Shirley Camper Soman, ACSW

Bachelors say they want to marry and procreate when they look through this unique volume! The book is full of fun and joy. And as the reviews all recognized, very useful information covers not just the clothes and equipment needed, the health data, the effect on marriages and families, but also the medical data and a great deal of the amazing history of having a baby. It is both cutting edge (with such information as babies born under water!) and replete with astonishing stories and practices. Many people gave personal experience comments--Eli Wallach, Liv Ullman, Helen Reddy, Sophia Loren, Ben Vereen, former U.S. Senator Birch Bayh and a host of others.

The book is also full of boxes of comments and instructions from the past--some hilarious, some eliciting pity for the poor mothers and infants! Viewing the historical comments in the context of today’s practices is especially instructive on how things change and also how things stay the same. Although the book first was published in 1982, preparing for a baby-to-come and taking care of the baby here and now are not that different. The book will be re-published in 2004.

However, the author‘s view of some aspects have become strongly emphasized due to current information. For example, if it were possible, the environmental influences would be emphasized even more strongly today. And since doctors are more worried about law suits and insurance costs, they are tending to restrict or drop their practice and, as a result, the role of the nurse/midwife is stronger. The family is also a threatened institution today with a huge number of divorces and with one partner or the other (more often the male) unable to deal with the addition of a baby or another baby. How to counter these factors would be stressed if the book were written today. And since the entire book was translated into Hindi and sold on the Internet without authorization, this author would try to make a federal case of that type of practice, even in the text of the book. This book was heavily researched and re-written more than once--and not being able to protect the copyright is truly a large slap in the face.

But right now it is an uplift to quote briefly from the book.

MY OWN EXPERIENCES

The First Time

I was crying tears of ecstasy. Here was this amazingly tiny, totally charming, familiar stranger with the quizzical, puzzled expression and a full head of hair--my baby! I could hardly contain myself. As I gazed raptly at him, his lips parted--they move, he moves!--I thought, and he gave a long contented sigh. “So this is where I am,” said the sigh to me, “interesting, interesting.” He was a real person already. I had never been so gloriously thrilled in my life.

The Second Time

“A girl, a girl?” I couldn’t believe it until the doctor showed me the first view of my baby, bottom side up. Quickly, too quickly, she was whisked into a small bassinet without clothes on. Immediately, my tears, my joy, my wonder at having a girl unexpectedly gave way to concern. She would be cold! Why didn’t they cover her?

As soon as they found time to tell me that the bassinet was heated, I relaxed...I watched...I listened. Her arms and legs were waving around. And--was it possible--she was gurgling! Cooing and gurgling. And a dimple showed. A beautiful baby girl with flyaway hair and dimples, who gurgled right away! I had never been so gloriously thrilled in my life--except the first time.