i recently observed a pregnancy from beginning to birth and i am in awe of the human body. it is amazing what the female goes through and ultimately produces. amazing.
child birth is obviously as old as time and the human body has evolved in some amazing ways to facilitate this arduous process and to ensure the highest likelihood to survival for the infant. from the rearranging of the abdomen to accommodate the womb to the systematic release of appropriate hormones, it is an amazingly complex and somehow obvious process. as humans we are after all built for this very purpose.
that being said, i can't imagine going through this before the comfort and conveniences of modern medicine and society. the comfort that a specialist from the hospital provides to the sterile environment to the availability of foods, bulk stores and everything else that might be needed quickly. how did a mother take the time to ensure her child knew how to latch on and feed for the first time when she had to avoid being eaten by a bear?
its makes sense now why we tend to give birth to a single child at a time. if you gave birth to triplets anytime before... basically the last century, there was a very high likelihood that they wouldn't survive. be it a mountain lion or the weather or the factory, something would steal your focus away from the offspring.
the octomom is a nice symbol of the almost absurd plushness of our time. the body is being manipulated to produce an unnatural number of offspring and science has found a way to keep them alive. wanting that many children is a perverse manifestation of greed that has teamed up with our natural desire to procreate. the children aren't needed, nor can the mother properly care for them (emotionally or financially in this case) but she wants them, so she gets them and society accommodates, as it always has tried to.
i suppose we would eventually start growing extra nipples if we continued to give birth to multiple children at once.
