Wonderful World of Child Birth

Thus far in my life, I have not had the joy or experience to give birth to a child.  Many of my friends have had children, my siblings all have at least one child, but I have never experienced a live childbirth.  I have been in the waiting room for multiple nieces and nephews.  I have been to the hospital several hours after a child was born and even once in a NICU for several days.  Thus I cannot say that I have personally experienced this miracle of life as it is proclaimed to be.  However the most recent birth that I was in the hospital waiting room for was my nephew, who just turned one in January.  This was my sister in laws third child, but she was having many complications.  She was not gaining much weight, but the baby was growing larger and larger.  She developed gestational diabetes, but she herself only gained 10 pounds.  Her blood pressure was high and she was constantly in pain.  In the beginning of December my nephew was already at the size he should have been for birth.  He was not due until the end of January.  Two months early the doctors were going to take him.  One thing led to another and the doctors decided to have my sister in law keep in the baby in.  After a few more weeks of this, my nephew was finally educed 3 weeks early.  He was having problems breathing and heart issues so he was placed in the NICU.  He was the largest baby in there, but was having so many complications.  As I sat with him for hours in the unit and looking at him compared to the other babies, I wondered what would happen to him.  Would these heart and lung issues prevent him from doing many childhood activities such as sports?  Would he be able to breathe at night without the worry of him stopping and not starting again?  I wondered what critical weeks of development he was missing and what it would mean for health issues in the future.  As of today, my nephew is a healthy baby boy.  He is actually in the top percentile for weight and height.  He is developing normally (he took his first steps today!) and could not be a happier baby!

In America we have the luxury of giving birth in a hospital, many pre-natal visits and pre-natal vitamins.  Along with the comforts of the hospital, women are able to choose to get an epidural for the pain, thus making childbirth even easier.  There is the option for home birth and mid wives that are trained to do so, but many Americans prefer the hospital route.
In poorer countries, hospitals are not an option.  Children are delivered at home without the use of medical tools or equipment, there are no vitamins or multiple doctor visits, and yet these children survive as well.

http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0017155