Archives for 2009

And no, I don’t mean drug-free. I just mean this:

Leaders of Canada’s pregnancy specialists are urging doctors not to induce labour unless there are compelling medical reasons.

The call is part of a campaign to “normalize” childbirth and efforts to reduce Canada’s soaring cesarean section rate. Some studies suggest inducing labour in a first-time mother significantly increases her risk of a C-section.

It’s great to have modern drugs and medicine at one’s disposal. But it can be taken too far. I’m not much of an expert, but I always thought babies came when they were ready and that nothing could really get them going before their time (as any 40-week-pregnant woman can tell you). Forcing Mother Nature’s hand may sometimes be the best, or least worst, option available. But doing it routinely just for convenience’s sake can’t be a good thing.

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Rebecca adds: In normal cases, though, a C-section is riskier for mother and baby than a vaginal birth, with or without medication. I really see this as an issue of how we frame childbirth, what we believe about women’s bodies, and once again, the illusion that we can control everything.

When something goes wrong after an intervention, the assumption seems to be that the intervention was necessary and carried some risk, whereas when something goes wrong with no intervention, the assumption is that an intervention would have fixed it. In urban Brazilian hospitals C-section rates are around 80%. There is no question that the great majority of these are not medically indicated, and that a large number of these women and children suffer avoidable problems.

The fact that so many women and doctors opt for C-sections when, by any rational medical standard, the risks outweigh the benefits, is a serious problem.

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Véronique adds: I love those professional associations’ statements. They have such an ability to state the obvious. The problem with the medicalization of childbirth is not that interventions are performed for no good reason but that women and their caregivers really think they have a good reason even when they do not. And who will challenge them? My last labour – baby is 3 ½ months – was induced because labour didn’t start spontaneously after the membranes ruptured. What I found difficult to accept was that labour had to be induced right away. Surely, they could give me a couple of hours? It’s not like my body had never done this before, right? Not only that but 9 years ago, when I had another pre-labour rupture, they – the medical practice guidelines – gave me 18 hours to deliver safely after the rupture. But there’s nothing like a couple of aptly quoted statistics on transmission levels of nasty group B strep to get an expecting mother – and fathers are probably worst – going medical.

The same goes for levels of c-sections. Yes, there is increasing momentum for c-sections on maternal request — a topic I have published on in 2007 – but those c-sections are still marginal compared to the “medically needed” ones. When you start scratching a little however, you see that while most c-sections are medically needed, the need is often created by other medical interventions such as inductions, epidurals, continuous fetal monitoring or non-physiological position (i.e. lying on your back as opposed to letting gravity be your friend). That’s one side of the c-section epidemic. The other side is increasing maternal age causing complications (things the women’s liberators didn’t tell you), increasing rates of medically assisted reproduction (or what I call “Your body didn’t really think it could handle it…”) causing complications such as multiple gestations and premature childbirth and increasing maternal girth causing blood-pressure and diabetes-related complications.

I had five natural drug-free deliveries – including one breech birth and 3 homebirths – and one induced but otherwise drug-free delivery. I should have had drugs the last time. But despite the complications, the pain, and the fact that I always promise myself never to do this again, childbirth remains the most empowering of experiences.

The march for progress continues:

Ontario parents of 4- and 5-year-olds should be able to leave their children at school from 7:30 in the morning to 6 p.m. as part of sweeping changes bringing daycare and kindergarten under one roof, the Star has learned.

A long-awaited report by Charles Pascal on full-day learning, to be released tomorrow, calls for a massive shakeup in children’s services that would see the Ministry of Education take full responsibility for learning from birth to young adulthood, sources say.

For families, it would mark the beginning of the so-called “seamless day,” where parents drop off and pick up their children in one location; kids then spend the day in one building, their school, instead of being ferried back and forth between class and child care. Research has shown that especially for younger children, the fewer transitions, the better.

How perfectly ghastly. This isn’t about what’s best for the kids. It’s about what’s more convenient to adults. Don’t let anybody tell you otherwise.

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Andrea adds: Probably has a whole lot to do with what’s beneficial for the Ministry of Education, too. Declining demographics means they have fewer students–schools are closing. How better to expand than to get themselves into the costly and time-consuming daycare business?

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Rebecca says: “A long-awaited report by Charles Pascal on full-day learning, …”  Oh for heaven’s sake. Support or oppose this notion (and I think it’s dreadful) can we at least please acknowledge that it’s day-long daycare, and nothing to do with education? If we talk like Orwell’s characters, the terrorists have won.

It turns out that having unprotected sex (on camera) with people who have lots of other unprotected sex (on or off camera) puts you at higher risk of catching a sexually transmitted disease. Who knew?
“Health advocates are using this new disclosure as an opportunity to push for mandatory condoms in all porn shoots. The porn industry responds, collectively, “No.”” 
I’m all in favour of preventing STDs. But considering the incredible damage done by porn to our culture, our understanding of sexuality, our kids, and so on and so forth, well, I’m not sure doing everything exactly the same, but with a rubber on, is really the answer.

Did we remind you to buy a t-shirt lately? Guaranteed to make an impact and get you noticed on that fashionable patio.

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Andrea adds: I was out walking with a friend the other day, and she was wearing her PET-P shirt. And a woman jogged by and said “Nice shirt!” No word of a lie.

When we write the biography of ProWomanProLife (and why shouldn’t we?), my part will read something like: “I wasn’t wild about abortion, but I’d never really felt like joining the usual pro-life groups. I found them either too religious or too preachy or too shrill or all of the above. But when Andrea asked me to join a group devoted to trying to change the culture – trying to end abortion by influencing the culture in a way that would make demand for abortion dwindle without resorting to legal threats and harsh punishment – now that was different.”

That was the one thing that made me join and want to help launch this website. The idea that we could end abortion by choice. Now other people are doing something similar, and – hooray! – the mainstream media is starting to pay attention. I knew Andrea was onto something…

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Andrea adds: The headline of that article made me laugh. (“Born again”). There is a small mistake, though, insofar as the ProWomanProLife slogan is attributed to Signal Hill. Anyways, I’m hopeful with all these groups working hard, even including those who want to change the law, that we’ll see some change.

So, Letterman’s defense of his remarks about the sexual activities of the Palin women comes down to him asserting that he was referring to 18-year-old Bristol and not 14-year-old Willow. Why is this any better? Is it the fact that he was joking about statutory rape that was really the problem, or is it the contempt he showed for the entire family by taking his jokes in that direction in the first place?
In spite of the fact that Letterman’s behaviour was sexist, and that feminists have been entirely silent about it, in my opinion the really interesting issue in Palin-hatred is about class, not sex. The Palins, before her entry into politics, anyway, were solidly middle class – at the blue collar end, at that. She has a bit of an accent, one that isn’t associated with erudition and sophistication. They have a number of children that, for coastal elites, is awkwardly high. And they’re tacky enough actually to believe in and live their religion, as compared to just going to a beautiful building where the choir sings traditional songs, and not letting anything as silly as faith shape their behaviour. I’m waiting for a book about that. Any potential authors out there?
On a more politically relevant note, Palin denies that she’s a “frontrunner” for 2012, for what it’s worth. I kind of hope she isn’t a frontrunner- I think it will take something extraordinary for the current incumbent to lose the next election, and I don’t want to see her lose in 2012, because then her chances of getting the nomination in 2016 are slim. I’d like to see her stay as Governor, or perhaps become a Senator, keep building support and credibility and connections, and then run in 2016.

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Andrea adds: I still have faith (the hope for things as of yet unseen) that extraordinary things can happen. (“I think it will take something extraordinary for the current incumbent to lose the next election”). Call me a dreamer. And yet I too don’t believe Palin should be a frontrunner for 2012. I conclude that she was not ready for the vice presidential candidacy this last time round. She needs some time to get her head around the wily ways of the Hamptons set.

I’m not dishing dirt, but rather reviewing it. Or reading a review of it. There’s a book out called Dirt and Wendy Shalit, who I like, has written this review:

Ms. Lewis’s anthology ­offers a series of lively essays about “who wields the vacuum and why.” Subjects range from household help to a widower who realized too late how much his wife did for their home. Some authors are baby boomers, others are in their 30s or younger—but most are women who brag about not wielding a vacuum and an inability to keep order.

I do not brag about an inability to keep order. Au contraire. Everything has a place, and life is good when my tiny apartment is clean and organized. Like a ship. Life gets even better if I remember to buy flowers, just because they are pretty.  (Not like a ship. I don’t imagine there are flowers on the high seas.)

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Brigitte would like to illustrate another point of view… (I’m not proud of it, I’m just trying to be honest)

Read the voice of a young woman who wants to provide abortions though she doesn’t think it is morally right:

I agree that ending an unwanted pregnancy is a tragedy. When I advocate for reproductive rights, for choice, I don’t claim that abortion is morally acceptable. I think that it’s a very private, intensely personal decision.

I think this sort of argument does sway a lot of people. She’s making the case for compassionate killing, and if we as a culture didn’t think abortion was compassionate, I don’t think we would offer them.

Your funny video for today.

We may never find out what happened or why. Read the story and shake with horror like I did. Then remind yourself that it is not a crime in this country to kill a viable child who isn’t born yet and throw the remains in the garbage.

The woman who is charged with concealing the bodies of three babies in a London, Ont. basement is believed to be their mother, reports say.

According to a charge sheet filed by police in court, investigators estimate the infants died in the years 2001, 2002 and 2006.

Jennifer Sinn, 32, faces three counts each of concealing the body of a child and offering an indignity to a dead human body. Court documents reportedly identify the woman as the babies’ alleged mother.

The remains were found on Saturday by the woman’s boyfriend, who told neighbours he found bloody blankets in a box in the basement.

He also said his girlfriend had been carrying around the boxes for two years, neighbours said.