Hervé Varenne and Mimi Cotter


Transcript -- p. 40

93958 L coughs.
94006 Mellie walks into far left of frame and asks tentatively if L and I are friends. L nods, and explains how I tried to do this at her last birth.
94030 L now explaining re me and last labor, gesturing freely with right hand, while holding Jeff's left hand.
94103 L grimaces and moves leg down and up again. Jeff: "Keep breathing." He is looking at machine printout and then at L's face.
94107 Mellie LEAVES during the above.
94116 Bad audio, but L seems to say that contractions are getting worse, and Jeff seems to say yeah, these are long slopey ones. Ka"j , s
94124 L grimaces and covers forehead with right hand and groans and pants. Puts hand over face several times.
94204 Breathing is quieting down. Jeff says the whole level is picking up, moving from shorter to longer slopes, which he illustrates by drawing in air. Then he holds her left hand again, while she keeps right hand to face.
94231 L leans up to look at printout.
94235 She lies back down, coughs, and then lies quietly with hand on chest. Jeff sitting on bed, holding her hand.
94310 L asks Jeff A if he'~s bored, and he says "No, are you?" L nods, but then says "No, I'm frightened." She says something like "I don't like pain, and I don't like not being in control."
94327 Jeff answers: "It's not the pain you don't like so much, it's not

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This works continues the work Mimi Cotter presented in her dissertation Labor negotiations: A study of interactions around pre-natal care and childbirth. Teachers College, 1996.
Last revision: November 10, 1998