OK but terribly American and doctor-knows-best
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I wish I hadn't bought this book. It has a lot of information, but
it's hard to sort out what's widely agreed on and what's just the
opinion of the book's authors. After doing a fair bit of research I
see that a lot is the latter, and some of it is pretty way out. There
is an assumption that you will do what your doctor (sic: not midwife)
says, without question, and even that you should assume you need
permission for everything, e.g. it says that you might like music
while you are in labour "if the doctor allows"! Typical of the tone is
that homebirth is scarcely mentioned except to scare you about what
might happen if you don't go to hospital soon enough (i.e. you don't
want an unplanned home birth, do you).
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Good for specific problems, but very negative..
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As a mother to be, I found this book very helpful if I needed to look up a specific symptom, but not to read through. I found that it was very negatively written, and I actually found myself imagining symptoms and issues after reading it, which turned out to be nothing. A good book for specific references (as you might use an encyclopedia), but I wouldn't recommend buying it to read right through.
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The one book to refer to all the way through your pregnancy
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As a young mother to be I didn't have many friends to give advice and this book provided a huge amount of support and help all the way through my pregnancy. It is a little american biased but not much. I found every niggle or worry that I had was covered. It gave me advice on what to do, when to call in the experts and when not to panic. I am online ordering the next one in the series and I hope it is as good!
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Preachy
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I found this book to be extremely unrealistic and preachy in terms of what to eat when pregnant. Some of the month-by-month Q&A were informative, but often repetitious. The focus also tended to be on all the things that could go wrong, not simply on what to expect.
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Worth it's weight in Gold!!
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What a fantasic book! As someone going through my first pregnancy with my head full of 'old wives tales' and everyone else's opinion this book was my sanctuary! This book answers every question you could possibly think of regarding pregnancy, childbirth and the first few weeks of being a parent. It saved me many unnecessary phone calls and trips to the midwife. It also went into considerable more detail about first signs of labour than any other book I had - which is great as there are lots of false alarms. I have lent this book to every pregnant friend I have had since I bought it. I would recommend this book to ALL pregnant women - I can't praise it enough!!
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