During the black summer bushfires Sonya gave birth six weeks early. Afterwards, when her doctor told her that bushfire smoke may have had something to do with it, she was shocked – she had not been warned that this was possible. Isabelle Oderberg explains how bushfire smoke and air pollution are harmful during pregnancy, and argues for better health information for pregnant women
Read Isabelle Oderberg’s article here:
Every year, thousands of British children are conceived with the help of donor sperm. But few ever meet their siblings...
Caroline Pearson, a podcast producer from London, was a few days into her maternity leave when she discovered that her unborn daughter had two sisters. She had visited a website a friend had told her about, which allows recipients of donated sperm (such as her) to search for families who have used the same donor. If they’ve registered with this website, they could be anywhere in the world, since the US sperm bank chosen by Pearson and her husband, Francis, ships internationally, and the website, Donor Sibling Registry (DSR), is also US-based with an international reach. Pearson couldn’t resist, and typed in the donor’s reference number.
“Suddenly, I was overwhelmingly curious,” Pearson says. She didn’t expect to find anything – let alone two families living within a half-hour radius. The first profile was a single mother to a two-year-old girl, living nearby in London. It seemed an extraordinary coincidence. Caroline was “totally giddy”; her partner Francis, a photographer, was cautious. “I tried to rein things in,” he says. “Caroline was pregnant and we were already dealing with becoming parents, and the donor process. But all this other stuff, it was so unknown. I’m practical and you think: yes, that could be amazing – but what if they’re awful people?”
Suddenly there was a lovely little girl, who shared our baby's DNA. It was extremely surreal
It feels really special we met; the randomness of choosing a donor translating into something so solid
Related: ‘I thought – who will remember me?’: the man who fathered 200 children
Continue reading...The pandemic has put everyone’s life out of sync but for some in their 30s, the turmoil has added complications
How have you measured out the last year of your life? In the number of binged TV series? Walks in the park? Or perhaps, by the number of periods, injections to your hormone-rounded rump or the hopeful swipes on dating apps?
For some the past 12 months have put a pause on one of the few decisions in our lives that has a biological deadline: should you have a baby? And if so, how, where, when and with whom? It is a question that smacks into us like a train at the beginning of what I call “the panic years”, a period of turmoil in your 30s, during which all decisions about love, work, friendship or where to live are given a special sense of urgency by the fact that you can mark your declining fertility with each monthly cycle.
Related: ‘It feels like a lost year’: the women who fear 2020 has stolen their chance of motherhood
Nell Frizzell is the author of The Panic Years, out now through Bantam Press
Continue reading...I wonder how the early days with my baby might have been different if I’d had a better understanding of what to expect from my own body
Recently, my daughter chipped my front tooth. It was an accident. She was simply being joyous and irrepressible, as three-year-olds are. She came up and cracked me on the chin, and now that lovely smooth ridge at the back of my eye tooth is gone, leaving a jagged edge that stabs my tongue and scrapes my bottom lip. There’s friction when my teeth meet. Weird pressure on one tooth. Chewing feels strange.
As I contemplate the new reality in my mouth, a few things come to mind. I think about Brad Pitt, who reportedly once had a front tooth surgically chipped for a role. Did he struggle with the new reality too? I also think about other changes to my body that are related to motherhood, and that I’ve worked hard to overcome or come to terms with: weight struggles, poor posture, carpal tunnel flare-ups, incontinence, a hip problem which limits the exercise I can do. This is yet another example of collateral damage to add to that list, testament to the ever-growing list of new realities I associate with motherhood.
Related: My first labour rocked me, but sharing our birth stories can empower new parents | Sophie Walker
Related: Pushed to the limit: six birth stories from around the world
Continue reading...Tory London mayoral candidate suggested in 2010 that young mothers push people who ‘do right thing’ down housing ladder
The Conservative candidate for London mayor, Shaun Bailey, has been criticised for newly emerged comments in which he suggested teenage mothers pushed people who “do the right thing” down the housing ladder.
Bailey has previously been condemned for comments about teenage pregnancies, suggesting that distributing condoms encouraged girls to get pregnant.
Continue reading...It is the most expensive country in the world to have a baby, there is no way of knowing the bill in advance, and you can potentially be charged just for holding your newborn
I’m delighted to announce my partner has been struck with a short-term disability. She is pregnant. Which, in the capitalist utopia that is the US, is pretty much the same thing. It’s the only developed country without mandated paid maternity leave; in some states, however, short-term disability insurance covers your income for a few weeks while you recover from the miracle of birth.
You know what is really a miracle? The fact that anyone gives birth in the US at all. (And, in fact, not many people do: the birthrate has plummeted.) It doesn’t just have the worst parental leave in the rich world, it is also the most expensive country in which to have a baby. It is hard to pin down exact costs because they vary wildly depending on your location and your health insurance. However, even with decent insurance, you can expect to pay a few thousand dollars out-of-pocket for an uncomplicated birth. Indeed, the cost of delivering a regular American baby is more than that of delivering a Royal baby in the UK.
Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist
Continue reading...Photographer who took shot of pregnant Duchess of Sussex says couple ‘absolute soulmates’
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s second child will have an automatic right to US citizenship if born in America, as is likely.
The new baby, news of which was announced by the “overjoyed” couple on Valentine’s Day, will be born eighth in line to the throne and become the most senior royal in the current line of succession to be born overseas.
Continue reading...Select committee issues 20 recommendations including maintaining universal credit increase
The government risks “turning the clock back” on gender equality by overlooking the labour market and caring inequalities faced by women during the pandemic, a report published by the women and equalities committee warns.
The select committee has issued 20 recommendations for the government to tackle inequality, including maintaining the £20 increase to universal credit.
Continue reading...Luca Yupanqui was recorded by her parents using ‘biosonic MIDI technology’
An American toddler, Luca Yupanqui, is gearing up to release her debut album, the world’s first LP made from sounds inside the womb.
Her parents are Elizabeth Hart, a member of psych-rock band Psychic Ills, and musician Iván Diaz Mathé, who has worked with Lee “Scratch” Perry and others. In five hour-long “joint meditation” sessions, they recorded Yupanqui in utero via electrodes on Hart’s abdomen, and using “biosonic MIDI technology” transcribed the vibrations they picked up into synthesisers.
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