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Notes -
I did start hemorrhaging after my second birth but I don't think it actually got to the point of being truly dangerous (it's a little hard to know, the medical professionals try not to make you panic, but they gave me the necessary medication and got it under control pretty quickly so I think it was just a routine complication) and at the time my PPD was severe enough the slim prospect of being dead felt like a relief, I mostly felt bad for my husband. (Spoiler: I did not die)
But I don't think I'd be ok with a 10% risk of dying to have a fourth kid. That seems pretty damn cruel to the first three.
(Of course large portions of human history people seemed to feel otherwise, unless the only reason husbands were still ejaculating inside their wives after the first kids during periods of history when maternal mortality was higher than 10% was because they had religious reasons so strong it was worth risking their wife's life over. Idk, I find it very very hard to relate to the choices made during time periods with high maternal mortality, it seems pretty crazy to me, but maybe it explains why women who feel the risk is worth it exist because we'd have gone extinct otherwise?)
I have a relative who got post partum psychosis, which I consider approximately 1000x more terrifying than PPD, and she's on her way to a fifth child. Discussing having kids with her is a very strange experience because she's so much less ambivalent than me. Like I was listening to her describe her experience and feeling my ovaries shriveling up inside my body from terror and meanwhile she was talking about how much she wanted another kid. I guess the evolutionary drive to reproduce is just that damn strong in some people? Idk.
It's a good point re age and finding a spouse. Definitely having more kids is a lot easier if you start younger. I know women freezing eggs and women single-parenting-by-choice so obviously options do exist but I guess I probably agree that most women would really prefer to have kids
And that of course is entirely dependent on factors not entirely in their control
Maternal mortality with no medical care isn't anywhere near 10% per birth- it's 1-2% per birth in the least developed parts of subsaharan Africa and that seems to line up with historic data from Europe(granted, needs to be taken with a grain of salt).
Yes? I feel like you're reading my comment out of context.
We were discussing
Edit: no actually I see your point. Yes, it makes no sense to invoke evolution for it for temporary periods (and in fairness when it spiked people surely didn't realize what was happening)
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