Do You Consider Yourself a Feminist?

TheFloatingBear said:

And, just to add to what @cabanafrau posted in regards to complexities in all of this...in my last job I was a family therapist/case manager in a residential treatment facility for adolescent girls, all of whom were either in state custody or had an open case.

I worked with many children that were adopted through the foster care system. In these cases (this is not true of all cases of course, but the ones I would see), things would go well, sometimes for several years, and then once adolescence began, behavior or emotional issues would arise/resurface that would become unmanageable for the adoptive family. The child would be placed at my agency in order to address the issues and work toward reunification, but often it was unsuccessful. The adoption would be revoked and the child's goal would be changed to Independent Living, and she would stay with us until she aged out of the system at 18YO. These were heartbreaking cases, and the adoptive families would do everything they could to make it work, but sometimes reunification and a "home" setting for the child was not possible. Sometimes it is not an easy road for anyone involved...

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Whenever any of the groups I'm involved with or just the general charitable Christmas giving discussions get rolling I always put in a plug for teens in foster care/aging out of foster care being the focus of the generosity instead of just the typical excitement of buying toys for the tiny tots. Everybody's always excited to give, give, give when it comes to the thought of how thrilled the little ones are about Santa and toys. Personally it hurts my heart to talk to some of the teens, hear what some of the social workers report about some of the struggles the teens are going through. The teen years and image are tough enough. The teen years really suck when you have access to virtually nothing to put on your back, let alone anything remotely like most kids your age are wearing. For a lot of years I was sending my daughters' hand me downs off to a friend's SIL who was running a cupboard for teens in foster care/aging out. She's no longer running it and I know it helped a lot of kids. I've suggested starting one at our church but I've never been able to get enough votes to make it happen.

luvsJack said:

Babies do not tend to be in foster care from birth. They are adopted easily.

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luvsJack said:

I have researched it on several different sites and they all say the same thing. 20 couples apply to adopt each baby that is available. Infants are easily adopted. I am talking about infants whose mother choose to put the baby up for adoption at birth. Children who are put in foster care because of one reason or another do have a long wait because they do everything they can to reunite families or keep the children with some part of the family. Two very different things being talked about.

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Foster care and private adoption are two different things. To suggest that babies do not tend to be in foster care from birth is completely incorrect. To suggest that those babies are adopted easily is also completely incorrect, as pointed out by several posters.

Eeyore2142 said:

Anyone who is saying "why not just carry the baby and put it up for adoption" - think of the burden that places on the woman. Medical fees, lost work, expenses in transportation, clothing, time off for recovery. Really? It's not just like you pop the kid out and go back to farming the field.

My body, my choice. Pro-choice doesn't mean we want to kill all the balls of cells. Which is what they are. They are not babies at this stage

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That is a belief of yours. Life begins just like life ends, with the heartbeat, in my opinion and that of many, many others.

You know, I get the worrying about the burden when we are talking about a woman who has to abort for one reason or another to do with her or her baby's health. When you are talking about someone who had unprotected sex and just doesn't want this child she created, I am sorry, but why am I supposed to be concerned with her hardship? I am all for giving her the best health care and paid maternity leave. The rest is on her. (and I had that one time of unprotected sex and got pregnant at 17, the burden for all that you name, was on me and his father)

luvsJack said:

That is a belief of yours. Life begins just like life ends, with the heartbeat, in my opinion and that of many, many others.

You know, I get the worrying about the burden when we are talking about a woman who has to abort for one reason or another to do with her or her baby's health. When you are talking about someone who had unprotected sex and just doesn't want this child she created, I am sorry, but why am I supposed to be concerned with her hardship? I am all for giving her the best health care and paid maternity leave. The rest is on her. (and I had that one time of unprotected sex and got pregnant at 17, the burden for all that you name, was on me and his father)

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How do you know it was unprotected sex? That is a HUGE leap. HUGE. There are plenty of people who take precautions and still get pregnant.

Is there not some kind of emoticon for "DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE....."
Ohhhh, here:

I'm a middle-aged woman and I have identified myself as a feminist for as long as I can remember. As someone who has made some more "traditional" choices with my life, I can understand and empathize with people that my feel marginalized by some of the current, more radical feminist viewpoints, but for me, that does not deter my more moderate voice, and I feel like identifying myself as such at this time continues to be very important. It seems like we take two steps forward and one step back, and sometimes the step back seem more subtle (or less so depending upon the issue!) than before and I for one do not want to be complacent, nor do I want my kids to be. I saw two different stories on the news this week that reflect these types of issues for me...

The first is about the unintended consequences to the #MeToo movement in the workplace. Apparently there has been in increase in men feeling uncomfortable with women in the workplace, and that is impacting woman's access to promotions, etc. I'm just summarizing so if you have time to watch the story, it goes into more depth. So, it's great that we're shining a light on harassment in the workplace, but we need to find a better solution and a better way for everyone to get a seat at the table. No harassment in the workplace should be expected and the standard normative of behavior, not the end goal.

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/shery...orkplaces-its-not-enough-to-not-harass-women/

The second one is about Olympian Alysia Montano and the article describes that she "is calling out the sports industry and sponsors like Nike for allegedly discriminating against pregnant athletes and not marrying advertising to reality." As a mother of a 12yo girl, in this specific case I appreciate that my daughter is hearing different messages than I did when I was growing up about what she is capable of accomplishing. However, some of this is just packaging to get my daughter to purchase something. The corporate structure and policy of this company is controlled by men, and it's not particularly family friendly or progressive. Now, one can argue that an athlete like this could be viewed as a independent contractor, but it still brings to light that the messages that our young people are hearing in a more general sense may not match the equality of policies in reality.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/alysia...at-they-are-preaching-alleges-discrimination/

luvsJack said:

I have researched it on several different sites and they all say the same thing. 20 couples apply to adopt each baby that is available. Infants are easily adopted. I am talking about infants whose mother choose to put the baby up for adoption at birth. Children who are put in foster care because of one reason or another do have a long wait because they do everything they can to reunite families or keep the children with some part of the family. Two very different things being talked about.

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You have private adoption confused with adoption through social services. In private adoption there are more parents than children, but only when it pertains to healthy, Caucasian children. Private adoption is a very different thing than foster care. These are children whose parents have voluntarily relinquished their parental rights.

Foster care is a whole new ballgame. When a newborn is removed from the birth mother for whatever reasons, and the birth mother will not voluntarily relinquish rights to the child there are many steps involved in terminating parental rights. Parental rights are only terminated quickly in the case of egregious neglect or abuse. The kind of thing that you see on the news.

If a newborn is removed from their birth mother they are placed into emergency foster care. Social services, then, has to go through the legal wranglings to place the child into temporary foster care. At this point the birth mother is given the opportunity to "fix" whatever situation caused her to lose custody. She is given multiple chances, so that may be drug out over years. During this time the child may be lucky enough to stay in one placement, or may be bounced around.

You are seeing average time in foster care as being 3 years because these children bounce in and out of foster care. They may go in and out being placed and then removed from birth parents, or as someone said above they may have had an adoptive placement, but because of their unstable beginnings they have ongoing psychiatric issues and are placed back into the system. This is why there are so few children in the foster care system that have had parental rights severed and are available for adoption. Reunification is always the goal, and the system errs on the side of the biological parent.

The foster care system pertains to the abortion debate because the system is already overburdened with children it cannot adequately care for. Forcing more women to have children they cannot care for will increase the amount of children being placed in the system. Already, there aren't enough foster homes in which to place these children. There aren't enough resources to adequately care for the special needs of these children, whether they are psychological, physical, neurological, or a combination of all 3.

Let's face it, most women who carry a child to term bond with that child and relinquishing a child for adoption is a very, very difficult thing. Even for women who are drug addicts (and we have a horrible drug problem, particularly in those states that are seeking to ban abortion) and women who are mentally ill. So many of these women give birth and think that they will be able to get it together and get their kids back, and they never quite can, or they cannot maintain sobriety long enough to keep their child in their custody for any significant period of time. Meanwhile, these children have been exposed to drugs and alcohol in utero and have had minimal, if any, prenatal care, and they have a host of neurological and physical problems resulting from this. Which creates a viscous circle because this makes them difficult to place or keep in one placement because of their behavior or medical needs. The inconsistency in parenting leads to more psychological and behavioral problems. The cycle continues.

cabanafrau said:

Here foster placement can be very tricky because of things like the designation foster parents are registered under. Many children that very well may wind up needing adoptive parents down the road cannot be placed in foster homes where the parents are designated as foster to adopt where the label is used to indicate a definitive preference to adopt the child(ren) they are fostering. Many people are completely unaware of the intricacies that exist and may come into play because of designations

Some people choose to foster strictly as an emergency placement, meaning they take children with virtually no notice, sometimes simply for a single day/night when a child(ren) is removed from their home and needs a bed immediately. Sometimes the kids are there a week or two until a long-term placement can be found. It may be an interim placement for a situation where an existing placement is ending for whatever reason and a new placement needs to be found. People choose to be emergency placement only for a variety of reasons, some even do so because they really want to help kids but they've burnt out on thinking that the child(ren) that they've fostered for two, three, four years with the expectation that the placement will become permanent with termination of parental rights does not play out that way yet again for whatever reason.

Some people register as willing to foster long-term, with potential for adoptive placement. Other people register as willing to foster long-term(some even short-term), but do not want to be prospective adoptive placement. Both designations occur for a wide variety of reasons. Due to a string of complications in several cases for the past several years social workers have been widely encouraging foster parents seeking to become adoptive parents to approach the process with an open mind and the more open designation of potential for adoptive placement as opposed to foster with a definitive intention to adopt. There has been a problem with the cases moving through the legal process wherein the parent(s) are working on a reunification plan monitored by the court and legal objections are filed because the child(ren) is placed in a foster setting where the stated objective of foster to adopt is in conflict with the goal of family reunification. Courts have ordered children removed to a different foster placement to avoid the implication of conflict of interest. The broader designation of fostering with a potential for adoptive placement presents no conflict of interest challenge.

Some things for potential foster to adopt parents to consider is siblings. In cases where parental rights are terminated, preference is given to keeping sibling bonds intact. Where possible that may mean placement of siblings together. It's more common than not for the foster parents who take the newborn home from the hospital to also wind up with one, or more, older siblings or half siblings placed with them as well. Sometimes older siblings have already been placed in another foster home or have been fostered by relatives and the newborn sibling is born during the pendency of a case and the existing placement is unable/unwilling to care for the newborn and another foster placement is found for the baby. That does not mean baby will be available for adoption separate from his or her siblings if parental rights are eventually terminated. Efforts will be undertaken during the case to formulate and maintain not only a parent/child bond with the birth parents in an effort toward reunification, but additional efforts will be undertaken to forge and protect a sibling bond as well. If there is not willing and qualified family prepared to adopt all siblings in the event of termination, the first choice for adoption placement will most likely be for all siblings to be placed together as a familial unit. If the number of siblings is particularly large and/or one or more of the children has high maintenance special needs separate placements may be required, but generally it will be done in such a way where maintaining some semblance of sibling bond/family unit will be part of the planning.

What many people don't understand about the process that's happening when children are removed from their parents' care, become wards of the court and placed in either family or agency foster care setting is that the goal that everyone is working for is to rectify any dangerous conditions and barriers that prevent a child from going home with mom and/or dad. So yes, parents get a LOT of chances to get it together. It's easy to look at the situation and say, it's too many, it's just too many. I've seen I don't know how many hundreds of cases over the past dozen-plus years and I still look at plenty and say that too. Believe it or not, some completely worthless parents do ultimately get it together and manage to be a worthwhile option for creating a good homelife for their children. Most cases revolve around neglect and substance abuse -- usually brought on by untreated or inadequately addressed mental illness. Most of the kids are not physically abused (thank goodness!). Most of the kids are not born with substances in their systems or addicted -- thank goodness! Many of them do have a variety of special needs to some extent, some chronic, some situational. Adopting through the foster system is a very long, very emotional and very challenging road.

This is only a very shallow look at the complex ways babies in foster care are absolutely not easily adopted.

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TheFloatingBear said:

And, just to add to what @cabanafrau posted in regards to complexities in all of this...in my last job I was a family therapist/case manager in a residential treatment facility for adolescent girls, all of whom were either in state custody or had an open case.

I worked with many children that were adopted through the foster care system. In these cases (this is not true of all cases of course, but the ones I would see), things would go well, sometimes for several years, and then once adolescence began, behavior or emotional issues would arise/resurface that would become unmanageable for the adoptive family. The child would be placed at my agency in order to address the issues and work toward reunification, but often it was unsuccessful. The adoption would be revoked and the child's goal would be changed to Independent Living, and she would stay with us until she aged out of the system at 18YO. These were heartbreaking cases, and the adoptive families would do everything they could to make it work, but sometimes reunification and a "home" setting for the child was not possible. Sometimes it is not an easy road for anyone involved...

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In answer to both above posts, my DS has discussed all of this with me and I am in awe of all the complications associated with this process. when DS and DDIl got involved they were looking at this through the "adoption" lens, however as they progressed through the classes, visits, etc they needed to look at it differently. I discussed with them that their path in life may be to provide respite for children who desperately need it during a difficult stage in their lives. My DDIL also was open about the challenges that children face as they approach the teen years, and this was something that my cousin told me as well. Teens are tough when everything in their World was positive. I cannot imagine the stresses these kids have been placed that compounds the growing process.

I am not going to judge how many chances a family has to get it together, but I will judge the system that has so badly let infants and children down, ties the hands of caseworkers, and limits the resources that parents who need the help the most are allowed to access. I would not be able to do the job these caseworkers and attorneys are charge with and admire those who step up an din to help.

YCCS said:

Stop making it sound like women have abortions on a whim. That they go and get them like they are picking up a happy meal.

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Thing is, SOME women do use abortions as birth control, and they don't give them any more thought than they'd give to ordering a Happy Meal.

The first time I became aware of this attitude was in college. I can't remember her name, but I remember her face well -- a girl who lived several doors down from me for two years. She had four abortions in the time I knew her. She talked about her multiple abortions quite openly and several times various people pointed out that birth control pills were only $2/month at our health center -- she admitted that she just didn't want to be bothered. She said it was less effort to pop into a clinic for an afternoon and have the father pay for the abortion.

Is this a typical attitude? I don't think so, but it's untruthful to say that such people don't exist. Over the years I've heard similarly callous things said about birth control or abortions -- things that indicate that the mother-in-question either couldn't be bothered or would deal with the issue later, if it were to come up. No, I can't say I've heard it often -- but I have definitely heard it.

luvsJack said:

No the doctors said the baby would be severely disabled and wouldn’t live. Not that he was the healthy child he is.

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Thing is, you're presenting this as if it is something that happens all the time. Yeah, doctors can be wrong, but the situation you're describing is a weird outlier. The vast, vast majority of the time, if a doctor says the child is going to have medical problems ... the child is going to have medical problems.

If I had a friend in a situation like this, I'd suggest second (or third) opinions from different doctors in different medical practices. Different tests, different machines.

jalapeno_pretzel said:

I too agree there should be a happy medium, and I don't understand why a happy medium wouldn't be working to lower the abortion rates while simultaneously preserving choice and a woman's autonomy over her own body.

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The happy medium is promoting birth control so that unwanted pregnancies are small in number. Birth control is cheap, widely available, and highly effective ... when used properly and when used every single time. Have you seen statistics about "perfect use vs. actual use"? People who are TRYING to use birth control tend to avoid unwanted pregnancies.

Hrhpd said:

The vast majority of today's abortions are all about the health of the mother or the child.

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I'm not aware of this. Source?

kiddo76 said:

Everytime a woman gets pregnant she puts her life in danger. The worst part of this, is that women without access to quality healthcare to prevent an unwanted pregnancy are the same women who are most likely to die from pregnancy.

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I accept that "back in the day" -- such an exact term -- pregnancy was super dangerous, and many women died. However, I personally know no one and have never heard of anyone in real life who died as a result of pregnancy or delivery. Oh, I know people who've had horrible-bad deliveries, but I know no of no mothers who have literally died.

The worst things I personally know: My cousin went back to work too soon after delivery, hemmoraged, and put herself back in the hospital. My sister was in labor for three grueling days -- don't ask why she didn't opt for a C-section; I don't know. That's kinda it for bad tales from my "I really know them" storybook.

Does anyone here know anyone IN REAL LIFE who died in modern times -- say, the last 50 years? -- as a result of pregnancy or delivery?

Colleen27 said:

... But when you say a husband should "get a voice" in a woman's decision to have a tubal (or a wife in a man's decision to have a vasectomy), you're saying that marriage makes a person something less than a fully autonomous human being.

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A husband absolutely should "get a voice" in his wife's decision to have a tubal ligation ... and she should "get a voice" in whether he has a vasectomy. When you marry, you become one. You agree to share all decisions ... forever. This comes with lots of wonderful benefits, but you also voluntarily give yourself and a portion of your freedom to your chosen spouse.

jalapeno_pretzel said:

Anti-choice celebrate every time ...

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Throwing out emotional words is dirty pool. I don't think anyone on either side of the abortion debate "celebrates" any part of an abortion.

luvsJack said:

For every baby that is put up for adoption there are something like 20 couples that apply to adopt. And that is what we are talking about here, babies.

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Yes, babies are highly coveted in the adoption system, and they are few in numbers. Birth parents have an awful lot of rights, and they get multiple chances to screw up a child before the child lands in foster care. Not very fair to the child.

People tend to have incorrect ideas about adoptions. My mom worked with adoptions through DSS for years, and I have a good friend who works with a private adoption agency. Things I know from them -- things that aren't quite what people think:

- Most adoptions are family adoptions; for example, a daughter is on drugs, and the grandparents adopt her child ... a brother is killed, and his sister adopts his children ... teenaged girl faces an unwanted pregnancy, her aunt and uncle offer to adopt the child. These children are NEVER available for adoption to the general public.
- The typical woman who puts her child up for adoption is single, in her 20s, and she already has one (or more) children. She is no longer living in her parents' home /has fewer resources than a teen still living at home, and she knows just how expensive /time consuming children are ... but she also can't kill her unborn child, so she gives it up.
- The most coveted baby, the one adoptive parents dream of is a child born in prison. Why? His mother had access to 3 meals a day, had health care and limited access to drugs /alcohol.
- This is a weird one: If a newborn baby has any Native American blood -- I mean, back to some nth degree -- the tribe (even if they have never had anything to do with the mother or father) must give permission for that child to be adopted. If the tribe chooses, they can claim the child for their own /place it in a home of their choosing. Two tribal elders must formally "release the child for adoption". I think this goes back to times when Native American children were "adopted" into wealthy families ... but were actually made into servants.

Moliphino said:

She isn't taking away his choices about children. He can still procreate should he want to. And really, if one goes behind their spouse's back to sterilize themselves they probably don't have a healthy relationship. I think a couple should certainly discuss it before going ahead, but doctors should not require the other's permission to do the procedure.

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Disagree. When you marry, you agree to share your lives together ... while he could technically go procreate with someone else, that wouldn't really work in practice.

I'm not sure where the "behind someone's back" thing is coming from.

FlightlessDuck said:

Gotta be for homeless rehabilitation as well. If you are worried about people living their best life, you best be in favor of getting the homeless off the streets and into a shelter and working (or into a institution, or what have you). We just lost another member of our homeless community ten days ago.

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No, just because a person believes Idea A, he or she doesn't have to also believe Idea B. These are complex ideas, and they don't necessarily connect.

shelemm said:

Tampons are taxed in 38 states because they are deemed not medically necessary.

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Perhaps I'm being argumentative, but around age 30 I started using non-disposables, and they are SO MUCH BETTER than disposable tampons or pads. Not to mention cheaper. Surgery has taken away my need for such items, but if that were suddenly and miraculously "undone", I'd never buy disposables again.

Maggie Gallagher said:

The system is broken, and children are always the ones who lose. This administration cares nothing about human rights, not to mention the rights of children, and they need to stop pretending that they do.

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True. The system should focus on the best home for the child -- not the rights of people who've already proven themselves inferior parents.

Eeyore2142 said:

How do you know it was unprotected sex? That is a HUGE leap. HUGE. There are plenty of people who take precautions and still get pregnant.

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oh jeeze. Ok, so every abortion is due to the health of the mother, the health of the baby or failed birth control. Ok. And yet statistics say otherwise.

Besides, my answer is still the same. There are exceptions of course but its called personal responsibility.

cabanafrau said:

Whenever any of the groups I'm involved with or just the general charitable Christmas giving discussions get rolling I always put in a plug for teens in foster care/aging out of foster care being the focus of the generosity instead of just the typical excitement of buying toys for the tiny tots. Everybody's always excited to give, give, give when it comes to the thought of how thrilled the little ones are about Santa and toys. Personally it hurts my heart to talk to some of the teens, hear what some of the social workers report about some of the struggles the teens are going through. The teen years and image are tough enough. The teen years really suck when you have access to virtually nothing to put on your back, let alone anything remotely like most kids your age are wearing. For a lot of years I was sending my daughters' hand me downs off to a friend's SIL who was running a cupboard for teens in foster care/aging out. She's no longer running it and I know it helped a lot of kids. I've suggested starting one at our church but I've never been able to get enough votes to make it happen.

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That's so great that you do that! It's so true! It's been a few years since I worked there but your post brings back a lot of memories of some tough holidays. I would often volunteer to work holidays since at the time I didn't have children myself and we always had residents that either didn't have a home to go to, or were not allowed to go home. We would try to make it festive but it wasn't always easy! We would often get just straight financial donations from people that understood what you're saying about getting gifts for teens, then our direct care workers that really knew what the kids needed/wanted would do the shopping for them!

luvsJack said:

oh jeeze. Ok, so every abortion is due to the health of the mother, the health of the baby or failed birth control. Ok. And yet statistics say otherwise.

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I never said every. I don't use absolutes

cabanafrau said:

There is a branch of science that has had a very quiet battle going on for several years due to lack of female representation in leadership roles of virtually any kind. Peruse the professional journals and it will take quite some time to find a single article authored by a female. There have been a string of incidents where the exact, same articles are subsequently published by either elevating a male team member to co writer or cited as being part of project leadership in a senior way.

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Kind of short on details here and doesn’t quite sound right but if a women made any fundamental breakthrough in any science I assure you she would receive full credit for the discovery. The last Fields Medal (kind of a Nobel Prize for Mathematics) was awarded to a women.

Women receive above 50% of the PHD’s in Biology and slightly less than 50 in Geology. Physics and Engineering they are about 20% and half of those are foreign nationals.

Trivia-The reason Nobel didn’t include a prize for mathematics was because his wife had an affair with a mathematician and has a result he hated mathematicians. Ii

L&Lfan said:

I think the Sherman Bros summed it up beautifully in Mary Poppins. I paraphrase and I firmly believe it applies to either gender.....Though I adore men individually; as a group they’re rather stupid.

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This is a perfect example of toxic neofeminism.

So I guess Winifred Banks was a neofeminist in 1910!

pahoben said:

Kind of short on details here and doesn’t quite sound right but if a women made any fundamental breakthrough in any science I assure you she would receive full credit for the discovery. The last Fields Medal (kind of a Nobel Prize for Mathematics) was awarded to a women.

Women receive above 50% of the PHD’s in Biology and slightly less than 50 in Geology. Physics and Engineering they are about 20% and half of those are foreign nationals.

Trivia-The reason Nobel didn’t include a prize for mathematics was because his wife had an affair with a mathematician and has a result he hated mathematicians. Ii

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I understand your skepticism completely. I do have a specific reason for not sharing beyond what I did. I was quite surprised when this situation came to my attention, thinking it had to be impossible. I am not willing to share more detail, but I've seen evidence that supports what I've said. I completely understand your viewpoint and would feel the same.

MrsPete said:

Does anyone here know anyone IN REAL LIFE who died in modern times -- say, the last 50 years? -- as a result of pregnancy or delivery?
.

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yes it does happen. Do a quick Google search just recently it was in the news a healthy woman gave birth and died and left three daughters behind. In fact the US has the worst mortality rate for births in any western country.

MrsPete said:

I accept that "back in the day" -- such an exact term -- pregnancy was super dangerous, and many women died. However, I personally know no one and have never heard of anyone in real life who died as a result of pregnancy or delivery. Oh, I know people who've had horrible-bad deliveries, but I know no of no mothers who have literally died.

The worst things I personally know: My cousin went back to work too soon after delivery, hemmoraged, and put herself back in the hospital. My sister was in labor for three grueling days -- don't ask why she didn't opt for a C-section; I don't know. That's kinda it for bad tales from my "I really know them" storybook.

Does anyone here know anyone IN REAL LIFE who died in modern times -- say, the last 50 years? -- as a result of pregnancy or delivery?

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It's not something I really thought was the case but according to the CDC in a recent article (which everything in quotations is from the recent article): "About 700 women die from pregnancy and childbirth every year in the U.S., according to the report. Of those, 31 percent die during pregnancy, 36 percent die during childbirth or in the first week postpartum, and 33 percent die at some point in the first year after they give birth.

And roughly 60 percent of those deaths could be prevented."

"Severe bleeding and embolisms were the top causes of death during delivery. In the first week postpartum, severe bleeding, high blood pressure and infection were the most common causes of death."

Weakened heart muscles caused most deaths that occurred later — at some point in the first year after a woman gave birth. Pregnancy and childbirth tax the heart and circulatory system, increasing blood volume by up to 50 percent. Women with known heart conditions require special, watchful care.


But the part that I wasn't prepared for was this aspect speaking towards the U.S.: "The United States is the only developed country in the world where the maternal mortality rate is increasing, particularly among women of color — and lack of postpartum support is a major contributing factor."

Things like paid maternity leave and how quickly a mom goes back to work after the baby, lack of going to the doctor for the postpartum visit, Medicaid coverage restrictions, etc all factors for long after the birth occurred.

**I'm just speaking towards the comment**

mousefan73 said:

yes it does happen. Do a quick Google search just recently it was in the news a healthy woman gave birth and died and left three daughters behind. In fact the US has the worst mortality rate for births in any western country.

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And you personally know this person? I'm not looking for stories on the internet. I'm asking if anyone here has personally known an American woman who has died in modern times. I've been on this earth for 53 years and have not known anyone personally ... not even a friend-of-a-friend situation. This leads me to believe it's a very rare thing.

Mackenzie Click-Mickelson said:

"About 700 women die from pregnancy and childbirth every year in the U.S., according to the report. Of those, 31 percent die during pregnancy, 36 percent die during childbirth or in the first week postpartum, and 33 percent die at some point in the first year after they give birth.

And roughly 60 percent of those deaths could be prevented."

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So approximately 280 American woman die because of pregnancy /delivery UNAVOIDABLY every year. I know, I know, that's serious to their families, but it's a drop in the bucket compared to the number of people who give birth without complications.

This still isn't a personal "I knew someone myself" story. What was the point again? I think it was, Pregnancy can be difficult, but the chances of dying from the condition are slim. To put those 280 women into perspective, (if you believe a quick google search), 1.25 million people die in car wrecks every year, yet no one's saying we should stop driving.