How fast can one safely accelerate a pregnancy without sounding ridiculous?

[nyalathotep]

I am creating a setting in which biomancy can be used to make childbearing easier on the mother. Biomancy is a form of magic that allows for the manipulation of certain biological processes. Midwives take the form of witches who specialize in childbirth-focused Biomancy magic. Some ways it can be used are as follows:

Widening the birth canal to make passage easier.
Reducing hemorrhaging and repairing tear.
Lessening pain from cramps and labour.

Another way I wanted was to speed up rate of gestation from the traditional 9 months by using runes. These runes are cast using an incantation and speed up the body's natural proccess to a limited extent. They are not permanent and must be recast every so often.

There is a particular trope called Express Delivery that talks about this very thing, but many examples come off as crazy or unrealistic because they don't take important things into account, and they just seem to work without any cost or adverse effects. The human body is capable of impressive acts, but such processes take a lot of time, and can take a toll on the body. There are hormonal and physical changes that the mother must go through. Nutrients that the child is made of must also be pulled from the mother for it to develop fully.

The question is: how fast can the body safely adapt to these conditions without causing problems for mother and child? What can one do to alleviate these risks?

 

[Layla Nahar]

Well - I mean, you're using runes here. Who's to say what runes can do? Maybe (if they worked, or - in a world where they work) runes can cause the body to do all kinds of things that technology - or the natural human body - can't.

 

[Alessandra Kelley]

Pregnancy already sucks a surprising amount of resources out of the mother’s body at a tangible rate.

I think if you magically accelerated the process the pregnant mother would have to eat like Jughead Jones to not be anemic and wrung out with osteoporosis at the end of the process.

 

[Brightdreamer]

As mentioned, if you're using runes and magic, I would think your magic system would set the limits. Are there astrological or elemental influences that affect things? (Say, when Planet X is in the House of the Crane, it's safe to accelerate, but when it moves to the House of the Turtle, meddle at your own risk.) Does a child need four moon-turnings in the womb to get the four elemental influences in its development or risk damage? Does the parentage or genetics factor in - some races or families are more amenable to runic influence than others?

As a general answer, I'd say avoid rushing things faster than 2/3 to 1/2 full "normal" gestation; building a human is a delicate, complicated process, after all. Going too fast could/should result in increased risks that become unacceptable at some point.

Are there going to be potential risks involved? Does speeding up growth lead to potential birth defects, weaknesses, vulnerabilities (magical or spiritual), or even an off chance of a shortened life span? Does it affect the mother - drawing too much energy, too many nutrients, potentially overtaxing the system? Magic ideally has some manner of price to keep it from being overpowered or too plot convenient.

 

[lizmonster]

Well, in a magic scenario, you can have anything you like "work" for the story. But a couple of things in what you wrote have tweaked my suspension of disbelief just a little:

1) All of the magic you describe here affects the mother, not the child. The mother's an adult with a far more resilient system; I'd expect the child's health and safety to be a far more complicated situation, and at least be considered by the magic system.

2) In specific, widening the birth canal wouldn't necessarily be a good thing (unless the mother's actually physiologically too small to birth the baby, which can happen but is pretty unusual). As I understand it, the compression the child goes through can actually help with respiration (it's sometimes an issue with babies born by c-section).

For story purposes, of course, you can have your midwives rune their way around all of this. But just based on what you've written here, I'd be careful about equating "easier on the mother" to "removing all pain and process," because a lot of that pain and process happens for infant-centric reasons. There's a balance, and as a reader I'd side-eye a story that focused on one side but not the other.

Assuming you're writing actual humans. If you're dealing with a different species, do as you like.

 

[Frankie007]

well i know the Species movie....yeah, i know a movie, not a book...but, Sil gave birth in a matter of hours....

 

[Woollybear]

Ditto Allesandro Kelley's comments.

But if the baby is born early (and has also been adapted by rune magic ... for example, maybe the skull bones are even softer so the birth canal of the mother need not expand) and there are runes to accelerate the baby's adaptation perinatally you will buy yourself a little more wiggle room both in terms of the energetic cost on the mother and the length of pregnancy.

Currently I believe 24 weeks gestation or thereabouts is considered viable for humans (very tiny preemies). Maybe you could halve that length of time, and have a three month pregnancy, a tiny baby that rapidly grows to full size. Marmosets have a gestation period of about half that of humans. This is probably due to their relative size and lifespan but I think if you wrote it well I would buy a three month gestation.

Deanna Troi on ST:TNG had a baby after a week or two and that was ridiculous. I can't see that short period not looking ridiculous. On the other hand, since it's magic you can play with rules.

 

[Sarahrizz]

Well, since we're talking Fantasy here, If you say it lasts 1 week, 3 months, 6 months exc. I'd believe you. Just stay consistent with whatever rules you apply. I would caution you to avoid mentioning widening the birth canal, or repairing tears because they give some specifics & incite some visuals that some readers may be uncomfortable with. And as to someone else's comment that the pregnant woman would be eating like a horse, to keep up with the baby's growth. I think this is a realistic comment. Perhaps something the witches/midwives mix/brew is a special food for the mother that magically accounts for this.

 

[Blinkk]

Everyone has made good comments...just wanted to throw in another viewpoint in addition to what's already been mentioned.

Pregnancy at its norm is already a delicate thing. If magic was involved to speed up the process I'd realistically believe that it would work, as long as the basics were covered like everyone else has been saying. Speeding it up would be believable as long as there are higher risks as well. When rune-assisted pregnancy goes wrong I imagine it would be hell in a handbasket. And someone else already mentioned astrological assisted runes which I think is on the right track; some months are better than others to accelerate pregnancy. As long as the magic isn't a convenient, failsafe, cheap plot device, I'd believe it.

 

[Harlequin]

it's magic, it can be instantaneous. Honestly, I'd avoid explaining specifics. Decide what you NEED it to do for plot reasons, and simply have it do that.

And if you're using magic for the birth, too, then just have a magical cesarean that heals all the scars. Birth is long, bloody, and dangerous; in a low tech setting, c section or equivalent will just be safer.

 

[lonestarlibrarian]

I'd also want more focus on what the benefit is to the baby to have an accelerated gestation.

With biomancy, I'm hearing fantasy, and unless you're doing urban fantasy, I'm tending to visualize something more of a relatively low-tech traditional fantasy setting. So for people who live in an agricultural kind of world, you go with the natural flow of the seasons, the predictable cycles of life: when to plant seeds, when seeds sprout, when the flowers come, when the fruit sets, when the fruit ripens, when things are ready for harvest.

I'd be more likely to accept the idea of a culture that embraces accelerated pregnancy in a more sci-fi futuristic settings--- because we all know how rushrushrush we are, and how so many of us have no clue as to the natural flow of things, and how we want to rush to get to the end goal and skip all the tedious middle stuff.

If you've been pregnant in the last ten-fifteen years or so, and had joined a birth board or anything, you probably ran into a debate about moms who are happy to let the baby be born when it's ready to, versus moms who choose to induce early. I remember one mom on mine who chose to deliver a few weeks early because her doctor was going on vacation and she didn't want a stranger to deliver. I think someone else had something she wanted to do around the time of her EDD, and so she chose to induce early so that she knew her schedule would be clear for it. And then there are others who say, "You know, babies who are born at 37-38 weeks look just as healthy as 39-41-week-old babies, but are more susceptible to respiratory problems/blood sugar issues/needing antibiotics/vision problems/hearing problems."

If there's a benefit for the baby--- the baby is under the protection of a deity, or they acquire a particular talent as a side effect of the magic, or some other benefit that's in line with your world--- then I could see it. But since pregnancy is a common thing, and you've got about 85 million mothers in the US... you're going to be messing with 85 million ladies' individual experiences, which are going to range from "What a good idea! I hated being pregnant!" to "Awww! I loved being pregnant! Who would want to rush it?"

 

[Harlequin]

They ARE more susceptible to problems if delivered early, that's simply true. America has a rather unique outlook on early induction which is slightly horrifying to the British/European mindset. Partly it's bound up in the private healthcare, and the fact that c sections are more lucrative. But that's a whole can of worms.

 

[Shoeless]

I have nothing to add to this thread except that I think a lot of the folks here have given some pretty good ideas to mull over, and that I'm horribly jealous the thread creator came up with name "biomancy," as I really like it, and am mightily struggling not to steal it if I ever get the chance to write the sequel to a novel I've got on submission.

 

[Woollybear]

I have nothing to add to this thread except that I think a lot of the folks here have given some pretty good ideas to mull over, and that I'm horribly jealous the thread creator came up with name "biomancy," as I really like it, and am mightily struggling not to steal it if I ever get the chance to write the sequel to a novel I've got on submission.

You can lay claim to 'pregmancy.'

 

[Kjbartolotta]

You can lay claim to 'pregmancy.'

And go on to make millions writing tasteful, slightly specialized fantasy erotica.

 

[Shoeless]

You can lay claim to 'pregmancy.'

Hmmm... is Obgymancy taken yet?

 

[Thomas Vail]

As has been said, 'how safely can this be done' kind of goes out the window with magic involved, but in terms of something easily measurable, when it comes to 'eating for two' IIRC a woman doesn't have increased dietary needs during the first trimester (but making sure certain trace substances and vitamins are included is important), with dietary intake increasing to an extra 300ish calories per day in the second trimester, and 400ish calories per day in the forth.

An influx of 'magical energy' can account for some part of that, but if, say, the time is reduced to one month, there should definitely be indication of the how much extra whatever it takes to speed things up safely.

 

[Brightdreamer]

If you've been pregnant in the last ten-fifteen years or so, and had joined a birth board or anything, you probably ran into a debate about moms who are happy to let the baby be born when it's ready to, versus moms who choose to induce early.

Somewhat tangential, but selecting a birth date/time would take on greater significance in a magical world where astrology was influential/reliable, and could have a direct impact on the child's abilities or future; the difference between a Virgo and a Libra, to them, might be worth the risk of magical meddling. (My mother claims she picked her c-section date based on projections from an astrologer friend. But, then, Mom also was sure I'd be a boy, so...)

 

[Albedo]

I keep picturing an 'accelerated pregnancy' as a baby doing 0-60 so fast out of mum it becomes airborne, midwife barely ducking in time as the small pink poop missile flies off to parts thither. That might just be me, though.

 

[Shoeless]

I keep picturing an 'accelerated pregnancy' as a baby doing 0-60 so fast out of mum it becomes airborne, midwife barely ducking in time as the small pink poop missile flies off to parts thither. That might just be me, though.

You didn't happen to see this video game commercial about 16 years ago, did you?

 

[Masel]

My friend's baby is in the NICU having been born 2 months early. They were very keen to give her steroids in the last days of her pregnancy to help the babies lungs develop. This could be thought of as giving a fetus strength or spirit in magical terms.

I think of runes as for predicting the future so in biomancy they may have diagnostic powers. I think one of the worst things about being pregnant is just not knowing. In pre-modern times just not knowing if you would survive or the baby. Will the debilitating hyperemesis go though the entire pregnancy or just the first trimester. Does the mother have too much sugar in her blood. Is her blood pressure too high. Will the baby be breech? Wil the pregnancy end with a drawn out labor, abdominal surgery, or a house full of EMTs and a bill from the carpet cleaner. (That last one was me.)

If you need a story reason for a pregnancy to end sooner maybe a biomantic incubator would help.

Addressing hemorrhage if a really good idea. There are still parts of the world where this is a problem.

I've read a lot about how pregnancy and childbirth was dealt with in the Middle Ages and I could point you toward some resources. I tried to restrain myself.
I do love it when writers try to address this part of the lifeworld.

 

[nyalathotep]

Yes I'm interested.

 

[Masel]

One of best things to start with is The Trotula. It was a medieval gynecological textbooks that was popular during the middle ages. 100 copies survive which makes it a runaway bestseller. Monica Green did a translation of it. (She has written many articles on women's medical issues in the middle ages and shares her work at Academia.edu.) Green M. Obstetrical and Gynecological Texts in Middle English, Studies in the Age of Chaucer 14 (1992), 53-88

Fiona Harris Stoertz, "Suffering and survival in medieval English childbirth" Medieval family roles, edited by Cathy Jorgensen Itnyre, Garland Medieval Casebooks; 15 (Garland Publishing, 1995).

Bühler, Curt F., "Prayers and charms in certain Middle English scrolls," Speculum 39 (1964), 270-78.

Weston, L. M. C., "Women's Medicine, Women's Magic: The Old English Metrical Childbirth Charms," Modern Philology 92 (1995), 279-293

My research was centered on Western Europe. There are a few references in my working bibliography that are related to adjacent cultures. Does this help? Interlibrary loan is your friend. Green's Trotula is in Google Books I think so you could get a peek if it meets your needs.

 

[Albedo]

You didn't happen to see this video game commercial about 16 years ago, did you?

No. Unless I somehow did and it's remained in my subconscious. That's rather ... mordant for a video game ad.

- - - Updated - - -

It's amazing how close it was to my vision.

 

[Aggy B.]

No. Unless I somehow did and it's remained in my subconscious. That's rather ... mordant for a video game ad.

- - - Updated - - -

It's amazing how close it was to my vision.

There is a similar scenario in the film version of Big Fish as well. (Minus the rapid aging and death. But baby pops out and slides out the doors and down the hall, if I remember correctly.)