Health, Bodies, and Identities - Essay Example

Health, Bodies, and Identities Health is a that takes into account multiple perspectives. According to Lupton, pregnant mothers are subject to society’s particularly restrictive definition of what can be said to be a healthy pregnancy. For a pregnant woman to be defined as being healthy, she has to follow the different rules and regulations, which are set by society, and that effectively stop her from recognizing her own unique needs and abilities (Lupton 2012). According to Macvarish (2010), there are different parts of an individual’s life that have to function in synch in order for it to be determined that she or he is healthy.

For example, it could be said that teenage mothers are actually unhealthy in different aspects. Their present condition may be attributed to unaddressed dysfunctions in their emotional lives as well as family lives. Having emotional dysfunction then makes them more vulnerable to other dysfunctions in society that culminate in their making the wrong decision.For women who have few resources, though, encouraging a discipline-based regiment will merely seem to be yet another additional burden that they have to bear.

According to Macvarish (2010), teenage mothers will have a different definition of health that is based on their experiences in life. In the absence of a real depiction of what constitutes real health, they are more likely to define health as being a state of being that is defined by luck, and not any behaviors of self-preservation maintained on an individual’s part.