Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine - Sawbones: Birth

Episode Date: July 15, 2014

Welcome to Sawbones, where Dr. Sydnee McElroy and her husband Justin McElroy take you on a whimsical tour of the dumb ways in which we've tried to fix people. This week: We finally get that sucker out. Music: "Medicines" by The Taxpayers (http://thetaxpayers.net)

Saabones is a show about medical history, and nothing the hosts say should be taken as medical advice or opinion. It's for fun. Can't you just have fun for an hour and not try to diagnose your mystery boil? We think you've earned it. Just sit back, relax, and enjoy a moment of distraction from that weird growth. You're worth it. that weird growth. You're worth it. Alright, time is about to books! One, two, one, two, three, four! We came across a pharmacy with a twin that's busted out. We were shot through the broken glass and had ourselves a look around.

Some medicines, some medicines that escalate my cop for the mouth Hello everybody and welcome to Saul bone say Merrill tour of misguide medicine. I'm your co-host Justin McAroy I'm still Sydney McAroy Sydney I'm the tire to be a pregnant. Oh I'm sorry your tired. I'm tired of being pregnant as a couple. I'm trying to share in your burden What which part of pregnancy? pregnant as a couple I'm trying to share in your burden. What which part of pregnancy has been hardest on your body? Would you say? Which?

I really, the house too tired. Can't do that. You can't ever leave the house because you're too tired. Every time I drink I feel guilty. Oh gosh, that must be so hard for you. You don't know what it's like, Sid. I don't know what it's like to drink anymore. I don't remember. I don't remember what it's like, Sid. No, I don't know what it's like to drink anymore. I don't remember.

I don't remember what it's like to do anything other than sit and be tired. Are we so tired of it? They're tired of hearing about pregnancy? I know. They're tired of hearing about it. Everybody's tired of it, we just want the stupid baby. Oh, she won't be a stupid baby.

At first, she will be stupid. No. There's literally no other kind of baby. I've seen and I've seen baby geniuses trust me. That's fake. So I guess we're almost out of we kind of thought the baby would be here by now. Maybe there's just like we should think you know our part but like we've doing video loss shows about pregnancy just like we figured it's on our minds, so let's cover all the pregnancy topics. Well, I was kind of hoping maybe if we just kept on that train, you know, kept talking about power positive thinking.

Yeah, maybe it would be like eating pineapple or, you know, walking around the neighborhood or having sex. These are all things there's just a trigger laborious. Exactly. So maybe talking about birth will trigger labor. What do you think? Okay, let's talk about birth. I think we're out of pregnancy topics after this. So I really hope the gig comes this way. Oh, I could keep going. Yeah. Oh yeah, you got more.

Yeah, but I think that I would start to get bitter after a while. Let me tell you some more about being pregnant. Listen, here's a scope. Here. This will be a record for our child. I hope I'm still able to get back into the archives and see what a huge inconvenience she was. And I have to say it makes me feel a little guilty to feel that way because I've had women tell me that they just love that they wish they could be pregnant all the time. That they loved the being pregnant state. Not having kids, but the- Just being pregnant.

Being pregnant. Listen, I'm only half pregnant as a partnership here. I'm only half pregnant and the novelty has worn off. Well, I mean, I kind of get what it's all about now. Like I understand the gist of it, and I'm excited to be having a child, but I'm kind of ready for like okay, okay So have the child having a child. Let's have the child

Burr this and this topic has been suggested to us by so many people so many times I Didn't list them all okay people are constantly Thank you a lot of people yes, thank you all of you who wanted us to talk about birth. And so take that everybody who doesn't. Okay So you know initially our ancient ancestors going way back Before the Greeks we're going back before the Romans way back. How much how much are actus? You you know women gave birth the way that most mammals give birth, which is just like they, you know, find a safe comfortable spot out under a tree somewhere and just give birth. Just do it.

Alone. Just do it. And come back carrying their baby in their mouth or whatever. I got this baby. I went to the baby tree and I got it. Obviously we are not able to do that now. Which seems appealing to me in some ways. I like the idea of having complete control

over all of the process. Right, it's a little unnerving, but I see where you're getting that. Yeah, no, I'm not saying that it's safe or a good idea. I'm not in any way endorsing it. And actually what I'm about saying that it's safe or a good idea. I'm not in any way endorsing it. And actually, what I'm about to say is the reason this is why I am not endorsing it. We don't do this anymore for a lot of reasons. Safety being number one, but also because of

the shape of our pelvis. Oh, really? How so? Well, the shape of the female pelvis evolved over time so that the baby usually not all the time but for the most part it's supposed to come out facing down and because of the position of the neck and the way the shoulders have to be you know have to come out it's it's a very difficult delivery for a woman to do on her own. It's not impossible. I'm not saying that every baby comes out the way you plan, but it would be very difficult to unadid deliver your baby.

Just because of the positioning and the way you'd have to bend. I kind of have this big belly in my way right now. Not all mammals have this issue, right? No. No. And our all mammals have this issue, right? No. No. And our ancestors didn't. The pelvis initially was wide enough that the baby could come out facing up, could come out facing sideways, could come out in a lot of different directions that would be easier

for you to deliver your own baby. But homo sapien pelvis is not like that. Do you think it's a societal evolution, like forcing us to live in societies? Well, I thought about that. I also thought maybe the evolutionary pressure was actually exerted in the direction of partner birth, of having a partner for the birthing process, because if you think about it,

it was probably always safer to have somebody around to help out if there was a crisis, you know, just because it's easier if you have an extra pair of hands. So maybe the pressure was women who had a partner to help them give birth maybe because they were having difficulty were more likely to survive and their offspring were more likely to survive. So their pelvis shape was more likely to crossper. So what's our next step after evolution?

So we can do that anymore because it it's a spoil sport right so at that point I mean basically the rest of the history of birth is trying to figure out who should be there and where we should do it which tree which tree is the nicest which tree is the nicest and like you know do we want to try a You know, do we want to try a delivery in our hut or maybe in the big health hut? The health. The health. Do we want to give birth in the primordial ooze or do we want to give birth on land?

I vote for the health hut that was invented. I'm a super village. We have a large and occupied hut. We can either use it for health or pizza. Let's take a village vote. I'm at the point where I vote pizza. Is it thin crust? Yeah.

Initially, birth was very much the domain of women. Midwives usually ate it in deliveries or just women in your family. Women, family members, I mean, midwife, and I think I may have mentioned this in a previous episode. I don't know, comes from with women, mid with with women. So it would have been very unseemly initially for a man ever to be involved in the birthing process. Just not dignified like a dude in the ladies room kind of thing? Well, yeah.

I mean, not, do you mean on the man's part or on the... Yeah, it just be inappropriate. Yes. I mean, women were very much clothed in multiple layers of clothing. And for a man to see her naked would have been you know a big faux pas. Very stressful. Very stressful for everyone. Everyone would be stressed out. And it was just seen as kind of a thing that women knew about like well we guys don't really know much about that and it

seems pretty icky. We guys know way more now. We are way smart about it. Oh yeah, some of them, some of them are. And not only was this the norm that you would only have women involved, but it was, it was not okay. It wasn't like men had the ability if they wanted to to say, oh, I do want to be in on a delivery. Just no, no, they were discouraged. I would say very strongly. How strongly? Well, in 1522, Dr. worked of Hamburg, Germany, decided he really wanted to see

what this whole birth business was all about. Maybe the doctor, he was, it was, I mean, let's give him a benefit of that, purely academic interest. Yeah, right. And so he's snuck into a delivery room. And listen, I'm caught and I'll limb for you here, Dr. Wirt. So you better not make me a liar.

Let's just pretend you are on all the level, dude. Just wanting to get some science done. Just wanted to know about, hey, what is this whole birth thing that women do, that women watch? That women have to weigh. We know nothing about on this thing. But he was caught and he was burned at the stake. Wow. So it was more than I would say just taboo. Right yeah it was like a big a big issue. Now was it his was it his baby? No, I think he was just going into it. No, just yeah, couldn't help himself. That was before they invented binoculars. I'm assuming

Or webcams Definitely before webcams. I don't actually know what your binoculars were invented, but I feel like we're gonna find out now Yeah, we'll definitely get to emails about that So I hope there weren't windows open that you could look through with binoculars. They didn't even have window technology. Now that that I think is debatable, but it goes without saying that childbirth was not a safe practice throughout. Well, it's not 100% safe ever, what is is but For and this period of time we're kind of in the middle ages. Oh, God We go again middle ages

Women it's probably the unsafe is like worst thing worst time ever Because the middle ages were the absolute pits for everybody. Well, it was just accepted at the time that Some women would not be able to go through with childbirth that they you know if their pelvis could not accommodate the time that some women would not be able to go through with childbirth, that they, you know, if their pelvis could not accommodate the baby, that maybe they would die in the process, because C-sections were not, you know, we've talked about this in the past. C-sections were not readily available. That some women would get infections, and there weren't antibiotics, and we didn't know what infections work, so we didn't know what bacteria was, so everybody was an idiot in the middle ages?

Some women would post part of hemorrhage or bleeding after birth was a big deal. So there were lots of reasons why birth was, you know, and of course women were excited to have children, but at the same time it was common practice that when you found out you were pregnant, you would make out your will. This is why dope middle ages were the worst. same time, it was common practice that when you found out you were pregnant, you would make out your will. This is why dope middle a used were the worst. Hey, I'm going to go spend the whole year trying to figure out how to turn a lead in the gold with alchemy.

Also ladies, if you could just sign this will that I fashion because I can't do anything for you. Oh, is it your first congratulations? Now, have you thought about who's gonna get like your bed and your kitchen table? Oh, Darla, ask her about the lead too, because I'm gonna figure out how to turn it all in the gold. So I definitely wanna have a lock down on that.

I want all their lead. Now, you've got three goats, right? Three. Okay. Are we cousins? Distant. Distant cousins? Um, are those good shoes made of lead?

Are those lead goat shoes? Because if so, I'm going to need those too. What do you, what do I do to sit with lead? Because I'm working on a... Because you're trying to turn it into gold. Okay, all right. I need it for either experimentation or riches, depending on how fast things go. I imagine a law of lead will be destroyed in the process of this discovery.

It's interesting because you would think that in throughout history that royalty would have it easier in a lot of these kinds of situations that they had money and power and prestige, should they have access to whatever the best thing of the day, or have the best odds of surviving anything. In the case of childbearing, so obviously they didn't have birth control. So women just got pregnant when they got pregnant. Breastfeeding was a form of natural birth control. We've talked about this before,

that breastfeeding does not 100% prevent pregnancy. It is still possible. But it makes it much less likely that you'll become pregnant. So it naturally spaces birth. If you breastfeed your child for a year, it is unlikely you'll get pregnant for that year. And it's safer for mom to space out her children. It's just safer for her body and for the recovery of her of her uterine muscle and all of that. Royalty often, you know, handed their children over to wet nurses for breastfeeding. As a result, they got pregnant a lot faster, which was a lot more dangerous for them. So this was a place where their money and their power kind of worked against them. Because they were tasked with turning out maybe so quickly.

Exactly. And that was, and it was in part intentional because, you know, of course for one, exactly, you wanted a lot of children in your line. Of course, you wanted to make sure you're produced male children, but also because it was undignified to breastfeed your own children at this period of time. But that's another show. Men eventually got sick of being excluded from the birthing process. We hate that. Yeah. We like to have our fingers and everything. Was that a... No, it wasn't. Get your hair to cut her. So male physicians really, you know, they wanted to understand the birthing process better. They wanted to have more involvement in it.

And as science was trying to take over everything, they thought, well... We should have a slice of this too. We should have a slice of this whole birthing. And they started trying to encourage women to have their babies in hospitals. Now at this point in time, this idea does not take hold. For the most part, if a doctor is involved in your delivery, they're probably involved at your house. That's where you're having your kid. If women were deciding to go to hospitals very few were and that trend ended pretty quickly because of what was called either child bed or perperal fever.

So this was basically, so it was, women would get really sick after delivery, get horrible fevers, get incredibly sick and then die after delivery. And this happened a lot in hospitals, less likely to happen outside of hospitals. Why was that? Well, the reason is that doctors who were delivering babies in hospitals, because if we're in a hospital, we're talking about a doctor at this point. Midwives were not welcome there.

Doctors... It wasn't like the health hut days. No, not like the health hut, where you head on down to the health hut with your midwife. Right. No, in the hospital, a doctor was obviously performing all kinds of services, not just delivering babies. So, let's say, you know, I'm a doctor and I'm doing some of my doctorally duties. Maybe I'm, you know, taking care of patients, you know, doing procedures on them or listening to their hearts and lungs and then pay probably

doing an autopsy because that was well within the realm of all doctors did that. Sure. And then I get called to a delivery. So I go rushing over to labor and delivery and get in there and do that delivery. At no point in time did I ever wash my hands? Because you didn't know it. You didn't know anything about that. I didn't know I was supposed to. And at the time, why don't you just want to? This is why it breaks down for me. Like, when you're just like, does it feel like, or is that just like in us now? Like do we just like have that in our

imprinting or something? Well, I mean, we talked about this before, there was a time period where you would drink blood from another person in pursuit of health. Yeah. Well, yeah. So our idea that blood is something to, that you don't want someone else's blood on you is kind of a, I don't want to say a new idea, but is a more modern concept and it is probably because of our understanding that diseases can be in blood. But it was also. I don't agree. You don't think so? No, I don't agree with your reason.

Why? I never read it in a book that it's bad if someone piece up PPs on me, but if someone started Pping on me, I'd be like, oh, good away. Stop it. Like, you don't need a book to tell you, like, oh, you're bleeding, that's gross.

Stop it. No one's gonna be like, oh, blood, give me, give me. But people used to drink it. Okay, like, that, you're bleeding, that's gross, stop it. No one's gonna be like, um, blood, give me, give me. But people used to drink it. Okay, like that's different. If there's like dudes in robes and they're like handing you a goblet, that's one thing. But nobody's like, um, finger looking good,

dead person blood all over my hands, I love it. Don't you remember the people standing at the hangman's news and that was like, that was like people collecting it to sell it in pre-packaged bottles with labels. They would catch it in cups or they would stand there with their mouths open Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, Newspings, know what supports this, is that at this time period, part of the problem is that doctors were seen as more... Vampires. No, as more heroic or better at their job, the dirtier their lab coats were.

So they would walk around hospitals, caked in blood as a marker of their, you know, it was like a badge of honor, like look at how many patients I've been inside today. Ugh, it's gross. So anyway, they weren't washing their hands and they were performing deliveries and so they were delivering all kinds of nasty little microbes

into the woman's uterus, which resulted in infection, which resulted in women unfortunately dying after childbirth. So hospitals were not places you wanted to go if you were pregnant. It was scary. Until, first of all, we learned about the germ theory of disease. We've talked about this before with pasture. We've talked about the idea of, you know, disease and then in 1840 there was a guy Dr. Ignos Semmelvice Who invented who invented hand washing? Hand washing it basically saved millions and millions and billions of people He was the first guy to say hey, I think if we wash our hands in between I think we'll probably stop passing

Whatever these new these brand new bugs that we just learned about our on other people and everybody was excited about it No, everybody was furious excellent job medical community. Yeah, how do you know they were they thought it was insulting to doctors because it put the blame on doctors Sure, and that wasn't right and they thought it was stupid But he started doing it in his own obstetrical wards The mortality rate dropped dramatically. There you go. So it caught on. Still a wise hero. A washing hero. So at this point, we're moving more and more towards doctors

are getting involved in delivery. Midwives are still doing the majority of deliveries, I should note. And there are still most women are still delivering at home at this point. But we're starting to see some, you know, scientific meddling in the process. That's exactly right word for it too. In the 1850s, another big step forward was when Queen Victoria, having her eighth child, asked the doctor, could I have some chloroform? This novelty has won off. Could I have just a little bit of chloroform and see what happens and since she was a queen, they gave it to her. What else they have to know about their choice. And it went swimmingly because she felt great afterwards.

Awesome. Awesome, baby. My best baby ever, totally bad. Thank you you and she told everybody hey that was great you know ladies you should start asking your doctors for chloroform I've said the most delightful birthing experience. I recommend. And this started the trend of women starting to seek some sort of pain relief and labor up until then this was not done at all. There were a lot of reasons for this using any any kind of substances like this was seen as immoral even if it was for pain relief.

So you certainly wouldn't want to give it to a woman in labor and there was also fear of the effects on the baby. What would happen? You know some some of them real would you overdose the baby and some of them imagined would the baby be? I don't know Angry a lot when it was older Right a lot of bad poetry There was also I think the worst reason I would say is there was a lot of religious objection Over giving women pain medication during delivery because it's God's punishment To us for Eve and the whole apple and all that cool job Religion that you guys done did it again

Just when I think you are out of tricks you come back around again. Good job religion. So proud So obviously again, we can't save women from all that pain because they're still paying for you know I Do want to mention that piece of fruit on the subject of religion No, I wanted to issue a correction. Oh, yeah, I just reminded me of it from our C section episode We what was it specifically? our C-section episode. What was it specifically? You'll... Specifically, I had found referenced that in... I was talking about different religious attitudes towards C-sections and that in Islam it was thought previously, not currently, that a

child born of C-section was evil. That is actually apocryphal. We discovered with the help of a delightful listener. And actually, some of the first people to successfully perform C-sections were, in fact, Muslim. So, there you go. So, history got that one wrong and Bikes interested in a way. So, there you go. Muslims, they love C-sections.

I don't know if they love C-sections, but they certainly don't. I would make statements like that. There you go. So anyway, women won out over, you know, doctors, reluctance to give them pain medication and over the church's reluctance to allow women to not be in pain. Yeah, good. And doctors started trying all kinds of things. Gas was tried like ether and or ether and gas was tried and then there was chloroform of course and then there were different like opiates you know we're starting to be used just pain relief and all kinds of different things started to enter the labor and delivery realm. Okay so we got to be about the 1900s now.

What what happened next? Well, I'm going to have to stop you there Justin. Oh, no. Yeah, it's that it's that time of the month again, not that time of the month, but the time of the month we go visit the billing department. Let's go. 1900 Sydney, take me there. So as I mentioned where more and more labor and deliveries becoming the realm of doctors. So they're coming up with all new kinds of rules. You know women have been doing this for years. I bet men can do it better. Right? I'm sorry. It wasn't me. Let's get in on it. It wasn't me. And I

should be let me let me just preface with this. Some of these ideas are good and necessary. Not any of the ones I'm gonna talk about because they're not funny, but there were definitely good and necessary ideas that came out of this time period. You're welcome, ladies. I mean, obviously, it's safer to give birth now

than it was a hundred years ago. I don't think there's any argument about that. You're all very welcome. No, but it wasn't because of that. And the United States Transportation System ladies enjoy and also NASA for a long time. You're welcome ladies. I know if you get a lot of guff lately as fellas, we did some things, okay? That's great, can I have my birth control back now? Or? No. No.

No, I don't know those guys, but I know other guys I can talk to about it, but. Okay, thanks. So, more and more women are listening to doctors. They're starting to think about having their babies in hospitals and you see this trend all through the 1900s, it goes from in the early 1900s, it's like 5% of births are taking place in hospitals to by the 1950s were in like this 70, 80% range. Now, to be clear, we are talking about the US, right? Because this is one of those areas where we're on a very different trajectory, right?

That's true, Justin. While in the US, we just steadily moved more and more towards hospital birth and that has been a trend that has stayed constant. Other countries were not necessarily on the same trajectory. In Holland, for instance, they have, I think, still, as far as I know, the highest home birth rate in the Western world, like 30% of births are at home. Wow. And in the UK, while still most births take place in the Western world, like 30% of births are at home. And in the UK, while still most births take place in the hospital, there are certainly a lot more midwife deliveries than we have here. So I'm talking mainly about the US at this point. As I said, doctors had advice on everything and rules for everything. So I'm going to reference

a little bit as we're moving into the 1900s from a book that I have that was written in 1915, that is a real gem if you're pregnant. What, forget what to expect when you're expecting. No, no, no, this is the real story. Now go and purchase EB Lowry's, your baby. It's age like a fine line. So here's some things you might want to keep in mind.

Before you deliver. You want to make sure and stay away from anything that is scarier upsetting. A book, a movie, I guess he didn't say a movie because they didn't exist like yet, but movies, TV shows, you know, don't don't go watching true blood with all those scary vampires. So if you compare our way to watch true blood in 1915, it has off to you. But your baby might have a bad countenance if you do.

Watch scary stuff. Yeah. It also advises some good stuff. Plenty of sunlight and drink your milk and eat your vegetables. You should also exercise regularly when you're pregnant. But there's only certain exercises that are safe, because you don't want to be sedentary, but you also don't want too strenuous stuff.

So the ideal balance is obviously housework. Oh, man. Awesome. So sweeping the floors, dusting, cooking, washing the dishes. It's just the right balance. And it just, I mean, isn't it weird that it works out that way? It's like nature intended.

Just like nature intended. Now, as for the delivery itself, in the night, just like me. You guys had this in that apple. That's the only thing. We wouldn't have to cook and clean while we're pregnant and then go through all the pain of delivery. First, I want to make the rules. It's a little book I call the Bible. Thank you men for giving us all these rules to make it easier. So how about some advice for the delivery from Dr. Lowry? I'm ready. Okay, so when you

notice labor, when you first think you may be in labor, what is the first thing you do? Call the doctor. That's right. Why do you call the doctor? I actually don't know what the next step is. I seem held time to come to the hospital. Well, but the reason you really want to call the doctor is because he's really busy and he's going to have to arrange his schedule around you now. So try to be considerate. Okay, we'll do. So stop what you're doing, call your doctor

and let him know so he can figure out when it's gonna be most convenient for him. Got it. I'm only using male pronouns because we're in the early 1900s. Got it. Now, second step, now that you are in labor, go put on a nightgown and a kimono and some

stockings and then part your hair down the center and put it in two braids. Perfect. Am I in labor still? Oh yeah, you're in labor. Okay, great. This is your labor outfit. Got it. It also makes my labor do.

This is your labor do. It makes it easier because you're gonna be in bed for quite a while. And you wanna make sure that your hair is easy to take care of from, you know, by your assistance. Who are gonna brush it for you and rebrate it periodically. Perfect. Okay, I got my hair braided.

Okay, so now you're gonna go to a hospital because that's what a doctor would have been urging you to do. Come on, we're safe. We wash our hands now. Please come to the hospital. Got it. I'm going to a hospital. Because that's what a doctor would have been urging you to do. Come on, we're safe. We wash our hands now. Please come to the hospital. Got it. I'm going to the hospital. What hospital are you going to?

Well, the best advice is to pick a hospital that's close to where your doctor lives, because it's convenient for him. This book was written by a doctor, actually. Yes. I'm going to give them a floor. I'm tired of getting in a buggy, driving down the St. Personals. If you're driving past two hospitals,

that's okay, as long as you're getting to the one that's closest to your doctor. Which also makes sure, make sure you know your doctor's address again. Not something I typically give out. A little personal, I think. Uh, now make sure that you're bringing everything you might need. Okay.

And that's a lot of stuff. In addition to what you may expect, you know, like some clothes for you and some clothes for the baby, and not a car seat because it's, you know, this is 1915. Bring your own bed linens, bring some blankets, towels, washcloths, maybe some bandages. Perfect. And you can do that just by tearing strips of flannel.

Bring lots of torn strips of flannel. Okay. Do not him them. Got it. Maybe they'll have that in the gift shop. Abdominal binders, breast binders. What? Breast binders.

Why? Yeah, just some like strips of, again, I think flannel is recommend. Lots of strips of flannel. Just to tie around your boobs because they're going to be engorged and sore and so just, okay. You know, but they do have ways of tying them around you so that your nipples are still exposed. Perfect.

I love that. Uh, boric acid crystals. Sounds like my regular saturday night on the snot bowl basically. So I like, I couldn't just bring my own. Sounds like my regular Saturday night on the samba basically. So I like, I couldn't just bring my own. Do you have your own Boric Acid Crystals as well? Now those I do not have that I cannot help with. See, we're gonna need those.

For what? The baby's mouth and eyes. Ah, welcome to the world, baby. Here's some Boric Acid in your eyes. You made, you just made the biggest mistake in your life, dummy. You should have stayed in there forever. Boric Acid. Tss. Ah, why? You just made the biggest mistake you're like dummy. You should have stayed in there forever. Bork acid

Why also for you also for your nipples mom Hey moms Sorry moms get some bork acid on there Put reps and bork acid on your nipples and anything else you can think of you probably should I'd be a fun surprise for the kid huh?? Hey, come enjoy my perfect life-giving nipples. I taste like Borg acid. How are you liking life so far, baby? Because it might seem kind of bad. The baby's mouth already tastes like Borg acid

because you put some crystals in it. All I know is Borg acid, 35 years old. The only taste that makes me feel comfortable is Borg acid. That's how you encourage breastfeeding. Because after that, you will definitely like breast milk. But Freud read about that and he's like sweet and set for life. Nobody's going to recover from this. Perfect. Also, you need to make sure that you bring your own lysol so that you can be scrubbed down like all of your, you know, your lady parts.

Inside and out. Mm-hmm. Can be completely scrubbed down with lice all. And then everything is going to be shaved. Wow. For dudes, it like didn't believe in germs a little bit ago. You guys are getting super protective about it, huh? Mm-hmm.

Like, these are way into not having germs around. Yep. Now you're getting a lice all douche. Yeah. How's that going? Oh, an an anema. Yep, now you're getting a lice all douche. Yeah, what's that going? Oh, anonema. Oh, man. And then they're gonna rub everything down with lard. For what?

Are they gonna fry me? No, grease the way. It's like a slip and slide. Sounds like some sort of bizarre, like adult double dare. One last physical joke. One last fun activity for the baby before it we dip it in border-gassing Now after delivery I mentioned you're gonna be in bed for a while. Mm-hmm. Don't move Don't talk for the first few days

What women were instructed not to talk You need to let yourself recover. This has been very hard on you and you're very delicate. So just lay there please. How long? About six weeks total. Oh, right. Right. Now, I should mention that by week three or four, you're allowed to get up out of bed some. Okay. But for about six weeks, you should just lay around. Tell me we got better than this, sitting. So before we actually got better at this, there was one more detour, and that was called Twilight Sleep. Hit me.

So, Twilight Sleep was a method of pain control developed in Germany, in about like 1914. The whole idea was that we're doing okay with some of these medications we're giving women, but we could do better. Women are just too delicate to go through this process. So pain control was started to become not only like an option, but maybe it's necessary, because these poor little ladies just can't go through this. Okay, so what did we do?

What was the plan? So we gave them a mixture of scopolamine and morphine. Now, you know what morphine is? It's a pain medicine. Right, it's an opiate. Right. Scopolamine is what we call an amnestic, so you'll forget things. Is that that thing we watched that vice-tackenery about? It is, the world's most dangerous drug. Well, I can just like, it was like brainwash you with the polamine. Sorry, yeah. So if you give somebody too much scopolamine, they'll die. but if you give them a little bit of scope olemine

They're still awake. It's not like knocking them out, but they won't remember anything that happens As a result between that and the morphine and then the pain that they were still experiencing women became Pretty wild during twilight sleep So they would become combative they would halluc hallucinate, they might yell or flail or kick or punch. So it became necessary to blindfold them, tie their arms down, tie their legs down. There's some really disturbing pictures of women in twilight sleep online if you're ever interested. Thanks. So you would basically fall asleep when you first

went into labor and wake up with a baby in your arms and have no memory of this horrible ordeal you've been through. This is sort of like the furthest we go for treating this as a disease, right? For treating pregnancy as a disease. Like this is our apex of like there, we fixed it. And you'll never have to think about it again. We saw it, we fixed it. And you'll never have to think about it again. We saw it, we cured pregnancy. I think this really was when we really saw pregnancy

as a pathologic state. This kind of peaked late, actually, 1950s. Because if you remember Justin, the episode of Mad Men, Betty Draper has a baby. Right, right. Using Twilight Sleep. And if you ever want a great example of what it is I think they depict it really well

Obviously we moved away from that because it's bad for a number of reasons It's probably pretty psychologically damaging for women I would say and it was dangerous for babies Now we do use pain control, but it's mainly epidurals if you so choose. Obviously doctors wash their hands. Birth in the US is largely in hospitals and mainly done by physicians. Although midwifery is is on the rise, there are more and more women opting for midwife deliveries, which is, as you mentioned, way more common in the UK. And their outcomes are just as good. So don't let anybody tell you differently.

It's all up to what you prefer and what you're comfortable with. But midwife delivery is a totally viable option. If you have some in your area, you should talk to them. We did. Home births are becoming more popular, but still a very small minority in the US, as I mentioned, more common other places and becoming safer as they become more popular. but still a very small minority in the US, as I mentioned, more common other places

and becoming safer as they become more popular. And then, clearly, we try to stay away from more acid and lice all. We got that at least. And unfortunately, now they allow us to work full-time right up until we deliver. Yay! Women's rights. Oh no! Can I lay in bed for six weeks now? Please! I'm sorry, but I don't want to cook or clean either. No. I won't do any of it. Can I just lay down? I, I, uh, again, I have said many times before on behalf of dudes. Um, I'm sorry. I'm real sorry. There's a lot more if you're ever interested in this topic that you can, I mean,

that you can discover birth is wide ranging and something that happens and is a physiologic normal state that is totally natural. Obviously, as humans, we have to mess with as much as humanly possible throughout history. But I think these are the highlights. Well, thank you so much, Cindy, for educating me about this. We certainly appreciate all of you listening to the program. It means the world to us. We are here every Tuesday.

That's the planet least when our baby gets here. I don't know. We definitely have one live show in the cannon. And so we'll be able to deploy that. And hopefully we won't have to take too many weeks off after that. We'll do our best. But Archie, guess is going to die this week, so I may have to take a grieving hiatus first.

That makes sense. Thank you to people tweeting about the show with the at-sol bones. Handle Eric Taichman, Dylan Wadlick, Melissa Danielson, JRP, Adam D, Bethany, DiBass, Kato, Cotonian, Venetia, Sabrina, Daniel, Merroth, Marine, Kevin, so many others, you're all very kind. Thank you for helping us to spread the word about our program. It really helps us out and spread the word about vaccines.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of you were sharing our vaccine episode and helping to spread the word there. So that's awesome too. We hope that you change a mind or at least reinforce your own absolutely well-founded beliefs. Facts.

They're facts. They're facts. The science. Thank you to the taxpayers for letting us use their song medicines for intro and outro Thank you the maximum fun network for having us as a part of their well network There's a lot of other great programs feel us to do there at maximum fun. I'm already including Jordan Jesse go judge John Hodgman the goose down lady and the lady Ono Ross and Carrie Stop podcasting yourself

My brother my brother and you dear. I do appreciate that bullseye so many others the Ono Ross and Carrie, stop podcasting yourself. My brother, my brother and me. Thank you, dear. I do appreciate that bullseye. So many others, go to maximumfund.org and check them all out. And that's going to do it for us this week. Thank you, again, a million thank yous. Make sure to share the show and just give people

sub on show.com. It's a link to our website. And that is it for us, Sydney. Thank you so much for joining me here today. No problem, J-Man. Until next Tuesday, I'm just a Macaroid. I'm Sydney Macaroid. And as always, don't jill a hole in your head. Alright!

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