I have no great sympathy for their claims that the media should back off, respecting their privacy as a family. When you open your life as they have (and as I have on my blog), you have to take the good with the bad. There will be those that love you no matter what. There will be people who will celebrate every stumble and heartbreak you experience. Others will question everything you do. It’s part and parcel of the deal.

In the end, though, what we have is a couple who is ending their relationship in a very public way. Regardless of my opinions about their relationship and parenting choices, I can’t help but watch their faces and see so much that is familiar.

I saw it months ago, the lack of physical contact, the emotional detachment, the harsh words that were only half-joking. They got further and further from each other. Soon, that interview couch could not have been long enough.

Eyes were swollen. Walls were up. The end was near.

They stopped joint interviews. Each took his/her turn with the cameras. The end was imminent.

The time they spent together with the children reminded me of the parallel play of toddlers. Functioning in the same space, but barely aware of the existence of the other. No empathy. No connection.

Now it’s over.

Watching last night’s episode reminded me so much of my experience over the last six months. The grief. The hurt. The regret. Playing things over and over in my head. Picking things apart to figure out where we went wrong. What I did. What he did. What we did.

I could see it in them and I hurt for them. I also know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. In fact, I have two little lights and they have the good fortune to have eight of them. The kids.

So, for the kids, I give Jon and Kate the following advice. Many of it came from the therapists and classes I’ve been to and the books I read, so I won’t claim original authorship by any stretch. Nonetheless, I see many parallels between the Gosselin’s post-split parenting plan and ours, so I’ll share the things that have been especially pertinent in our case.

1. It’s not about you anymore. It’s about them. Put the blame aside and think of the kids in every decision you make. What’s best for them may be a pain in the a$$ for you. Suck it up and deal.

2. If you were frustrated by the lack of control you had in your relationship before, be prepared to have even less. He will have his rules and routines and she will have hers. Structure is good and organic is great, but I can’t find any cases of death-by-breakfast-for-dinner.

3. Be flexible. Kids have this funny way of growing up. Their needs will change over time and so will yours. The arrangements you make now will need to shift at least every six months. Set up basic principles and guidelines to be fair, but expect that things will change.

4. Give before you take. If you expect flexibility, patience, and trust from your co-parent, you’ll need to give it first. You don’t have to be a doormat, but you don’t need to be a scorekeeper either.

5. Be prepared to communicate more than you ever did when you were married. Every hand-off will bring updates on who is up to what, schedules, activities, illnesses, boo-boos, school reports and more. Find a way that works for you. If talking doesn’t work, do it by e-mail. Don’t expect your kids to play messenger, they’ll get the emotions right (e.g., your hurt, anger, and distrust) and the facts wrong, neither of which is good.

6. Be the grown up. Yes, you’re both hurting and divorce is inevitably painful. (It should be. If it wasn’t, everyone would do it.) But venting to your kids or around your kids is not the answer. Be careful how you talk about your ex, even when you think the kids aren’t in earshot. Don’t be afraid to ask well-meaning friends and family to hold off on their editorials. It’s okay to let your kids know that you’re sad, but they need to know that you’re both going to be okay. They need to know that THEY’RE going to be okay. If you need help coping with the situation, get a therapist, meet a friend for lunch, take a walk.

7. Be sure to take care of yourself. Use the time away from the kids to recharge your batteries. Trust that your co-parent has things under control and, although things may not be handled the way that you would do them, the kids are going to be fine. The best gift you can give your kids right now is a happy and healthy mom and dad.

As the season progresses, I am sure there will be plenty of armchair experts out there who will analyze every move they make throughout this whole process. Will the decision to share the household work? Will Jon opt to leave for a job out of state? Will the show remain interesting without the constant tension on the sofa interviews? Are the kids getting too staged?

I’m going to stay out of that. I’m going to wish the Gosselins well and hope they find the healing they need.

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Dr. Dimino, from The Houston Women’s Care Associates, commented:

“After the hurricane was over our power was out for a day or so and that’s all it took,” she said. “When your power is out there’s not that much to do.”

Jenifer Bratter sees connections between sociological major events, like World War II and 9/11, and an increase in birth rates:

That is one reason baby boomlets follow “major events” says sociologist Jenifer Bratter, the associate director of Rice University’s Center on Race, Religion and Urban Life. “This pattern jibes with traditional patterns of the ways fertility surges can respond to major events,” she says, “be it the baby boom as linked to soldiers coming home from World War II to even the Oklahoma City bombing, which also had an associated elevation in births in surrounding Oklahoma counties.”

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Amanda Carpenter writes in the Washington Times:

The ruling was spurred by a request from Kai Wedenberg, head of the clinic where a woman twice requested, and received, an abortion based on sex.

Mr. Wedenberg asked for clarification from health officials after a woman, who already had two girls, requested amniocentesis and to be told the sex of her unborn child. She found out she was pregnant with another girl and asked for an abortion six days later.

The woman then became pregnant again, returned to the clinic and asked for another amniocentesis, which was not performed. Later, at her ultrasound, she asked the nurse to reveal the sex of her fetus, which was a girl. After learning this, the mother requested an abortion later that day and received it later that week.

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Photo by Sophie, Montreal, Canada

While perspective should prevail in calm — the death rate so far is a mere 5%. The “regular” seasonal flu kills about 38,000 people a year and is hardly considered anything more than an “oh, that stinks” response as you tell the tales of how sick you were over the weekend. The fact that it’s spreading so quickly and the history of these kinds of never-before-seen viruses tells us that they come back in lethal form in the fall and winter (as the case in the early 1800’s when 50 million people died of a similar flu), is enough to freak any mother out. Now that a baby has died in Texas, the thought of only a mild strain hitting the U.S. may be only wishful thinking at this point and is enough to put every mom and dad in complete panic mode.

Any parents here taking any extra precautions? Are you worried? What do you think about us sharing our 50,000 Tamiflus (an anti-viral medications) with Mexico? Should we?

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Oh, the tears and the pleading eyes.  She was looking at me with such desperation - please, Mummy, tell the dentist to take these yucky cotton things out and let’s go home, alright?  Please?  The tears were streaming out of her eyes and pooling in her ears, and she gripped my fingers as though she was hanging ten feet above shark-infested waters and begging me to pull her up.  The dentist had assured her it would be a quick ‘pinch’ as the needle went in, it would only last a few seconds, then a second needle, then she’d be done.

As the needle moved towards her reluctantly open mouth, Madeleine’s left hand flew up and hit the dentist’s hand, causing the dentist to stab the thumb of her other hand.  It happened so fast I hadn’t even realised she’d done it until the dentist made a joke of it.

Half an hour later it was all over, the dentist’s thumb had started to wake up and the little tooth that had been pulled easily from Madeleine’s mouth was in an envelope to take home for the Tooth Fairy.  I said something about the dentist I used to go to when I was at school, and the dentist’s assistant smiled and saidshe used to work at one of those school clinics, and you hardly ever heard any of the little ones cry or squeal, because all of them wanted to show their friends how brave and tough they were.  In fact, she told me, it was a very deliberate ploy on the part of the dentist to bring those kids into the clinic in groups of three or four, and the dentist would always pick out the toughest-looking kid and do them first, so the others could see how easy it was.

I suppose, way back then, I would have liked to see my mother in that room with me, holding my hand and telling me it would be OK.  But standing there next to Madeleine last week, trying to calm her down, I really did feel as though my presence was actually making things worse.  Certainly the dentist’s assistant thought so!

But sometimes you really do need your Mummy.  I’m glad I could be there.

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It really was lovely.  She was reading THE TE OF PIGLET while I was reading A NEW EARTH.  The candles were flickering, the house was silent, and Sis and I were cozy.  Zen even. Until the text came across from my American Idol text buddy, Trish.  It said, “Omg Omg Omg.”

OMG!  I forgot to watch the Idol results show because I was too busy bonding with my rotten daughter and saving the damn planet!

I caught the last few minutes with Danny and Tatiana (intentional cruelty from the producers) and thank goodness for DVR so I could watch the show in its entirety today.  It’s playing right now, in fact.  I have some thoughts and I’ll be bouncing back and forth between performance night and results night.

1) Performance night was really difficult for me.  I thought almost everyone was disappointing.  Tatiana outshined the majority of singers!  If Danny had sang earlier I would have gone to bed.

• Jackie was so corny and continues to be so overly confident it makes my skin crawl.
• Stevie was so bad and continues to be clueless.  It wasn’t just the bad song choice.  She sucked.  It sounded terrible.  She’s only sixteen so cut her some slack, right?  She has a good voice and she’s a super kid, but definitely not ready for this competition.
• Steven made me mad, he was so terrible.  He screwed up in Hollywood and screwed up again.  We know he has a great voice, he just doesn’t know how to use it.
• Tatiana’s song was good, too bad she looked sedated. Aside from the winners, everyone else was forgettable.

2)  YAY America!  Danny and Alexis Grace were the absolute best choices.  The number three spot could have gone a couple of different ways.  I was leaning toward Anoop or Tatiana, but all things considered, I think America embraced itself by choosing “the roughneck”.  Good job!

3) Bad bad performance by the whole crew at the start of the show.  “Excruciating.”

4) Tatiana.  I have decided that what she has is “controlled crazy”.  The whole thing has been an act.  She was crazy during auditions and Hollywood week, but she was in control of it.  It was crafted.  She was not “losing it”.  She relied on her “character” to separate her and her voice from other singers. For this week she simply chose a different strategy to highlight her voice and appeal to the voters.  Which is the real her?  Neither.  Her over confidence and self absorption is a product of her extreme insecurity and desperation.

Yes, I just came from my 9:45 therapy appointment.

5) Carrie Underwood and David Cook sounded fantastic together.

6) Michael & Carly!  Looking so fabulous and making me giggly.  Why did they have to sing such a stupid song?  No matter.  It made me smile, though, and I cannot wait for Michael’s single to come out.

7) The Danny - Tatiana match up was suspense building brilliance.  American Idol knows Danny is the favorite and that Tatiana’s performance was just good enough and she has sparked just enough interest in people, that she COULD have pulled the votes if Danny’s fans took votes for granted and slacked at all.  Too bad Tatiana is such a child and brat that she couldn’t muster up an ounce of congratulation for him and she behaved as though there were not 8 other people whose dreams were shattered in addition to her own.  One more reason the decision was so “right”.

So as the DVR is playing in my background right now, Danny is closing out the show with his song and bringing a close to my post.  It occurs to me.   Missing American Idol last night was not a tragedy.  But missing that special time with my daughter would have been.

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The relationship that I thought was going to last forever has fallen apart, largely at my own hands.

Friends and family are taking sides.

Stuff is being divided.

Schedules are being drawn up.

Lawyers and therapists and judges, oh my!

Mommy needs a drink. And in a bad way.

But is it okay? Have I earned it? Am I sending my kids a message that by knocking a few back, I’m going to make things better? I know that pomegranate martini I’m lusting for isn’t going to fix my marriage, nor will it keep my mother from telling me that I’m making the worst mistake of my life.

But gosh darn it, it sure as hell would taste REALLY good about now.

Paul Clarke posted this piece in The New York Times this week. He explores the impacts of adult alcohol consumption in the presence of children. He observes that, for many of us, our initial exposure to the delicious delight is as a drug, not a a drink. With underage partiers stowing stolen bottles in cars for late-night bonfires and house parties with parents in absentia. The thrill of doing something “bad” and not getting caught adds a new dimension to consumption - one that makes the drink into more of an “act” than merely a beverage.

I was raised in a home where, like the author, there was really no mystique about alcohol. Dad would have the occasional screwdriver at a wedding or card party at the house. We always had Southern Comfort on hand for my Grandma Freda to sip while she taught me how to play King’s Corners. Mom was never afraid to douse spaghetti and lasagna sauces with a giant jug of Gallo, while spilling a bit into a tumbler to quench her thirst while cooking.

I was always allowed a taste, but the flavor never did too much for me. I still can’t explain how I’m half-Canadian and I can’t stand the taste of beer (sorry Moosehead, I’ll pass). Yes, I had a fake ID (Sorry Mom! I’ve disappointed you yet again.), but my desire was for access to where my of-age friends were, not the drink itself. Although I was known to tie one on every now and again, I was the one who was usually holding some poor sorority sister’s ponytail while she prayed to the porcelain goddess. I saw firsthand the price for overindulgence, and experienced my share of it now and again.

So how do I handle it now that I have kids? Yes, Homer and I drink in front of our kids. We jokingly refer to it as “mommy juice” and “daddy juice.” When they get old enough, we’ll probably let them have a sip now and again, like our parents did for us. Do I expect them to make stupid mistakes with alcohol? Of course. But I am responsible for teaching our kids that all food and drinks can be okay in moderation and enjoyed responsibly.

After all, too many Oreos means that I’m holding another ponytail over the porcelain goddess. This time, though it’s on a five year old.

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The nation’s No. 2 hamburger chain said it will now limit sodium in its kids meals advertised to children under 12 years old to 600 milligrams or less.

Virtually every major chain has rid the majority of its menu items, if not all of them, of trans fat, which raises the level of bad cholesterol in the body and can increase the risk of coronary heart disease. Others have added healthier items like salads and yogurt parfaits to their menus, partially marketing to moms looking for lower-calorie options when eating with their kids.

I have to say, I give them credit for at least trying. But really? They could do better.

Burger King and all fast-food chains can do what they like about adding ‘healthy’ to their menus. But after reading Fast Food Nation and watching Super Size Me, I think there are more issues to be addressed other than less sodium and the addition of more nutrients. Perhaps something along the lines of sanitation in the workplace and at the meatpacking plants, food preparation and the relentless advertising thrust at children.

I realize sanitation codes have been more strict than they have been in the past, yet there are still reports of unsanitary conditions. One such example, back in 2003, recounted-

In a groundbreaking report in late 2003, Dateline ranked the top ten fast food chains, and revealed which ones ran up the highest number of critical health code violations.  Critical violations are the ones that can make you sick.

Back then, we looked closely at thousands of health inspection reports, and discovered some dirty dining — a worm in a salad, a cockroach in a soda, chewing gum in a taco. Horror stories like these are rare, but about two thirds of the restaurants we reported had at least one critical health code violation in the previous year.

EW.

Whether or not fast food joints are on their way to healthy, I cannot bring myself to grab a Big Mac or a box of Chicken McNuggets. Perhaps it also has something to do with being a fast food weekender when I was younger and just getting burned out on the stuff.

And my daughter? Well, she hasn’t had too much experience with fast food and I intend to keep it that way for as long as possible.

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Granted, I’ve always been vain and completely silly about my hair.

Leave in, rinse out, deep conditioners, masks, color enhancers, frizz tamers, you name it, I’ve probably sat around with it steeping on my head for thirty minutes or longer at some point in my life. Some profess to believe in all-natural products made with butters, balms and banana peels (for all I know). Me, I’ve always been partial to the artificial. Better living through chemistry I say. I lean toward hair care chockfull of delicious chemicals that you cannot even begin to pronounce like ammonium lauryl sulfate and that perennial fave, guar hydroxypro-pyltrimonium chloride.

Words like these bring back traumatic flash backs to childhood spelling bees, but one must suffer for beauty.

Surprised. I’m comfortable with stressing over my split ends. It’s my skin that’s starting to alarm me. My complexion is beginning to crave attention and I see no reason why it has to be so dramatic about it.  I’m concerned, in particular, with the subject of aging. You know the crease that appears when you furrow your brow in puzzlement or deep concentration? Well, the only thing puzzling me of late is why that line is there ALLTHE TIME?  On my forehead, a line associated with an expression of surprise has found a permanent home as well. I’ll say I’m surprised all right. I never thought it would happen to me.

Fortunately, one need go no further than a department store, drug store, and, perhaps, hardware store for all I know. Apparently there is big money in mounting a pharmaceutically enhanced mission to stop the march of time. Standing before a dazzling array of packaging and marketing that only the finest minds of Madison Avenue could dream up, I am overwhelmed. My choices includes multi-action cleanser, invigorating scrubs, hydrating masks, daily moisture defense, age rescue, eye therapies, refreshers, refinishers, revitalizers, lotions and something called a serum that appears for all the world like it should require a prescription. These products come in tubes roughly the size of my thumb all holding something like .002 ounces of product.  Buying them all would cost me well over $4,000 annually and easily require an additional two to three hours per day to apply them all in proper formation. Call me a slob but this seems just a tad excessive.

Off. Worse yet, it turns out that slathering things ON my skin is not nearly enough. “Most people can benefit enomously from adding a proper exfoliant into their daily routines!” trumpeted a recent beauty headline. A proper exfoliant? Is that anything like fiber?  

Apparently I must REMOVE the top layer of my epidermis (that’s skin to you non-beauty expert types) in order to effectively slather moisturize back ON? Interesting theory, but how on earth do I know when to STOP? I’d hate to be removing perfectly good skin that I had spent good money to plump, luminize, and moisturize just hours earlier. I’m no expert, but that seems counterproductive.  

The final blow comes from the realization that even the not-so- pearly-whites aren’t safe from the anti-aging onslaught. Manufacturers, not content to make us feel inferior about our skin, have stepped it up to making us afraid to crack a smile. Apparently, whiter, brighter teeth can “dramatically reduce the signs of aging.” Thoughtfully, a vast array of teeth whitening products have come forth to save us from our dull-smiled (and apparently dim-witted) selves. I think we can all agree that there is simply nothing more pathetic and unattractive than an otherwise lovely woman with badly aging molars. 

Rest. So much for resting on my laurels ala’ “well, she has a great personality.” Now I have to feel inferior because I haven’t (yet) had my teeth whitened. If I can’t smile (thus providing at least some REASON for having all those wrinkles in the first place), what’s left? I’ll just be standing around all wrinkley and puckered up with only the barest hint of a Mona Lisa smirk to indicate my pleasure with life.  

That DOES sound pretty. 

Frankly, I’d throw in the towel on all this goop, glop, cream and lotion but I’ll need the towel to wipe this cr#$ off. 

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Honestly, if supplements were the cure for Autism, don’t you think that somebody other than Jenny McCarthy would have figured that out? Don’t you think that scientists and doctors would have latched onto such “cures” and capitalized on it?

Many forms of autism are still being diagnosed rather subjectively, so certain behaviors can foster such a diagnosis which can lead to nothing more than a label. A child labeled with austim might not truly have autism to begin with, but his/her behaviors cannot be explained under any other label. I know this firsthand. My son was diagnosed with Aspergers a year and half ago which is part of the autism spectrum, and just as soon as one of the top pediatric neurologists gave him the diagnosis, a year later, it was taken away. Turns out, he was given that diagnosis because they didn’t know how to label his developmental delays and wanted to give us a path to receive services. This neurologist, at a well known University, gave him an IQ test and said, “Well there you have it. His brain is over-developing in the areas of processing information and analyzing subjects and as a result, his emotional and physical development is lagging behind. Here’s a book. You’ll need this in order to navigate a school system that has very little to offer gifted children. Good luck… oh, and his development? Don’t worry about that. He’ll catch up. No need to schedule a follow up.”

Yes, I realize this is anecdotal, but no more so than the “expert” Playmate… but, my son really loves chocolate and eats more than he should. If I follow McCarthy’s logic, perhaps it’s chocolate that “cured” him! Await my appearance on Oprah next month.

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Yeah. It gets better.

After they get home from their pediatrician’s office, they come over asking for our cat’s vaccination records. To see if the kid needs rabies shots, you understand.

For a cat scratch.

The doctor put him on antibiotics, “just in case” (because that’s how you maintain and develop healthy immunities in both individuals and groups, right? Everybody should probably be on antibiotics all the time, “just in case”). And, according to the hysterical parents, if our cats aren’t up to date on their vaccines, their poor little snowflake is going to have to get RABIES SHOTS.

Well, the cats aren’t up to date. I thought the rabies vaccine was good for three years (some of them are, at least), but it turns out they need to have them annually. My bad, I admit. So I call Animal Control to find out what we need to do, short of cutting my pretty kitties’ heads off and shipping them to the state health department, to ensure this poor kid doesn’t have to undergo painful and unnecessary vaccination. After having a good chuckle, exclaiming, “Oh, my God, really?” and explaining that they’ve never actually dealt with a cat *scratch* case, the nice officer informs me that in the case of a bite from an unvaccinated animal, what they do is have the owners quarantine the critter for 10 days and then get a vet to sign off on a “bite card”, saying no, this animal didn’t give your kid rabies.

That’s not good enough for Mr. and Mrs. “we’re not worried about our children’s homicidal tendencies but we freak the fuck out over a cat scratch”. After explaining to the father what I’ve been told by the authorities, he blusters, “Well, that’s peachy for you, after ten days you know your cats are going to be fine. My kid could DIE in ten days!” I tried explaining that the incubation period for rabies in humans is measured in months, not days, but he’s having none of it. I also try to explain the purpose of the quarantine, which is not to ensure our cats’ health, but to determine if there’s a need for his kid to get the shots, but he’s having none of that, either. “What I’m saying here is, my kid could DIE.”

From a cat scratch.

Did I mention their mom is a registered nurse? Yeah.

I gave up, gave him the number of the Animal Control officer I’d talked to, and he says he’s going to call back after he talks to his kid’s doctor. When he does, I let my husband deal with him, because I’ve met my quota of conversations with the functionally retarded for the year.

He’s a bit calmer when he calls back, but no less stupid. He’s insisting on a vet-supervised quarantine (I figure his reasoning must be that, well, he’s too dense to realize that an animal who’s drooling constantly and is afraid of light and water might be sick, so we must be, too, right? It takes a certified professional to make that kind of delicate call.), and informs us that “Animal Control told me that 2 out of 10 cats have rabies.”

Really? Two out of ten? You’re sure that’s not one in five? Nope, he insists, two out of ten! And they get it from birds! Really! A mammal-specific virus is transmitted by non-mammalian creatures! He also insists he was told that the incubation period for rabies in humans is 15 days, rather than the commonly accepted and exhaustively-documented 6 months to 7 years, and that Animal Control will provide free boarding (which the department doesn’t have facilities for) and blood tests (which don’t exist).

Of course, Animal Control found all this “information” to be hilarious when I relayed it to them this morning. I doubt they’ve had this good a laugh at the office in a good long while. I’d think it was funny as hell, too, if we weren’t facing the possibility of a $600 boarding bill to ensure that our cat (which they’ve admitted to law enforcement they’re not even sure scratched their child) gave their kid rabies through a method of transmission that’s never been positively documented in even a single case.

I’m all for erring on the side of caution when your child’s welfare is concerned, but this is ridiculous. However, despite the frustration and yes, outright anger, I’m feeling right now, I can’t help but feel a little pity, as well. I mean, it must be terribly scary and frustrating to navigate the world when you’re incapable of rational thought or even processing facts as presented to you. If I were that stupid, I don’t think I’d ever leave the house—I mean, frozen airplane poo could fall out of the sky and kill you! The Weekly World News says so!

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One of the things she talks about is her relationship with food as a young child, and the role her parents played in her weight gain. I’ve watched enough episodes of Oprah and Dr Phil to know that ‘eating issues’ are often established in childhood, and I have family members and school friends who can trace their weight problems back to their parents’ insistence that they finish everything on their plate before they could leave the table.

Point being, there are plenty of adult ’survivors’ of childhood obesity who feel their parents made it difficult for them to start their lives as anything but rotund and permanently in search of their next salty, greasy snack. There are surely exceptions, but given that nutritionists and dietitians are telling us that childhood obesity is a result of poor diet and lack of exercise, and given that parents are responsible for their children’s diet and lifestyle… well, you do the math.

Shauna tells of the heartache of being a fat kid and a fat teenager and a fat young woman and not being able to control her desire for still more food. My little sister was overweight until she got to high school when she made an abrupt decision to lose the weight and did, through good ol’ exercise and portion control and in spite of my mother’s attempts to keep her chubby. It wasn’t until my sister told me about the teasing from other girls (and, shamefully, from me and my other siblings) that I realised how bloody miserable she had been for all those years. Reading Shauna’s warts-and-all book just made it all that more real to me. My sister has accepted my apology for those years of torment but I don’t deserve her forgiveness.

There are a handful of obese children at my daughters’ school. I have worked in the school cafeteria and served them both at morning tea time and again at lunch. They line up with their fists full of coins (or, sometimes, ten dollar bills), and they stare at the racks of potato chips behind the counter like a grizzly bear just out of hibernation might eye off a stream full of salmon. Our school cafeteria has a healthy-food focus but there will always be versions of fats and salts and artificial colourings and flavourings. The trick is to have these once a while, not every single day. It breaks my heart to hand over the junk food to these children, as the homemade muffins and bowls of fresh fruit go untouched. I can’t help it; I have to wonder why these kids are being sent to school with fists full of cash and not lunchboxes full of healthy alternatives?

There are still more chubby kids at weekend soccer. I have seen the parents buy them sweets and chocolate and hotdogs after the game as a reward for half an hour of exercise. There is so much wrong with the picture, it makes me want to scream.

If I see a child being smacked in public, or out on a freezing cold winter day without a jacket, or playing perilously close to a busy road without an adult nearby, I just want to grab them and do something, you know? I think the vast majority of parents probably feel this way when they see a child suffering or in danger because of the questionable choices of their parents. But we hold back, it’s not our place to interfere… up to a point, of course. But now I am wondering - how do I feel about parents who feed their children so much junk food that they are obese, morbidly obese, before they are ten years old? How do I feel about parents who are setting their children up for a lifetime of physical illness (the list of problems associated with childhood obesity is long and well-documented) as well as the psychological anguish that authors like Shauna Reid write about?

How do I feel? I feel extremely angry. Angry that the parents’ choices, or their laziness, or their apathy, or whatever it is, is literally making their kids fat. Angry that there’s nothing I can do about it. If these kids were being beaten by their parents on the sidelines at soccer, I wouldn’t hesitate to swoop in and grab them, and call the police. Because that kind of abuse is unacceptable to society and outlawed in most civilised communities. But what can I do other than stand by and watch the parent hand their child a ten dollar bill and send them off to the snack bar for junk food, or buy it for them so it’s there when they come off the field at the end of the game? What can I do? Nothing, it seems.

I have wondered what I might say to a parent like that, if I had the opportunity. Hey, did you know that your child is overweight, or do you just not see it? I was wondering, are you concerned about Susie’s weight gain? Do you think his chronic knee injury might have something to do with his weight? Have you thought about going to a pediatric dietitian? Do you have any idea what your kids are in for when they get to high school? Do you?!

My kids are healthy and I put this down to genetics, lots of exercise, and a good diet. We don’t eat a lot of junk food. The kids used to have McDonalds once a month, if that, but it was a treat, and these days we only buy it if we’re passing McDonald’s on a long road trip. I cook dinner for them every night of the week, and I use recipes that call for fresh ingredients and I don’t fry anything and I don’t give them too much and force them to finish it. If we get takeaway, it’s something from the local Noodle House, not pizza. The last time we had fish & chips, none of us could eat the batter from the fish simply because we are unaccustomed to that amount of grease in our diet. We don’t have the appetite for it. If they have dessert, it’s usually fruit, or icecream and fruit. These are simple choices that we have made and at the risk of sounding righteous and condescending and sanctimonious I don’t understand why other people can’t make these choices as well, when we’re talking about the health of their children. Please, feel free to enlighten me.

There’s all this stuff in the media about making it the Government’s responsibility to keep the population healthy. I think it’s the responsibility of the parents. It’s not as though there isn’t a lot of information out there on how to feed your kids well.

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Here in Australia, and in freezing-cold Canberra to be exact, there are some nasty winter bugs going around, and the girls in this family have all succumbed, one by one. My eight year old had it a fortnight ago, last week was my turn, and now it’s Madeleine’s. This poor kid’s annual winter bout of the ‘flu usually involves a trip to the ER in the middle of the night for a dose of something to open her airways. She has a tendency to develop croup when she catches a cold, and I’ve seen her lips turn blue enough times now that we now know to take her in the minute she starts sounding even remotely seal-like. We took her last night at about 8.30pm, and fourteen hours later she’s happily ensconced on the sofa with her iPod, the remote control, her Nintendo, the electronic thermometer and a banana smoothie, breathing easier. She never complains, she just looks at me with bloodshot, teary eyes and pulls Buster the Bear in a bit tighter. Which is all a parent really needs to hear, really. More chocolate, darling? OK. Here, have a whole block.

Compare this act of incredible bravery with my own experience a few days ago. I was actually weeping. I would like to tell you that my aches and pains were FAR WORSE than Madeleine’s struggle to breathe but I’m pretty sure that argument wouldn’t fly. But I really, really felt terrible. Everything ached, nothing fixed it, and nobody was giving me chocolate. And did I complain? You BET I did. I complained to my husband at every opportunity, begged him to make the nasty aches go away, implored him to do something, anything, to make my life less miserable. Yes, it was extremely undignified.

Why do we complain? Does it actually make us feel better, somehow, to be explaining to somebody else just how rotten we feel? Do we do it for the sympathy, for the chance for a cuddle or some flowers or just some acknowledgment that what we’re going through really is awful? Is complaining just another way of seeking validation? Maybe it is. But that doesn’t explain why some people complain and others don’t. Don’t we all need validation for the way we are feeling?

I’m a shameless complainer. OK, maybe not completely shameless. Sure, I feel a bit ridiculous afterwards, especially if the person I’m complaining to calls me on it and points out how pathetic - in the miserably or contemptibly inadequate sense - it is to see a grown woman weeping about a little upper respiratory infection. A dear friend of mine has just been through several harrowing sessions of chemotherapy and the only time I’ve heard her complain was when she was getting frustrated with the turban covering her bald head, because it kept slipping sideways. I’ve heard about chemo, I’ve seen people in the movies go through it - it looks like sheer bloody hell, but I never once heard a peep of a ‘why me??’ from my friend. Why doesn’t she ask for sympathy? Doesn’t she need somebody to tell her ‘you poor bugger, I’m so sorry, that must be awful, you’re very brave’?

Maybe she doesn’t. Maybe she has made peace with the fact that this is just something she has to go through, something that will eventually make her stronger and wiser. Maybe when you’ve got something that awful happening to you, it just seems like a complete waste of energy to be undignified and ask someone else to agree with you that it’s awful. Yes, that must be it. And that would explain, I suppose, why I wept at my aching body… in the great scheme of things, a mild upper respiratory infection really isn’t that bad. In fact, it’s pretty contemptibly inadequate. I wasn’t weeping because it hurt so much, I was weeping because of the futility of having a cold that had knocked me completely on my arse without teaching me anything profound about myself other than the certainty of my own pathetic-ness.

I think I’ll just stick to my job as chief medicine-distributor and chocolate-provider and try to remember to take some echinacea next winter so I can avoid getting sick and miserable in the first place.

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Unfortunately, our standards of “expertness” aren’t really up to par. We tend to believe any news anchor, medical reporter, or lifestyle columnist that comes along. No good can possibly come of this. That lack of attention to detail is how the fitness movement, the theory of global warming, and the scourge that is decaffeinated coffee all got a foothold on us.

Global warming. In the case of global warming I suspect that the entire “theory” was actually invented by a couple of bored scientists who wanted to pull a fast one on their lab partners. Chuckling maniacally, they circulated a memo claiming that hair-spray or some such nonsense was going to bring about the end of the world through a bizarre chain reaction involving icebergs, the rain forest, and Aqua Net - and then sat back for some belly laughs when the other scientists stumbled onto their practical joke.

Except, their bad luck, the Associated Press picked up the memo on a slow news day and to the scientists’ everlasting horror they now had to make it seem as if they were SERIOUS about this global warming thing.

To this day they devote every waking moment to convincing us that global warming is a “very real threat” and we are all only one aerosol spray away from becoming toast. This despite overwhelming evidence that the average American cares more passionately about gas prices than global warming. (Unless, of course, global warming will somehow impact gas prices).

Unpopular science. Meanwhile, these scientific scare mongers became addicted to their 15 minutes of fame, and increasingly sought to scare the beejeebies out of us.

Thus brought the brief and inexplicable lifesaving aspect of oat bran (which fortunately passed quickly, in more ways than one), carcinogenic lipstick, poisonous apples, and the dire threat posed by eggs, just to name a few.

Of course, after years of maligning eggs, they also came slinking back to tell us that eggs were incredible, edible, and not likely to kill us after all. Clearly, someone owes the nation’s chickens, and anyone who ever ingested a powdered egg substitute, a huge apology. Still, we did not learn.

After spending a decade nagging us about how we must consume eight, 8-ounce glasses of water daily in the pursuit of health, happiness, and world peace, it would appear that this particular “fact” has been an urban legend all along.

Much like the one about the guy disguised as an old lady who waits in your car at the mall to grab you, or wait, was that under your car to slash your Achilles tendon unless you are warned off by the choking Doberman? Whatever. The point being that all are accepted as fact and just as wholly unreliable.

Duped. Here we sat, dutifully consuming 64 ounces of water per day, never passing a rest room without stopping in, and floating through our lives with our legs crossed and a slightly pained look in our eyes for no darned good reason. We, my waterlogged friends, have been duped.

The greatest indignity here is that this wasn’t even science gone wrong. Instead, it appears that after spending years hearing from doctors, fitness experts, and other such shifty types that it is crucial to consume our body weight in water each day, no one can actually find a single scientific study that proves this theory. How did everyone manage to miss that?

Look, we expect this kind of free and easy way with facts from our friends. But shouldn’t we expect a little more substance from those who harp on our health?

Have I honestly been wandering around with my legs crossed all these years because so-and-so heard from her cousin, who was married to a mailman who had a neighbor who was a doctor that eight 8-ounce glasses was the gospel?

Now they’ve gone after first the tomatoes. After nearly dessimating the tomato industry with reports of the life threatening impacts of tainted tomatoes the FDA now says, oops, our bad. It was perhaps the jalapenos after all! So clearly, they are going for the salsa (a staple in my diet) and that is so not cool. Do they know or can they just guess? Do they just make this stuff up? What does it take to work for the FDA anyway?

Fine. Good. Two can play at this game. Starting today here’s a new “fact.” Ice cream is a health food, double cheeseburgers are low-cal, and aerobics will, in fact, kill you. Pass it on.

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The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence; the earth will continue to rotate around the sun, and I will not get even one iota smarter this summer over last.

Learned lesson. After three plus decades on this earth you would think that by now I would have learned just a little bit about sunscreen. You would be wrong. I have, however, recently learned quite a bit about aloe.

I sum it up thusly, on the first day God made the sun so the devil had no choice but to counter with sunburn.

For the record, I am much better at parenting then I am self-preservation.

Stupid mistake. Despite remembering to coat both children with a thick layer of sunblock, I still managed to believe it a fine idea to stand IN THE WATER under a blazing hot sun for more than four hours with nothing between me and the sun but my own stupidity. I know, just typing it I’m embarrassed all over again.

I honestly don’t know which hurt worse — the peeling or my pride.

What I really suffer from is a case of rampant optimism.

A little sun. Despite years of cause and effect training which would have trained even a gerbil to recognize “sun minus sunscreen = burn,” I continue to operate under the delusion that I, the whitest white girl in America — can get “just a little sun.” This is akin to believing you can get “just a little pregnant” or “just a little nuclear radiation exposure.”

I persist in this belief because in my teens I could — and did — tan.

Tanning goal. That was really my whole life goal back then. Study? Maybe. College? Yeah, whatever.

A nice golden copper toned glow — I’ll work on it day after day until I achieved my goal with only a backyard lawn chair, a couple hundred gallons of baby oil, and my ability to lie completely prostrate for hours at a time to guide me.

Brown baby. They also tell me I used to get “brown as a berry” as a baby. Apparently, I am supposed to take great solace in the fact that I was a real babe when I was FOUR.

Meanwhile back at the pool, well meaning friends tried to warn me. By late afternoon my back was starting to feel a wee bit warm and I thought about sunscreen for a nano-second, but my children blissfully sliding time and again down a waterslide and my need to be waiting at the bottom because, after all, how could I trust the no less than THREE lifeguards on duty, seemed the more pressing matter.

By the time we left the pool, my upper body was the approximate color of a ruby red grape. I radiated enough heat to toast a marshmallow and people just passing by clucked in sympathy and then, I don’t doubt, laughed uproariously when out of my earshot at how stupid some people can be.

Phase two. Now, a few days later, I am currently in phase two of the sunburn process, phase one being the getting burnt part.

Phase two is the back-slapping phase. In this phase people who have never shown even the slightest iota of interest in you previously, people who don’t even KNOW you, will suddenly be seized by the need to slap you on the back.

It’s as if there is a primordial siren call of seared skin. Seemingly unbidden they are moved to “slap!” you on the back with a hearty hail fellow well met even if they know not why.

As you cringe and slither to the floor in a heap of blinding red hot pain, they are left to state the obvious to soothe you, “little burnt huh?” “Little burnt huh?” is obviously code for “I hate you enormously and I wish to see you dead!,” that is the only possible explanation for this.

The only possible defense to back slapping is to make the universally recognized sunburn warning noise whereby you grit your teeth, pull back your lips, inhale briskly and spasm your body inward in the standing equivalent of the fetal position.

Sure, they’ll STILL slap you on the back, but with these motions you are slightly less likely to want to punch them. As if you could really lift your arms to take a swing anyway.

As the days have passed I have regained near normal movement in my upper limbs.

Shedding skin. I have also started to shed skin like a snake, lending whole new meaning to the phrase “You scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours!” My husband, lucky man that he is, gets to witness it all.

All I can say is that when it comes to reliving the sheer stupidity of the moment when I chose to eschew the necessity of sunscreen for the certainty of a not-so-slow burn, all I can say, is boy, was my face red.

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Like many imperfect parents, I’m more or less a very good parent on most days… but this requires a certain amount of concentrated effort and a whole lot of help. I used to get help in a bottle, and now I get help from a variety of sources.

But I still need and want a vice.. something that serves no other purpose than pleasure and rebellion. A way to cut loose and be onesself without getting mistaken for a “ma’am” or a “sir”… or someone who is, say, turning 40.

I like to joke about starting a respite center for mothers staffed with hot Italian boys (or girls, depending on your preferences).. and I’m only sort of joking. Seriously, it’s so very easy to take parenting too farging seriously these days.

But the thing is, I miss having a vice. I don’t want anything life or health or marriage threatening, just something to spice things up and remind me of the wild girl I used to be long long ago.

So when my friend told me of her new “thing” for nicotine-free cigarettes (doesn’t that sound like “no strings attached” sex?? nice idea but highly unlikely?), I thought I’d give them a try.

I’ll report back soon.. but until then.. any vices you’d recommend?

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In this universe, I’m just your average, garden-variety ineffective parent whose favourite method for calming down involves a large glass of shiraz and an even larger block of chocolate, and whose body would simply snap in half if made to do the downward dog.

When my mother was a stay-at-home-mother of four she went to yoga classes once a week – we used to say she was going to Yoghurt Classes – and she once told me that yoga saved her sanity in those days. So one day I went to a yoga class for new mothers and stretched for about 50 minutes before being told to lie down and listen to the lovely music and breathe deeply and just as I felt the tension melt away and the thoughts leave my troubled mind and just as I reached that state of blissful contentment… I fell asleep. I might have snored. Well, at least I didn’t neigh.

I really love the idea of meditation, but although I have tried I just can’t do it without the snoring. So, like all good mothers, I am living the life of a calm and contented human being vicariously through my children. My kids are learning to meditate. In our house, every day ends with reading from a book called The Wishing Star: Meditations for Children by Marneta Viegas. There’s a good reason why this is a good thing.

Both my girls have Anger Management Issues and I’m entirely responsible. I would like to be able to tell you that I am a slightly smug and contented person with nary a cranky bone in my body but that would be lying. I do have a cranky bone in my body, and I suspect it might be one of the big ones. Like the femur. Or pelvis. I have a cranky pelvis on account of all the kids I’ve birthed. They were both posterior, so it makes sense really. My pelvis has a lot to be cranky about. Anyway my point is that every now and then I get a bit cranky and I wish I could clear my mind of all my negative, cranky thoughts and just calm the heck down (without falling asleep) and I also wish that I hadn’t passed on my cranky pelvis gene to my kids. I have a tendency to fly off the handle a little and maybe raise my voice from time to time and yes, I’ve been known to slam the odd door in frustration. And sometimes they slam the door too. They inherited their father’s nice straight nose, they got my Issues. Whenever Ella yells at Madeleine I cringe a little because I know that she learned that behaviour from me. And when Madeleine yells back at her I know she got that from me too. It’s cute, really, how alike we all are.

I am a firm believer in meditation and all that positive-visualisation stuff. I’m not a religious person so I don’t pray. I suspect that a lot of people who do pray to a God or some other Higher Being get some of the same benefits of people who meditate regularly. It’s doing something good for your soul, isn’t it? I believe that spending some time each day just clearing your mind of negativity and instead filling your heart with peace is good for you, good for your relationships and good for the earth. The thing I’ve always said I want for my kids, more than anything else, is for them to be happy. I can give them love and stuff and food and pony rides and all of these things will make them happy but true happiness must come from within and…

… and I’m starting to sound a little preachy. Sorry ‘bout that.

The bottom line is that I feel more than a little bit responsible for making them short-tempered cranky-pants and so it’s my responsibility to help them find some peace. This is why I got the Meditations for Kids book. At bedtime, after we’ve tucked them in, I read one of the meditations and they go off to sleep all calm and at peace, dreaming about rainbows and fairies and clouds. And my last contact with them at the end of the day is positive and happy, which is lovely for all of us. I hope that they will both grow up to be the sort of people who don’t throw tantrums and slam doors like their mother did. And I hope they don’t have odd-shaped pelvises and babies that want to come out the wrong way up.

Oh, and I hope that when they find their inner peace, they don’t disturb everyone else with their snoring and neighing.

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We’re certainly not ones to shy away from a trend when there’s good science and our kids’ health involved, so we’ve convinced Medela to give away a Breastmilk Feeding & Storage Set containing three BPA-free bottles, lids and nipples, to 5 of our lucky readers to get started down a toxin-free path. (Pssst, we have a sneaky feeling these bottles would be just fine for formula feeding as well.) The entry form is here.

Ed. note: The Imperfect Parent did not receive any compensation for this post

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1. When there are kids in the car – NO SMOKING
2. When there are kids in the house – NO SMOKING
3. When I am near my pregnant sister – NO SMOKING
4. And when I am in the vicinity of children – NO SMOKING

If I happened to be outside smoking and I see someone approaching – especially if that someone is a child — I quickly move, attempt to blow the smoke as far away from them as possible, or hold my breath until they pass.

So, the next time I see someone smoking with a mini-van full of children, or smoking while pushing their child in a stroller and holding another kid’s hand, smoking while holding a child, or smoking while — gasp — pregnant, would it be impolite of me slap them upside the head?

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It’s too bad that far too often, a parent’s desire to influence a social movement leaves them vulnerable in order to make a point or act in protest.

For example, and I know this is a touchy subject with some, but parents who refuse to vaccinate their children, claiming that it’s all part of some conspiracy theory to line the pockets of pharmaceutical companies. Many parents are so busy trying to find ways that vaccinations cause more harm than good, I think they forgot why vaccines were introduced to begin with. How much evidence does one need to make the logical conclusion that your political gain may compromise the health of your child?

For example, a recent Measles outbreak in San Diego:

On Jan. 25, the 7-year-old’s parents took the youngster to the Children’s Clinic of La Jolla. The child may have coughed and sneezed in the office, thus infecting four other children.

Those four patients returned to the clinic between Feb. 5 and 8, possibly spreading the virus to 60 other children.

All of the 11 confirmed patients, from 10 months to 9 years old, were not vaccinated either because they were younger than 1 – the minimum age for measles inoculation – or because their parents objected to having them vaccinated, county officials said.

…and, although it has NEVER been proven that vaccinations cause Autism, and countless studies fail to even make a link, there are still those holdouts that don’t care what science has to offer, the political statement of pharma vitriol means more to them than what they consider to be a minuscule risk. Nevermind that the risk WIDENS and INCREASES as more and more parents decide not to vaccinate. (Oh, the irony!) Facts, in these cases, don’t seem to be a priority.
One physician tries to uncover the psychology of it all…

It seems to have taken on a life of its own and may be a good example of a socio-psychological phenomenon known as “groupthink,” a mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive group.

There may be many parents who will never be convinced that the benefits of immunization for their children in most cases outweigh the risks. In free countries, that is their prerogative and I, as a physician, accept that.

Society must understand that such convictions must not dictate public health policy. Failure to offer people a sound vaccination program would no doubt result in a resurgence of contagions such as polio, measles, and heaven forbid, perhaps even smallpox, should the wild virus ever be reintroduced into the world.

The human toll in lives and suffering, long forgotten by our postmodern world, would be incalculable in a jet age which rapidly spreads infectious disease to all continents.

I’m sure we all have different, conflicting examples of “group think” and some “group think” is beneficial to a child, like the disdain of child abuse, but when does group think interfere with our own sensibilities? I think the Internet, for better or worse, has propagated much of this and found validations for practices in which some critical thinking would go a long way. I can think of a bunch just off the top of my head, can’t you?

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