I try not to link too often to items found on BoingBoing—they get plenty of traffic already, and everyone reads them, so why bother? But I found this recent rant—about due dates and statistics—fascinating. It’s the kind of thing I should’ve been obsessed about when Sasha was gestating but somehow forgot to be:
Petunia was getting bigger. Her bones were hardening. Her eyebrows were growing. She had a July 11th due date, and, though there was not much I could do to influence anything, I could, nonetheless obsess about what, precisely, a due date means. I asked anyone who I thought might have some insight. I know, for example, that due dates are simply calculated by adding 40 weeks to the start of the mother’s last menstrual cycle. But how effective is that? How many babies are born on their due dates?
Our child birthing class teacher: “Oh only 5% of babies are actually born on their due dates.”
Me: So are half born before, half after?
Teacher: “Oh you can’t know when the baby is going to come.”
Me: I get it. I just want to know the statistics.
Teacher: “The baby will come when it is ready.”
It goes on from there. If you like science or statistics or are just a whacked-out obsessive nut job like this BoingBoinger and me, you might like.
I have this absolute hatred for waiting for anything, so I decided not to tell anyone my due date. For those who “knew”, like my midwives and doctor and spouse, I simply told them to relax, I had no plans to have my kid for at least a month after the said appointment.
When I was two weeks away from that time, my midwife said simply, Okay, we’d be comfortable if you had the kid anytime now. From that I made the calculation of the three weeks post date and coined (you heard it first from me … mark my words) Due Zone. I used it at my yoga classes, I used it at work. I worked past that date, and had my kid when she told me she was coming. She came exactly within her Due Zone, pretty much 2.5 weeks past the date I’d been “randomly” assigned. That made me the most relaxed “overdue” mommy my midwives had ever met. And nobody made those annoying calls to me asking daily if I was worried and when I’d be induced.
The Due Zone. I said it first and three times. My second was roughly a month after that “date”, and my third was ten days early. All came when fully baked. 😉