The documentary A Walk to Beautiful, follows five women in Ethiopia suffering from fistula, isolated from their villages and some from their families, seeking treatment at one of the few charity clinics. It can be viewed online at the PBS NOVA site. Dr. Catherine Hamlin, who runs the hospital in Addis Ababa, is interviewed here. There's also been a couple of recent articles on fistula: one from Nicholas Kristof who's been one of the most prominent voices on this issue, a piece by Kate Harding, and an older piece where Abby Frucht describes living with fistula in a developed country with a supportive family. For those inclined to donate, links to charities can be found in the Kristof op-ed. Other Metafilter posts on fistula: 1, 2
posted by BigSky on Nov 2, 2009 - 14 comments

Experiencing the pain of labor...when you're male[slyt]
posted by gaspode on Oct 13, 2009 - 153 comments

If you were a parent, and had lost your child during birth--what would you do? Grieve--yes; mourn, of course; photograph your dead child... ? WHY? [please don't click if you're a soon-to-be-parent] [more inside]
posted by hadjiboy on Sep 26, 2008 - 93 comments

Amazing Birth (NSFW). One link youtube post, requires login for age verification, but it's worth it.
posted by alms on Jan 20, 2008 - 136 comments

Resolve.org is a site devoted to providing support, both emotional and practical, to people struggling with infertility issues. The immediately apparent benefits to visiting would be their informational documents and errata, but of at least equal value are the bulletin boards where you can talk with other people dealing with infertility, whether it's for the sake of venting, chatting or just to have someplace you can go where you don't have to hear the words "well, adoption isn't so bad..."
posted by shmegegge on Sep 17, 2007 - 66 comments

HelpMyBabyLive.com It comes down to this. If we can't raise the $50,000 in the next 3 months, we'll have to choose abortion. And you thought Save Karyn was bad. Via
posted by ThePinkSuperhero on Jun 28, 2007 - 176 comments

virtual labor
posted by konolia on May 3, 2007 - 31 comments

"Souvenir prenatal ultrasounds worry experts." Parent's desire for early snapshots in the womb have led to a rise in commercial companies offering what it describes as "boutique ultrasonography." This site, preciousbabyimaging.com, is just one example.
posted by engling on Feb 3, 2007 - 34 comments

The Childbirth Centrifuge You must be pregnant to ride this ride. Why push your baby out when you can spin the sucker out? This device probably makes one mean martini, too. Unlike many patent applications, the Apparatus for Facilitating the Birth of a Child by Centrifugal Force is described in great detail, making me wonder whether a prototype actually got constructed. Link goes to a summary. Click through for the completely confusing text of the patent.
posted by fleener on Jan 25, 2007 - 38 comments

Eloysa Vasquez, a 37-pound woman with osteogenesis imperfecta (the "brittle bone disease"), has given birth to a premature, but otherwise healthy, son. OI is the disease affecting the actor Michael J. Anderson, most famous for his roles as "The Little Man from Another Place" in Twin Peaks and Samson in Carnivale. Children with OI experience so many broken bones that their parents are frequently suspected of child abuse.
posted by feathermeat on Feb 11, 2006 - 58 comments

One Egg At A Time, Please, Just One Egg At A Time!

Representative Lonnie Napier has a great idea! IVF requires eggs to be harvested from a woman, combined with a man's sperm outside of the woman's body, then putting several embryos back in hopes of getting one to implant and grow, resulting in a baby. Rep. Napier, being strongly pro-life and opposed to IVF, thinks the way to solve this is to fertilize only one egg at a time. And to violate this new law would be a class D felony in Kentucky, punishable with 1-5 years in prison.

Via And I Wasted All That Birth Control...
posted by OhPuhLeez on May 12, 2005 - 71 comments

Good luck, blessings, positive thoughts, and an early mazel tov to Mathowie, Kay, and Fiona!
posted by digaman on May 2, 2005 - 92 comments

Miscarry in Virginia? Call the police or go to jail. John Cosgrove, Delegate for the 78th district of Virginia has introduced a bill to criminalize not reporting a miscarriage to the police within 12 hours of the miscarriage. via Chez Miscarriage
posted by SuzySmith on Jan 7, 2005 - 75 comments

Grin And Bear It, Woman! Think Of England! Caesarean births in the U.K. should be severely curtailed, say the medical mandarins. Germaine Greer says, in a cracking column, that the new guidelines are misogyny pure and simple. Is it just my impression (think of American Pie-type teenage movies; advertising; "guy lit") or are hatred of women and beery, bozo celebrations of indifference to the feminine sex on the up and up?
posted by MiguelCardoso on Apr 28, 2004 - 64 comments

Woman Performs Caesarean On Herself to Save Baby
Its thought to be the first case where both mother and child survived a self performed caesarean.
From the article, "...a mother's instinct to save her child can move a woman to perform extraordinary acts but said it would not have been necessary if adequate medical care had been available."
Contrast that story with the recent news: Chico Student Allegedly Kills Newborn and then leaves the body in a plastic bag in her dormroom.
An avoidable situation given California's Safe Haven Law that allows new mothers to safely surrender their newborns within three days of birth with no questions asked, no names taken and no repercusions, assuming the child isn't abused or neglected.
And she wouldn't be held on a million dollars bail awaiting trial for murder.
posted by fenriq on Apr 6, 2004 - 9 comments

Recharge Your Ovaries? Would it be better to have babies in our 60's? What if we could eliminate menopause? Is this just another instance of the dawn of agelessness?
posted by ewkpates on Mar 10, 2004 - 7 comments

More children now than ever are being born from cesarean sections. It's known that giving birth this way can leave psychological damage to the mother, but what effect is it having on the children?
posted by atom128 on Nov 24, 2003 - 39 comments

JK Rowling's expecting - twice over. A new baby's on the way and the new book's almost finished. Ain't life grand.
posted by zimbobzim on Sep 20, 2002 - 10 comments

Mothers who wait to have a baby are at risk of evolutionary extinction. "If you want to see your line persist, then it's probably optimum to start reproducing in your early to mid-20s". According to this 220 year statistical model late-reproducing women [genetic lineage] declined as a proportion of the population from 11 percent to about 5 percent
posted by stbalbach on May 27, 2002 - 8 comments

Las Vegas obstetricians are turning away newly pregnant women, including existing patients who become pregnant, because they say they cannot afford to deliver more babies ... If newly pregnant women cannot find care in Las Vegas, their choices include moving elsewhere, traveling out of state for care or going without prenatal care and delivering in area emergency rooms or a casino?
posted by lola on May 8, 2002 - 11 comments

Woman Pregnant Twice. An Italian woman is due to give birth in a hospital in Rome this week to a baby girl - before returning three months later to have triplets. If both deliveries are successful, it is thought that this will be the first such case in history.
posted by tpoh.org on Nov 12, 2001 - 17 comments

French retards can sue their birth doctors for not killing them in the womb... I thought the link I posted about a woman suing her boss when she crashed her car after driving home drunk from a staff party was the height of lawsuit insanity, but this takes the cake: in France, if you are seriously disabled, you have the right to sue a doctor who failed to recommend an abortion to your mother.... .... Homosaywhat?
posted by tweek! on Jul 13, 2001 - 123 comments

Massachusetts' acting governor Jane Swift (R) is bed-ridden, about to give birth to twins. State legislators (mostly Democrats) are challenging her right to run the state via telephone. Sleazy, sexist politics? Or do they have a point? Is it irresponsble for an elected official to start a family while in office? (more inside)
posted by jpoulos on May 10, 2001 - 41 comments

"I love my stillborn daughter so much, I'm putting her picture on my site for all the world to see!" Am I wrong to be somewhat disturbed by this? She even had to have "the bruises" photoshopped out!
posted by aaron on Apr 5, 2001 - 42 comments

Imagine the reaction in the delivery room! Baby swap in hospital is one thing, but fetus-swap?
posted by Steven Den Beste on Oct 19, 2000 - 2 comments