A friend, who is a new mother, says her favorite book about pregnancy is the "Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy," by Vicki Iovine. She likes it, she says, because it offers the kind of advice your girlfriend might offer. Sample: If your doctor is a man and you think you are falling in love with him, just remember he is getting paid to take this deep personal interest in you and your pregnancy.
If a "Girlfriend's Guide" sounds a little too hip, pick up another one of the burgeoning number of advice books for the pregnant. Here are five of the most recent:
THE PREGNANT WOMAN'S COMFORT BOOK, by Jennifer Louder; HarperSanFrancisco; 303 pages; in paperback, $14.
Surrender. That's the most interesting message of "The Pregnant Woman's Comfort Book." If you surrender yourself to the strange new things your body is doing, you'll be better prepared for motherhood - which is one surrender after another.
Jennifer Louder has written an extremely comforting book. The chapter on physical discomforts of pregnancy is titled "It's Not All In Your Head." It suggests buying new sheets, washing your comforter and giving yourself permission to sleep for an entire week-end.
There is a chapter on "Ambivalence, Grieving the Changes." There is a chapter on "Fear." There is a chapter on "Preparing for Postpartum." Each ends with a book list for related reading.
HUSBAND-COACHED CHILDBIRTH, by Robert Bradley, M.D.; Bantam; 266 pages; in paperback, $11.95.
Robert Bradley first wrote "Husband-Coached Childbirth" in 1965. This new paperback is a revised edition. He talks about psychological preparation for labor, about bonding, about the ill effects of drugs, and how "love talk increases intimacy and builds morale during labor."
He writes from a doctor's perspective about pain, circulation, about the position animals adopt when they are in the last stages of labor. This is a good book for couples interested in the scientific details and in having the husband help.
WE ARE ALL WATER BABIES, by Jessica Johnson and Michel Odent; Celestial Arts; 124 pages; in paperback, $24.95.
Dolphins, babies and pregnant women (clothed and unclothed) swim through deep green water and are captured by Jessica Johnson's camera. "We Are All Water Babies" devotes more space to pictures than prose. Which is good because the pictures are the most compelling.
In Chapter 6, a woman gives birth underwater. In Chapter 11, humans swim with dolphins. One photo, taken from the water, shows a dolphin breaking the surface, flinging himself high into the air, silhouetted against the sun.
The text, by Michel Odent, is not as moving as the photos. Too New Agey. Writes Odent, with typical lack of logic, "All over the world, water has always been seen as the ultimate female principle, the Mother of all things. For example, the letter M, `the Mother letter,' and its inverted form W, are descended from Egyptian ideograms representing water in the form of waves. Is this a key to understanding how water can influence the ways babies are born?"
Johnson's contributions to the text are equally unpoetic. In the end, Odent quotes William Wordsworth, who gives a more eloquent description of the human attraction to water. "The World is too much with us, late and soon. Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: Little we see in Nature that is ours. . . . So might I standing on this pleasant lea, Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn."
If nothing else, this poem and Johnson's photos will motivate a pregnant woman to go swimming. As the water envelops and supports her, she stretches and rolls, and moves more freely than she can on land. Meanwhile, her fetus makes the same swimming motions in the salt water within her.
"We Are All Water Babies" teaches this: If you want to feel close to your unborn child, you could rely on machines to show you pictures of your baby swimming. Or you could just go swimming yourself. It's another way of knowing.
PREVENTING PREMATURE BIRTH, by Barbara Luke; Times Books; 239 pages. $23.
Barbara Luke is an RN with a master's degree in public health. She says she wrote her book, "Preventing Premature Birth," to try to mitigate one of the nation's greatest public health problems. Premature births have increased 20 percent in the last 20 years.
So, Luke wrote a book for expectant mothers, detailing 60 reasons for premature labor and 60 preventative steps. Luke goes into great detail. Instead of just cautioning expectant mothers not to drink, she explains the way alcohol is absorbed into the body and what foods make it be absorbed more slowly or more quickly.
There are detailed sections on nutrition, on laws related to pregnancy and working, and on amounts of caffeine in various soft drinks. All good information. Still, you find yourself wishing she'd just written a long magazine article rather than a book. The information is more than most women need. Also, the book is fear-inducing.
It begins with a quote from a woman who gave birth 12 weeks early and whose baby died. "I keep going over and over in my mind, What did I do wrong?" she says. This is not a happy way to begin a book for pregnant mothers. At the very least we want the author to state, right up front, that this woman probably didn't do anything wrong. But Luke doesn't reassure us.
Reading Luke's book wouldn't make anyone feel less guilty. Luke does make the point, but she doesn't make it often enough: There are some risks - such as her age and the cervix she's been given - that a pregnant woman can't overcome.
YOUR PREGNANCY WEEK-BY-WEEK, by Glade Curtis, M.D.; Fisher Books; 415 pages; in paperback, $12.95.
Big type and a simple format and illustrations make this an accessible guide for any woman. Knowledge is reassuring. Here's an excerpt from the chapter titled "Week 26": When listening to your baby's heartbeat during pregnancy, you may be startled to hear a skipped beat. An irregular heartbeat is called an arrhythmia. . . . Arrhythmia in a fetus is not unusual.
The book is not without its cautions. Each chapter includes a section on "how your actions affect your baby's development," describing medicines to be avoided, signs to watch for if you fall, and other danger signals that should alert you to call your doctor.