That, unlike other mammals, the human placenta gets *arterial* blood. The fetus gets the oxygen we breathe before we do.
It’s part of what makes us so susceptible to hemorrhage and preeclampsia. And it’s so much harder for humans to miscarry, because we can’t just shunt off our own arteries.
Brain development is just very oxygen hungry. We give birth at the time that the baby’s oxygen needs outstrip our ability to breathe for them and ourselves at the same time. It’s not really hip width!! The hip width thing is mostly a male-gaze reading of the birthing process.
It also allows people to act as if what’s dangerous about childbirth is the birth canal issue. It’s not! Human pregnancy is dangerous because our bodies are literally playing a kind of oxygen-chicken. Cesarean section doesn’t change this fundamental fact.
It’s part of what makes us so susceptible to hemorrhage and preeclampsia. And it’s so much harder for humans to miscarry, because we can’t just shunt off our own arteries.
Brain development is just very oxygen hungry. We give birth at the time that the baby’s oxygen needs outstrip our ability to breathe for them and ourselves at the same time. It’s not really hip width!! The hip width thing is mostly a male-gaze reading of the birthing process.
It also allows people to act as if what’s dangerous about childbirth is the birth canal issue. It’s not! Human pregnancy is dangerous because our bodies are literally playing a kind of oxygen-chicken. Cesarean section doesn’t change this fundamental fact.