The Myth of the Perfect Pregnancy

When a couple plans for a child today, every moment seems precious and unique. Home pregnancy tests promise good news just days after conception, and prospective parents can track the progress of their pregnancy day by day with apps that deliver a stream of embryonic portraits. On-line due date calculators trigger a direct-marketing barrage of baby-name lists and diaper coupons. Ultrasounds as early as eight weeks offer a first photo for the baby book.

Yet, all too often, even the best-strategized childbearing plans go awry. About twenty percent of confirmed pregnancies miscarry, mostly in the first months of gestation. Statistically, early pregnancy losses are a normal part of childbearing for healthy women. Drawing on sources ranging from advice books and corporate marketing plans to diary entries and blog posts, Lara Freidenfelds offers a deep perspective on how this common and natural phenomenon has been experienced. As she shows, historically, miscarriages were generally taken in stride so long as a woman eventually had the children she desired.

This has changed in recent decades, and an early pregnancy loss is often heartbreaking and can be as devastating to couples as losing a child. Freidenfelds traces how innovations in scientific medicine, consumer culture, cultural attitudes toward women and families, and fundamental convictions about human agency have reshaped the childbearing landscape. While the benefits of an increased emphasis on parental affection, careful pregnancy planning, attentive medical care, and specialized baby gear are real, they have also created unrealistic and potentially damaging expectations about a couple's ability to control reproduction and achieve perfect experiences.

The Myth of the Perfect Pregnancy provides a reassuring perspective on early pregnancy loss and suggests ways for miscarriage to more effectively be acknowledged by women, their families, their healthcare providers, and the maternity care industry.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Chapter 1: Childbearing in Colonial America
Chapter 2: Planning the Baby: Fertility Control from Withdrawal to the Pill
Chapter 3: Bonding with the Baby: The Changing Meaning of Parenting
Chapter 4: Taking Care of the Baby: Prenatal Care at the Doctor's Office and Elsewhere
Chapter 5: Buying for the Baby: Marketing, Earlier and Earlier
Chapter 6: Imagining the Baby: Debating Abortion
Chapter 7: Seeing the Baby: The Ultrasound Ritual
Chapter 8: Detecting the Baby: The Home Pregnancy Test
Conclusion
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index