plus 3, Carolyn Hax | Stress of pregnancy, or just morons? - Kansas City Star

Carolyn Hax | Stress of pregnancy, or just morons? - Kansas City Star
Wyoming committee advances homicide pregnancy bill - KULR8
Rhino born at Cincinnati Zoo produces pregnancy - Fox 19
Teen pregnancy a giant hurdle for Hispanics - Batavia Sun

Carolyn Hax | Stress of pregnancy, or just morons? - Kansas City Star

Posted: 19 Feb 2010 08:20 PM PST

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ADVICE

DEAR CAROLYN: My friend and his wife are expecting ... and separating. The cause of the separation seems to be (significant) "stress of pregnancy" issues that I think are temporary.

While I recognize their choices are none of my business, it's hard to watch my friend nurse his hurt and think about dating other women, rather than look toward a very near future in which there will be no reason to separate and at least one big reason to stay together.

As a bystander, what kinds of things are OK to say/do in support of the marriage? What kinds of things are over the line? — Va.

Assuming you're that kind of friend, how about: "Maybe you should wait till your wife gives birth before you openly contemplate dating other women, you moron."

Absolutely, there are things you don't know, as you acknowledge. For one, she could be as big a moron as he is. It could just be his hurt feelings talking. And it could be over between them for reasons that have nothing to do with pregnancy stress, where the prospect of a child merely precipitated a meltdown that was coming all along.

Whatever the case may be, you do know your friend is a mess, and you know the baby's coming, mess be damned. And your friend is confiding in you. And, while the baby obviously has a timetable, absolutely nothing else does.

So the most productive — and compassionate — tack might just be to listen as he talks his way through this, and remind him at judicious intervals that his best move might be no move at all. He loses nothing by waiting to see what effect the baby has on his life before turning that life on end.

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Wyoming committee advances homicide pregnancy bill - KULR8

Posted: 18 Feb 2010 06:41 PM PST

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Rhino born at Cincinnati Zoo produces pregnancy - Fox 19

Posted: 17 Feb 2010 07:08 AM PST

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CINCINNATI, OH (FOX19) - The Cincinnati Zoo's first Sumatran rhino calf has produced the first Sumatran rhino pregnancy in Southeast Asia for the global captive breeding program.

Andalas and his mate, Ratu, both 8-years-old, were brought together through international goodwill and cooperation in an effort to save this critically endangered species. Now, scientists at the Cincinnati Zoo are joining conservationists around the globe, celebrating the rare pregnancy.

In 2001, Andalas became the first Sumatran rhino born in captivity in 112 years. Six years later, he journeyed across the world, more than 10,000 miles and 63 hours by plane, truck and ferry, with a very important mission: to breed successfully with the female rhinos at the Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary in the Way Kambas National Park in Indonesia.

Ratu, a native Indonesian, wandered into a village just outside the Way Kambas Park and was brought to the Sanctuary to keep her safe. The pair have been getting to know one another through sight, sound, smell and other ways in which only rhinos can ascertain, ever since. And now, Andalas and Ratu are expecting a large 75 pound calf in May 2011.

The two rhinos will remain at the 250-acre complex built and supported by the International Rhino Foundation (IRF). The sanctuary houses five rhinos that are part of an intensively managed research and breeding program aimed at contributing to the conservation of the species in the wild.

"The Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary has been encouraged by Cincinnati Zoo's success," said Widodo Ramono, executive director of the Indonesian Rhino Foundation. "Our staff has diligently applied the Cincinnati Zoo's methodology, especially ultra-sonographic techniques, to achieve this result."

The Cincinnati Zoo is the only place in the world to successfully breed this critically endangered species in captivity.

"Sumatran rhinos are very solitary by nature and very aggressive towards one another except when a female is in estrus," said Dr. Terri Roth, Director of Cincinnati Zoo's Center for Conservation and Research of Endangered Wildlife (CREW) and vice president for IRF's Asia programs. "Through science we can determine when the female is ready to ovulate so that she is paired with a male at the right time and fighting is minimized while the likelihood of conception is optimized. It is wonderful to see the science developed at CREW help our Indonesian colleagues achieve success in the forest of Sumatra."

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Teen pregnancy a giant hurdle for Hispanics - Batavia Sun

Posted: 19 Feb 2010 10:43 PM PST

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EPIDEMIC | By age 19, more than a quarter of Latinas is a mother

One of the most stubborn barriers to success for young Latinas is teenage pregnancy.

More than one in four Latinas is a mother by the age of 19, a report by the Pew Hispanic Center found, a number higher than in any other demographic.

Experts said the high pregnancy rates could be in part due to cultural norms in rural Mexico, where having more children is seen as an advantage to the family and not as an economic burden.

But while that would explain why the birth rate dips for the first generation of U.S.-born Latinas, the rate actually increases for the next generation.

"The pattern is perplexing,'' said Lorena Garcia, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago who has studied pregnancy among minorities in Chicago Public Schools.

Rebecca Perez of Logan Square was 13 and in eighth grade when she found out she was seven months pregnant. The father was 18, the brother of a friend.

"I was the smartest one, you could say, for school," she said. "But when it comes to life and outside of school, that's when I had trouble, like, making the right decisions."

Perez, the youngest of six, was born in Los Angeles to Mexican immigrants and raised in Chicago.

In her peer group, her experience was typical, even though 75 percent of Latino youth told Pew they believe teenagers having babies was bad for society.

"I got a lot of friends who got babies," said Perez, whose son, Michael, is now 4. "They all got pregnant during high school."

One of the problems Garcia found in her research is that in sex education classes, "too much emphasis was placed on risk and the dangers of sex and not enough information on how exactly to talk with partners about safe sex or where exactly to locate resources in the community.''

She also said "images of Latinas and Latinos in the media ... oftentimes glamorize sexual relations and early pregnancy.''

Finally, Garcia said, pregnancies could be "more visible to us because Latina girls are more likely to go through with their pregnancy than other groups.'' The reason "seems to be a combination of religious values and financial constraints'' in that they are less likely to be able to afford an abortion, she said.

Perez said that while she plans to openly discuss sexual health with her son when he is older, her mother was too "shy" to talk about sex with her.

"We had [sex education] in high school, which was already too late," she said.

Perez said her own pregnancy was the result of bad decision-making. As a student at Roberto Clemente Community Academy High School in Humboldt Park, a school where 63 percent of students are Latino, she said friends actively sought out pregnancy.

"They want the guy to be with them forever," she said. "It doesn't work out like that."

Now a freshman at Northeastern Illinois University, Perez is studying to become a math teacher. But she spends all day Friday, Saturday and Sunday working as a car wash cashier to pay for supplies for her son and a car for her and her mom.

She relies heavily on financial aid to pay for school, and on her own mother for child care.

"I think [my mom] still is more like the mom to [Michael] because she spends more time with him than I do," she said.

When Michael was a year old, Perez joined New Moms Inc., a Humboldt Park program for at-risk teenage moms.

Beyond her mother and the New Moms staff, her decision to stay in school wasn't supported by the rest of her family. Her five siblings, for example, didn't attend her high school graduation.

"After I had Michael, they said [college] was just wasting time, I was just wasting money on school, and that I should just start working," she said.

Her aspirations of a college diploma aren't the only thing separating her from her peers.

"Most of them have two kids by now," she said. "They think that's their life. Having kids. Being home. That's it."

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