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From: suze@terak.UUCP (Suzanne Barnett)
Newsgroups: net.med
Subject: Re: Answer to Medical Puzzle #5
Message-ID: <1018@terak.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 24-Jan-86 13:47:45 EST
Article-I.D.: terak.1018
Posted: Fri Jan 24 13:47:45 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 26-Jan-86 20:16:01 EST
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Organization: Calcomp Display Products Division, Scottsdale, AZ, USA
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> 	When I tell this to friends, especially female, they invariably say,
> "How could she not have known she was pregnant?"  My theory is that the power
> of denial cannot be underestimated.

Several years ago I was at a clinic getting a
vaccination. I spoke with a nurse I knew, normal greetings and
how is your day? type of things. She said they'd had a hectic
day, a birth (births are not routinely handled there) where
the mother was admitted to emergency  with severe stomach
pains (she was in labor and didn't even know she was pregnant).

Apparently the woman had had a pregnancy test very shortly
after getting pregnant, but it was negative, so she assumed
she wasn't pregnant. My friend wondered what the woman could have
possibly thought was happening to her for the past 9 months as
she displayed all symptoms of pregnancy, also, how could
others not have noticed and said something (especially her
family)? I wondered too, it was certainly bizzarre.
-- 
Suzanne Barnett-Scott
uucp:	 ...{decvax,ihnp4,noao,savax,seismo}!terak!suze
CalComp/Sanders Display Products Division
14151 N 76th Street, Scottsdale, AZ 85260
(602) 998-4800