From the New York Times bestselling author of Expecting Better, a guide to navigating a second pregnancy when the first did not go as planned—with Dr. Nathan Fox, maternal fetal medicine specialist
In Expecting Better, Emily Oster revolutionized the pregnancy landscape with her data-driven approach. In the years since, she kept hearing questions from listeners on how to approach a second pregnancy when the first has not gone as planned.
While The Unexpected is an audiobook that Oster hopes no one needs, the reality is that 50 percent of pregnancies include complications, a fact we don’t talk about. Preeclampsia, miscarriage, hyperemesis gravidarum, preterm birth, postpartum depression: these are lonely experiences, and that isolation makes treatment harder to access—and crucial research and policy change less likely to happen.
The Unexpected lays out the data on recurrence and treatments shown to lower or mitigate risk for these conditions in subsequent pregnancies. It also provides listeners road maps to facilitate productive conversations with their providers, with insights from lauded maternal fetal medicine specialist Dr. Nathan Fox.
By bridging the knowledge gap and making space for difficult conversations, The Unexpected promises to make the hardest parts of pregnancy a little bit less so.
*Includes a downloadable PDF of graphs and tables from the book
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"They don't sugarcoat reality, and they make great use of statistics . . . Oster and Fox want to arm moms with information about what they should ask their providers and what treatments might lower their risks in subsequent pregnancies . . . The message from these compassionate authors, parents themselves, is that what happened needs to be processed, not ignored, and joy is still possible."
— Karen Springen, Booklist
Encouraging and empathetic . . . On every page, the authors offer extensive research and support . . . A comprehensive, empowering resource.
— KirkusCogent . . . informative but not dry. It’s a valuable resource for parents who have experienced pregnancy complications.
— Publishers WeeklyBe the first to write a review about this audiobook!
Emily Oster is an associate professor of economics at the University of Chicago. She was a speaker at the 2007 TED conference, and her work has been featured in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and Esquire. She is married to economist Jesse Shapiro and is also the daughter of two economists. She has one child, Penelope.