Recently in Motherhood Category

Like many politicized and not so "political" women of color I've had my qualms identifying as a feminist. As addressed before the Internet blew up, traditional western feminist discourse connotes white, middle class, straight women and many of the issues fought center this group; that has been covered extensively Online, in print, and on Feministing by folks like Samhita. Zoom back to me, as a 27 year-old daughter of working-class Mexican immigrants and a single urban mama , my lifestyle and at times worldview does not seem to be grasped by western feminism.  Like I've said before in my other blog and in real life conversations, my mama, grandmama (resting in peace now) aunties, mentors and closest friends do not identify as feminists and are some of the staunchest, strongest, hard working, autonomous independent thinkers, and just people that I know. All without identifying with feminism, and as complicated as that is, I respect that and even admire it. Honoring the women in my blood and non blood family  relating to them, has made it easy for me to question and at moments reject dominant feminism.

Are my two biggest fears.

I know, I know, many people I tell that to laugh at me and tell me when I'm ready to have kids, I'll want to, but at this moment, I don't ever think I'll want to.

As an almost 16 year old, my mother believes I have no reason whatsoever to even think about becoming pregnant.  (I love her so much.  But her motto is if she isn't getting any, there's no way in hell I am :D)  She says her pregnancies (I have an elder sister) were pretty good, but she wishes she didn't have to get c-sections.

The mention of a c-section sends shivers down my spine.  I can't stand the thought of a flipping KNIFE cutting through my ABDOMINAL MUSCLES to get some filmy sea monkey extracted.

But I guess some people think it's worth it if it turns cute in a couple hours.  :DD

I know from previous experience that breastfeeding is a very sensitive topic here, and that it's almost impossible to say anything, on either side of the issue, without hurting feelings and stepping on toes. This has been kind of perplexing to me, but I'll admit I haven't spent much time thinking about it. I have strong convictions about the benefits of breastfeeding, but then my mom is a nutritionist so I have access to a lot of research that others probably don't. I also have strong feelings about the influence and control of the formula companies, etc. but then, I tend to be a little more anti-capitalism than most people on Feministing. So I understand that my view is probably not the norm, and this seems unproblematic to me.

The thing is, I have never pushed my views on anyone else or tried to guilt anyone for their decisions. In spite of this, I have been attacked (called a "tit nazi," even) for even mentioning the benefits of breastfeeding, the lack of support most women experience, and for noting that I made the choice to breastfeed for a full year because of the history of diabetes in our family and the resulting risk that formula presents to my daughter. On the other side, it is suggested of mothers who don't breastfeed that they are not concerned about their child's health, that they're lazy, etc. So the attacks seem equally harsh from both sides. Up until now, this has seemed like the kind of disagreement that's both irresolvable and highly emotional, so I've sort of left it alone. But the coverage of this topic on this post has made me rethink the source of the controversy. I'm very compelled by Lauredhel's take on this:

It's not as simple as "The Patriarchy wants women to not breastfeed" or "The Patriarchy wants women to breastfeed". What The Patriarchy "wants" (if you'll bear with me on this somewhat teleological train of thought) is to have control over breastfeeding. Sometimes that might involve coercion to breastfeed (while withholding full support), sometimes coercion to not breastfeed, sometimes breastfeeding is a tool to confine women to the domestic environment, sometimes guilt over not breastfeeding is cultivated to sell women more products. Above all, breastfeeding women are reminded day after day after day that their bodies are public property, that breastfeeding isn't a free pass out of the sex class, and that whatever they do, there will be no shortage of people telling them that they're doing it wrong.

Australian and USAn societies are down there with the lowest breastfeeding rates in the world. We have developed a peculiarly pernicious mix of:

* half-secularised Puritanism;
* half-baked woman-hating Freudianism;
* toxic capitalism;
* mother-hostile workplace practices;
* social isolation of new mothers;
* a deep-seated fear and suspicion of any bodily intimacy that isn't sexual;
* and an overwhelming sense of proprietorship of breasts by heterosexual men.

It seems to me that conceptualizing the controversy as a patriarchal means of control makes sense of a lot of the contradictory messages women receive about breastfeeding. What do you think? And is there some way to approach this topic (which I think deserves a lot of feminist dialogue) that would steer clear of the hard feelings and emotional baggage that's currently tied to it? Because it seems to me that if we could do this we could make a lot of headway and at least begin to sidestep the whole patriarchal-control-of-women's-bodies thing.

Catherine Skol, 40, worked as a Chicago police officer for more than a decade in some of the roughest assignments until an on-the-job head-on collision put her on medical disability.  But nothing could prepare her for the pain of birthing her fifth child -- pain needlessly inflicted by her own doctor. 

The Chicago Tribune reports on the civil suit filed this week by Skol and her husband against one Dr. Scott Pierce , a fill-in for Skol's doctor who was out of town.  According to the suit, the doctor arrived four hours after he was called and immediately began chastising Skol for not calling ahead.  Appalling, for sure, but it gets even worse:

The suit said the doctor told Skol she would soon have the baby and that there was no time for pain medication.

Later, Pierce allegedly told a nurse that Skol deserved the pain because she had not called before coming in. "Sometimes pain is the best teacher," the suit quoted him as saying.

The doctor conducted a painful vaginal exam in the middle of a contraction and then told Skol to start pushing, despite not being fully dilated, according to the suit.

Pierce also berated her and hospital staff who questioned him, telling her to "Shut up, close your mouth and push," the suit said. Pierce said Skol was likely to hemorrhage during birth and said the baby might die, causing Skol and her husband to fear complaining, the suit alleged.

Pierce also made cell phone calls during the more than two-hour labor, cursing about colleagues and talking about an abortion for a woman he said should never have gotten pregnant, the suit said.

After the birth, Pierce gave Skol needless stiches for tiny tears, using a needle that was unnecessarily large, the suit alleged.

The hospital said that Pierce is in private practice, and therefore they could do no more than give him a written warning and an indefinite probation with the warning that if he messed up again, he'd be barred from the hospital.  The Illinois Department of Professional Regulation is also investigating.  According to their records, he's never before been disciplined, but they also don't make public letters of complaint that were not acted upon.

from MetaHara

Guilt is self serving and interferes with intuition.  Yet, so many  have been conditioned to feel guilt.  Sometimes guilt is thrust upon us by an outside source. The next time someone tries to give you a guilt trip, you can know that is a form of abuse and reject it. 

What if every time you felt guilt creep into your consciousness, you replaced it with another G?

Glad
Good
God
Goddess
Gratitude
Grace

Finding something to be grateful for in the situation is like  a light at the end of the tunnel.  It allows us to accept where we are in the moment, directing ourselves toward  more ease.  I'm not suggesting denial.  If something that isn't working can be changed, work at changing it.  Guilt doesn't help in that process.

Motherhood is full of opportunities to feel guilt and worry.  I haven't figured out how to get rid of worry so much, but, my technique for guilt seems to work just fine.

For instance, I could feel guilty that I had my son experience the institution of school.  He is someone who could have been better off home schooled.  Or I could be grateful that he experienced the challenge and list the many benefits he  would not have had in a home school environment (like learning to produce music on a computer).  I can help him with  the options available to him now and be supportive of the choices he makes to educate himself further.

Examining guilt to relieve ourselves of it informs us that every choice has pros and cons.   Sometimes we do make a poor choice.  We can examine that & make adjustments that guilt would get in the way of.  Guilt fogs up the head.  Gratitude creates clarity.

Looking to start a discussion on the particular issue of the insidious devaluation of stay at home moms... In reading some past posts and comments I believe there exist 3 or 4 implicit and completely unacknowledged assumptions in the discussion at large. They are as follows (in no particular order):

-Women who stay at home do not use their brains let alone utilize their degrees they may have earned

-Women who work outside the home do use their brains and utilize their degrees they may have earned

-The only place women can affect any change or make strides towards the feminist cause is in a paid and/or public position

-Women at home are living less than fully satisfying lives -- as women at work are living fully satisfying lives

The overall and often unrecognized assumption in this discussion at large seems to me that even feminists seem unable to imagine a thing as valuable if society has not placed a dollar sign on it. To me the point of feminism is striving towards equal access to all choices. I see very little difference between a person who tells me "your place is in the home" and a person who tells me "get off your ass and go to work." As a stay at home mom I do a lot of work, I affect change in meaningful ways beginning but not ending with my own children. It's a bit disheartening that we seem concerned about affordable childcare and good childcare as important until one chooses to do it oneself.

Crossposted from my own blog.

We held a fantastic event at our medical school Wednesday night. We were a little disappointed in the student turn out, but otherwise, it was wonderful. We had a panel of eight female physicians speaking about being a woman in medicine. Seven of the eight are mothers, so there was a lot of discussion about pregnancy, babies and family. I was happy with the diversity of our panel. We had one Chinese doctor, a few hispanics, a lesbian (who humorously advised us to wait until menopause and then let our partner carry the baby), a few Jewish doctors, and only two WASPs like me. Unfortunately, the two black doctors (I don't like the term African American, which rarely applies to the frequently Caribbean born blacks in South Florida) who we invited were not able to attend, and neither were the Indian doctors. We are blessed with a diverse pool of professors and physicians associated with our school.

I wish we videotaped or had transcripts of the discussion. We got great advice, from having a fire drill-like plan of what to do if we get groped by a patient or a fellow physician (which has happened to members of the panel), to how to answer (or not answer) illegal questions in interviews about how soon we were planning on getting pregnant, how to manage when our kids our sick, and other wonderful bits of information and experience.

The next morning, I was driving 4 year old Z to school. He was sitting next to the big contraption the catering company rented to me to keep the food warm for the event. He was confused, somehow thinking it was for me to bring food to the people at the hospital. I explained to him that I was still in school to learn to be a doctor, then I would go to the hospital to help people.

Z paused for a second and then asked, thoughtfully, "When you are a doctor and you go to the doctor place, will you still be my mommy?"

"Yes," I said. "I will always be your mommy."

"Will you still come home to me?"

Oh, kid, you're killing me. "Yes, I will still come home to you." In my head, I was thinking, sometimes, during residency, it may seem like I don't. But I will always come home, eventually. When all the babies are born, all the sutures are closed, all the cases are presented, I will come home. And I will try to find out about your homework and listen to you and hug you and kiss you before I collapse into bed.

How do you feel about women who donate their eggs?
Do you think it is wrong because it is selling a part of your body?
Do you feel it is right under certain circumstances?
Are you completely against it?
Any other thoughts?

Tell me how you feel... I have gotten mixed reviews about this from other women. I don't think it's something a woman should do just for the money. Maybe for a friend, sister, or family member who really wants a baby and can't have one? I don't know if it is something I would do, but I was curious about how other women feel about it.

Hello Ladies,

This is my First post and I'm still a little un-sure of how this works..here I go. I am in a Kinship, Marriage and Human sexuality class and we were randomly assiged debate roles. My role is a FEMINIST PROFESSOR WHO ARGUES THAT SURROGATE MOTHERHOOD EXPLOITS WOMEN. I have no idea what to say??? I consider myself a Feminist but I personally dont know why surrogate motherhood is a bad thing. Or maybe I am just seeing things one sided because I think that any couple that are willing to go through all that hard work to get a baby and want a baby should have one no matter their disabilities and if there is a women that is willing to give them a baby is a great person.Can any one out there help me?

My mom called with a very surprising request today.  She wanted me to recommend books on feminism to her!  This was surprising because this is the same women who used to tell me to "not be such a feminist!"  And who used to be (might still be) convinced that declaring myself a feminist is scaring all the boys away.  Okay, to be fair, I do consider her to have a lot of feminist values, but she's just not a fan of the label feminist and its (negative) connotations.  I would love for her to learn more about something I care so much about and hopefully understand why it is so important to me.  The only problem is that I don't really know any easy-to-read intro to feminism books to recommend to her. Can anyone help me out with some recommendations?  Thanks in advance!