I knew that holidays - that any special day that I was accustomed to sharing in some fashion with my father - would be hard, but I was unprepared for just how hard. On my daughter's birthday last weekend, I got as far as dialling the first three digits of his telephone number so that she could thank him for the birthday present she didn't receive this year before realizing that - of course - there was no birthday present and that he wouldn't pick up the phone. The emotionally gut-punch that came with that realization drove this point home: that I need to be better prepared for these moments. I need to have a plan for coping with these 'special days', these days that bring the emotional shocks and upsets with full force, before such days arrive.
But how to do that?
Dr. Cara Barker, writing at the Huffington Post, notes that "loss is an unwelcome guest at too many a holiday feast. We need to take time today with those we love, and celebrate those who are no longer here." She suggests "rewriting" your holidays (this is a potentially useful strategy for anyone struggling with the holidays, not just those coping with loss): begin by 'writing' (literally or figuratively) what your holiday/holiday planning usually looks like (in my case, unplanned, and featuring grief shocks) and then 'rewriting' it so that it looks like what you want it look like (my own example, again: a holiday that includes a plan for celebrating my father and making sure that his continued presence in our lives is honored.) Dr. Barker writes that you can begin this process simply by taking a piece of paper and writing "a simple description of what's most important for you this season. Go for details, not perfection" and then asking yourself what one little action you might take to set that in motion. In my case, for my daughter's birthday, that might have involved acknowledging my desire to include my father in some way, and then establishing some little tradition (having Emilia include him in her thank-yous, perhaps, or drawing a picture of how she'd like to include him, following the tradition she has already set of creating heaven-art for him) (since we're on the topic, see this post at ParentsAsk for some useful advice on navigating the tricky waters of talking to children about loss) that effects that inclusion.
There are other ways of celebrating/honoring/including lost love ones in the holidays and other celebrations. Beth Patterson at Navigating Life's Changes suggests lighting a candle in your loved one's honor, donating to charity or volunteering in their honor, telling stories about them, writing them a letter, or even throwing them a party. These are all good suggestions. But she also suggests taking care of yourself, and taking the time to nurture and protect your heart, which may be the important advice of all. Celebrating and including our lost love ones during the holidays can go a long way toward easing the pain of loss, but it can't make it go away entirely. Our hearts will still hurt. We need to be gentle with them.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
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I know. I squeezed my legs together, too. You might as well keep yours squeezed, because this topic doesn't get any prettier.
]]>I know. I squeezed my legs together, too. You might as well keep yours squeezed, because this topic doesn't get any prettier.
Jezebel notes that the report points out that there really isn't any reason for anyone to get this kind of surgery - 'discomfort' with weird (whatever that means) labia is likely more psychological than physical, according to the report - and that there are certain basic risks, like reduced sexual sensation, that are to be expected. But they go on to note that the really discomfiting part about the report is its assertion that the risks go far beyond reduced sexual sensation, and are similar to what happens when womens' genitalia is mutilated: "the procedure," they report, "may cause some of the same childbirth problems as female genital mutilation does, including bleeding and tearing in labor, and even the death of the infant."
This matters, of course, to any women who might be thinking of getting a new look for her labia. But it also matters to mothers who might be worried about what happens down there when baby causes more damage than expected on his or her journey out the ol' birthing canal. I know something of this: my labor with my second child was precipitous (happened really, really, really fast - like, forty minutes and some seconds fast) and he basically made his own exit on the way out. I needed surgery on the spot to stop the bleeding and repair the damage.
That presents a difficulty in itself: the report notes that, basically, what gets taken apart in the nether regions can't be fully be put back together again - once the nethers have been cut or torn and restitched, that area is much more vulnerable to future trauma. As my own doctor told me, if I were ever to get pregnant again, I'd likely need to have a c-section, to avoid fully shattering the already ravaged parts below. (For the record, my circumstances were extraordinary: precipitous labors are rare, as are tears above the third degree. But some tearing is normal, and tearing that requires some repair not at all unusual.)
My nether-surgery was (brace yourself) actually botched a little - the nature of the damage, and the emergency circumstances of the surgery itself conspired to make the stitch job a little ragged - and my doctor raised the issue of reconstructive surgery, noting that I'd need to be aware of the fact that any cross-stitchery in the nethers would just make things all the more vulnerable down there. I passed. It didn't occur to me at the time that I had anything in common with anyone who'd suffered FGM - and I still think that there is a vast, vast difference, such that the only real similarity might be in some of the physical markers of traumatized genitalia. But mine came through the natural course of childbirth; mutilation-by-intent is mutilation of a very different sort.
That British researchers are raising the spectre of mutilation in the case of vaginal plastic surgery is interesting. If it stops even a few women from cutting themselves unnecessarily, then that's a good thing. But it does raise a lot of questions about how we should be thinking about what happens to our nethers in childbirth. Natural tearing isn't mutilation, obviously - but what about some of the medical practices surrounding it? Episiotomies have been discouraged by many doctors for some time now, and in any case calling an episiotomy mutilation is probably a stretch. But what about what happens when tearing is bad enough to need repair? How many women get their nether repairs repaired? Can some types of repair make things worse? I was lucky enough to have a doctor who warned me that further repair would further weaken things - but I know some women who weren't so lucky, and who have had their parts stitched and restitched. With the idea of vaginal cosmetic surgery out there, will more of us pursue the extra stitchery? How many of our doctors will give us the proper warnings? Shouldn't we be talking about this a bit more - even if it does make us squeeze our legs together? Especially, perhaps, if it does make us squeeze our legs together, and think twice about what we do - or have done - down there.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
]]>According to a report discussed this week in Newsweek, depression may be an "adaptation" in human beings - and, oddly, rats - that provides for selection of stronger, fitter humans:
]]>According to a report discussed this week in Newsweek, depression may be an "adaptation" in human beings - and, oddly, rats - that provides for selection of stronger, fitter humans:
Writing in the journal Psychological Review, postdoctoral fellow Paul Andrews of Virginia Commonwealth University and psychiatrist J. Anderson Thomson Jr. of the University of Virginia present research suggesting that depression is present in the species, and in individuals, for a purpose, and we're playing with fire if we try to eradicate it. In evolution-speak, depression is an "adaptation," they argue. That is, it evolved because it made individuals who experienced it fitter, under natural selection, than individuals who did not experience it. Andrews and Thomson... offer as evidence the presence of a molecule in the brain called the 5HT1A receptor. This serves as a docking port for the neurochemical serotonin, which the Prozac/Zoloft/Paxil class of antidepressants targets. Human brains are not the only ones with the 5HT1A receptor. Rats also have it.
So, yeah. Darwin wouldn't want you (or, presumably, your pet rat) to pop that Zoloft, because those blues you're feeling? Are just nature's way of telling you that you need to address some issues, and you need to pay attention, lest nature weed you out. Or something. Hey, I'm not the scientist.
Why is this? Because, as Andrews and Thomson argue, "depression alters thinking and behavior in beneficial ways." For example, depressed persons are usually "highly analytical:" they "tend to ruminate, to turn an issue over and over in the mind... That can be useful, producing solutions to what tipped the person into depression in the first place, not to mention "Eureka!" moments such as discovering fire."
What they don't seem to address in any detail is how this seeming aspect of depression - heightened powers of analysis, focused thinking - is actually absent or blunted or compromised in certain depressive conditions. Women with post-partum depression might tend to ruminate more than mothers without PPD, but that rumination is also likely to be confused or even delusional. I ruminated a lot while I was struggling with PPD, but much of that rumination concerned how my baby was going to die, how I was going to die, how we were all going to die, etc, which, perhaps, might have - okay, certainly did - heighten my attention to issues like SIDS and other risks to infants, but they also made me BATSHIT CRAZY, and caused me to neglect my own health, and might have compromised my ability to mother, in the long haul, had I not medicated my way out of that obsessively ruminative state. So.
It's an interesting argument, and one that might be useful in informing how we think about certain types of depression. But we need to be careful that research like this doesn't undermine the seriousness of certain kinds of depression, nor discourage people from seeking treatment. Because - and I'd venture to guess that Darwin would agree - madly depressed mothers whose abilities to parent are compromised by, say, post-partum psychosis and the like, are very likely not useful in advancing the evolutionary advantage of the human race.
That's just a guess, though. The anti-anxiety meds that are helping me to be a calm and focused mother might have blunted my ruminatory powers.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
]]>I wrote yesterday at Their Bad Mother about Evan Frustaglio, the thirteen year old Toronto boy who died suddenly from H1N1 this week:
]]>I wrote yesterday at Their Bad Mother about Evan Frustaglio, the thirteen year old Toronto boy who died suddenly from H1N1 this week:
"Yesterday, a healthy young boy in our city died of swine flu. He was diagnosed with regular flu last week after falling ill, felt improved enough to play hockey on Saturday, and then fell ill again that evening. His parents took him to a clinic on Sunday, where they were told it would pass. Evan Frustaglio went bed on Sunday evening, and stopped breathing, and when his parents went to wake him, he was gone.
Just like that. GONE."
Evan Frustaglio had no pre-existing medical conditions. Evan Frustaglio was a healthy, active young boy. Evan Frustaglio caught swine flu from someone and died. Evan Frustaglio's story - like the story of Aubrey Updyke - demonstrates exactly why we all should be doing everything we can to prevent the spread of this flu.
So, does that mean you should be making sure that your kids get vaccinated? That you get vaccinated?
For my money, yes. There are plenty of people out there who are nervous about the vaccine, who worry about side effects, who point to the presence of thimerosal (the preservative that Jenny McCarthy blames for her son's autism) in the vaccine, who simply regard the vaccine as involving more risk than does the illness that it aims to prevent. But there are far, far more people - people with the relevant degrees and scientific accreditations - who argue strenuously that the vaccine is as safe as a vaccine can be (which means, of course, that people who are simply opposed to vaccines in general will not be comforted by this) and that it is being closely monitored and tested and retested and examined for any possible unanticipated side effect. Science - as embodied by our national medical associations and pediatric associations and centers for disease control - advocates getting the vaccine. For me, that's pretty compelling.
Shelley Abreu at Babble makes a similar argument:
Fear of vaccines cannot be completely eliminated, but the majority of research and evidence points to their safety. What’s more, the CDC has devised a careful monitoring system to track and respond to any kind of adverse reactions that might develop. And aside from a vocal minority, the majority of the medical profession seems to wholeheartedly support swine flu vaccination. When all is said and done, it’s hard to find any real evidence that suggests that the risk of side effects from the vaccine outweigh the tremendous benefit to children, pregnant women and adults alike.
Madeline Ellis at HealthNews cites experts at the Center For Disease Control on the vaccine's safety:
Federal officials say the H1N1 vaccine is made the same way as seasonal flu vaccines that have been used for years. “This isn’t a new vaccine,” Anne Schuchat said. “The vaccine is being manufactured exactly the same way as the seasonal flu vaccine. It is basically a vaccine made against the H1N1 instead of the seasonal viruses (expected to circulate in the upcoming season). Based on everything we know now, we are expecting a good safety record for H1N1.”
I respect any parent who worries about vaccines, and who frets over the research and who struggles to find a good, clear path to doing what's medically best by their children. I've hemmed and hawed over these issues myself. But for me it comes down to this: vaccinations are about much more than just preserving the health of your own children. They're about preserving the health of the community. They only work if the majority of the community participates. So, if you wager that your children might not get swine flu, or might not get it bad, or that if they did get it, it's less of a danger than other risks that might be associated with vaccines... well, you might be right. Maybe. But even if swine flu doesn't bring its worst to bear upon your child, it might do so upon the child of another. And your child might be the one to pass it along.
My youngest has a respiratory condition that has weakened his lungs: swine flu could be very, very dangerous for him. So I worry. Evan Frustaglio didn't have such a condition, and, presumably, his parents didn't worry, or not to the same degree. But Evan Frustaglio is dead, and swine flu killed him. His death probably would have been prevented by a vaccine - his own, or one for the person who passed the flu on to him. That's reason enough for me to beat the vaccination drum.
Lives are at stake. Maybe not your life, maybe not your child's life, but still. Children are dying from a preventable illness, and if any of us can do anything to prevent that from happening to even one more child? Then it's worth being scared. So if you're still determined to not vaccinate, do everything - everything - that you can to do your part to contain things. Stay home/keep your children home at the first sign of symptoms, wash your hands - WASH YOUR HANDS - see your doctor, cover your mouth, WASH YOUR HANDS.
It could save a life.
(There's a good, forthright FAQ about H1N1 and the vaccine - at least as it's being provided in Canada - at CTV, here. Share any other resources you might have in the comments, below.)
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
(It is, it seems, my role in this space to harangue and terrify you. Playgrounds will kill your children! Plastics are poisonous! Your uterus CAN FALL RIGHT OUT BETWEEN YOUR LEGS OHMAHGAH. And for that I am sorry. I am also sorry that I have to do it again.)
Let me repeat that: their lives depend on it.
Just ask Aubrey Opdyke.
In a New York Times piece this week, Ms. Opdyke told her story - the story of how the flu virus almost killed her, and how it did, tragically, kill her unborn baby:
"On June 27, Ms. Opdyke... came down with mild flu symptoms.
She finally came home from the hospital three weeks ago.
In the four months she was hospitalized, she spent five weeks in a coma, suffered six collapsed lungs and a near-fatal seizure. High-pressure ventilation blew her up like a molten balloon until “she looked like she weighed 400 pounds,” her husband, Bryan, said, and she has stretch marks from her neck to her ankles. Her muscles and lungs are still so weak that she uses a walker.
While hospitalized, she missed seeing her 4-year-old daughter, Hope, learn to swim and start pre-school.
And, most important, she lost her baby."
Yeah. Because of the flu.
Pregnant women are particularly vulnerable to the flu, not least because their immune systems are preoccupied with the work of protecting the baby within the mother. According to the article, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that 100 pregnant women had been in intensive care with swine flu and that 28 had died, and that those numbers are likely a "tiny fraction of what are believed to have been millions of cases in the country."
Millions of cases. The number of which ending in fatalities is unknown.
So what are we to do? Make sure all pregnant women and all persons in regular contact with pregnant women get flu shots? Maybe. But there is, apparently, some uncertainty about how to protect against both regular and so-called swine flu. CBC reported today that there seems to be some preliminary evidence that the flu shot increases risk of contracting H1N1. In which case, what's a concerned expectant mother to do?
If you're pregnant, or living with someone who is pregnant, make sure that you speak with your doctor about how best to protect against any kind of flu. If you're neither pregnant not preggo-adjacent, think about doing this anyway. At the least, pregnant or not, make sure that if you have any flu symptoms you're staying home and laying low and covering your mouth and washing your hands - OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN - and doing everything you can to contain it.
Because the life you save? Might be a mom and baby's.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
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A new report from the Guttmacher Institute suggests that access to contraception and legal abortion would reduce the 70,000 annual deaths (globally) from unsafe abortions. The Catholic Church says, basically, pish-posh. As Jezebel reports, Deirdre McQuade of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities said, in response to the report, "We need to be much more creative in assisting women with supportive services so they don't need to resort to the unnatural act of abortion," and that "use of artificial contraception could increase a women's health risks and... they would fare better using natural family planning methods approved by the church."
So, basically: 70,000 women die every year from botched abortions? They shouldn't have access to those unsafe abortions! They should be pushed to alternatives! And: natural family planning! Just like their husbands want! Which, okay: women should have access - access - to alternatives to abortion. They should have support in whatever choice they make around dealing with an unwanted pregnancy. But access to abortion is not the problem. In fact, it's the lack of access to abortion that is the problem, which is the whole point of the report. Many, many women without access to safe, legal abortions will seek out abortions anyway, simply because for many, abortion is the only reasonable option, whether because they don't have sufficient systems of support (systems of support - like positive family and/or marital relationships - that neither the Church nor any other organization can reliably replicate), or any one of a zillion other reasons. For many women it is, simply, the only option, and so they pursue it even when they know they risk injury or death. To respond to the issue with the assertion that such women just need 'supportive services' is to miss the point entirely. Most such women would need a support services intervention into their entire lives (pregnancy, childbirth and motherhood, after all, are not fleeting circumstances.)
Which is also the problem with the second part of the Church's response: 'natural family planning methods' presuppose a loving, supportive relationship with a cooperative partner. Unless, that is, the Church doesn't have a problem with husbands coercing their wives to be fruitful and multiply, even if bearing such fruit causes her emotional or physical distress. The fact of the matter is that if natural family planning methods worked or were relevant to all sexual-slash-reproductive circumstances, there wouldn't be so many women clamoring for abortions, or for safe and reliable access to birth control that remains under their control. And safe and reliable access to such birth control is the only thing that has been shown to reduce abortion rates. The only thing. Which is to say: safe and reliable access to birth control saves the lives of women who are mothers, women who are not mothers, women who hope to be mothers and women who hope never to be mothers. It saves women's lives. Why can't the Church get behind that?
I've been outspoken about the fact that I deplore abortion. I wish that no woman had to have an abortion. But I am nonetheless emphatically pro-choice, and will defend to the end the right of women to control the terms of their reproduction. And there is no question in my mind that although 70,000 abortions represents the termination of 70,000 pregnancies and that that is regrettable, 70,000 women's lives lost in unsafe abortions multiplies the tragedy immeasurably, and if that can be prevented, it should be. It must be.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
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They still don't.
I only know one woman personally who has lost a baby to SIDS. Loralee's description of the horror of her baby's sudden - sudden - and unexpected death is difficult reading (it breaks my heart into a zillion tiny pieces every time I read it), but it's important, because it's a stark reminder of how very, very important it is that we continue to press for a better understanding of SIDS, and that we continue to talk about it and stay aware of it and spread the word about anything, anything at all that might reduce risks, so that we can further reduce the number of babies - babies like Loralee's - who succumb to it every year. As Woman Tribune says, "people are working amazingly hard at reducing the number of babies who fall victim to SIDS every year; since 1992 when the Back To Sleep advisory was first introduced, the rate of SIDS has dropped more than 50% and has spared the lives of about 3,000 infants every year in the US."
But babies still die. Loralee's baby died. The babies of too many mothers - and fathers and sisters and brothers - have died. So we need to keep listening to their stories, and sharing their stories, and doing everything we can to support and promote awareness of SIDS.
It's SIDS Awareness Month. Talk to another mom about that. Talk to lots of moms about that. And then talk some more.
From Woman Tribune: steps parents can take to reduce their baby’s risk.
* Place your baby on their back to sleep at night and naptime.
* Use a firm mattress, covered with only a sheet, in a safety-approved crib.
* Remove all soft and loose bedding from your baby’s sleep area, including pillows, blankets, comforters, bumper pads, sheepskins, positioners, toys and all other soft objects.
* Consider using a Halo SleepSack, a wearable blanket, or other type of sleeper as a safe alternative to loose blankets.
* Do not place your baby to sleep on a sofa, waterbed, pillow, soft mattress or any other soft surface.
* Keep your baby’s face clear of coverings.
* Be careful not to overheat your baby with excessive clothing, bedding or room temperature.
* Do not smoke or allow anyone else to smoke around your baby.
* Educate babysitters, day care providers, grandparents and anyone else who cares for your baby about reducing the risk of infant death.
Spread the word.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
]]>And then panic some more when she sees headlines like this: Is Your Playground Toxic?
]]>And then panic some more when she sees headlines like this: Is Your Playground Toxic?
Once the playgrounds are deemed poisonous, isn't it safe to say that we should all run screaming from so-called civilized society and rear our children in the backwoods where they can swing on tree branches and poke bears for fun?
The story, from Mother Nature News:
A recently leaked memo from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) indicates that agency scientists have begun to question whether there's stuff in the crumb rubber (used as play surfaces in many playgrounds) that could be toxic to kids. "What's known is very very little. They list, I think it's 30 toxic chemicals in one of the memos. And so far work has only been done on two of them," said Jeff Ruch, head of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, in an interview with The Environment Report. An EPA spokesman says the agency is doing a preliminary study of four playgrounds to test for toxins such as lead and volatile organic compounds. The results aren't in yet.
"Results aren't in yet," which for many parents translates into "don't bring your kids anywhere near this stuff."
MNN notes that the Rubber Manufacturers Association says that "there are more than 100 studies showing scrap tires are safe in playgrounds and that environmental groups are over hyping the concerns" But they also point out that arsenic treated wood was once defended as safe. And remember all those creosote-coated railway ties that were once a staple of yards and play areas? You wouldn't want your baby licking that stuff, right? So why risk him stuffing possibly toxic crumb rubber into his mouth?Or even just rubbing it all over his sticky little hands?
I just don't know anymore. On the one hand, I want to protect my children against anything that could possibly harm them in any way. On the other, I feel like I'm living in something of a culture of paranoia where panicking about our children's well-being has become an entirely mockable way of life.
So I'm trying to keep this in perspective. In the meantime, however, I'm going to stick to playgrounds with sand or cedar chips. Not because I'm paranoid, of course. Just, you know, because.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between. When she's not indulging in parental paranoia, she worries about God and death and Walt Disney. You know, the usual.
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This month in maternal health:
]]>This month in maternal health:
Women's Policy Inc held a congressional briefing on technology and maternal health. There's a webcast of the briefing at the Women's Policy page, as well as a slideshow and other resources.
The Guardian (UK) reported on the Taskforce on Innovative International Financing for Health Systems, which has stated that user fees for health care have a powerfully negative impact on child and maternal health, "particularly in the world's
poorest communities. Figures published last week by Unicef show that
under-five mortality fell from 8.9 million in 2007 to 8.8 million in
2008." They call for raising investment in health care, so that such fees might be reduced or eliminated in poorer countries.
Unicef reported that child and infant mortality rates are on the decline, but noted that maternal mortality rates remain much too high.
Kenya is bringing birth attendants into their maternal health strategy. (A very good policy that more countries should adopt.)
Sarah Ferguson visited Nepal to advocate for the cause of maternal health, and to congratulate Nepal's Prime Minister on the progress that has been made in that country on improving infant mortality rates.
Daily Delivery reported on an innovative and promising initiative in India that focuses on raising literacy and awareness among women of maternal health issues.
Hilary Clinton has been stepping up and speaking out for the cause, identifying it as a key concern of the Obama administration, and insisting, rightly, that it is a human rights issue.
Got any maternal health stories to share? Leave them in the comments!
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
]]>Terrifying places, places that we don't talk about. Places that we pretend don't exist when we talk about 'baby blues' or 'new mom nerves' or even just 'depression.' Places that we don't want to acknowledge exist, even as we crouch, terrified, in their corners. Places like the place that this new mother went to. Places that some mothers - mothers like this poor mother (caveat linker: the story here is not for the faint of heart) - never come back from.
Her story - the story of Otty Sanchez - is a terrible, gruesome story, the details of which I won't relate here, if only because once you know them, you can't unknow them, and even though I think that it's important that we know about these kinds of stories, I think that it's also important that a) such stories don't get reduced to their sensational components, such that we overlook the issues, and b) we all be able to sleep at night. I'll just say that she was a new mom, and that she was struggling with severe post-partum depression, aggravated by a conflict with her baby's father, and that she tried to get help, but that she didn't get enough help, and that the results were deeply, epically tragic. Tragic on the level of Andrea Yates, of Susan Smith, of any of the so-called 'killer moms' who we whisper about, shudder about, recoil from.
Which is a terrible, terrible problem. Moms that go to those places, those horrifying, terrible places, are as much the faces of post-partum depression and maternal depression as are you or I or Brooke Shields or whomever seems most sympathetic at any given moment. But because these moms have done things that repel sympathy, we close our eyes and ears and hearts to them and call them monsters. Because no-one likes to, no-one wants to, talk about the extreme, dark edge of maternal mental health, the place that depression can take a mom, any mom, if she isn't cared for, if she doesn't get help, if she isn't pulled back from that edge. Calling them monsters makes the nightmare easier to understand and to deal with: these women were unusual. These women are not you or me. That couldn't happen to you or me.
But it could. Otty Sanchez had a history of mental health issues, but then, so do I. Otty Sanchez felt herself losing her grip; so did I. Otty Sanchez sought medical help for post-partum depression; so did I. And then Otty Sanchez and I part ways: Otty Sanchez needed more help than she got; Otty Sanchez went home, alone, and wasn't well; Otty Sanchez found herself alone with a new baby, sliding into post-partum psychosi; Otty Sanchez killed that baby; Otty Sanchez tried to kill herself.
There but for the grace of God could I have gone.
Oh, of course, I badly want to add here: I know that I wouldn't have gone so far off the deep end as did Otty Sanchez. But I can't honestly say that. If I didn't have the resources I have, the doctors I have, the partner I have - who's to say? Who's to say that I couldn't have had a psychotic break? And become a monster? Who's to say?
By reducing stories like that of Otty Sanchez to sensational stories about 'mommy monsters,' we risk missing the moral of those stories: that they are what happens when PPD and other mental health issues go untreated or undertreated or under-discussed or under-noticed. They are what happens when we dismiss PPD as 'baby blues,' when we take seriously those who argue that all new mothers need is vitamins and exercise, when we look at the extreme cases, the cases like Otty's, and tell ourselves that those have nothing to do with us, nothing to do with us at all.
We do this at our peril. At our children's peril.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
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Slate posted an article today on the IUD, which, if you're like me, is more than likely to bring to mind early 80's era Cosmo magazines. How many women do you know who use an IUD? How many women have you ever known who used IUDs? In all my years of using birth control, I only ever knew two, and both of them got pregnant while using it. Which is why, when my doctor suggested it as an option, I just shook my head.
But Slate insists that the Intrauterine Device is an underrated form of birth control:
It has to be placed by a gynecologist, but once in, it's a practically foolproof method of birth control—99 percent effective—that can last up to 10 years. While daily or monthly forms of birth control can cost up to $60 a month, an IUD is a one-time cost between $300 and $500—though it's often covered by insurance. There's nothing to remember to take (unlike the pill), put in (unlike the NuvaRing), or take off (unlike the patch). And while efficacy studies suggest that the pill, patch, or ring are 99 percent effective in a clinical setting, real-life compliancy—like forgetting to take the pill at the same time every day—reduces its success rate. All that is a nonissue for the IUD: Once in, it requires no maintenance for the length of the device. Perhaps best of all, it can be hormone-free, which is better for the environment and ideal for women prone to some of the negative effects of hormonal birth control, like weight gain, mood swings, acne, or high blood pressure.
They seem like the perfect form of contraception: simple to use, long-lasting, reversible, hormone-free, economical. So why are American women so late to this party? Perhaps the better question is: Why did they leave the party to begin with?
The fast answer, they say, is the "erroneous" belief, in the US, that the IUD is dangerous.
A writer at Jezebel adds this point, in commenting on the article:
Some doctors are also not keen to recommend IUDs to patients who've never had children, in case they are unknowingly infertile and might later sue alleging their infertility is the fault of the doctor and the IUD (ed. note: IUDs have a "checkered history" in this regard, apparently) ... Although my gynecologist at the time I chose an IUD was both knowledgeable and willing to provide me with one (possibly due to her medical training outside of the United States), we actually drew up and notarized an agreement that if I did later turn out to be infertile, I wouldn't sue her — without it, she would not have agreed to do the procedure.
So say that one is a mom, and/or that one is not too concerned about fertility, and also that one is more or less opposed to hormone-roller-coaster that the Pill can be - is the IUD the way to go? I'm kind of past this decision myself - my husband had a vasectomy a few months back - but I'm honestly curious: is the IUD something that we should be promoting to each other as an alternative to the Pill and condoms and rhythm method and - *cough* - vasectomies? (I'm not saying that I regret my husband's vasectomy, just that I've had mroe than a few moments of ambivalence about the permanence of it. Had we thought that there might be a more reliable form of unintrusive birth controlout there, we - I - might have thought twice. But only awareness of the IUD is as a form of birth control that wasn't exactly failsafe, so.)
How are you managing your post-baby/no-more-baby/no-babies-at-all-thanks fertility? Inquiring, nosy and only sorta squeamish minds want to know.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between. She's still a little traumatized about having bared the ass-cheeks of her soul to a whole auditorium of women at BlogHer, but she'll get over it. Maybe.
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Nor am I.
So, herewith, my much-thought-out tips for staying sane and healthy at BlogHer when you've just left your baby and are kind of thinking that maybe you need to start hitting the Pinot Grigio at breakfast just to not go crazy:
1) Don't hit the Pinot Grigio at breakfast. There won't be Pinot Grigio served with breakfast, but still. The general principle still holds: don't drink too much. This goes for everyone, of course, but moms - especially new or newish moms away from their babies for the fist time - might be tempted to a) take advantage of their newfound freedom with a six-martini unplaydate, or b) drown their anxieties and guilt about having abandoned their babies for the wilds of Chicago in a Sparklecorntini or NPH Straight Up or whatever your poison is. Or both. Don't. Or at least, don't do it to excess. BlogHer is exhausting. Don't burn out before breakfast on Friday.
2) Get sleep. LOTS of sleep. When else do are you guaranteed a full night of uninterrupted sleep (assuming, that is, that your roomies don't snore) and the option of sleeping in? Take advantage of this! ENJOY this! Even it means that you do miss breakfast, or leave the People's Party a little bit early, or even slip away from the panel sessions for a quick nap - get some sleep! It will help you to stay strong, and sane, and you're going to need every ounce of that strength and sanity to get through the Sparklecorn Extravaganza or BowlHer or whatever other debauchery you have planned.
3) Eat. LOTS. And don't rely on the conference spreads and random appetizer for this - you might get enough food this way (many do), but you might also find that your blood sugar drops mid-afternoon, and at that point it won't be such a bad idea to grab a sandwich somewhere. Ditto for your evening activities - make sure that party appies will do it for you, or make a plan to grab a hamburger. You think post-partum hormones and the attendant anxiety are bad when you're away from your children? They're worse when your blood sugar plummets and you careen to the floor. (I have no science to support this. It's just theory. And personal experience. Don't ask.)
4) Don't get sick. Or at least, try to not get sick. I know: DUH. But seriously: you want to go home and pass on some icky virus to your kids and spend a week cleaning up vomit or wiping noses? I thought not. The above tips will help in that regard - basics, people - but this post also has some good advice.
5.) Call home. Or don't. Maybe you'll alleviate some anxiety by checking in with the family every few hours. Maybe a nightly video chat will do the trick. Or maybe you're the type - like me - who falls to pieces when she hears her children's voices on a long-distance call, in which case, schedule those calls carefully, like for when you have a little downtime or when you have a friend or two around.
6.) Have fun. You've been waiting all year for this. It's just three days. Your kids are fine, you are fine, everything is fine. ENJOY IT.
And while you're doing that, find me and we can spend a moment weeping into our Pinot before I tell you about the time I forgot my breast pump and wore pasties. I promise you'll be smiling immediately.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between. She thinks a lot about haircuts and nudity.
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And then my head blows off.
Apparently, BPA - bisphenol-A - might not be as dangerous as we were led to believe. This according to the TierneyLab blog at the New York Times, which points to a report recently released by "nonpartisan, nonprofit group, STATS."
"Scientists, regulators, politicians in Europe, Australia, and Japan have all rejected the evidence that the chemical is harmful as methodologically flawed, badly conducted, or irrelevant — with some warning that banning it could actually endanger the public. Now that
the National Institutes of Health has acknowledged that it funded a lot of poorly-designed research on BPA — the very research that is touted as evidence that the chemical is deadly — it’s time to ask whether America has been spun by clever marketing rather than clever science."
Hmm. I'm not sure what the marketing spin would be for scare-mongering around BPA, but still. Has there really been an excess of anxiety over something that really isn't worth worrying about? Health Canada has recently stated that it's not all that concerned about BPA, either, noting that BPA levels in bottled water, infant formula or baby food are "not expected to pose a health risk."
I don't know. This is interesting news, of course, but is it enough to make me worry less about BPA or whatever other nefarious toxin is lurking in my baby's sippy cup and binky? Not really. If anything, it makes me worry more. If science can't make up its mind about what is toxic and what is not, how am I supposed to make up my own?
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between. In her spare time, she murders ducks. Sort of.
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BabyCenter.com, Kellymom.com, the Dr Sears site, the What To Expect When you're expecting books, the Baby Whisperer books, The Happiest Fetus/Baby/Toddler/Future Rodeo Clown On The Block books, Fertility Friend, Pregnancy Friend, pregnancy and parenting forums - all of it. I was addicted to it. If it purported to guide me through the dark forest of birth and babies, I attached myself to it like glue. And even when it became clear that all the websites and boks and forums were making me more anxious, not less anxious, I clung to them still. I clung to them all the way through a partum anxiety disorder, post-partum depression and regular old new mom panic. And indeed I panicked, because these things fuel panic. They feed on panic. Panic is what keeps them in business: panic over fertility, panic over pregnancy, panic over childbirth, panic over new parenthood. If none of us were panicking, none of us would scroll manically through BabyCenter's calendars, frantically trying to find out whether the fact the little Engelbert can't pronounce 'hermeneutics' at 14 months means that he has a learning disability. If none of us did that, or the like, at other sites and with other books, etc, none of this would be a business. Also, probably, many of us would need less Ativan.
Which is why I think that this new site - Let's Panic About Babies - actually provides a maternal health (certainly a mental health) service. A new project by bloggers Alice Bradley and Eden Marriott Kennedy -- better known in the blogosphere as Finslippy and Fussy -- it is, as Rita Arens of Surrender, Dorothy (and fellow CE) says, "a sinfully funny site about new parenthood." But it's more than funny (though funny it is: as Liz Gumbinner of Cool Mom Picks said, rightly, it's what would happen if the What To Expect books were reimagined by the Onion): it's sanity-saving.
Because it pokes fun at the panic-inducing earnestness of the big parenting and pregnancy resource sites and the like, it breathes a welcome - necessary, even - breath of irreverence to the whole parenting enterprise. It tells us, it's normal to panic. And it's silly. So LAUGH the next time you find yourself freaking out over green poo or your child's failure to find joy in the Latin edition of the Cat In The Hat. Go ahead, freak out, and seek out advice. But know that you're a freak and that most other moms are freaks and take whatever advice you find with a grain of salt. And? LAUGH.
Laughter, after all, is pretty good medicine. And odds are that you can take some of the piss out of your anxiety if you can laugh, a little, at it. So, yeah: Let's Panic might not be a replacement for Xanax, but it's a pretty good start.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
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Because, seriously. Like I was going to let a little post-partum recovery - and an infant - get in the way of my annual pilgrimage to be with my virtual soul-sisters? Hellz no. I was going, and Jasper was coming with me.
And he did, indeed, come with me. He flew with me from Toronto to San Francisco. He rode the weird little shuttle bus to the party at Guy Kawasaki's house with me and some of his virtual aunties and at least one virtual uncle. He shat on this lady, who was very gracious about it. He sat in on the MommyBlogging session, and got his picture taken by the New York Times. He accompanied me to the session at which I was a speaker, and - when his appetite struck mid-session - got nursed at the front of the room while someone held a microphone for me. He stared a lot at this lady - who can blame him? - and got rocked a lot by this guy - who has formidable arms - and basically just made himself right at home. He was eight weeks old.
It was awesome. It was also terrifying.
I did it because I wanted to go, and because I couldn't go without bringing him. There's an argument to be made that the most healthful decision for me would have been to not go - I was still recovering from his traumatic birth - but my only real concern was whether it was a healthful decision for him to go, and our pediatrician said sure, why not, so we did. And as it turned out, the trip was totally fine for him, and really quite discombobulating for me. I didn't tear anything anew, or drop a uterus or anything, but it was mentally extremely challenging - I was in the throes of and taking medication for post-partum depression - and I felt it. Oh, boy, but I felt it. You can read about it here. It was hard.
I was asked many times, during and after the fact, whether I was glad that I'd done it, glad that I'd made the trip, and would I do it again? And then Shannon wrote a post the other day asking, elliptically, the exact the same thing. The truthful answer was, is, yes and no. Yes, I was glad that I'd made the trip. Very glad, despite how hard it was. Would I do it again? Harder to answer, but if you'd caught me in any of the moments when I was sobbing in a corner, overwhelmed by hormones and maternal anxiety, I'd have said no. But as it happened, I went on to take Jasper to three more conferences in the 8 months after BlogHer, so. Clearly the answer was not a wholesale no. Would I tell another mom to go, or not go? Neither. Only you can tell you whether you're up for it, whether it's worth it. (For my money, if you want to go badly, it is worth it. I'd rather face the challenge and deal with whatever struggles than cope with the regret. Then again, I'm also the one who cried like a baby the whole weekend, so.)
(Also, keep in mind that I was there with a newborn. In some ways, a newborn is easier than a bigger baby because they're so, you know, portable and sleepy and stuff. But you're more vulnerable. Bigger babies demand more attention because they're more squirmy and wakeful, but you'll be less hormonal and prone to random bursts of sobbing.)
So, let's say that you do want to go with your very little person. Here are my tips on how to take a baby to BlogHer and preserve your mental health:
1) If you can, room with somebody that you trust and who is sympathetic to babies. Someone who you know will be happy to watch over little Sigfreid or Brunhilde while you take a bath or weep in the corner.
2.) Travel in a pack - yes, even from the moment you leave home (there's gotta be other BlogHers flying out of wherever you're flying out of - try to arrange flight seating in advance) - with supportive women (and other women with babies are always a boon.) If you can make sure that wherever you go there's a pair of eager, trusted arms ready to hold baby and give you a break, you will feel much more comfortable and safe.
3.) EXPECT to feel uncomfortable and unsafe and overwhelmed at times. Your body is flooded with new mom hormones, and you have your baby with you, and ALL THOSE PEOPLE and ALL THAT NOISE - it's going to feel threatening and oppressive at times. Know that and plan for it. Promise yourself that you'll take yourself and little Engelbert away from the thrum whenever you start to get twitchy.
4.) Take breaks. Take LOTS of breaks. Do not plan on doing everything or seeing everybody. You will need quiet time. Baby needs quiet time. So bail on a few session in favor of in-room naps, and feel free to leave the MamaPopRocks! Sparklecorn Extravaganza early.
5.) Leave the computer in your room - or even at home - and use the extra space in your bag for extra diapers and wipes and clothes and blankies. If the gods are willing to summon epic shits when you walk out your front door at home, what do you think they have planned for you when you wander into lunch with a thousand bloggers? Yeah. Expect the apocalyptic shit. (Mine came at Guy Kawasaki's house. By his pool. I cried.)
6.) Say yes when people ask to hold little Helga. And don't be afraid to ask - that person behind you at the coffee urn would probably love to hold her while you stir your decaf. Let her.
7.) Bjorns and slings and strollers, oh my. Whatever your baby is comfortable in, bring it. And use it. Jasper was slung through many a party, and it's pretty cool to be able to feel your baby snoozing against your chest while you sip (go easy) a Chardonnay with your friends.
8.) What I said in #3, above? Double it. You will be stressed out. BlogHer is stressful even if you've nothing to manage but yourself and your Ativan, so when you've got baby along, and you're mothering AND BlogHering all at the same time? DOUBLE stressful. Triple even. Expect it. But also expect that if you know that this is worth it to you, you'll manage, and be glad.
9.) Come find me. I'll hold your baby for you. And better, I'll whisper all about how I know exactly, exactly, how you feel. Because I've been there.
Catherine Connors blogs at Her Bad Mother and Their Bad Mother and everywhere in between.
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