In medicine, gravidity refers to the number of times a woman has been pregnant, regardless of whether the pregnancies were interrupted (by abortion, or fetal death) or resulted in a live birth.
In biology, the term gravid (from Latin gravid-us,-a, burdened, heavy) is used to describe the condition of an animal (most commonly fish or reptiles) when carrying eggs internally. In entomology it describes a mated female insect.
- A gravida is a pregnant woman.
- A nulligravida or gravida 0 is a woman who has never been pregnant.
- A primigravida or gravida 1 is a woman who is pregnant for the first time or has been pregnant one time.
- A multigravida or more specifically a gravida 2 (also secundigravida), gravida 3, and so on, is a woman who has been pregnant more than one time.
- An elderly primigravida is a woman in her first pregnancy, who is at least 35 years old. This term is becoming less common as it may be considered offensive.
The term gravida is generally coupled with para (and occasionally additional terms) to indicate more details of the woman's obstetric history.
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“The mystic purchases a moment of exhilaration with a lifetime of confusion; and the confusion is infectious and destructive. It is confusing and destructive to try and explain anything in terms of anything else, poetry in terms of psychology.”
—Basil Bunting (1900–1985)