Connected Mom

The Never Ending Mommy Wars

noreply@blogger.com (Anastasia) — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 12:00:00 +0000

When I became a mother, my life changed, and an entire world I knew nothing about took over. I had a mountain of decisions to make, and didn’t know which way to go. Those first lonely months at home with my newborn were really overwhelming. Mommy blogs and message boards were just becoming popular, and so, I turned to the internet for companionship. It was the easiest way to find and talk with other moms.

At first I was first impressed with the amount of information I found and felt comforted by the fact that there were so many women like me, who wanted to share and connect with people, even if it was just through a computer screen. But then I became aware of something that goes on not just on the internet, but in real life, as well: the mommy wars. Breast vs. bottle; work vs. stay at home; c-section vs. natural birth; Ferber vs. Sears; rear facing vs. forward facing car seats; Stride Rite vs. Payless; and pretty much any parenting decision you could imagine is challenged, dissected, and ultimately condemned by someone out there who disagrees.

I frequented one popular mommy site in particular, and the arguing that ensued there over nearly everything was reminiscent of a soap opera. Sharing that I was going to return to work full time when my son was six months old, I was blasted by strangers who knew nothing about me as being selfish, greedy, self-serving, and letting someone else raise my child. If only those women could have been with me to feel my heart being wrenched out of my body every single time I had to leave my child with a stranger. If only they knew the feeling of being ripped apart limb from limb, the condemnation I put myself through for not being responsible enough with money when I was younger so that I could afford to stay home; for thinking having a baby and going back to work would be a piece of cake; for not being there every single time my son cried.

I couldn’t believe that any woman, stranger on the web or not, would think or imply that I was any less caring or any less of a parent than she because I worked outside the home. Even worse, I had a very high intervention birth, I formula fed, and did not wear my baby, and those choices were put down too.

Eventually I realized that the worst of the criticism was coming from myself. As a first time parent, I was unsure of many of the choices I was making. I allowed people to make me feel like a poor parent because I felt like one already.

I started asking myself questions about how I was parenting and why. Over time I started frequenting different internet sites and became exposed to different groups of women, a couple in particular who challenged my decisions in a gentle, but thought provoking, manner. I went back to the drawing board with my parenting. I spent hours and hours researching vaccines; circumcision, breast-feeding, natural birth, baby wearing, cloth diapers, and much more. I changed what I could with my son, and swore to myself that when the next baby came, my husband and I would make decisions because we were informed, not because it was what everyone else was doing.

I suppose at that point I was no longer a mainstream parent. I honestly felt like I would be welcomed into the non-mainstream community, and that it would be wonderful to sit back and say, “Isn’t it just great that we all accept each other?”

Unfortunately, the mommy wars are never ending. I very quickly became aware of another facet to this side effect of parenthood, and it is the AP (attachment parenting), or crunchy, moms vs. the mainstream moms. One side attacks the other and each struggles to come back with something proving that they are the better parents. It’s really sad, it’s really disappointing, and what’s been particularly surprising for me has been that even the like-minded moms argue amongst themselves.

Even in the non-mainstream parenting circles, I often find that there seems to be a certain set of rules and standards that moms are held up to in order to be Good Parents. Among those are: cloth diapering, co-sleeping, no pacifier, breast-feeding, child led weaning, elimination communication, drugless births, delaying solids, organic eating, home schooling, and more. (I’ve done most of these with my second child and plan to continue with my third—and I still don’t feel crunchy enough). If a mother does not adhere to all of these rules yet she claims to be an AP parent, she is criticized and ultimately, over time, becomes ostracized from the very circle she sought to join. And amongst the blue ribbon pedigreed AP moms, there is a lot of patting on the back, a lot of self-congratulatory comments and behavior, a lot of self-satisfaction and praise for each other for being the Perfect Parent.

Isn’t attachment parenting about not conforming to anyone else’s rules? Isn’t it about child-led parenting? Isn’t it about listening to your baby and child’s cues, and doing the best you can? If every child is different, then what works for one will not work for another. There is no set of standards, or at least there shouldn’t be in my opinion. Since when did it become a battle of who uses the most organic cloth diapers, who doesn’t get the epidural, who breastfeeds the longest? Since when have using a pacifier or the Ferber method become acceptable reasons for casting someone out, for ending friendships? It startles me that we can go on and on about accepting and being gentle with our children when we don’t do it with each other.

Though these types of disagreements happen everywhere, the online world seems to be the worst. I’ve read comments on message boards that seriously make me cringe. Why are people so beastly on the internet? Is it because they hide behind their keyboard, never having to face the consequences of their words? Do people become bolder when they are tapping the keys away well into the middle of the night, instead of having to actually speak with someone? I wonder how many of these Perfect Mothers would tout their credentials with fervor in a room full of real people, instead of in a virtual chat room or on a message board?

Why don’t we think better of ourselves as women? Why don’t we hold ourselves to higher standards? Don’t we realize that by fighting amongst ourselves we perpetuate the unfortunate stereotypes that women are catty, backstabbing, and dishonest? Even the phrase “mommy wars” makes me feel like we’re just a bunch of loud-mouthed, cat-fighting witches.

While I don’t believe in circumcision, don’t practice crying it out, selectively vaccinate on my own schedule, am obsessive about eating well, and am insanely passionate about breastfeeding and car seat safety, among other things, the thought that I couldn’t be friends with a mother, in real life, or on the internet, who doesn’t do all these things exactly as I do, never occurred to me. I talk to my real life mom friends and family about the wealth of knowledge I have acquired and how valuable it is to me, but I would never dream of ending my interaction with a mother based on whether or not she actually followed my path. Frankly, if I believe my way is best, and I’m hoping to get other moms over on my side, the best way to do that is with gentle advice, guidance, and support. I’ve never had any luck convincing anyone of anything when I’ve criticized them and made them defensive.

As much as I pride myself on making our food from scratch, staying away from processed snacks, and as pristine as our diet is the vast majority of the time, occasionally you may find Chex Mix (for me) or Cheez Its (for my husband) in my pantry. I nursed my daughter for two and a half years, and she enjoyed a pacifier for two of those years. In my home, we all prefer to sleep in our own beds. I don’t have homebirths. My kids eat Amy’s Organic frozen pizza. I gave up my all-natural shampoo recently because after getting a sample of Aveeno in the mail, my hair was so much shinier and manageable that I couldn’t go back. Some days I recycle like a mad woman, and some days I just throw the toilet paper roll into the regular trash. Why? Because I don’t have a crunchy checklist. And because I’m human. There’s so much to keep track of and manage, and sometimes one of the balls I’m juggling falls to the floor. And that’s OK.

You can be a good parent, a great parent, in fact, and make none of the choices I have made. I know I went through a period where, internally at least, I was judgmental of other mothers and the way they raised their children. I know I was self-righteous and thought I had it all figured out. Finally branching out in my neighborhood and making some real friends has helped me get over my judgment. I’ve come full circle. Sure, I’m opinionated—and I love to share information about what I’m doing. But I’m finally confident enough in myself to not pay too much attention to what other people are doing. I no longer feel the need to brag about my natural living or parenting skills. In fact, amongst my friends, none of us do things exactly the same. And I like it that way!

I’m finally home full time and ecstatic to be so; and make the best choices I can for my family. My husband and I parent as human beings, good human beings. We love our children; we parent them instinctively, and will continue to do so. If something works for us, great, and it doesn’t matter which umbrella it falls under, the mainstream or the AP.

I certainly don’t measure a good mother by how long she breastfed, or what kind of labor she had, or whether her baby sleeps in a crib or not. I don’t find it necessary to alienate mothers for using the cry it out method, or for giving solids in a time frame I deem as too soon; because I know that they are good mothers. They love their children, and they do what they think is best. I wouldn’t take my friendship away from a woman who chose to have an elective c-section at 40 weeks—I would try with all my might to warn her, and give her information, but the idea that she is a bad mother or doesn’t love her baby is ridiculous. Often, moms make these types of choices because they don’t know that there is another way—and I know that because I was one of those mothers.

And of course, the judgment comes from both sides. It is because of the harsh words and comments from the mainstream community, and because they sting, that I am disappointed to find that the other side engages in this war, as well. I guess since it seems as if non-mainstream parents hold themselves to a higher standard when it comes to their living and parenting choices, I hoped that would apply to them as human beings, as well.

I feel for the new mothers, the ones who struggle the way I did, to find the right way. I fear the rejection and judgment they will face when they enter an environment full of Perfect Mothers for the first time, whichever side of the spectrum they are on. It saddens me, as a woman and a mother, that we cannot find common ground in simply loving our children the best way we know how.

You Need More PINK!

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 16:42:00 +0000

I can’t pinpoint exactly when Americans felt the necessity to dress their daughters up like Easter baskets with ribbons and ruffles and sparkles and bows in order to prove they were girls, but I can say that as a child born in 1976, those things were generally reserved for special occasions, and there are plenty of photos of me and my three older sisters wearing earth tones and primary colors, and even [gasp!] blue without any flowers or frilly things with it! If you know me well, then you know that I hate the color pink. As one might imagine given today’s society, this became somewhat problematic once I had a daughter. While there are a few muted shades I can tolerate, especially when sprinkled in with other colors, I usually find myself shuttering, and ultimately fleeing from the girls section in clothing stores. Particularly the shoe department – apparently no girl can be without a bedazzled flower, rainbow, or glitter on her already pink shoes.

Don’t get me wrong, I see plenty of little cutie pie girls dolled up in pink floral dresses and I find them absolutely adorable! I have no problem with other parents choosing to dress their children this way, because that is absolutely their own decision and far from my business to judge. Worrying about how others dress their children is not something I see as a valuable way to spend my time. However, when it comes to my own daughter, something about the whole thing makes me cringe. I dread the day when she will be old enough to choose the things she wants to wear. The day when she will start to submit to marketing, peer pressure and social paradigms. She is only 19 months old, and I’m already struggling to devise a way to somehow protect her from this oversimplified “genderfication,” as I personally like to call it. Even if I can limit her exposure at home to television and Disney princesses, how can I stop it from seeping in through friends at school, sleepovers, etc… without keeping my child in a bubble or making her an outcast?

It is infuriating to say the least, because there is something far greater going on than simply dressing girls in pink. The notion that girls are only meant to be pretty little princesses has far reaching implications, and marketing, media and society all seem to be on board with the plan. But whether or not immersing my daughter in a sparkle covered pink world of Barbies and princesses will have an adverse impact on her life is a topic for another post. My intention is to focus on the color divide that has evolved around our children. It truly baffles me.

Prior to last month’s addition of yellow, somewhat feminine looking eyeglasses, I can probably count on one hand the number of times strangers referred to my daughter as a girl. Even if she was wearing hints of pink, the response given far too often after it was revealed that she was not a boy was, “You need more pink.” You need more pink? What does that even mean? I have to dress my daughter monochromatically because you are incapable of uttering an extra sentence to inquire about the sex of my baby? These people always acted as if I had her dressed head to toe in baby blue, and it was obviously all my fault for leading them astray. When in actuality, my means of trickery usually consisted of her being dressed in earth tones, primary colors, or even pastel yellows and greens. My favorite incident occured when she was wearing the rainbow, puffy sleeved onesie pictured below. She was pulled out of a blue baby carrier, and my other baby gear is either indigo blue or earth tones. It made me question whether baby gear colors trump clothing in shaping people's perception of gender. I was unaware that I had to extend the pink rule to my baby gear as well. In the end, I was always more irritated by the foolish color related comments than the fact that they mixed up her sex.

Onesie from my favorite "you need more pink" incident

What struck me about the whole thing was that apparently baby boys are permitted to wear ALL but one or two colors, whereas girls are strictly limited to pink, and I suppose by close relation purple. When did this happen? I realize it’s been going on for some time now, but it only seems to be getting worse. The few commercials I have managed to catch that are aimed at young girls practically make my head spin Exorcist style. There’s usually a few girls playing in a bedroom, EVERYTHING in the room is pink, and there are sparkles literally flying through the air. What is the reasoning behind this? Is our society so hell bent on instilling female gender roles from infancy onward, that from day one we have to blanket their entire world in the one color that is associated with women? Will they not know that they are girls if every single thing they own, from school supplies to dishes, isn't pink or purple? I’m pretty sure if we opened up the spectrum a bit, girls would still play with dolls and adhere to all the other parameters of their “genderfication.”

For the record, I’m not against playing with dolls, or many other things typically associated with girls. The division of labor in my home could not be more stereotypically assigned, with me doing the cooking, cleaning, laundry, sewing and daytime child rearing as a stay at home mom. I adore fulfilling that role and wouldn’t have it any other way. I think doll play instills nurturing abilities, and pretending to be a princess is wonderful exercise for the imagination. However, my daughter also plays with cars (which she loves!) among other things, and even at this early age is showing signs of becoming what some may consider a tomboy. I just wish that everything for girls wasn’t color coded, and especially in the case of toys, that pink girly things weren’t the ONLY things marketed towards them. Sadly, with media variations expanding by the second, hand in hand with new means of bombarding these images and products at the brains of our impressionable daughters, I only see this problem getting worse. As a result, chances are my daughter’s favorite color will be pink. If that’s the case – so be it, as long as it makes her happy.

The Hippies Would Disown Me

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 14:00:00 +0000

A couple weeks ago, one of the pages I follow on facebook posted a question for their followers on what things they are hiding so they aren't kicked out of the crunchy crowd. There was even a blog carnival on this topic a week ago. It got me thinking.

We are hiding key parts of ourselves so we aren't judged. Things we are ashamed of for no other reason than having a very judgmental crowd of people look down on us. And the thing is, most of those that would judge the decisions we make that set us apart from the truly crunchy crowd do the same things we are doing.

So I asked my friends, asked on the facebook page, and a lot of the answers were shockingly similar.

These are my top reasons the hippies and crunchy crowd would disown me in a heartbeat.

1. Shopping at Walmart - This one is highly hidden, yet when asked, is admitted freely. I shop at Walmart for everything. I live in a smaller town, and we only have 3 grocery stores, but Walmart has everything I could need in one trip. And when you shop with an almost five year old that wants everything, the faster the trips, the easier it is on me. I also used to work at Walmart. Just with those two admissions, I'm out of the crunchy club.

2. Television - The television in our house (for the most part) runs all day long. I can't have quiet no matter what I'm doing, so most of the day it's music (our laptop is hooked through our TV since we don't have cable or a DVD player), but our daughter watches movies, I watch trashy TV shows, and the TV is rarely turned off.

3. Ina May Gaskin - This one is more in with the natural birth crowd, but I am not a big fan of Ina May. I believe she has done a lot for pregnant women and birth in this country, but I don't think she is the all knowing and powerful midwife she has been set up to be. I don't agree with a lot of her practices. And with that, my birth credibility is out the window ;)

4. High Heels - I love my stilettos. I will always love my stilettos. I don't care if they ruin my hips, my ankles, my posture, my back. I will wear them until the day I die.

5. Tin Foil - I cook with this all the time. The bottom of my stove is lined with tin foil to catch drippings. I use tin foil to cover food in my fridge if I don't have a lid for it. Tin foil is my best friend.

6. Disposable Diapers - I used only disposable diapers with my daughter. Yes, this was before I became the crunchy nut I am, but I never once considered cloth.

7. Baby Led Weaning - We started our daughter on solids at four months old (three months adjusted). We fed her with a spoon from bottled Gerber baby food until she was almost a year.

8. Babywearing - We had a crotch dangler that we used all the time with our daughter. Bought it for $20 at Walmart.

9. Toilet Paper/Paper Towels - I've thought about going to family cloth, but I love flushing toilet paper and not dealing with it, and I love using paper towels. The idea of switching is an idea just to save money, but I do love my disposable paper.

10. Video Games - My house is like a fun house for geeks and nerds. We love Nintendo, and own almost every system they've ever made. Our daughter knows how to play most Nintendo games, knows most of the characters, and we are proud of that.

11. Fast Food - Our daughter loves Happy Meals. We love fast food. We eat it less often now, but it's still a splurge and it's still delicious.

12. Vaccinations - We don't vaccinate, but I love people that do. Especially those that research the decision and made the choice themselves. I can't ever say what is right for another family, and this topic is one of them. It is none of my business, and if you are with the crunchy crowd everyone thinks it's their decision to make for you and it isn't. Vaccinate your kids if you want to and have researched your decision. It is after all your decision to make.

13. Disney - Our daughter loves Disney, as do we. Her room is decorated with Disney Princesses, she has a princess castle, and has memorized every line from Beauty and the Beast. And I'm not ashamed of that.

14. Artificial Dye - We don't eat this anymore, only because of how much our daughter has changed while being off, but I used to love it. Candy is delicious and I love it. If our daughter hadn't changed when coming off, we would have gone right back to eating fake food and loving it.

15. Nestle - The Nestle Boycott is one of the main staples of being crunchy. We won't buy anything Nestle even if it's from one of their partners, but if someone gives us stuff that Nestle made (especially Wonka candy which is my weakness), we will eat it. I won't throw it out. For Halloween, our daughter got a lot of Nestle candy, and I enjoyed it right alongside her. No shame. I didn't buy it, but I will enjoy eating it.

Just because you lead a crunchy life doesn't mean you have to hide the parts of you others in your circles wouldn't agree with. And the thing is, I'm pretty sure there are no true crunchy types and no true hippies that don't do at least one thing others wouldn't scoff at.

Lead your life. I still say I'm uber-crunchy and hippie, and the parts that don't truly agree with that are just my flair for the dramatic.

5 Revisions I'd Like to See Made to the Parenting Phrasebook

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 19:13:00 +0000

As someone who has had a love of words and language for most my life, I pay attention to how we use language, how we use specific words to describe things, or how one’s use of language reveals not just a specific thought, but how one views herself and her particular situation. For example, when I hear on the playground a parent disclosing that they are in the midst of the “Bedtime Battles,” I can’t help but wonder to myself if this particular parent views all of parenting as a war, where their child is the enemy and the aim of each day is to gain the upper hand. Comparing parenting to fighting a war makes me sad; I think of all the moments in those relationships that end up lost because the attention is on “staying in power”. I’d like to see the comparison drop out of use. There are a few other words and phrases I’d like to see drop out of use:

1) Naughty. As in, “You’re being kind of naughty right now.” Generally used when the child is not doing what the parent wants or is not listening to the parent or doing something else the parent considers disruptive. Yet, it doesn’t describe the child’s behavior that is frustrating the parent: essentially it’s a judgment and label used for the parent’s convenience. When parents label a child in such a way, they are in no way working with the child. Did the parent get down on the child’s level, make eye contact, and specifically say what the desired behavior is? As in, “I know you would like to keep playing with your toys, but we need to leave now, which means we need to put your shoes on. Can you help me find your shoes?”

Labeling a child’s behavior also negates the child’s experience. Alfie Kohn in Unconditional Parenting points out that when every time a child “misbehaves” or exhibits challenging behavior, there is a valid complaint on the part of the child, whether it’s that the child is hungry, over-stimulated or tired (especially in younger children) or that the child is upset about something and doesn’t feel safe expressing their emotions. Telling children they are being naughty may be effective in shaming them to give parents the desired result, but it’s not sustainable parenting because it doesn’t get to the root issue causing the “naughty” behavior. Doing a little detective work to get to when the child's behavior started to go south, however, can go a long way to getting to the source of what happened. So can teaching your child self-awareness by asking how s/he feels when s/he engages in such behavior or if s/he can use her words instead of acting out.

2) Good. As in, “What good children” where it is essentially saying the children are being well behaved. It seems harmless in this context, but it’s still a judgment. It also infers that by “good” we mean the children are being quiet, polite, and don’t require much attention from the surrounding adults. Because good is also a judgment, it can be seen as praise, which can be just as manipulative (if not more so) as punishment or shaming.

When it comes time for children to differentiate themselves (called rebelling in some circles), the "good" label becomes an easy thing to test, as in, "If I get bad grades, am I still good? Shoplift my clothes? Skip school?" On the flip side, children are less likely to take chances, push themselves, challenge themselves or take on big projects, because they're scared they might lose the "good" label.

3) “I’m your parent, not your friend.”

Friends listen to each other. Friends talk to each other in a respectful manner. Friends share their feelings with each other. They accept and respect each other. Friends are always on each other’s side. They guide each other through difficult situations and tough moments. They offer perspective when a friend is about to be untrue to her values. Friends celebrate each other’s triumphs. Friends work and play together. Friends ask for – and take – each other’s advice. They laugh and cry in each other’s company, where it’s safe to be vulnerable. In the friend relationship, the relationship has to work for both parties, and both people are equally important. In healthy friendships, one friend does not manipulate or take advantage of the other, because it would be disrespectful. In arguments, friends can say, “My feelings are hurt,” or “I feel frustrated,” or “Let’s work this out.”

Parents – traditionally – judge, approve, disapprove, punish (whether it’s spanking, giving time outs, shaming, or putting their kids down, etc) reward, manipulate or bribe (but frown on being manipulated or bribed by their children) and are full of “teaching moments” and corrections. Traditionally, the parent-child relationship privileges the parent and the parent’s experience. This is convenient for the parent, but in the long run, it doesn’t contribute to building a strong relationship with the child, since it mainly is about having the child behave.

Some parents are more interested in having their children behave, and I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that, just that it has limitations. Many seem to think that if they are “friends” with their children, somehow they will spoil their children or their children will not behave because in being friends their parenting has slipped down the slope towards Philistine permissiveness. Yet if parents brought some of the qualities of their friendships into the relationships with their children (enjoying each other’s company, laughing together, respecting each other’s autonomy), they could have their children behave and a beautiful relationship with their children.

4) “Distinguish between the child and his behavior. Make it clear that it’s not the child who’s bad, it’s the behavior.”

Right. Because young children have the intellectually advanced self-awareness that this distinction requires. Adults struggle with separating what they do from their self-worth or their achievements (or lack thereof) from their self-worth, so it’s unreasonable to expect children to be able to separate their behavior from their self-worth. And if children are then told that they themselves are “good,” it’s just their behavior that’s “bad”? What a muddle, to be a good person who does bad things and what a challenge, as the ability to hold two contrary ideas in one’s mind at the same time is also rather an advanced mental task.

For purposes of behavior and child rearing, I’m all for dropping the uses of “good” and “bad” (aka naughty) altogether. No one likes having themselves or their behavior judged. We can use non-judgmental language instead in such situations, by simply explaining that the unwanted behavior is disrespectful to, devalues, or hurts another person (or thing). Children feel shame beginning at around two ages of age (some even say as early as ten months, but I can’t find the research that substantiates this); they already feel bad when they do something that displeases or disappoints us, but rather than add to it, why not just give them the tools to correct their actions, and in the long run, be accountable for their actions?

5) “Because I said so” or “Because I’m the parent.”

Granted, there are times when we need our kids to do what we say, and even cases where they need to do it immediately, whether it’s to get out of the street because there’s a bus coming or to hold our hands in a busy subway station where they could easily get lost; however, when these phrases are used outside of emergency-like situations, they are nothing more than authoritarian bullying. They teach a child that whoever is bigger is right just because they’re bigger. It’s an oxymoron to tell your child to stop playground bullying when you bully them at home as a discipline tactic. And it’s okay for children to question authority, to learn how to negotiate, to compromise, to ask questions. Parents aren't doing children any favors by teaching them that authority figures are infallible.

In Robin Grille’s Parenting for a Peaceful World, he cites a powerful study, where children raised in authoritarian homes where parents taught children to blindly obey, grew up to be the adults who didn’t say anything when the Nazis came to power in Germany. Children who were taught to question, however, were more likely to be compassionate and empathetic and put their lives at risk to save or hide perfect strangers. In such a situation, who do you want your child to be?

A Letter To My Preggo Self

noreply@blogger.com (Momma in Progress) — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 06:53:00 +0000

Today I'd like to share some wisdom with my first-time pregnant, anticipating the birth of Agent E, confused, overwhelmed self. Following are just a few things it would have been nice to know in advance.

The birth class at the hospital will be pointless. Still, you attend out of obligation and hang on every word. You even drag your husband with you, with pillows. (Why do they ask you to bring pillows? It's not like they have nap time halfway through.) You come away with a list of things to bring to the birth, including but not limited to a giant ball to sit on, music (with your own boom box), and more pillows. Then you go into labor at 2:00 a.m., three weeks early, before you pack your hospital bag. So, you throw your cell phone and a few pairs of underwear in a backpack and consider yourself ready. When Baby #2 comes along, you plan what you are taking right after you pee on the stick.

Take more pictures of your pregnant shape. Yes, you will go on to do this two more times, but each growing baby deserves its own photographic evidence. Then back them up; your computer will crash when your daughter is a few weeks old and you will lose some beautiful photos forever.

You have already decided you will breastfeed, and that's great! However, you seem to think it will be quite simple since you've read a few chapters of a (lame) pregnancy book. Trust me; you do not have the first clue what breastfeeding is really going to be like. You know those breastfeeding classes you have seen advertised? The ones you have been kind of giggling at and making fun of? Take one. I'm serious. Take. The. Class. Plus, you still have some unresolved negative feelings about nursing from what you've heard from friends and the media. Get over it, and get to a La Leche League meeting. Your future self will be most grateful, and someday write this about your breastfeeding experience and how far you've come.

About that pathetic pre-birth reading list . . . you could really use some new material. Go ahead now and buy a copy of The Baby Book. While you're at it, pick up a copy of The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding as well. Read them both from cover to cover. Now do it again. Stop reading pregnancy magazines, mainstream parenting magazines, and online message boards. You're just making yourself crazy.

Buy some cute newborn clothes and pajamas. Everyone will tell you it's not worth it, they outgrow them too fast, and to buy 3-6 month stuff instead. However, you will birth a tiny baby who will be completely swallowed by every article of clothing you have. Luckily, some nice friend (who's been there, three times) will give you some clothes that actually fit, and it will be much easier to dress her for the first two months.

You will debate the merits of crib style and mattress firmness as if the fate of the universe depended on it. And you will end up co-sleeping. Congratulations: You just purchased the most expensive cat bed and stuffed toy receptacle ever. Actually, that's not 100% true. Eventually you will discover if you remove the front it makes a great sidecar. Agent E will sleep here until she's almost three. And you will kick yourself for taking so long to figure this out.

That Baby Papasan chair you get as a baby shower gift? The one you open and think, "what in the heck will I need this for?" All three babies will spend many, many nights sleeping in there when stuffy noses, earaches, or tummy troubles require them to sleep upright. It will end up being one of your most used baby items.

The CIO sleep book you also receive as a gift? Exchange it for a copy of The No-Cry Sleep Solution. Or take bookstore credit, buy yourself a fancy latte and a muffin at the in-house coffee shop, and get some quiet writing time in while you can.

Do get a good supply of those thin receiving blankets. You will use them for many things . . . to lay the baby on, wrap the baby in, as a towel, as a burp cloth, to put under the baby for diaper changes, to cover the baby while sleeping or nursing . . . everything. Skip pretty, fluffy blankets, and definitely pass on the crib bumper (see above).

Don't buy wicker baskets. Not for putting toys in, not for storing little baby washcloths, not for anything. I know they're in all the catalog pictures, they look cute, and they have those pretty liners with the tie on the front that matches the changing table pad cover. And when you find them on clearance at Target it will be hard to resist. But . . . babies try to eat them, toddlers destroy them, and preschoolers use them as footstools. Someday you'll be pulling shards of wood out of your 15-month-old's mouth. Forget sweet and buy big, ugly, plastic bins from the get-go.

Most importantly, when E arrives, after you get through the blurry post-birth hemorrhaging fiasco, unravel the swaddling and pick her up. Hold her to your body. Do this as many hours a day as you are physically able. Someday you will regret not focusing on this skin-to-skin time until your third baby comes along. Do it for E. And for J, too.

What would you tell your first-time pregnant self?

Thanks for reading and have a blessed day.

The Comfort Corner

noreply@blogger.com (Shawna) — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 13:00:00 +0000

As my 2 1/2 year old blossoms more and more into his own personality and every day becomes more vocal in what he wants (and doesn't want), I'm finding that I need to expand my repertoire as a mom. For example, I'd noticed that when he got really upset, his urge to throw or rip things was very strong and that caused a lot of problems because the more destructive he got, the harder time I had keeping my cool, which meant the more upset he got, and, well, you get the idea. A lot of my friends who have kids of a similar age have been using time out, but I found that didn't really appeal to me at this time. The idea of getting into a power struggle with him and getting him to sit still in one place or in one location at a time when he was so viscerally, physically, and emotionally upset just didn't seem to be worth the effort. I also felt like time out (time away from me and my attention) would be mostly about punishment and I didn't really feel like I needed a punishment as much as I needed a tool to help him calm (and me) down when things got really crazy emotionally. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I remembered reading a year or two ago about "comfort corners" and that seemed more to fit the bill of what I had in mind. A couple of google searches later, and I decided that it was exactly what we needed.

What is a "comfort corner"?

A "comfort corner" is a parenting tool used to help your child learn how to calm down and to seek "comfort" when things are going tough. (Here's my favorite description of it!) It's about building a physical space completely designed to trigger a calmer emotional space. The most helpful article I read about suggested you think of it as a little oasis or a space where your child can get back in touch with themselves and their emotions. Going to the corner is not a punishment, so it makes sense for them to have things they love there. Comfort corner is about helping your child to recognize when s/he needs some self-care. It doesn't have to have much, just some comfy pillows and whatever items help trigger "calmness" and "safety" to your child. Think of your favorite place to calm down when you are upset. For me, it's my bedroom. In my bedroom, I can read books. I can lay in my bed under my soft blankets and I can watch movies. Those are all things that trigger "serenity" in me. A "comfort" corner serves the same purpose for your child, but because the child is still learning how to calm him or herself, the comfort corner is a more public space than an adult would probably choose. Your child might not know exactly how to use the space at first (especially if they are young, as my son is) so it's not a place where they can go alone to give self-care until they are older. You can use the comfort corner as a tool to teach them how to recognize when they are spiraling out of control and what they can do to help themselves calm back down. So, for example, your child is throwing an outrageous fit about wanting juice when you have told her/him that he has had enough juice for the day and s/he needs to drink water, you can say to him/her, "Honey, it sounds to me like you are very upset. Let's go to the comfort corner and see if we can find something to make you feel a little better and then we can talk about juice versus water." Once in the corner, you work with him or her to find an activity that creates calmness. Once calm, you can either talk about what triggered him or her, or if it already feels resolved, you can move on. This sounded like exactly what we needed so about a month ago my toddler and I built a comfort corner in our living room where our Christmas tree used to be.

How do you "build" a comfort corner?

From the beginning, I wanted the comfort corner to "feel" like a space my son could love. I involved him in its very construction. Together we decided what pillows and blankets to put in there and which stuffed animals to leave in there. Knowing that my son loves to read, but can be destructive when angry, I decided to leave the book tubs just outside the corner, but within reach for when he is calm enough to do reading. Together we placed a soft cloth"taggie" ball in there that we'd gotten him when he was just a tiny baby and a blow up penguin that bounces back up when he gets pushed down. The rule is that he can (and does) go into the comfort corner at anytime and take anything he wants out or can even spend time in there when he's already calm, but when Mama thinks he needs to spend time in the comfort corner he needs to stay there until we both agree it's time to move on to another activity. (Because of his age, he does not currently go to the comfort corner alone. In a year or two, that will probably change, but for now this seems to work best.) To introduce the comfort corner as a positive thing, we first went in there only when he was in a good mood to read books, snuggle, or just play with stuffed animals. It was few days before I suggested going in there when he was upset.

What do you do in the comfort corner?

In the beginning, I really wasn't sure what we would "do" in there when he was upset that was so radically different from what we were doing already out of the corner, but slowly three basic activities have arisen.

The first involves throwing the soft, cloth ball around. We do this when the issue is that his urge to throw is causing him to throw dangerous things a little too often. The rule is that the ball must stay within the corner and strangely, it does seem to take the edge off of his urge.

The second involves the penguin. When he is very, very angry with me, I encourage him to physically work out his emotion by playing with the penguin. I never tell him to hit the penguin, but I do say. "Hey, sweetie. I think you have a lot of big emotions, let's see if we can get penguin to lay down so we can tell them to him." The physical energy needed to get penguin down when he keeps popping back up, often gets my son in a different space. Then, if he gets to a giggling place quickly with the penguin, I try to help him find words for his emotions while he's playing with the penguin. If he doesn't get to that giggling place, but does get to a little bit calmer space, I then get him to look me in the eye or snuggle with me and I try to help him voice what he is feeling. Julian has already written about this kind of "time-in" before.

The third is, by far, my son's favorite. It is a "love pile."

The love pile is simple. My son sits on some comfy pillows and I give him a hug and a kiss, tell him I love him, and then have each and every one of his comfort corner stuffed animals do the same as I pile them up one on one on top of him. He stays still and asks for "more" until we run out of stuffed animals or until he's ready to get up and go. I find for him that it gives him the sensory feeling of being surrounded and loved and it also gives him the realization that if he is feeling that he needs more love and attention, all he needs to do is ask for it. More and more often lately, I've noticed that he often pre-emptively asks for a love pile before the melt-down could occur. He recognizes in himself that he needs a little more attention and he gets it in the form of the love pile. He's even started practicing giving his stuffed animals love piles when they are sad or upset. It's a beautiful, beautiful sight to see my little toddler kissing his stuffed doggy who "fell" from the table and telling him to come to the comfort corner for a love pile. It's become such a positive activity that even Daddy sometimes jumps into the love pile with my toddler when he's having a bad day, too!

So what has the comfort corner done for us?

The comfort corner really has become a place "apart" from the rest of the house. As soon as I enter the comfort corner, I know that whatever it is that I wanted to clean/do/accomplish is officially on hold. My son recognizes this and he also knows that whatever he was upset about is temporarily on hold until we calm down long enough to work it out (of course, I say this, but like all things with a two year old there are some days where this is more evident than others!). When I suggest the comfort corner, I am always careful to keep anger out of my voice and to remember that this is a place of reconnection and a space where my primary job is to teach my son how to choose activities and words that will calm himself down. It takes me out of the "topicalness" of his usual meltdowns and reminds me of the bigger picture.

Actually, since installing the comfort corner, I have found more and more that the fits that I thought were about "not getting his way" or specific "things" were really more about my son really wanting to be heard and paid attention to. Often, I let myself get busy or distracted and instead of voicing his needs to me in a way I understand, he was throwing fits over "other" things. If I addressed his deeper need by taking him to the comfort corner and showing him how to do things to calm himself down, the need to scream went away even if I did absolutely nothing about the topic he was originally screaming about. That is worth the price of creating the comfort corner just on its own.

Thanks for letting me share. Maybe if you try a comfort corner in your house, you can let me know how it works for you. After all, I'm just flying by the seat of my pants here! I'd love to hear your ideas, too! I'm sure the comfort corner will evolve in amazing ways, the longer we keep it around the the older my son gets. I'd love to hear how one works in your home!

Shawna

The Decisions Never End

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:00:00 +0000

We decided a few weeks ago to homeschool our daughter for at least Kindergarten, and then go with whatever works after that. We've decided to be flexible so that things change according to how she learns and what we feel needs to happen.

However, I had a day filled with anxiety the other day when confronted with planning what we are going to do.

My husband works at the High School, and he was talking to one of the administrators that told him that by the age six, your child has to be enrolled in a program, not just signed in with the school district. I lost it.

I had to research all the different programs here, worried that we were going to pick the wrong one, trying to figure out how we would incorporate the unschooling atmosphere with an official program, and trying not to lose my mind with worry about if we were doing the right thing.

After a few hours of this, one of my friends let me know this was wrong and all she had to have was registration with the school district. Utah doesn't require any particular curriculum, so no programs are necessary, which helps a little bit.

Except that I'm back where I started. Do I want to continue with unschooling, or should I register for an online program to monitor how well she is doing? If I don't go with a program, will I fail at this? If I do go with a program, will I fail at this?

I thought for sure that when we decided to homeschool that the rest would be easy. This has definitely been a lesson in how parenting never ends, and the decisions are always there.

I question a lot of what I do as a parent, and when I don't feel something is working I change it accordingly. This has shown me that I truly have no idea what I'm going to need to do, and either I need to prepare or just let things go. The next few weeks will be telling to my personality and how we want to go forward.

Do any of you use a particular program for homeschooling, or do you go with the flow? How does this work for your family? Do you ever worry it isn't enough or it's too much?

What Snacking in the Subway Gets You

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 05:11:00 +0000

One day this week, as my children and I sat on the subway platform waiting for a train, my son asked for a snack. I hadn’t packed anything. We had just had lunch at home before leaving, and we were going to Trader Joe’s for groceries. Given that my son and I usually snack our way through most grocery shopping trips, I didn’t think I would need snacks. I said all this to my son. He asked for a snack again. Later in the week, I would realize that he was in the midst of the kind of growth spurt that demands constant food and sleep, but in the moment, all I could do was rummage through my bag for any left behind or forgotten snacks.

To his delight, I found a package of seaweed. I opened it up for him. He sat on the bench contentedly eating his snack, and we waited for the train.

Then, just as he neared the end of his seaweed, he dropped the tray on the ground. He hopped off the bench, bent down, picked up the remaining seaweed, stacked it neatly in the tray, and got back on the bench to finish eating it. As he did this, I felt the eyes of all my fellow passengers watch him – and me – for what he would do, and if I would let him eat it. Because I have been criticized more than once and had more than one finger shaken at me for exposing my child to germs and potential plague when he drops a cracker on the ground. I know that while I think my son is adorable picking up after himself in public, no one will compliment him on being a responsible 3 year old and for not littering our public spaces.

So I knew it was coming before the woman even opened her mouth.

“Are you sure you want your child to eat that, after he dropped it on the ground?”

I gave her my standard canned response of how we spent a year traveling around SE Asia and if she wanted to scare me about the potential health threats of a New York City subway platform, she was going to have to work a little harder. I threw in – as I often do – how even his US doctor says that in terms of my son’s health and immune system, there is nothing better that we could have done for him than take him traveling around the world.

She didn’t say anything for about a minute.

“Listen, it’s not my place to criticize and I’m a parent too, but it’s not about the germs. It’s about the toxins, the lead people track on their shoes, the rats and the rat poison they scatter in the stations. It’s about limiting exposure since toxins accumulate over time and can cause long term health issues.”

I told her I understood, and I appreciated her concern. I told her I was well aware of environmental toxins and health risks and the repercussions of accumulated levels of toxins over time. I told her we made very conscious choices about the food we ate, the water we drank, the products we used on our bodies, the products we cleaned our home with and limiting plastics within our home. I told her precisely how long my son was breastfed. I also told her precisely how well read, researched and educated I was. Which was when I realized that I sounded like a bitch even to my own ears.

And while I’m rarely at a loss for what to say, it is true that in the moment of a confrontation, I don’t think of what I actually want to say until much later. In this case, it was all of fifteen minutes before I realized that I was just trying to say that my husband and I make very conscious choices, so that when my son eats the three sheets of seaweed he dropped on the subway platform, I don’t have to panic about his potential toxin exposure. I was trying to say that I want my family to live consciously, but to also live our lives. I don’t want to live my life from a place of fear of what might happen when. Nor do I want to tell my hungry child that he may be holding food, but he cannot now eat it.

Though I had to admit, she had me on the lead and the rat poison. I haven’t spent much time thinking about the lead people track on their shoes or the rat poison that they use in the subways.

The interaction left me in a tangle. It’s easy to feel judged and criticized, especially given her delivery, even if she was well intentioned. But I have to admit that I admired her for speaking up for what she believed in; that while I may have thought there are millions of parents far more worthy of her tirade, she did speak up out of concern for my son’s health and well-being.

On the one hand, we want to be tolerant of other people and that they do things differently. The world is a diverse place and people raise their children in a variety of ways. Most of us want the same things for our children – that they be happy, healthy, well educated, successful and productive people whom we enjoy being around. And there is more than one way to nurture the growth of children. Yet, accepting differences can sometimes slip towards complacency. It’s easy to not have the difficult conversations when you’re “being accepting.” Most the time we can assume how people raise their children or how they are with their children is none of our business, and there are times when speaking up or intervening in someone’s child rearing habits can save a child’s life.

This woman also had a very valid point; one I hadn’t even been aware of. And I had to admit even to myself that my defensive reaction actually had very little to do with her and more to do with the fact that a stranger criticizing my children or my parenting is not a rare occurrence. Many people do stop to tell me how beautiful and aware my 7 month old daughter is or that my son is very considerate wanting “to help” and hold the door open for them. But even more people tell me that my son might get hurt on the tall slide or that if I let my son walk up to ten feet in front of me, I’m guilty of negligence, or my son shouldn’t be out with me, but should be in school instead. If my son breathes on the window of a subway to watch it fog up? As if no other child on the planet has done such a thing and survived? It’s a matter of seconds before the plague warnings start coming my way. On this particular outing to Trader Joe’s alone, I would also be told to buckle my son into his stroller and that my daughter wasn’t wearing enough clothes (It was 45 degrees. She was wearing her hat and boiled wool jacket.). I get told so often by a stranger that I am doing something wrong with my children, that by the time this woman sat next to me on the subway platform, I just wanted to make the stop sign with my hand and say, “I don’t even want to hear it.”

I read a lot of parenting books, but I haven’t read the book from the Tiger Mom or the book about French parenting because I don’t need anyone else telling me that other people are better parents. Parents are so inundated with opinions of other people or thoughtless criticisms that when we do hear something that we might actually need, we’re so worn out from feeling criticized, we don’t actually hear it. Thoughtless criticism becomes noise like snow on an old TV set. It gets in the way of us trusting ourselves as parents and trusting our children. It gets in the way of us following our instincts because it causes us to doubt our values and our selves.

On the walk home from the subway stop, we came across a mother pushing her almost three year-old son in his stroller. He had gorgeous curly hair long enough to blow in the breeze and a big smile on his face. He wore a thin jacket and no shoes. I laughed at the glorious sight of his bare feet in the late afternoon sun. Then I asked his mother, “How often do you get criticized for his bare feet?”

“All the time,” she said. “Then when he actually wears shoes, I get criticized because he’s not wearing mittens, and I just want to shout, ‘But he’s wearing shoes!’”

Which is the detail that is often forgotten: our children are children, and just because they are smaller than us, we can’t make them do something they don’t want to, not when we’re trying to teach them to be accepting and the best way to do that is to accept them and the way they experience the world.

My son pointed to the boy’s feet. He shouted, “He’s not wearing any shoes!”

“No, he’s not,” I said. “Isn’t it fantastic?”

Raising a Pink Boy

noreply@blogger.com (Anastasia) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 12:01:00 +0000

My son likes pink.

There, I said it. My son likes pink. Actually, he loves pink. He loves fairies and princesses and crowns and jewels. He often laments that he wishes he could wear dresses and grow his hair out and put on makeup. He doesn't particularly dislike being a boy, but he is fascinated with all things girly. And who can blame him? Being a girl is pretty cool.

Most outfits designed for baby boys have either a construction vehicle or a baseball bat on it. I held out on imposing gender roles on my son for as long as I could, dressing him in "boy" outfits only when everything else he owned had either poop, pee, or _______ (insert other gross/unknown substance here) on it. One of my favorite things to say to people when I got on my soapbox was "What if he grows up to like tutus and ballet slippers?" Well, you know what? He does.

Obviously, his affection for things that society associates with being female can, and does, lead to questioning my son's sexual orientation by other parents, however far in the future that may surface. Though no one actually comments, the silence that follows my son's declaration of how much he loves to garden while wearing the princess heels he's borrowed from his little sister speaks volumes. It stuns me that, in our society, we still assign gender roles and stereotypes, especially so early in our children's lives. Of particular interest is that no one questions my three year old daughter’s likes and dislikes, whether they have to do with “girl stuff” or “boy stuff.”

But that's not what really bothers me. When I became pregnant for the first time, I promised my baby that I would love him no matter what he chose to do in his life; no matter what profession he pursued; no matter how many piercings he put in his body; no matter what shade of orange he colored his hair; and no matter whom he chose to love or spend his life with. My wish for my son, for both my children, is only that they spend their lives feeling happy and fulfilled with whatever choices they make. For now, in part at least, my boy is happy idolizing fairies and wearing pink.

What bothers me is that, as liberal as I pride myself on being, as progressive and open minded as I am regarding nearly everything, I have had moments when I feel embarrassed by my son's penchant for the girlier things in life. When we are out and about and his adoration for pink, ruffles, high heels, makeup and whatnot comes up in conversation, I often have to qualify it with, "But he also loves art, and cars, and is fascinated with wizards and magic." And why? Because I fear the inevitable judgment that my son is not "normal." I certainly fear that people will judge me, but ultimately, I fear that people will judge, and thereby abuse, him.

I fear that while the other boys in our neighborhood are off playing stickball, or punching each other, or comparing their packages, or whatever it is that "real boys" are supposed to do, my son will be off playing princess with the girls, and that he'll be ostracized by the kids and whispered about by the parents--especially those "real men" whose sons will never, ever be gay (yeah right). I fear that, if my son does turn out to be gay, he will be left out, made fun of, or worse, emotionally and physically assaulted by homophobic jackasses. He comes home from school with stories about kids making fun of his likes and dislikes already--and he's not even seven years old!

But what I fear the most is that because of my need to prove to people that my son is "normal," explaining his girly interests away as whims of age or passing obsessions, my child will grow up feeling like he has to do that, too. I fear that I will fail at teaching him to proudly display himself, as whatever he is, to anyone, at any time, without hesitation. I fear that I will harm his self esteem, his sense of self worth, his sense of self--because I believe that all those things should be fostered and nurtured at home, with the people he loves the most--his parents.

I fear that his girly embrace means that he is unhappy with himself, with who he is, with being a boy, and I worry that he will be faced with years of feeling out of place and uncomfortable in his own skin. But then, who says that princesses and fairies and liking pink are girly? When my daughter plays with trucks and cars, I don't give it a second thought. If I am too embarrassed to accept my son for who he is, how can I expect him to accept himself?

Inside our home, we embrace my son's interests and cultivate and encourage them, no matter what gender they are assigned to. It pains me when he asks me why boys can't wear makeup and I don't have a good answer. Why can't boys wear makeup? I try to explain that in our life, in our town, boys generally have short hair, and girls have long hair. That mommies wear makeup, but daddies don't. That usually, boys wear pants and girls wear skirts. "But Mommy, you're a girl, and you wear pants!"

My smart boy. My lovely, unassuming, untainted boy.

So I find myself explaining why some things in our society are acceptable and why some things aren't. I talk about what our society's expectations are, and that, right or wrong, it's what we're dealing with at the moment. I don't want my son to be ridiculed. But I don't want to teach him that it's OK to be one thing at home and another in public. And frankly, I do believe that men can wear skirts, and women can shave their heads, and everything in between. I feel as if, in my wish for my son to be accepted in society, I have betrayed my ideals.

Does it matter that he does indeed adore art, music, cars, and trains? That he is fascinated with obscenely gory things like death and loves to hear stories of people getting dismembered? That he likes to dress up as a knight and a wizard and a train conductor? That he bites his nails and loves dirt and thinks farts and burps are hilarious? He still watches me with utter fascination as I put on lip gloss, and when I cheerily put my daughter’s hair up in pig tails, I know he is jealous.

Should we be exposing him to the traditional young male role models? I have a hard time finding anything boyish I can expose my son to that isn't based on some type of violence or that doesn't engage in mindless, slapstick activity--and that's a soapbox I've been standing on for a long time. Power Rangers? Sponge Bob? Even superheroes like Spiderman and Superman have to kill and/or hurt people. A couple of years ago, I bought my son a foam sword for his birthday. Sure enough, he wanted to "kill people" with it. When I threatened to take it away, he compromised with "killing dragons," instead. Though I think that's pretty cool in spite of myself, I'd rather he stick with Tinkerbell. Wouldn't you?

I'm so sad as I write this because my fears always feel very real to me, as if they're already happening. I adore my son and while the thought of him being hurt by an outsider is too awful to imagine, the thought that he would be hurt by my failures and inadequacies is much worse.

So, I've made a decision. No more explaining, no more qualifying. My son is who he is, and we will unabashedly and proudly display him for the world to see. Pink, blue, gay, straight--whatever. I don't care what people think. I will no longer make excuses or feel embarrassed--and if I have to get into fights to defend my son until he can do it for himself, I will.

Breaking the Silence

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 15:19:00 +0000

TRIGGER WARNING: CONTAINS DESCRIPTIONS OF VIOLENCE WHICH MAY BE UPSETTING TO SOME READERS

Chris Brown and Rihanna, Whitney and Bobby…while domestic violence seems to be deservedly discussed more than usual these days, there will never be enough awareness. Most survivors keep quiet when faced with the ignorance that often surrounds this issue. We may be more inclined to repost violence related issues on social networking sites (along with fellow women's rights advocates), or get into heated debates on the topic, but nobody ever REALLY shares what happened to them. I was reading the detailed description of Rihanna being beaten, and I realized she had no choice in what the world would know. Most of us don't want the world to know, and then the cycle continues - nobody talks...nobody notices...and society as a whole ignores the needs of the women involved. It’s taken me 16 years to tell my story, and now, as a mother nearly twice as old as I was when I was that scared, manipulated 19 year old girl, I’m done being silent.

I wish I could say I’d left it all behind and it didn’t affect who I am today. I wish I could say that the nightmares were gone, that I didn’t still have random “sightings” where I’m convinced it’s him when it really isn’t. I wish I could say that I didn’t have PTSD breakdowns, complete with flashbacks, every time I see someone get hit, strangled or held at knifepoint in a movie, leaving me sobbing in a bathroom. Over the course of 16 years, these things have subsided dramatically, and the panic attacks are just about gone, but everything still lingers.

People often hear about domestic violence and their most immediate response is to question why the abused stay. I’m not going to begin to explain the complexities of the masterful manipulation I endured, or the details of how I ended up with him because my big heart just wanted to help him. If you haven’t been through it, I don’t think anyone could ever understand what being beaten, spit on and raped (sometimes at knifepoint) on a daily basis does to your confidence, or what it does to a person to live in fear that the next time he strangles you or lightly drags a knife across your throat will be the last time. If you’ve never TRULY feared, begged and pleaded for your life, it’s difficult to convey. However, perhaps I can shed some light on what it’s like to try to leave, and maybe, just maybe, I can stifle some of the ignorance surrounding this issue and that immediate assumption that these women should “just leave.”

For starters, I was quickly disconnected from family and friends in the manner that many abusers do, which was aided by the fact that we had no phone. Eventually I lost my job as a nanny, because rather than help me when they saw me come to work with bruises, they fired me without notice and sent me off to be with him 24-7. My boyfriend had no car and I worked 45 minutes away, and while I understand their apprehension, I loved their daughter probably more than they did, and I was never late since it was my only time away, despite the fact that he would often keep me up all night on purpose as another means of control. I was crushed when I was fired - losing my utopian alternate life, and having to say goodbye to a little girl that I loved dearly, without any warning. I remember crying to him that I lost my job and him saying, “remind me to be nice to you tonight” and a few hours later, having to drive us home from a friend’s house after he broke my nose, since he didn’t know how to drive a standard transmission.

When I think back to the times I really tried to leave, a lot of attempts ended up in the deadbolt room. There was a bedroom where we lived that oddly enough had a deadbolt on the door. A broken one at that, so it could be locked and then he could put the knob in his pocket. Let’s just say good things never happened in the deadbolt room. But during a specific escape attempt, I remember being locked out of the house in the middle of February without a coat, because I fled as quickly as possible. Since I had informed him I was leaving, I was outsmarted and my keys were removed from my purse before I left. My shirt was torn all the way down my back, because that’s how hard I pulled to get away, and that’s how hard he held on. I actually had quite a few shirts that met their demise that way. So I stood there, bare back in the cold February day, while being mocked and laughed at on the other side of the door - so much for leaving.

Another time I was supposed to go visit my parents. Instead I ended up locked in a cluttered closet for over 24 hours, crying, terrified and hungry in the darkness, feet and fists sore from trying to get out - never knowing if I’d be released or just left there to rot and die. Consequently, my parents were understandably upset that I never showed up, and yet I couldn't tell them why. Their disappointment and my shame played beautifully into his agenda of keeping me isolated (in addition to literally locking me up in isolation). But the most significant memory of trying to leave him was what came back to me so clearly when I was reading the details of the Rihanna/Chris Brown beating, and it was what inspired me to write this. The time I got away set a number of things in motion that allowed me to get away for good. However, the beating that preceded it was witnessed by about eight of his friends (all male), and NONE of them stopped him, NOBODY helped me, and they all just stared…

We were in the parking lot of this apartment complex, and we were getting ready to leave and saying goodbye to his friends when some more of his friends pulled up and he got out to talk to them. Eventually he got in their car, and I saw him lean over and snort some coke. This was something I never did, and he actually didn’t either (he had in the past, but not while we were together). I did not want to see what his already explosive anger would be like on coke, and I was livid that he did it. I immediately went to start the car, and he jumped out of their car in a fury. The passenger window was still down all the way from when we were saying goodbye to the first set of guys, and I had an old two-door with giant doors/windows. He screamed that I would never leave him and reached in for the keys from the passenger window. I swung both legs around from the driver’s side, and tried to kick at him to keep him from getting the keys. At that point, he grabbed my ankles and pulled me through the window, so my back and head slammed to the pavement from the height of the window. He then proceeded to kick the living shit out of me IN FRONT OF ALL OF HIS FRIENDS. They did nothing. They stood and watched. They didn’t even ATTEMPT to stop him.

When it was all over I was “allowed” to leave alone for the first time. I picked myself up and got into my car. I remember going to a gas station payphone and calling a dear friend at the time, who was my ex who lived in another state. Since I was ripped away from all my friends and family, this guy was about all I had left who he didn’t know about and hadn’t cut me away from. That day set in motion events that led to a plane ticket sent so I could go live with my ex and his parents, and to this day I’m still grateful and feel that I owe them my life. But not everyone has someone like that, and not everyone is so lucky.

So the next time you’re inclined to think, “Why don’t they just LEAVE!?” I hope you will remember my story. It is not so cut and dry. I didn’t even have any children with this guy, and we weren’t married. I also had the advantage of moving halfway across the country for some time, in order to prevent any follow up harassment and potential for going back to him. As it was, years later he was still stalking me at my job, but enough time had passed that I was invulnerable to his manipulation. But my point of all of this isn’t just to help people understand the difficulties of leaving, and it’s not some public display of trying to cope. I’m a wife and a mother now. I am so far from the person I was at 19, and yet, I still carry her with me. I still say “I’m sorry” way more often than I should, and could probably stand to work on my self-image. But I realized tonight when I decided to write this that despite all the positive changes I've made in my life since that time, I’ve been contributing to the problem. I’ve been silent. Nobody wants to talk about these things, and my hope is that if one more person comes forward, it will make it that much less taboo to discuss.

I’m the woman you see at the co-op bagging produce in her little mesh bags and wearing her baby – not someone you’d envision getting beaten bloody on a daily basis. But we’re here. We exist. We have stories, and we need to share them and support one another. We are your mothers, your sisters, your friends, your coworkers, your daughters and even your grandmothers. We bag your groceries, teach your children, serve your coffee, and even serve in congress. Survivors are EVERYWHERE, they are just often silent about their struggles. People shouldn’t be dismissing them based on their inability to leave a dangerous situation, they should be trying to HELP them.

When all of this happened to me we lived in a duplex with thin walls and as I mentioned, no phone. I used to scream and plead with the people on the other side of the wall to call the police. They never did. EVERYBODY has the power to change this when you suspect something may be wrong. Don’t just sit back and watch it happen, thinking it’s none of your business. I intend to teach that to my daughter one day, and I only hope that she will understand it all. That she will be empowered and not get into the same kind of trouble. It breaks my heart hearing about all these young girls tweet about gladly and willingly letting Chris Brown beat them. I just can’t even wrap my head around that mentality. I spent at least 10 years trying to come to terms with the fact that it wasn’t my fault. I’m still not entirely sure I’ve convinced myself, but I do know I’d never wish it upon myself no matter who the guy was. It makes me question the future for my daughter, and makes me realize there’s a tough job ahead in getting her on that road to empowerment. It all starts with breaking the silence. The more we speak up, the greater the chance that people will listen. So I ask you to please share my story, so one more voice can be heard and the awareness can spread.

“In the clearing stands a boxer, and a fighter by his trade

And he carries the reminders, of every glove that laid him down or cut him
‘Til he cried out, in his anger and his shame
I am leaving, I am leaving
but the fighter still remains”
- “The Boxer” by Simon and Garfunkel

Thank you for reading my story

If Not For You, Then For Our Daughters

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:46:00 +0000

Social Media has done so much. You can get information at the click of a button. You can make friends with people on the other side of the world. You can “like” someone or something just by sitting on your couch. You can spread your message in your underwear and people will come read it.

And yet, how much are we truly accomplishing?

I mainly work with the birth community within social media. I follow all the birth blogs, I read, I comment, I learn. But, how many of the non-crunchy crowd are doing the same thing? How many of the people that aren’t radical like me are even caring what we write?

The cesarean rate is going up daily. Regardless of what I write on this blog, or my twitter, or my facebook. The number of women being induced is going up. Again, regardless of what I write. The number of epidurals or pain medication being used is going up. Women that want these things don’t read my blog. They don’t read the birth books or blogs I do. They are sheep.

They believe that the things we write are done out of spite. That we hate hospitals, OBs, midwives and everything they stand for. They think that we make up risks, that the movies we recommend are just to scare them. That we are hippies who don’t know any better. That their way is right.

Over the last few hundred years, we as women are bringing ourselves down. First welet men push us onto our backs for birth so they could help better. Then we took their drugs. Then their idea that the hospital was safer. Then we let them knock us out to drag out our children. Then they told us that once we had a cesarean, that was the only way we could birth, that vaginal is unsafe. Now, we are doing everything we once did. We are letting others control our bodies.

Over the last 100+ years, we have demanded change. We didn’t want to feel pain. So they answered. We didn’t want to have a wrecked vagina. So they answered. And now, we want to birth. Now we want to feel. And because of our past ignorance, no one takes us seriously. We are the minority. We want change. And yet, we aren’t listened to. After all, we are the hippy nuts that want to feel the pain and stretch so our husband’s don’t want us anymore.

We preach empowerment and informed consent and refusal. We try to educate women that their choices have a profound impact on their confidence as a mother. We try to inform on the risks of procedures, that they aren’t safe like we are told. That nothing is the same as what your body can do naturally.

And yet, we aren’t being listened to. Women that are doing these, don’t care.

After all, it is their body and their choice. They know what they are doing.

The thing is, they really don’t. They talk about how a healthy baby is all that matters. That it doesn’t matter how the baby gets here. It makes you wonder, why don’t they think they matter? Why don’t they think that their choices are important?

Even women with dementia and those so old they don’t remember their names, they remember their births. They remember how they were made to feel. They remember how they were treated. They remember.

Choosing an induction or a cesarean isn’t about information. It is all about impatience and fear. Impatience that your body will never start. That you just want to be done. Fear that you will tear, or be cut, or need an assisted delivery. Fear that your body is flawed.

1 in 3 women leave the hospital with an incision in their abdomen. 1 in 3 women are told that this was the way their baby had to be born. That their body did something wrong. 70% of women are told that their body doesn’t know what to do and they need labor induction or augmentation medication. That their body is stuck. That it needs help. Even more are told that they don’t know how to push, that the better way to push is on their back, that the epidural is completely safe and won’t interfere with the birth or after.

And we believe it.

We are sheep.

All because we don’t have a medical degree and they do.

How bad will this have to get before all women see what is happening? Will 50% of women need to be cut? 85%? 100%? How many more women will have to die before we say it needs to end? How many babies? How many women need to have problems from their cesarean for us to admit it isn’t the better way to birth? How many women need to be told they can’t do it before we all begin to question?

We as women have lost our power. We have lost the goddess within ourselves. We have made it so when we are pregnant, even if we have never needed help before, are automatically in the mindset we need tests and ultrasounds and pills. We are thought to be sick and weak.

We put ourselves on a clock. 40 weeks and we are done. Anything over that is dangerous. That we are overdue. We imagine that the baby is ready at 37 weeks and is just late coming out. We never think that there is more to this process than just their lungs being ready. No one ever questions if you labor prematurely. They know the risks then. But if you are 37 weeks, things should be fine. We don’t question.

I didn’t question. A NICU stay later, I wondered. And then I knew I had failed my child.

Does it only take a bad experience to let you know something is wrong? Does it only take being battered daily with birth information to realize there is something better? Does it only take being open to the idea to know the system is flawed?

When will we as women stop holding ourselves back? Pregnancy, birth, and raising children are some of the greatest things we can do. Why are we being told by doctors or midwives that our bodies forgot how to do it? And why are we believing them?!

Pregnancy and birth used to be sacred. Something only women could do. The highest form of respect to the next generation was a supported birth. Back when we believed in the goddess. Back before we lost our power.

We need to take back our power. We need to take back respect. We need to take back our births.

Even if no one reads this that doesn’t agree, the great thing about social media is it is out there. Sure, it might never help anyone. But either way, my words are there.

We need to change the way we birth. We need to do this now so that our daughter’s aren’t facing something worse than we are. We need to control ourselves. We need to know that we aren’t sick. We need to know that we as women hold the power over ourselves.

No woman should ever be told her body is flawed. No woman should leave the hospital with an incision, whether in her abdomen or her perineum. No woman should have to wonder what might have been if she had just said “No” that one more time.

No woman should be used.

Educate yourselves. Empower yourselves. Inform yourselves.

If not for you, then for the next generation of birthing women. They need a better birth than what we have settled for.

Where Have All The Kids Gone?

noreply@blogger.com (Julian@connectedmom) — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 16:12:00 +0000

When I was a kid I spent a LOT of time outside. We lived in the city, first in a neighbourhood that wasn’t exactly your ideal white-picket-fence-attached-garage kind of affair, then in a neighbourhood that was neither good nor terribly bad, then later in a really nice quiet one. But that doesn’t really matter. No matter where we lived I spent a LOT of time outside doing whatever I felt like doing in a completely undirected manner.

When my husband was a kid he spent what sounds like ALL of his time outside. He and his family lived in a good neighbourhood with lots of kids through his entire childhood and owned a cabin where they spent most of their summers. No matter where they were he spent nearly ALL of his time outside. He fished, rode his bike, helped his dad do work on the property and just generally milled about.

Neither my husband nor I spent this time outdoors completely alone. We spent it with other kids in the neighbourhood. We got up in the morning, hastily gobbled our breakfast then made a break for it to see who was already out. If no one was out we would start knocking on doors. Last week we went on a little walking tour of my husband’s old neighbourhood and thirty years later he can still remember which kids lived in which house and who had the fastest bike or the best stocked snack cupboard. I could probably do the same in my old neighborhoods as well.

When we found out I was pregnant with my son, Oliver, and were looking for a place to live we settled on an apartment close to parks and schools in a neighbourhood where many young families were living. Not because it is a particularly nice apartment, but because our old apartment (which was way nicer) was home to mostly young childless hipsters and backed onto a hospital parking lot. Not exactly a great place for our child to roam free and make friends. But as Oliver gets bigger and our wandering range grows with him I am starting to realize that making friends with the kids in this neighbourhood isn’t going to be as easy for him as I would have thought.

Oliver and I walk everyday, rain, snow, or shine. We meander along at toddler pace looking at rocks and trees and animal footprints; we have several different routs all of which lead through quiet cul-de-sacs, school yards, and public parks. We have been doing this since last summer, over six months, and we have yet to meet any of the kids who live around here. We see evidence of children; snowy footprints leading to and from school and giant family vehicles full of booster seats sitting in drive ways, but we never actually see any children. No street hockey, no bikes, no swing races, no secret forts, nothing.

Where are all the kids?

This question keeps me awake at night, because more than being kind of disappointed that my son hasn’t made any friends in the neighbourhood yet I wonder what this next generation of kids who don’t play outside is going to be like when they are running the show. Surely a generation completely disconnected from the outdoors doesn’t bode well for the health of the environment. A generation of children raised in front of screens and the media onslaught that goes with them can’t be healthy, can they? Can a generation of children who know only the competition of organized sports and not the quiet synchronicity of nature be able to embrace peace and care for their communities? What happens when a generation of kids who have never spent a single moment without adult management and supervision are suddenly in charge of the nursing home I end up in?

Even more I wonder WHY these kids aren’t outside.

The answer cannot be as simple as ‘video games’. I will concede that kid directed media is part of the issue but I am also going to point out that kids with video games also have parents, and I would hope that at least some of those parents don’t allow their kids to spend ALL of their time in front of their games.

I don’t even think the blame is in organized activities. There is definitely a trend towards over scheduling kids these days but I find it hard to believe that every single child in my neighbourhood is completely booked up with extra-curricular activities every single day of the week.

It could be homework. I was absolutely shocked when my niece, now 10, brought homework with her to stay with me over a weekend when she was only 7. She goes to a public school for six hours a day during which she was expected to sit still and concentrate, and then they wanted her to do even more busy work on the weekend!? What a total crock! But for every kid that does this homework there has to be a number who blow it off and do their own thing anyways right? I certainly hope so.

To be completely honest though, I think all of these things are symptoms of the same problem. People like their kids to have homework and organized sports and video games because it makes them easy to supervise. The reason everyone wants their kids to be easy to supervise is fear.

Fear of the ‘stranger danger’ boogey man. Fear of loss or injury. Fear of looking like a bad parent; of the parenting police coming to take your children away if you make choices that are not in the main stream. Fear of screwing up your kids. Fear of losing control.

Maybe some of these fears are valid concerns, I am not suggesting that we simply stop caring about the well being of our children, but I am suggesting that constantly supervising and micromanaging their activities is maybe not the best way to go about alleviating those fears.

I am suggesting that we need to teach our children to make good choices and then trust them to do that even when we’re not around to make sure they do, we need to think about the life lessons our children are missing out on when they don’t get to roam free and make connections with other kids (without your help), we need to ignore the sanctimonious glares of less confident parents at play group and make empowered decisions for our own families. We need to throw open the kitchen door and tell our kids to get off their butts, make their own fun, and not come back until the street lights come on unless they have a problem.

While my own son is admittedly not at this stage yet I am already finding ways for him to explore his independence. I let him trail behind or run ahead a ways when we are out walking, I don’t insert myself in his play unless he asks me to and I make a lot of room in our lives for free play at home and out of doors, I let him get hurt sometimes, I give him space to do things for himself, and when a fenced yard is available to us (we don’t have one of our own unfortunately) I let him play with only intermittent supervision. But if you are still feeling unsure about allowing your child free play outside in your neighbourhood here are a few safety suggestions that may put your mind at ease:

1) Establish reasonable boundaries: Where a toddler or preschooler may be able to find hours upon hours worth of fun in a small fenced yard, older children may tire quite quickly of the same-old same-old and find themselves right back in front of the television in search of stimulation. I think it is important to let a child’s boundaries grow with them. An older child will want to break out of the yard and explore his home street, a year or two later walking known routs to parks or friend’s houses is perfectly reasonable, a preteen should be geographically adept enough not to get lost in a boundary of blocks and blocks. And your teenager, well once they learn to drive and realize they are independent people you pretty much don’t have a say anyways so unless you plan to chain them up in your basement you may feel better about them having practice being free-range before that particular milestone.

These boundaries depend a lot on your individual child, some six year olds are more responsible than others just as some adults are more responsible than others, but make sure you are giving your children enough opportunity to demonstrate their competence and that they understand and agree with their set boundaries.

2) Regular check-ins: If your child can read time give them a watch and ask them to come say ‘hi’ at set times throughout their time out doors or give them environmental cues like a local church bell or regular delivery service. If your child is not old enough to read time chances are they will be nearby anyways so you can always peak out the door or window occasionally to make sure they’re still playing happily.

3) Decide on a password: Have your child pick a special word that is just between you. If your child is approached by an adult (ANY adult. A stranger or someone they know.) have your child to ask for the password. If you have not OKayed that adult they will not know this secret word and your child should know to come and get you right away. My password was ‘poopy diapers’ and it was so well established by my mother that I once refused to let my own father drive me home from school because that wasn’t our routine and he couldn’t remember mine and Mom’s password.

4) The buddy system: Two tiny heads are generally better than one. I can’t count the number of times I watched out for younger siblings and other kids, and my siblings and other kids from our neighbourhood looked out for me. If something does happen like a child is hurt or about to make a really poor personal safety decision there is another pair of legs to run home for help (or another voice to second the poor personal safety decision, but really, who didn’t twist their ankle or break an arm trying to fly from tree top to tree top as a kid!?).Either way, finding your kid a friend/side-kick can help alleviate a little anxiety you may have.

5) Be available: Just to be clear, while I think unsupervised child-directed time outdoors is a right of passage, I am by no means suggesting you say good riddance at the door. Your children need to know that you are there for them if they happen to have a problem and they need to have a safe place to come home to. In short you need to be available.

In my opinion the kind of free-range childhood that I am suggesting does not work without a strong parent-child attachment. If your child is going to be unwilling to tell you things because they don’t want to be punished, don’t feel they will be listened to, accepted, and loved unconditionally no matter what it leaves room for dangerous situations to go unreported and overlooked. If your child has been taught through common punitive forms of discipline that they have no power, or that right and wrong can be dictated to them by anyone bigger than they are, there is room for manipulation. I will even go as far as to suggest that without a strong attachment, spending a lot of time outside alone may feel to the child more like abandonment than freedom. I will also say that while unsupervised and undirected time to play is important, our children also like to spend time with us so if they ask you to play, be available.

In whatever way you can, whether you are willing to try giving your kids unsupervised time outside or not. Just get your kids outside as much as you can because my outside loving child and I are getting kind of lonely out here!

Congratulations! You're a Mother! Now What Do You Wear?

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 04:46:00 +0000

When I was pregnant with my first child, I encountered woman after woman who shook their heads at my belly and said, “You know, it never goes back.”

I didn’t believe them. I had three sisters-in-law and one cousin who all emerged from their pregnancies looking fit and phenomenal – in time of course. I too lost my pregnancy weight, and thanks to breastfeeding, I lost more weight than I gained in my pregnancy. But what caught me off guard was the time it took, and that it didn’t come off gradually at a steady pace, but in chunks. I wouldn’t lose a pound for 8 weeks then seemingly overnight I’d lose ten.

I discovered that while plenty of people talked about the process of losing pregnancy weight, they didn’t talk about what to wear while the weight came off, or that it would be stupid to buy clothes, when I would only be able to wear them for a month or two before they too would be too big. But you have to wear something, so it’s a bit of a catch-22.

My second child is seven months old. I have bought five pairs of pants in different sizes off the clearance racks. I’ve gone through three of them. I found a gorgeous pair of trousers at an after-Christmas sale on pure faith that they will fit at some point. They don’t yet, but I have hope. My favorite health practitioner told me that women shouldn’t even consider dieting until 9 months after giving birth. She said most women actually lose their weight from all the extra calories it takes to breastfeed, recover from labor, and mother their children. It’s why they say that it takes 9 months to gain the weight, so it takes 9 months to lose it. For some of us, it’s up to a year.

So, in theory, with the 9 months of pregnancy and the year to lose the weight after, some of us go almost two years before we’re reunited with our wardrobe. For some, it’s a short reunion, if they opt for the second child being close to the first.

Every few weeks or so, I go through my clothes and see which ones I can get away with. It’s tricky because just because you can zip a zipper shut doesn’t mean you should walk out of your bedroom wearing said item. Or some clothing items are no longer relevant to your mothering life. But there are items I couldn't wait to get back to. I spent my pregnancies missing my pencil skirts. I finally found one that fit, only to discover that now pencil skirts are essentially stupid to wear while mothering a child. I felt like a mermaid on land. I couldn’t move. A friend of mine confessed that since she became a mother, she could no longer wear or walk in heels. I laughed. Then last night, as I got dressed for my sister’s engagement party, I realized I couldn’t either. I slipped on my favorite heels and suddenly felt like I was on stilts. I was scared to descend stairs and knew I wouldn’t be able to carry my baby while I teetered downward. I considered sending my sister a note that said, “Can’t come because I can’t wear heels.” I wore my slightly heeled oxfords and added, “Practice heel wearing for sister’s wedding” to my to-do list. I went to put on a favorite dress, before I remembered that dresses are not breast feeding friendly. It didn’t fit anyway.

So what do I wear as a mother? Cute boots and shoes I can walk in that don’t make me feel frumpy. I wear trousers and skirts I can move in. I take the advice of a friend who told me, “After giving birth, it’s easy for your self-image to land in the gutter, so you need to wear things that make you feel good, things that make you like yourself when you catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror. And above all else, have compassion for your body. Parenting changes us; it’s stupid to pretend that it doesn’t.”

Hey Society: Give Kids a Break!

noreply@blogger.com (Mandi Spencer) — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 05:55:00 +0000

Over the past few days, one dad's video has gone viral. Tommy Jordan shot nine bullets into his 15-year-old daughter, Hannah's laptop after she posted a "disrespectful" status about him on her Facebook wall. I have plenty of problems with this his "Facebook parenting," but since The Connected Mom is intended to be a positive, supportive environment, so I am going to restrain myself from ranting. (That's not to say I won't do it on my personal blog, wink-wink). If you have followed the comment threads on this video, you will be relieved to know that I'm not going to discuss who is more in the wrong or dissect the Jordans' family dynamic. Instead, I want to challenge a view that was frequently expressed in the comments: that today's kids are out of control and need more of this sort of harsh "discipline" to keep them in line.

Even if kids are more disrespectful now than those in the past, one must ask where they have learned this behavior. They didn't raise themselves. Nor were the majority of them raised by permissive parents. Some estimates indicate that as of 2008, as many as 85% of adolescents had been physically punished, and more than half of those had been hit with an object like a belt. No, Mr. Jordan does not use physical punishment in this video, but almost every negative comment about teens calls for spanking. The truth is, most kids are physically punished. If they are as bad as their critics would have us believe, then it follows that physical punishment isn't the solution.In fact, corporal punishment has been linked to the antisocial behaviors, which might include impulsiveness, lying, aggressiveness, and even breaking rules. In other words, physical discipline just might cause the very problems parents are trying to prevent.

So, if physical discipline is out, what is there? Here's a concept: treat your kids like people! If and adult friend posted something negative about you on the Internet, would you pop her laptop full of lead? Most likely not. You might get angry, but instead of using violence, you would tell her how you feel. You might also examine yourself to see if there are any truth to her words. If there were, you might even change accordingly. If you would do that for your friend, then doesn't your own child deserve the same courtesy? Instead of demanding respect, let's earn it by treating our kids respectfully. The results might just astound us!

Why I Hate MNO (and What I Do Instead)

noreply@blogger.com (Momma in Progress) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:57:00 +0000

When my first child was born, I joined a local moms' support group. One of the big things everyone kept going on and on about was Moms' Night Out and its importance for keeping mom sane, having fun, enjoying your time, saving the planet, and promoting world peace.

Okay, maybe not those last two. But . . . they certainly made a huge deal about it.

So, when Agent E was three month old, I gave it a try. I came home (early) to a hysterical baby who wouldn't take a bottle and simply missed her mommy. This was early in my mothering and a lot of my parenting philosophy hadn't really come together for me yet. (More on that here.) I tried again two more times (over the course of the next couple of years). While the second attempt turned out okay (in that toddler E did fine with Dad and Momma didn't have a panic attack), I ended up coming home early from the third attempt to nurse baby Agent J.

To sum: I did not have fun, I missed my baby as if a part of my own body were cut off, and I spent the entire evening uneasy.

Still, I listened to the voices that insisted I had to leave my baby, I had to teach her to get along without me, I had to do this for myself. This was great for moms and I needed it! Right? Why didn't this work for me? Why wasn't I looking forward to this? What was wrong with me?

Turns out, nothing. It's just not how I'm wired.

Not until I participated in a Bible study some time later did it finally hit me. A chapter in the book we used described introverts and extroverts in a way I had never heard. I always assumed that being an introvert meant you didn't like to be with people, and being an extrovert meant you did. It made perfect sense that I wasn't that into MNO as an introvert, but there was more to it. I don't dislike being with people. I enjoy family gatherings, small group discussions, meeting other moms at the park, and joining friends for coffee. However, that's not how I energize myself when I'm feeling low.

Being an introvert vs. an extrovert is more about how you refuel when you need to recharge your batteries. An a-ha moment for sure. Somehow I had managed to find myself in a group of extroverts who thrived on being able to go out once a month (or more) and let loose, have a few glasses of wine, and be part of a big group in a festive atmosphere.

I, however, much prefer to go out during the day. I am not a night person. I absolutely hate leaving my babies at night. (Even my oldest "baby" who is now almost six.) I don't feel recharged; I feel on edge and restless. I need "mom" time, just like every mom does, but in a different way.

What do I do instead? I do the things that help me (not the mom next door, or my best friend, or well-meaning relatives) to refocus and enjoy parenting with a clear, relaxed mind. I get up early to have some quiet time for reading, writing, and thinking. I employ the use of a sitter a few hours a week (early in the day) when Hubby is out to sea for extended periods. When I meet with friends it's during the day, not at night, not at bedtime. I arrange mom/kid play dates with one or two other families at a time, and avoid big, organized "mom and tot" events.

And that is what works for this introverted Momma.

How about you? What energizes you?

Thanks for reading and have a blessed day.

My Little Hero's Hero, Zero

noreply@blogger.com (Shawna) — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 01:09:00 +0000

When I was 2 1/2 (my son's current age), my heroes were E.T., Oscar the Grouch, and Bert (of Bert and Ernie). I have to say that, in retrospect, most of what you really need to know about me as the person I am today can pretty much be summed up in those three characters. With my stuffed E.T., I loved taking care of him and teaching him all about the world around us. One of my first clear memories is of taking E.T. to the beach with me in San Francisco (where we lived at the time) and teaching him all about the water, the sand, and everything else around us. Keep in mind, I was only 2 1/2, so my repetoire was pretty limited, but I still loved taking care of someone and teaching. Education and nurturing, it seems, have gone together for me since the very beginning. My love of Oscar is also very telling. "I Love Trash" remains one of my all time favorite songs, and with it, I trace both my love of recycling/used goods shopping AND my love of bonding with personalities that others would describe as irascible or "difficult." (In my pre-mom days, I worked at what will probably forever remembered as my dream job at a school for adolescents with emotional/behavioral disturbances. I LOVED working with those kids and would love to find a way to work with troubled teens again someday.) When I watch Sesame Street now with my son, I fall in love again with Bert, whose bravery in extolling the virtues and beauty of the every day ordinary (like pigeons, oatmeal, and reading) is an example that I strive to achieve every day.

I tell you all this as a preface to my son's unabashed, no holds barred, five month long love affair of a much maligned and undervalued number. My son loves zero. It might be because of it's almost identical appearance to the letter "O" which is the first letter of my son's name. It might be because it looks almost like a circle which is one of the few shapes my son can (almost) draw. It might just be an inexplicable attraction, but it is safe to say that my son is smitten with the number. I know what you are probably thinking. But zero means nothing! It's a horrible number to love. That is the most common reaction we get when family members or friends hear about Owen going to sleep at night with his "Zero" puzzle piece or the way he is thrilled every time he looks at a clock and there is a "zero" in the time. Although most agree that it is a cute story when I tell about how he used to chant "zero come back" when the zero would disappear from the time on the clock and would be thrilled when it reappeared, it still seems like an odd choice for something to love to the general population. I understand that. And yet . . . well, I understand where he's coming from.

Sometimes, I wonder where this love of zero will lead him in his life (if it leads him anywhere). Will he listen as an adult to his childhood love affair with the number zero and see it as the first step to his inevitable fate to become an accountant or a tax attorney? Will he, from the future perspective of a political activist or counselor, see it as the first time he came to the defense of the disenfranchised, the under appreciated, the ignored? Will he (as an artist and student of the human condition) see it as his first ability to see beyond what everyone else sees into the negative space of perspective? Or will it be as puzzling to him as my childhood insistence that my future husband would be Inspector Gadget? (Although, thinking about it now, my real husband is awful into "gadgets" and technology . . .)

The point is that my son is not yet who he will one day become and, ultimately, only he will be able to decide and interpret how the events of his life and the development of his personality came to be. As much as I, as his mother, may want to step in and predict his future or even try to determine his future, I can't. My primary future function will be that of an archivist who will present him with his past so that he can make sense of his life today and in the future. It is both a beautiful and an honorable fate that awaits me and I honestly have been so amazed and surprised by who he has already become that I can't wait to hear what he will make of all this one day. Until then, I will hold my little Zero Hero in my heart and in my arms and I will treasure this sweet little quirky love affair for as long as it lasts because nothing lasts forever. Or is it only nothing lasts forever? I will certainly never write a zero again without thinking of this period in our lives.

I'll leave you with a link to one of my son's current favorite songs. If it were up to him, we would watch this a thousand times every day. (And is it just me, or does the Zero Hero bear a striking resemblance to what might be a grown up version of my little boy?)

Thanks for reading,

Shawna

Loveybums Giveaway Winner!

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 20:17:00 +0000

The winner of the Loveybums Giveaway is (chosen by random.org)....

Janet Benthin

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Needless to Say

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 05:36:00 +0000

Needless to say – given the viral explosion of outrage – most of us have heard about the disturbing events between the nation's leading breast cancer charity Susan G. Komen for the Cure and Planned Parenthood.

Needless to say, people far more eloquent than me have written about all the various aspects of this debacle.

Needless to say, I am hardly the only one who was left utterly sick when I heard the news of Komen’s choice on NPR. When I received Change.org’s petition in my email inbox, I could hardly believe what I was reading; my eyes went so blurry, I couldn't focus on the words.

Needless to say, in light of this affair, we are reminded of various sad truths:

1) Bullying takes many shapes and forms.

2) Politics has no business being involved in health care, except that with health care being such a big business, politics is involved in health care, and not necessarily in the individual’s best interest.

3) Women’s health care is still wrapped around the issue of abortion, despite the fact that abortion is a legal and safe procedure, and like much of women’s reproductive health, it is a deeply private and personal matter and choice.

4) Because of abortion, politics is especially involved in women’s health care. The abortion issue is controversial enough that it can drive a historically apolitical organization to privilege politics over women’s lives. When an organization that was started to save women’s lives devalues women to the extent that it is willing to put politics before the very lives it hopes to save, we are all left devalued.

I am thankful for Planned Parenthood and for what it provides to millions of women. But I am sad and sick to realize – not for the first time – how little we value women, our health, and the precautions that keep us healthy. Even with Planned Parenthood, women's health care in this country is lacking. It's about time we got outraged about it.

Loveybums Review/Giveaway!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:33:00 +0000

As a devoted cloth diaper user, I felt like I’d tried just about every style and every brand out there, until I discovered the wonderful world of small, family owned and wahm-based diaper companies. I first found Loveybums while looking for wool. They are a family owned and operated business in Massachusetts, and all of their products are made in New England with eco-friendly fabrics produced in the US. They make incredible wool wraps, that are exceptionally trim under clothing. I decided to give the jersey and crepe covers a try, and I was not disappointed. After receiving my first package, I quickly realized that the only thing that topped my love for Loveybums wool wraps was my love for their velour fitted diapers. After trying multiple brands, these had everything I had been looking for! I was so in love, in fact, that I volunteered to write the review based on my experience with the products I’ve previously purchased.

[*Note: All photos are of my personal washed and worn Loveybums diaper, and unfortunately I was unable to fully capture the vibrant color, or the squishiness!]

The velour fitteds are constructed of the softest, squishiest organic velour, with hidden layers of organic interlock and fleece. But don’t let the squish fool you – they are also one of the trimmest fitteds I own. There is no sacrifice in absorbency though, as they are also crowned as my favorite in that department as well! They are so beautifully made in vibrant, hand-dyed organic velour, and the fit is outstanding. Three snaps on each side prevent wing droop, and the stretchy, well crafted elastic gussets offer the snuggest of fits. My daughter is 33 inches and 27 lbs and still fits into her larges on the smallest settings (without using the crossover snap). The rise fits her beautifully without any lower belly sagging. My first ones have been in heavy use for four months and show little signs of wear.

There is a snap in soaker that generally stays completely attached in the wash, that goes right up to the edge of the gussets. I particularly like this feature when it comes to poop. As many of you may have experienced, some diapers have skinnier inserts where poop can get trapped beneath them, or in the case of multiple layer soakers - sandwiched throughout, and it can be difficult to track it all down if you use a diaper sprayer as I do. These are by far the easiest fitteds I own to spray clean, and the stretchy gussets hold in the biggest of messes. The simple one piece, hourglass-shaped soaker is fully absorbent and does the job in spades. There are doublers available if you’re looking for more holding power. In fact, I have found that a doubler paired with a fleece topped hemp doubler was all I needed to make my loveybums fitted last 12 hours through the night!

In all, my only tiniest of tiny desire for something more with these diapers would be a stay-dry option. I fully understand the need for many mamas to keep their fibers natural, but some of us have little ones with tender, sensitive tushies, and I get awfully tired of dealing with skimpy stay-dry fleece liners. In my fantasy dream world I wish there were a stay-dry option so I would have one less piece of diaper laundry to tangle with.

Overall, Loveybums offers many beautifully crafted products that are worth consideration. Some are periodically offered at deep discounts to facebook fans, and with coupon offers as well as seconds and overstock sales, there are always great deals to be had. But these products are worth every penny. And certainly, one of the best aspects of the company is not only its commitment to selling products manufactured entirely in the US, but Pam of Loveybums has always given stellar customer service. She promptly answered all of my questions prior to purchases and has been a pleasure to deal with. I am always happy to give my business to amazing companies such as this.

For your chance to win your very own Loveybums Velour Fitted in the gorgeous Aquamarine color with your choice of size make sure to leave a comment on the blog post with your choice of diaper size and tell us your favorite loveybums product!

For this and additional entries,if the entry box does not automatically appear, please CLICK ON "READ MORE" BELOW FOR YOUR CHANCE TO WIN!

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Her Crying Spot

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 14:00:00 +0000

A few weeks ago, my daughter got really upset about something and ran to my room. I could hear her muffled sobs and walked back there to see what I could do. I unwrapped her from the blankets she'd pulled off the bed and wrapped around herself, picked her up and held her tight.

"What's wrong, sweetheart?"

"I am just a little sad, so I came to my crying spot to feel better."

"Your crying spot?"

"Ya. The place I go to feel safe and cry until I feel better."

"Oh, that's very smart! Would you like me to leave you in your crying spot until you need me?"

"Yes, mama. Thank you."

Since, every time she gets a little upset or doesn't want to talk, we ask her if she'd like to go to her crying spot and then call for us when she was ready for us.

What an ingenious idea! A place you can go where you feel safe, comforted, and you can just feel whatever you need to feel.

We lost our seventh baby almost two weeks ago, and the idea of a safe place to grieve came back to me. How many women suffering through the loss of a child put a smile on day after day and wonder when they can finally feel safe to actually feel what they need to feel? How many times do we wish that we could run to the nearest hill, in the pouring rain, and sob all the anxiety and grief away where no one can hear?

How many times do we, as mothers and wives, just wish we could go somewhere to feel warm and comforted?

No matter the trials in our life, everyone needs to be able to let it all out sometimes. Being a woman, and I speak from experience, we feel we need to take care of everyone else first and then deal with ourselves. Not only is this unhealthy, but all the bottled up emotions have to eventually come out.

Everyone deserves their own place to do what they need to do, regardless of what that is. It doesn't have to be a crying spot, but make a place of your own that is just yours.

Everyone has times where they're discouraged, sad, troubled, and grieving, and feeling safe can do a lot for letting that out. Don't bottle things in. Find a crying spot. My daughter swears by them.

What Are Mothers Not Saying?

noreply@blogger.com (Tara Lindis) — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 04:34:00 +0000

A few months ago, a dear friend and her husband visited my husband, children and me in New York City. We met them for a lunch of lobster rolls on the Upper East Side. After hugs and cheek kisses, we asked how each other were. My husband said, “We’re good!” just as I said at the same time, “we’re hanging in there.” My friend laughed knowingly, of how it’s tiring with a new baby (even if we are all sleeping through the night), while the men understand that for months after giving birth, women are tired, without really knowing just how tired we are. Our husbands played chase with my son. My son instantly claims any kind man as his play gym, even if the last time he saw the man was when he was baby. My friend took the baby from me, as I threw our coats, hats and gloves over my son’s stroller.

My friend took the natural segue of our greeting and began telling me her three worst moments of motherhood. Often the worst moments, people say, are the ones that make you laugh when you look back at them. Nonetheless, my friend still had a moment – when she kicked her 8 year old out of a car on a city street and made him walk the rest of the rest way home after he called her names – when she caught herself thinking, “Crap. This just became a Social Services issue.” She then stopped the conversation and asked, “Why am I telling you this?”

I was listening rapt, as if she had been telling me about her personal encounter with aliens that landed in her yard.

“Because no one talks about these things,” I answered. I had just thrown my first temper tantrum in front of my son that week. I had just had my first experience of wondering if I had crossed into Social Services territory. I had just had my first realization that there is a whole other world of parenting that people don’t talk about. Or at least I don’t hear them talking about this underbelly of parenting - the days we think about sending ourselves to the looney bin, the days we don't want our children to crawl into our laps because we're tired of them touching us, the days our children disappoint us, but we don't say so because we think we're supposed to be accepting and free from expectations.

My friend's son walked home. And now, when someone in the car puts down his mother, he says, “We are too far from home for you to be talking like that to her.”

My son survived my temper tantrum too, and now greets my exasperated groans with, “You’re frustrated, Mom?”

This week, I was talking with my neighbor who, like me, is adjusting to life with two children. Her second child is three months old. We wondered at how some parents sail through the adjustment, while we found it so exhausting and so much work.

She then said, “I don’t enjoy motherhood as much as I thought I would.” She looked at me, “I know. I’m not supposed to say those things.”

“Why not?” I asked. “Not all of motherhood is enjoyable.”

But I know why we don’t usually say these kinds of things. When I’ve mentioned in conversations our adjustment growing pains, I’ve been advised to just take better vitamins. I’ve been on the receiving end of that stern matronly that says: “Woman! Make an effort!” I’ve been told that if I had my own interests, it’d be easier (I swear.). I’ve been asked if I had Post-Partum Depression.

No, I said, but thanks for the reminder that the thinking of the Victorian era is still with us, that if a woman finds mothering hard, she must be sick.*

I’ve also received notes from friends wondering how to stay on top of it all, or if they made a mistake in having children, or friends who love their careers, but find their children drive them crazy simply because they are worn out from work. They have it all, but if they admit their exhaustion, some one tells them to quit complaining. There’s a recession.

It’s had me think, if motherhood is so hard, why is it so taken for granted? Why is it so undervalued? Why are women feeling guilty and isolated for not loving it as much as they think they should? Social Services exists for a reason, but should we fear its existence on our bad days? And why are women such harsh judges of each other, when we do open up about the raw, ugly, and authentic moments of parenting? What are mothers not saying about mothering?

*Please don’t get me wrong: I greatly appreciate that women can talk about having Post-Partum Depression openly and we can know it strikes any one from Gwyneth Paltrow to the young woman in the Walt Whitman Projects who threw her baby down the trash chute. Being able to talk about it makes a difference for women, their partners (especially now that we know men can also suffer from Post-Partum Depression), and their children, and we’re also now dealing with a kind of backlash – that if we take too long to recover from giving birth, or have too many hard days or what have you, we must be depressed. Rough spots don’t necessarily mean illness.

Practical Tools for Challenging Times

noreply@blogger.com (Momma in Progress) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 06:17:00 +0000

At my best, I am a loving, gentle, compassionate parent who adores my children and strives to be positive and focus on relationship. At my worst, I'm pretty sure clips of my week could be sewn into a reality television show about how not to parent.

So what about the in between? What about when you want to be centered and calm but trials of everyday life become overwhelming? What do you do when you start to become frustrated and need a better way to handle things?

Following are six tips I use around our house when things start to spiral.

(Or, Six Ways To Get Through the Day When You're About To Lose Your Mind. Not that I've ever—ahem—felt that way.)

1. Chill out. (Breathe, Momma, Breathe!)

This one is soooo hard for me to put into practice. I may possibly have a wee bit of a tendency to overreact. So I attempt to follow the old adage: Will this matter in 10 years? 10 hours? 10 minutes? I try to maintain a calm perspective using the ideas in this fabulous post from Dr. Laura Markham. Can I just tell you how many times a day I mutter to myself, there is no emergency . . . no one is dying?

2. Take a hug break. (Remember: Break before you snap.)

Sometimes all I can do is invite Agent J to come flying across the room into my arms. I just call out "hug break" and she comes running. (Well, 95% of the time, anyway.) When I'm tempted to get angry with her, or to yell at her (again) . . . or when I start thinking this time I'm just going to bag all that gentle parenting stuff and try something different . . . I hug her instead. And I squeeze tight.

3. Sing a lot. (Talent optional.)

Kids love to hear singing. I don't know why this works so well, but I can get my kids' attention instantly if I sing instead of talk. The louder and the nuttier the lyrics the better. Our favorites include Where Is . . . (sung to the tune of Where Is Thumbkin?) as well as variations on the Kindermusik Hello Song. Works great for diaper changes on a wiggly baby, too. Agent A is a huge fan of the ABC song.

4. Talk really fast. (Topic irrelevant.)

Remember the TV show Gilmore Girls and how Lorelai and Rory would engage in rapid fire conversations that would baffle anyone listening in? Babies love to listen to your voice, and they seem especially interested when you talk super quick. I find that if I just start yammering on about whatever, A will forget all about trying to run away from a diaper/clothing change and actually lie still (for 30 seconds, anyway). Talk about your to do list, your last vacation, a great new website you just discovered, your thrilling plans to clean out the refrigerator.

5. Get really quiet. (Yes; the exact opposite of #3 and #4.)

Sometimes, however, the other extreme can be just as effective. Quiet down . . . to a whisper if you need to . . . and often your little ones will, too. Many ~~days~~ weeks I need to get drastic and just stop talking altogether for a while. It helps me to focus on my words and how often I keep talking when I should really just listen instead. On a related note, having time each day to be quiet with my own thoughts helps tremendously, too.

6. Use labels. (Ooh, wait . . . is that bad?)

We have this running joke that sometimes we all turn into giant grumps and we need names to match, like Eva Grumplepus and Mommy Grumplepus. We've shortened these to initials: E.G., J.G., M.G., etc. Cracks them up every time and helps to lighten the mood. Even my usually serious E can't help but giggle when I call her out on her E.G.-ness. Now she is able to just tell me "hey, I'm just feeling grumpy right now" before things go off the deep end. I already use silly nicknames for all of them so this fits in well around our house.

We definitely don't get it right all the time (and plenty of days I need to re-read some of my own advice). But we incorporate these six things into our routine to release the tension and give us me a chance to get back on track.

Thanks for reading and have a blessed day.

Post-Partum Pardon

noreply@blogger.com (Shawna) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 15:00:00 +0000

This is a blog that is a long time coming. It's one that I've struggled with a lot since my son was born over two years ago and I think I'm ready (finally) to talk about it. I was inspired by this blog I read recently about "Don't Carpe Diem" and conversations I've had with moms who have had similar experiences with new motherhood. I thought maybe it was time I shared my story in case there are new moms out there who are struggling and need to hear how someone like them survived.

I struggled with being a new mom. Really struggled. I was not blissful or happy with my newborn. I was heartbroken, tired, and (in retrospect) depressed. I did not feel instant joy when he was placed in my arms and I was unable to "treasure every moment" as I was so often urged to. Maybe it was the circumstances of his c-section birth; maybe it was the intermittent depression I've dealt with all of my life; or maybe it was the fact that we initially had a very small support system in the state where we lived but the first six months of my son's life were probably the hardest six months of my life.

I think what made it especially hard was all the shame I felt about not being the mom I thought I should be and would be. It wasn't about what I was or was not doing. Technically, I was doing everything that I thought I needed to do. I was a stay at home mom who wore my baby upwards of 16 hours a day and I was up for hours and hours every night with him. I breastfed him, I cloth diapered him, I was attentive to him day and night, I dramatically changed my diet to help his reflux, I was really trying to do my best. I did everything I thought I could do to be the best mom I could be for him, but I did not feel like I thought I should. I was not blissful and it seemed like everywhere I turned there was another person telling me how I should "love" every second of the infant stage because it would all go by so quickly.

I would go home and cry every time I heard someone say that because in my heart of hearts, I felt like I must be the world's worst mother not to be capable of "loving every second." I felt like I was just letting precious time pass me by and was throwing away all of that wonderfulness because I just didn't feel like I loved it. I loved my son; but I didn't love caring for all of his very intense needs. In fact, the love I felt for my son as a person only made things worse. Intellectually, I "got" that he was a wonderful angel who had health problems that made it difficult for him to sleep and that his crying was an expression of how he felt. I "got" that I was lucky to be his mom and to be able to stay at home with him and yet . .. and yet I felt overwhelmed and heartbroken. I found myself unable to escape the absolute blackness of sleeplessness. I felt overwhelmed more than I ever had in my entire life! I remember in my most desperate moments almost wishing someone would put me out of my misery so that my husband could remarry and my son could finally get the good mother he deserved. I loved my son, but I did not love being his mother. I felt like no matter what I did, it was never good enough! I was terrified of whether or not I had made the right choice in becoming a mom. Surely God had made a mistake because I definitely wasn't half the mom my son deserved to have! The experience left me so scared that I was absolutely terrified of having another baby. For an entire year, every time someone told me they were pregnant, my first instinct was to say "I'm so sorry!" and if it wasn't their first child, I wanted to scream out "Why?!?!? How can you do that knowing how tough it is?"

How could this have happened? I am a very sentimental person. I've looked forward to having children for most of my life. I began crying about what I would do when my last baby leaves for college before I even had children! How could I be anything other than completely honored to mother my son? I had been wanting to have a baby for at least six years before I actually had one. I have been campaigning for a third baby before we were even pregnant with the first because my husband was clear that he only wanted two and I wasn't sure two would be enough. I love children. I've worked in education for years. I helped my mother in her home daycare all through my middle school and early high school years. I was an awesome babysitter! I make it my mission to make the choice to be optimistic. I believe whole heartedly in seeing the best in everyone and in every situation. How could I be that depressed after having my greatest dream come true? What was wrong with me? How could I see nothing positive about myself as a mother? I felt so ashamed.

I was afraid of going to counseling because I didn't want to be more of a financial burden to my husband and my son had the tendency to scream for hours unless I held him and I already felt he was stuck with a horrible mom; I didn't want to make him stuck with a nut case mom who had to abandon him every week for counseling. I didn't know how to ask for help because I didn't want the world to know how little I deserved my son and what a lousy mom I was. I beat myself up worse than anyone around me could ever imagine. I loved my son with all my heart and I loved being near him, but I hated it at the same time because of how awful I felt about myself and my inadequacies as a mom. I felt hopeless. I would pray desperately for God to hear me, but then would wrap myself up in my depression before I could feel any relief. I was in a bad place.

It took a long time, but eventually, I opened up to my husband. Eventually, I allowed myself to open up a little to friends and eventually my son became able to sleep a little more at night and I began to function more like a person again, but still some shame remained. Every day, I fell a little more in love with my son and every day I tried a little harder to see in myself what my husband (and increasingly, my son) seemed to see in me. Eventually, I learned to accept myself as a flawed mom, but also a good one (or at least a good hearted one).

Looking back, I see those dark times as my "cocoon" stage. Maybe I'm just the kind of person who always has to cocoon myself up in complete darkness before I can really start meaningful transformation. The woman I was when I gave birth to my son was not ready to be the mom she could be although she really, really wanted to be good mom from the very beginning. That first year or so, I had to learn how to let go of that woman and all of her judgments, expectations, and misgivings. I had to learn how to open my arms to the woman I was becoming and forgive myself for the flaws of the woman I already was. I had to learn how to love myself again even when I didn't live up to the mom I thought my son deserved. I had to learn how to take care of myself by letting go and pardoning myself for my many imperfections, the same way that my son seemed to pardon me every day. I had to learn how to parent myself the exact same way I was attempting to parent my son. When I lost my temper, I had to say to myself, "Okay, you made a bad choice, you were tired and you should have done things differently. Now, go hug your son, tell him you are sorry, make things up to him and LET IT GO AND FORGIVE YOURSELF."

The mom that I am now is better than the mom I was two and a half years ago when my son was born. I have emerged with new wings and new freedoms now that I'm out of my black "cocoon" stage. I now have the power to not worry so much about what pre-new mom me would have thought of me and I don't worry so much what parents who disagree with me think about what I am doing. I have accepted that I will and do make mistakes, but I also have accepted that it is my job to learn from those mistakes and try not to repeat them again. (Tara recently wrote beautifully about this!) It is this new ability to forgive myself that really makes me a better mom. I still may not be the mom my son deserves me to be 100% of the time, but I am the only mom he has and every night I pray that tomorrow I can be a little bit better mom tomorrow than I was today. I don't know that depression won't sneak up on me again. I don't know that I won't start to cocoon again, but if I do, I pardon myself ahead of time and I will focus on learning what I need to from the darkness as quickly as I can so I can emerge transformed. The next time I have a baby (yep, I'm over that fear!), I plan to have a counseling plan in place before the baby is born. I also plan to be more honest with my pain with those who love me and to ask for help more readily (because I'll probably need it even more with two children!).

So if you found this because you are desperate and because you are worried that you are not a good mom, I hope that you will reach out to someone and learn that the core of you is already a good mom. You deserve the baby in your arms. You don't have to be happy all the time or treasure every moment. Just take care of yourself and forgive yourself. Remember that you need and deserve care every bit as much as your baby does! If you suspect you are struggling with postpartum depression check out websites like this one and this one. If there is a group for new moms to go and talk . . . Go! (My mom's group was like a life raft to me . . . other new moms "get" it!) Don't struggle it out alone because you feel like you deserve to feel awful for being a bad mom (yep, I told myself the same lie and probably had to stay in my cocoon longer because I would not face that for the vicious falsehood it was!). Embrace that transformations are painful and you are going through a particularly challenging one. You don't know what a wonderful woman you are becoming! Give yourself a postpartum pardon and give yourself permission to emerge exactly as you are . . .even if you are not yet mom of the year. (After all, you are going to be a mom for the rest of your life . . .you can always take the honor some future year!)

All my love,

Thanks for reading,

Shawna

Intuition

noreply@blogger.com (Kayce Pearson) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 14:00:00 +0000

When you read natural birth books, when you learn about a natural lifestyle, a lot of people talk about intuition, and how you should go with your gut.

Unless it is going the opposite way they would.

Having most of our lives on the internet can lead to a lot of issues. People thinking you should have done things differently, being judged for things you choose for yourself and your family. By going with your intuition, you will get steamrolled if others don't agree.

We tell women to follow their intuition with their pregnancy and birth all the time. To find what information they need, to do what they need to do in their pregnancy to protect themselves and their babies. And yet, when they do this an end up with an outcome that we think was wrong, like an induction or cesarean, we judge.

When a family chooses to bedshare or cosleep with their child because they feel it is the right thing to do, the natural community is so excited. But when they move their child to another room, or let their child cry (when they are obviously just going to cry anyway and old enough to not be at the age where they don't understand), we judge.

Intuition goes both ways. It can be anything from something like knowing you're pregnant before you are, to knowing that you are going to lose your baby before you actually do. It can be planning a very hands off homebirth to being in labor and knowing that something is wrong and a transfer is necessary before any signs show. It can be keeping your child close or letting them sleep alone when they are old enough.

Intuition is at the very core of being a mother. You know your child better than anyone. For most, you grew that baby, you birthed that baby, you nurtured that baby. They are forever part of you.

We need to stop judging so heavily because we think they are doing something wrong. Just because you think would do it differently (though in reality you have no idea why they are actually choosing what they are) doesn't mean it is okay to slam another family.

We need to learn that everything has two sides. Intuition has two sides. The side where things are good and the side where they are bad. That's how life works.

We need to learn patience and acceptance of other families, of other mothers. Mom wars get us all nowhere. It turns people off to what we are trying to do. You can't yell at someone that they are doing it wrong and at the same time hope they will listen and learn something.

It will forever be the one in the crowd speaking in soft tones full of patience and love that people will listen to. The one yelling will have them turn away.

Be patient. Be with others how you would want them to be with you and your children. And in the end, go with your own gut regardless of what others say.

Embracing Your Inner "Crunchy"

noreply@blogger.com (Amy) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 19:11:00 +0000

I admit it, I’m what some people may classify as a “crunchy” mama. Being a type A, self-professed control freak with OCD tendencies, I’d always shirked off my crunchy status. Not that the two can’t coexist, as I am living proof, but I just had some silly, preconceived notion of what a supposedly crunchy person was. Despite being referred to in this manner by others, I never really identified with the term. However, when I found myself converting to unpaper towels, family cloth and mama cloth, there finally came a time when I could no longer deny it – I had to embrace my crunchiness!

I used to like to think of myself as a relatively eco-conscious person. I recycled, composted, and diligently washed out my plastic baggies. I grew a lot of our food and tried to can it when I could, and was always proud of the fact that our recycling output at the curb was 3-4 times the amount of our regular trash. I always knew I could do more, but it wasn’t until we started trying to conceive that I really began my quest to try to lead a more natural lifestyle.

After being diagnosed with just about every hormone related affliction that can adversely affect achieving a successful pregnancy, I began to investigate why and how this could’ve happened to me. I was angry. Some women had just one hurdle to get over, while each of my 3 surgeries over the course of a year and a half would uncover another, and another and another. Each time they found something new it would explain why the previous months of fertility treatments, pain, heartbreak and sometimes miscarriages were completely and utterly futile. I felt like I had all the odds stacked against me. I spent what felt like all three years on bed rest, recovering from all of the above, plus many complications like ovarian cyst ruptures, ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, and even a rare second bout of mono in the midst of it all at the age of 30. It gave me a lot of time to kill at my computer, and that’s where my real journey began.

It started with toxic chemicals – pesticides and herbicides, BPA, phthalates, PBDEs, and the synthetic estrogens known as parabens. The more I learned, the more I realized it became a question of how could I NOT end up with all these hormone problems when surrounded by endocrine disruptors and synthetic estrogens everywhere I looked! I quickly converted our diet to mostly organic, whole foods, scrutinized every personal care product we use, and I began to phase out plastics in our home as much as possible. Since we were trying to conceive at the time, that led to researching baby gear and toys. I was appalled at the data regarding flame retardants in strollers (I never heard of too many kids being left in strollers in burning buildings?!) and bouncers, PVC in teethers, lead paint on snaps of baby clothing and zippers of boppy covers…you name it. I began to contact companies regarding the origin and makeup of their products, and formulating a baby registry of things that I regarded as “safe.” Keeping an updated list of all the baby products I found that were nontoxic did seem somewhat superficial and materialistic to me. I mean, I had the majority of my baby registry all in place years before I was even pregnant! However, in a strange, therapeutic way, it kept me going through the miscarriages, the failed fertility treatments, the surgeries and the endless physical pain and heartbreak. It was my way of telling myself, “You WILL need this baby registry one day – this will ultimately work.”

Of course no nontoxic baby registry could be complete without cloth diapers, and I found myself deeply immersed in all things cloth diapering. I still am! My daughter has not worn a disposable since our first day home from the hospital, and after over a year and a half, I hope to continue that trend until she’s done with diapers all together. And as far as toys, well, to the dismay of my family I have kept a strict no plastic policy. I only wish they would understand this is not simply a “no plastic toys” rule, it’s a no plastic anything if we can avoid it household rule.

I mentioned I used to be proud of our overflowing recycling bin because we had so little regular trash. Well, now I’m ashamed of it. I used to wash out plastic baggies, and now I avoid them like the plague. I do my best to keep ALL of our waste output to a minimum. This includes buying my milk in returnable glass bottles, and hauling my bags of jars to the co-op and filling them with as many bulk items as possible, including cleaning supplies. I’ve also tried to start making as much as I can from scratch – condiments, bread (in a breadmaker!), snacks and cereal to name a few. The real catalyst for all of this was becoming a stay at home mother. I realize I come from a position where I not only have the luxury of being home with my amazing daughter all day, but I also only have one child. This affords me time that many don’t have. So I chose to push myself. I continue to push myself. I know I can do more.

Once my cloth diapering routine was in place, the leap to unpaper towels, family cloth and mama cloth was more like a tiny step. It just made sense. I do find some of my extra “from scratch” items falling to the wayside now that my daughter is climbing things left and right, and has an innate proclivity for turning mundane items or situations into dangerous ones. Even so, I’m still hoping to move onto my next goal, which is to start sewing more clothing for her. I’ve made a few things, but I know I could do more.

Overall, I think the difference between myself in my 20’s and myself in my 30’s is I’ve set my focus closer to home. I used to think I could help change the world. In my 20’s, I thought I could convince people to change THEIR ways and make a difference. In my 30’s, I’ve turned that focus 100% inward, and I continue to challenge myself to do what I can to make a difference in the microcosm we call home. I realize many people out there do not have the kind of time I have to devote to such things, and perhaps do not live near co-ops with glorious bulk sections that sell milk in returnable glass bottles, but I still believe everybody can do a little something more. So I challenge you, as you read this, to take a moment and think of one small thing you can do to help lead a more sustainable life…and do it.