eBook Your Pregnancy Week By Week (1) ePub

uspeh

The cool part of this book is that it has a sketch for each week to show how the baby is developing, and how big it is, and so forth. I do like it for that reason.

However, in overall tone it is extremely condescending, to which I'll return in a moment. It also might be a bit scary for some, as each week's chapter contains a list of every possible thing that could go wrong with your pregnancy. It's also a bit impractical in odd ways (do you really want to find out only near the END of the first trimester that electric blankets might mutate your baby [especially if used in the first trimester]?)

But back to that condescending thing. It's to the point where it's kind of funny. "Make sure you eat healthy foods!" "You might be able to get a 'picture' of your baby, called a 'sonogram'..." "Make sure to wash your hands throughout the day!" "Don't use recreational drugs!" Well, duh.

It treats mothers-to-be as though we are all careening stupidly on the knife edge of disaster but for this kindly intervention that is *for your own good*.

"You can't just eat anything you want." Puh-lease. You just try and stop me, Mr. Paper Doctor. I can and I shall eat anything I want--which is probably not that terrible to begin with, anyway. And I resent your patriarchal assumption that only you stand nobly between me and the monstrous results of my out-of-control female wishes!

There's a particular phenomenon (as I tell my Psychology students) in which society tends to infantilize pregnant women, as though we aren't carrying infants, but becoming infants. (Despite the fact that pregnancy has been shown to actually increase IQ by a couple points. --Yes, ha ha, I'm still waiting.) This book definitely expresses that societal attitude.

However, the effect is not restricted to the mums-to-be. In the authors' view, dads are apparently not only equally as stupid as mums, but are uncaring clods as well. There are one or two little paragraph-length text boxes in each chapter ("Dad Tip!") since clearly men can't be expected to read an entire book (because they're illiterate, on top of all that?)

Dad tip: "Give your partner a lot of hugs." "Bring home flowers..." "Clean or vacuum the house without being asked." "...Change the litter box..." (This tip is in week 8, so the pregnant partner has already been handling dangerous cat feces for two months and it likely killed the baby, you illiterate uncaring clod!) "Remember to call her if you go out of town." "Pregnancy is a miracle despite headaches, morning sickness, and changing waistline." (Despite changing waistline?!)

My husband and I started making up our own helpful tips for Dad in the same vein: "Try not to make fun of your partner for being fat, as often as you usually do." "Wait until she's done throwing up in the morning to tell her to make your breakfast." "Don't get drunk at home so much--go out to the pub." "Try not to be a complete ass, at least not ALL the time."

Another humorous thing about the book is that each week it compares the baby's size to a food item: "Your baby is about the size of a pinto bean," "...a green olive," "...a peach," "...a lime." Which is a little disturbing. I'm not growing it to harvest and eat!

Of course we had to start making up our own comparisons. "Your baby is about the size of a 1-pound box of expensive chocolates with gold wrapping." "Your baby is about the size of a succulent filet mignon, served medium-rare with sauteed mushrooms and onions."

So all in all, an entertaining read, especially if one is a smartass.

If you are only buying one pregnancy book, then get The Mother of All Pregnancy Books or The Unofficial Guide to Having a Baby. If you are stocking up, then go ahead and add this one to your pile. Try to take it a little tongue-in-cheek!

Kuve

If you enjoy being scolded, talked down to, and generally not treated like a grown woman, then you'll love this book. My favorite part of this ridiculous book is that interspersed with the scoldings, there are genius "Dad Tips" along the lines of "Bring home flowers for no special reason!" and "Cuddle your partner, women love cuddling during this very special time!" WHAT?!?? Hallmark cards have more sophisticated relationship advice than that! Even Seventeen magazine wouldn't print such platitudes. To include them in this book betrays exactly what the authors really think of their readers - ie, not much.

Whiteflame

Although I am a registered nurse with a bachelor's degree, my specialty is telemetry and not maternal/child, so I sought a book by an expert that would supply me with vital information I didn't have concerning my pregnancy.
After reading the reviews here, I decided to buy this book over others. I was very disappointed after reading through the first half of the book, and not being able to continue because the book is so awful. It was really inaccurate, for example the grossly exaggerated claims about body temperature, the timelime for alpha fetoprotien tests ... and certain pieces of information that were actually true and important were in oddly misplaced sections. For instance, the discussion of caffiene, the advice on shopping for a new bra, the discussion on breast tenderness... all of those things were discussed way too late in the book. Caffiene should be avoided or cut to a minimum extremely early, not in the fourth month.
My physician, who is a board certified OB/GYN and chief of staff of that dept. at the hospital, has instructed me that it is healthy to get exercise if you are a healthy person with a normal, healthy pregnancy. Doing exercise would certainly raise body temperature, and according to this physician's brief discussion of body temperature, you would be putting your fetus at risk. That's just one example, there's more that I can't get into with the limited space available.
If I could, I would get a refund on this book. I wouldn't recommend it to anybody. You're better off reading literature that your physician supplies to you, such as the magazines and pamphlets.

Marirne

I got this for my first pregnancy along with several other books; it was my favorite, as it had timely information for each week, and showed a illustration of what the baby would look like. Usually the information presented each week was appropriate, and I felt very prepared for my OB visits. The information is spread out over each week, but the index is comprehensive, and you can find it again, no matter which week you're in.
The one thing that this book doesn't have is any information on what to do if you have various abnormal symptoms (i.e. bleeding), a chart for deciding when to call the doctor, or a cheat-sheet for if the baby starts arriving at home. However, usually you can and should go ahead and call your doctor if you have any worries whatsoever.
Your Pregnancy Week by Week a great source for letting you know exactly when various parts of the baby are formed, how big the baby is, when the baby can see and hear -- I loved having this glipse into my baby's growth -- None of my other books had anything quite as nice. Plus had something to look forward to reading each week!

Dream

This book was really pretty dry and doesn't seem to give the information I was looking for. It was also poorly organized so that you would be in week 6 and it would take about something and say (see Week 11), where I wanted all of the information for that week right there. Also there were a few seemingly editing errors, but I was reading on Kindle so perhaps it was just incompatible characters. If you haven't read any other book or any web site about prengancy, this might be helpful for you, but the free week-by-week emails you can get from BabyCenter, TheBump, etc. are just as, if not more, insightful, than this book.