Pregnant people?

[Trustisamust]

So our local NHS Trust have finally updated their guidance re allowing partners to attend pregnancy scans etc.
They now refer to pregnant people, not pregnant women.
I don't know if I am being unreasonable here but this does not sit comfortably with me?

I'm currently pregnant and have spent time on an antenatal ward for observation. At the moment no partners are allowed on antenatal wards due to Covid which meant that the woman next to me had to have her husband acting as translator via speaker phone. Her conversational English was good, she just didn't have any medical vocabulary, to the extent she couldn't explain the type of pain she was in to allow the midwives to understand if it was usual labour pains or something more concerning.

The thought that this woman would understand she was included in the phrase "people with a cervix" is absurd. This language is exclusionary of anyone who has English as a second language, as well as anyone with learning difficulties or limited reading skills. What proportion of the population are we happy to put at risk to cater to a literal handful of people?

It doesn't sit comfortably with me either.

As women are no longer called 'surrogate mother' but simply 'surrogate' when pregnant with a child they may or may not be genetically related to, the erasure of 'women/woman' and 'mother' is a now very obvious to me abs you see it all the time these days.

All pregnant people are women and it's queer theory in plain sight. I'd write to your MP and to the NHS trust. This began in Brighton and will spread.

It will be on their medical records if not so a sexual health practitioner can support them.

That’s no use at all when it comes to campaigns designed to improve the uptake of people going for screening. If a leaflet comes through my door stating that people with a cervix over the age of 25 need to go for regular screening, I need to know what a cervix is and there is no HCP there to explain it to me.

Trans men are men. Trans women are women

Until you can explain what characteristics are shared by all women and transwomen that are not shared by any men or transmen, this is another meaningless statement.

Happy to listen if you can explain this to me.

I really can't see why women are feeling upset and erased by being referred to as people.

Does the word 'parent' erase mothers and fathers?

Does the word 'partner' erase husbands and wives?

Should lesbians be forced to refer to anonymous sperm donors as their children's father in case it erases fathers?

I don't think forcing people to refer to themselves as women when they don't identify as women is a great solution.

Does the word 'parent' erase mothers and fathers?

It depends on the context. The Sands charity upset women hugely when it didn't refer to women who had had stillbirths as 'mothers'. I can't remember what language they used, but they ended up issuing an apology.

@EdgeOfACoin

Trans men are men. Trans women are women

Until you can explain what characteristics are shared by all women and transwomen that are not shared by any men or transmen, this is another meaningless statement.

Happy to listen if you can explain this to me.

Firstly you have to explain what you mean by characteristics? Because I don't agree with gender stereotypes. There doesn't have to be anything that all men must have or all women must have.

Given the numbers of ftm transitioners who will need to undergo hysterectomies in order to avoid vaginal atrophy and other health problems arising from taking cross-sex hormones, the number of transmen becoming pregnant is going to be pretty rare. Furthermore, given that an mtf transitioner would have to come off all cross-sex hormones for the duration of pregnancy, I'm also not sure what the difference would be between a transman and a woman. And finally, I find it difficult to believe that someone with severe gender dysphoria would be fine going through pregnancy and childbirth but traumatised by being referred to as a woman.

What Edge said. Plus it isn't just about trans men - if you follow the logic not all women are the pregnant types. You know, the support ones, so you can't call them women any more because they're mostly functional.

@ASugarr I promise you, there are people who do not know they have a cervix or prostate and for whom information to "cervix/prostate havers/owner" about the importance of screenings will be missed.

All women share a specific reproductive system.

The emperor certainly does have a dashing new set of threads...

Firstly you have to explain what you mean by characteristics? Because I don't agree with gender stereotypes. There doesn't have to be anything that all men must have or all women must have.

I agree, but if you are categorising people into 'men' and 'women' then there must be things that make one a man and not a woman and vice versa.

I would like to know what they are.

I mean, I agree that there shouldn't be gender stereotypes.

Incorrect because men can be pregnant as trans men are men. Not every adult human female is a woman. That is a fact.

This is some new usage of the word ‘fact’ that I was previously unaware of.

For all those who have stated or believe that medical records will be correct, therefore those with a cervix or prostrate will get called for the appropriate exam, that is incorrect.

At the moment, your GP will record your sex/gender as you identify and request it to be recorded.

The BMJ published this article last month highlighting the issues.

www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n735/rr-0

GP's have spoken out saying the spend hours every week manually ensuring every patient is being called correctly, based on their own relationship and knowledge of the patient and not the formal records.

So we have posts on here saying men can be pregnant and I'm having to pause and choose my words before I disagree. And this, I believe, is what is known as progressive.

Firstly you have to explain what you mean by characteristics? Because I don't agree with gender stereotypes. There doesn't have to be anything that all men must have or all women must have.

If you’re a man who doesn’t think you’re a man, so you’ve transitioned to being a woman, what have you transitioned ‘from’ and ‘to’?

Of course, the default should be pregnant women/woman. If anyone objects then that's up to them - and up to them to name what they want to be called.

Can we stop being wacky here? Being a woman isn't identity, only women get pregnant, there is no excuse for vague and unscientific language in essential medical information. Anything else is privileged middle-class navel-gazing designed to show off the high status of not being constrained by real life. It's bizarre, boring and annoying.

Because that’s what this is about. Not ‘including transmen’ but making sure TW are not reminded that the word ‘woman’ cannot apply to them in some situations, such as pregnancy care.

Yes this is it isn't it. 💯.

@EastWestWhosBest

Incorrect because men can be pregnant as trans men are men. Not every adult human female is a woman. That is a fact.

This is some new usage of the word ‘fact’ that I was previously unaware of.

I know, it's weird isn't it.

I'm a cat. Fact. So it.must be true?!

Yes their sex is female. But that doesn't mean they aren't men.

Is this not also considered transphobic now? Wasn’t that woman suspended from the Green Party for saying transwomen weren’t female (so therefore I’m assuming the view is also that transmen are male)?

I’m with your OP. This is a uniquely female experience and that should be acknowledged, it is of one of the fundamental biological processes that only our sex goes through. How many trans men have become pregnant. Other than Freddie McConnell

Oh boo, had @ASugarr flounced?? I wanted them to shine a light, as an apparent sexual health professional, on why anyone who is a trans man would want to do the most womanly thing possible, one of the things that only biological women can do?

We’ll know the answer ti your question Seahorses if your post is allowed to remain....