Carole says,

> .  A recent post
> denigrated ultrasound examinations in pregnancy; I
> found this quite distressing.  There are no studies to
> indicate that ultrasound exams in and of themselves
> are harmful.  They are non-invasive and can provide
> information about the growing baby that routine
> prenatal care may miss.  And as to routine prenatal
> care...it is a simple thing to check Mama out
> regularly during pregnancy.  Urine dipstick, blood
> pressure, weight, fundal height...How are you feeling?
> Is Baby moving?
>

Ah Ah Ah -- Carole -- you misunderstood, totally, my post.  (Sheesh -- why do
I ever bother????)  I was NOT denigrating ultrasounds, though heaven knows
how I made it through three healthy pregnancies without one) -- I was merely
pointing out why and how women may feel that their bodies don't work during
breastfeeding, when we have all this technology to *help* them through
pregnancy.  And then we leave them -- high and dry -- and tell them their
bodies work?  Just trust them?  Did I say ultrasounds are harmful?  No.
(Read the post again).  What I SAID was that they are used in combination
with a hundred other things in the prenatal period to assure women that their
bodies are NOT to be trusted to deliver a baby without the technology
available (read the post again) to make sure the baby was healthy.   The idea
is that how can women feel that they can produce what their baby needs after
birth when we need all the technology at hand to assure them they are
producing what the baby needs prenatally -- and there is someone available to
step in post haste should anything appear wrong.  No matter how slight.

You see, women are basically not to be trusted.  Amazingly enough, back when
I had Jill (all of 27 years ago), the physician actually trusted the fact
that I knew when my LMP was, and didn't have to do anything "because women
are notorious for being inaccurate about that."  And you know, she was born
on the day I predicted (which was actually 1 week after her due date) and no
one got hyper about it.  Of course she was breech, which dictated a spinal
but in those unenlightened days did not dictate a C/Section.  Despite threats
that a primip breech vaginal delivery would be brain damaged and not make it
through first grade, so far she's managed to get through nursing school
(maybe she was brain damaged), and now is in an FNP Master's Program at UIC
(University of Illinois in Chicago).   But you know -- it never occurred to
me back then that I might not have enough milk for her, or that I couldn't
breastfeed -- somewhere along the line, people trusted my body to do what it
was supposed to do without all the falderol.  And it did!!  But now??  I
don't think anyone trusts a woman to do anything.

So Carole, no, I did not "denigrate ultrasounds" nor did I "denigrate"
routine prenatal care during pregnancy.  What I am denigrating is the entire
attitude that goes into prenatal care, labor and delivery as one enormous
need for technology because a woman isn't to be trusted to do it without it
all.

And that impacts her response to breastfeeding.

Jan Barger, RN, MA, IBCLC
Who has worked L&D, nursery, postpartum, birthing center, mother-baby, and
lactation over the past 35 years.

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