Imagine the following. You are 9 months pregnant and:

• You believe it is perfectly acceptable to smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol and take any prescribed drugs available to make you feel better.
• The only information available about your pregnancy comes once a month from your doctor's mouth.
• You never question or make requests of your doctor.
• There is no such thing as a "birth plan" as most likely you will be completely unconscious when your child is born.
• Your husband or partner has no intention of joining you for the birth.
• You have few clothing options besides muumuu shirts and elastic waistband pants.

Does this sound like a bizarre dream? Maybe even a bad one? While the scenario above seems like pregnancy from outer space, it was very much the reality for expectant women in the 1960s and '70s. How far pregnant women today have come from where their mothers were! But are all the developments positive? Sure, we have much cooler clothes and multiple editions and variations of What to Expect When You're Expecting. But is the modern-day expectant woman really better off? While most people would say decidedly yes, there are some apparent downsides for the modern expectant mom who has everything.

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