at least a little less gross. She may have been wary at first, but Jones now tells People.com that she recommends every new mom eat her placenta — ...
Traditional birth attendants provide the majority of care to women in Sierra Leone. But despite the fact that the country has less than 80 professional midwives and only six obstetricians the government in Sierra Leone has banned them from practising their craft. The argument goes that because traditional birth attendants do not have knowledge of ...
How late is too late? When it comes to inducing labour this question is far from easy. Different countries have different rules in health services and women regularly come under pressure to fit in with them. But just as not every woman will get morning sickness or an aversion to coffee not every woman bakes ...
For women who have had a child before, giving birth is just as safe in a hospital, at home, or with a midwife, according to a new study. The research looked at 64,500 births in England and concluded that low-risk mothers should have the right to choose where they give birth. Who is low risk? ...
Dear Madame X, Any moment now my girlfriend is going to give birth to our first child. We’ve taken the classes and I’ll be there to hold her hand, support her and get ice chips, but I’m just not interested in heading down and checking out the business end of things. I’m ok with doctors ...
Controversy has erupted over women’s bodies in Britain this week. Pregnant women’s bodies, in particular. In other words, a very personal time in a woman’s life, yet one that causes all manner of people to come out of the woodwork with advice, opinions and unsolicited touching of the bump. A new report by the National ...
Childbirth. Despite having what a shop assistant once described as “splendid childbearing hips,” I don’t know much about it. Even with my lack of maternal knowledge, there were a few things I took as fact. –It takes about nine months to grow a baby. –There is a lot of kicking from within the bump. –There’s ...
Most women fear childbirth like the plague, but new information reveals that women are now getting pregnant over and over again just to feel the high of birth once more. Every movie we’ve ever seen or story we’ve heard has made childbirth seem like one of the most terrifying experiences to go through. But then they show us ...
The latest film in the American Pie series, American Reunion, contains a shocking scene – male full-frontal nudity including...
Dear Madame X, I have just started seeing this girl. She seems great, but she recently told me she...
Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved arrived in my hands via a public library, when I was a broke teenager with...
My attention was drawn this week to an article about the reaction at a Canadian university to proposals to...
Airport security. Bloody nuisance. Also a conspiracy designed to subjugate women. Allow me to elaborate. Despite flying quite a...
The Cannes film festival has kicked off this week with controversy over the lack of films made by women...
Dear Madame X, I seem to be only attracted to men who are macho assholes. I like them at...
When A Clockwork Orange was published in 1962, the term sexualized violence wasn’t in use. The distinction between sexualized...
