Get Me Out: A History of Childbirth from the Garden of Eden to the Sperm Bank by Randi Hutter Epstein

Summary and review:

As the subtitle to Randi Hutter Epstein's book suggests, Get Me Out follows the science and superstition of childbirth from the earliest recorded births to the fertility industry of today. But Get Me Out does more than just deliver birth-related anecdotes; Epstein uses historical attitudes toward conception, pregnancy, and delivery to comment on contemporary society. From feminism to industrialization to urbanization, Epstein argues that the way humans view childbirth is a reflection of the morals, values, and beliefs that we espouse in general. It is a fascinating read and moves quickly, throwing out examples from various historical ages. In particular, Epstein traces the "medicalization" of childbirth. Pregnancy, which began as a spiritual journey on which a woman was accompanied by instincts and fellow women became, in the 20th Century, a medical condition that necessitated professional treatment as would a life-threatening disease.

Epstein's attitude toward non-medical births is interesting. As a medical doctor (she received her M.D. from Yale University), I expected her to be aggressively pro-hospitals, pro-obstetrics, and anti-midwives and homebirths. She is firmly against "freebirthers," women who give birth at home without any medical intervention, shunning both doctors and midwives (her tone in the "Freebirthers" chapter is actually rather sarcastic and mocking. It's clear she finds the movement not only ridiculous but irresponsible). Yet Epstein seems surprisingly open to midwives and non-hospital births. She seems to regret the loss of the sisterhood that supported a woman before, during and after labor. Many of the anecdotes Epstein includes reflect negatively on medical professionals: doctors who unfairly painted midwives as incompetent and dangerous; men who had never stepped foot into a birthing room yet published medical tracts contradicting midwives' knowledge; horrifically painful medical experiments performed on unanesthetized slave women; epidemics of puerperal fever, spread by unwashed medical equipment and doctors' hands; and DES, a synthetic estrogen prescribed for everything from morning sickness to miscarriage prevention, which had horrific consequences for the children of DES mothers, and yet was prescribed by doctors even after it was shown to cause reproductive cancers and malformations in animal trials.

Initially I was slightly turned off by Epstein's writing style. As I mentioned, she has a medical degree from Yale, but she also has a masters degree in journalism from Columbia. However, her writing in places seemed unprofessional, even flippant. For example, in the introduction Epstein writes about the superstitions regarding cauls, pieces of the anmiotic sac that sometimes stick to a baby's head. She writes of a Roman emperor whose son was born with a caul, a fortuitious sign. "As predicted," she writes, "the boy joined his father as a co-emperor by age 9, but father and son were murdered the following year. Whatever" (ix).

Seriously? She has Ivy-league degrees in medicine and journalism, but that sentence sounds like it was written by an eighth-grade girl. Through text messaging. A few other instances like this in the beginning of the book made me wary, as if Epstein were trying too hard to sound cool, or to make a boring subject (how could childbirth and pregnancy be boring to a postpartum woman?) sound cool. Fortunately, things improved. I actually ended up liking Epstein's writing style. It felt like I was listening to an interesting lecture given by a well-spoken professor.

Other interesting stories in the book included the Chamberlens, male "midwives" who invented a type of obstetric forceps, "Twilight Sleep," a cocktail of narcotics given to women to make them forget the pain of childbirth (it was becoming increasingly popular in the early 20th century, but fell out of favor after its champion died during childbirth after having taken the drug), the use of X-Rays during pregnancy and the possible dangers of ultrasounds, and the ins and outs of the sperm bank industry.

Again, I thought this book was fascinating. The way Epstein presents the history makes it relevant to more than just women with children. Anyone interested in sociology or medical history will enjoy Get Me Out. ★★★★★★★★☆☆ (8/10)

Content:

Blood and gore: Little, but the descriptions of surgeries may be disturbing to some people.

Sex: Nothing too racy, but it is kind of the crux of the book. There is also mention of pornography as used in the sperm banks.

Language: Mild