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Is it bad to be born on Halloween? After all, the holiday - which has been traced to have Pagan roots - is all about death and horror.
So what's a pregnant woman who's due to give birth on October 31st to do? She defies biology, that's what! Here's what Yale researchers found by analyzing the birth statistics in the past 11 years:
All types of births — natural, C-section, induced — decreased significantly on All Hallows’ Eve. Overall, a whopping 11.3% decrease in births was seen on this day across the years. That’s a pretty clear indicator that women don’t want their babies associated with hauntings and horror.
Okay, so the numbers are definitive. But how could women exert control over when they give birth?! The short answer is that no one has any idea. The closest that these authors come to suggesting a psychophysiological mechanism is to say that wanting to give birth on Valentine’s Day and resisting giving birth on Halloween could, for a short time, alter the hormonal mechanisms responsible for determining birth timing.
Link - via This isn't happiness
I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t want to give birth to a 16 pound baby, even if it was through a caesarian. On top of every thing else, you’d have to worry about trying to find clothes for him. Janet Johnson, who just gave birth to a son that might be the world’s largest said she’s going to have to return all the clothes she already bought for him since he’s already the size of most 3 month olds.
John Varty founded Tiger Canyons reserve in South Africa. His goal is to start a population of wild, free-range tigers outside their natural habitat. He began with two zoo-born tigers, and now has 15 cats running loose in the reserve. This clip is from Tiger Man of Africa: The Mating Game, which aired last night as part of Expedition Week on the National Geographic channel. Link -via Buzzfeed
Identical twin sisters Amy Gilbert and Allison Oliverio of Clinton, Michigan grew up together, both married their high school sweethearts, went into the same profession, and then became mothers -on the same day!
Dr. Timothy Kim was back and forth delivering both babies.
“They were kind enough to put rooms next to each other, so not so much running. I’ve been doing this for 12 years and I never heard of twins having a baby on the same day,” said Dr. Kim.
Amy gave birth to baby Claire and Allison gave birth to baby Garrett. The sisters both married their high school sweethearts six months apart to the day. They say they didn’t plan on getting pregnant at the same
Only time will tell how alike the cousins who share a January 12th birthday will be. Link (with video) -via Arbroath
A church in West Columbia, South Carolina held a drive-through nativity scene last weekend. The hundreds of people who came to see it got more than they expected when a participating goat gave birth to a kid!
They knew they were awaiting the birth of a baby at a church’s live drive-thru nativity scene, but one of the stars, who was on loan from a local farm, fell to the ground. “Joseph was standing beside her, and he kinda looked at her and said something was wrong,” says the church’s pastor, Charles Westbrook.
Westbrook played one of the three kings, and he says it didn’t take he and Joseph long to realize the Virgin Mary wasn’t the only one who was pregnant. “I could see the head of the goat coming out,” says Westbrook, “She was actually coming. There was a water sac around the baby.”
The female kid was standing on her own within 15 minutes. The music minister named her Beth, short for Bethlehem. Link -via Arbroath
(Image credit: Peggy Peagler)
I just found out about another blessed event that occurred on Monday of this week. Neatorama author John Farrier (who runs NeatoGeek) and his wife welcomed baby Sophia! Then for some reason, he got busy and didn’t tell us. John referred to her as “my newest little Ferengi” (although she is much prettier than any Ferengi could hope to be). Congratulations to mom, dad, and the whole family!
Congratulations to Neatorama author Stacy Conradt (Stacy Bee) and her husband, who welcomed their first child Lydia Louise into the world yesterday! Lydia weighed 6 pounds, 15 ounces and measured 20.5 inches long. Mother and baby are fine, and Lydia’s parents and grandparents are as proud as punch! You can see a couple more pictures at NeatoBambino.
On February 27th, someone created a Facebook group that’s called “MY SISTER SAID IF I GET ONE MILLION FANS SHE WILL NAME HER BABY MEGATRON.” Already there almost 750,000 fans, and the due date isn’t until August. And over at the discussion boards, one thread asks what the middle name will be.
Easy: Destroyer of Worlds.
Link (Image: ©Hasbro) -via College Humor
Here’s a rather unexpected result of mass layoffs and high unemployment: the stress causes pregnant women to spontaneously abort more males, thus contributing to future gender gap.
To our ancient ancestors, those signs would presumably be signals of impending drought or other natural disaster, which would indicate a coming food scarcity. [Ralph] Catalano and colleagues concluded the closest thing we have today is the announcement of mass layoffs at major employers, which impacts “the degree to which the larger population perceives a threat to its economic security.”
Such threats are bad news to small male fetuses because “a relatively large fraction” of them fall near “a critical rank below which gestations spontaneously end,” the researchers explain. If they are born, these small males are more likely to die than larger infants and females of equivalent size.
The researchers examined California’s ratio of male to female births from mid-1995 to the end of 2007 and compared it to the federal Labor Department’s monthly statistics on mass layoffs in the state. The government reports a mass layoff has taken place when 50 or more people file for unemployment insurance from a single company over five weeks.
After doing some complex calculations, they estimated that news of impending mass layoffs “predicted the loss of 3,090 males in utero” during the 61 months (out of the 141 they examined) in which unemployment claims exceeded the expected number.
Link – Thanks Julia Monti!
The New Zealand Herald is reporting on a strange occurence at Kelly Tarlton’s Underwater World. Eloise Gibson writes that a shark was bit open at the stomach by another shark, which freed her young that were due to be born that night. Since the staff was unaware of the pregnancy, they were shocked and speculated that the sharks feared predator attacks if she birthed during the night; the likes of stingrays could be lethal.
The young sharks have been taken to a “nursery” tank with some baby eagle rays, where visitors can see them before they are released into the wild.
Link (Photo: Richard Robinson)
Update (11/11/2009): The mother and her eight babies are all doing fine. Link to Daily Mail story with video.
When a baby wants to come into the world, he/she doesn’t care if the mother is ready. If her due date is still some time away, the mother may be anywhere. There are also cases where circumstances get in the way, as in the case of Rosita Cheindza.
It sounds like the birth story of an ancient goddess, but it’s true. Ms Cheindza was near term in 2000 when flood waters raged through her town in Mozambique. She climbed a tree to escape the crocodile-infested waters and stayed there for four days with nothing to drink or eat. Finally on the fourth day, her baby came. Soon after, helicopters arrived to winch the mother and the baby, Rosita, to safety.
And that’s only the first of ten strange birthplace stories. Link -via Unique Daily
Watch the birth of a giraffe at Safari West Wildlife Preserve in California. It was a surprise, as zookeepers did not know the mother was pregnant. Unfortunately, this video report does not show the six foot drop a baby giraffe undergoes, but he is a cute little thing …if you can call a six-foot, 130 pound baby “little”! Link
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Esperanza Base (pictured) is now inhabited by 55 people, including ten families and two schoolteachers! Link
(image credit: © Samuel Blanc)
A fascinating video clip depicting the 12 billion years life cycle of a Class G type star in 6 minutes (actually 6:29). From its conception, birth, death – and the deaths of surrounding celestial bodies – and then its remnants contributing to the growth of future stars and planets are all shown. No narration just great music and animation so sit back and relax.
* Interesting note for those who don’t know: our Sun (Latin name Sol) is a Class G type star.
A baby was born in a McDonald’s restroom in Vancouver, Wash, and the mother didn’t even know she was pregnant.
It was the evening shift last Friday at the fast-food restaurant when employee Danille Miller suddenly felt ill and ran for the bathroom. Her 16-year-old co-worker, Jaynae Herrera, followed “I was like are you pregnant?” Herrera asked. “Because she was in the bathroom, and I’m like, are you pregnant? She says, I don’t think so. A couple minutes later, she says the baby is coming out, and that’s when I started freaking out.”
Herrera, with the assistance of a 911 dispatcher, helped her deliver baby Austin Laddusaw, and both mother and baby are fine. Miller said, “I was so shocked I couldn’t talk. I was shaking the whole time. I didn’t stop shaking until three the next morning. My sister stayed the night with me.”
Story: Koin
Video: ClipSyndicate
