I'm going to be prepping over the next couple of months to get my house unpacked so I can actually do stuff in my space. I had a talk with myself this morning and came up with an idea that as I develop it is actually getting more and more cool. It seems completely meant to be and this is the perfect time to get started with it in my life and the time of year.
I often bounce ideas off of my spirit guide. I'm convinced he hangs around and takes part wholly in these "thinking out loud" discussions I have. I tend to get some serious moments of inspiration when I talk to myself and this is partly due to the sparks he sends my way.
So starting in January of 2014 I'm going to be reliving my past 36 years in reverse. 3 years each month. I'll connect these years primary experience with life themes. rituals needs and journaling. The idea is to process and purge my past and then at the end of the year rebirth myself.
I did a schedule draft to try to brainstorm ideas for rituals, working with the elements and major themes to incorporate. The phases of the pagan holidays and the wheel of the year seem to align perfectly to what I am doing. It's uncanny how sweetly they all seem to line up. I spent a good two hours working on the two calendar drafts I have with many moments spent staring into space reliving some stuff.
I intend to blog once a month minimum but will probably blog more. I really need to get back to journaling regularly. These past 9 months have been so bad with all the crap happening while mom was in the hospital and nursing home, with my brother's illegal and abusive behavior, I just shut down and got into angry survival mode. It has not been good financially or stress wise. I've been physically ill from the lack of sleep and constant worry. I've had muscle spasms from driving 12 hours a day to get back to my former town and deal with the crazy people there. My wrists and shoulders still seize up painfully and it's been weeks since the last trip. Now that the house is on the market, I need not worry about travel anymore.
I'm at this point where I can cut off everyone from my past, never go back to that place and again and finally live in the moment, in the present with the family that I have created. I'm hoping the estate is all wrapped up by January first as well. Then I won't have to deal with the lawyer while I'm going through this process. I need all strings cut.
I'd love to blog a couple times a week and I'm sure the incorporation of daily meditation will give me a lot to talk about. I don't intend to sugar coat anything as well. I've got journals going back to age 12 so I'll have accurate recollections as far as my point of view of many things. The only thing I won't have a clear picture of is the actual abuse. I didn't itemize many of the events in my diaries. I don't know if it was denial or what mental process was behind not writing these things down. I wrote about everything else but the parts about being hit, choked, etc. never seemed to make it into the records.
Even my relationships in college and beyond I tended to leave out the codependent and threatening stuff. Often times I would stop journaling all together when things got really intense. I have memories for those but as is often the case, what I remember and what I wrote down tend to diverge as time passes. In some cases I might have to focus on the feelings from around that age period and work with those.
I finally get to age 1 and before birth around Samhain. Perfect match up again. That's when I'll have to start dealing with my adoption, abandonment issues, and purification. I'll use water for that time period. I need fire for the initial purge and severing at the beginning of the year in January.
I'll get a calendar worked up and get it online by the end of the year. I need to consult with some people for objective perspective and help filling in some holes in rituals and themes.
I'll also be moving this process to another blog. This one is for political stuff and career angst.
I know it's hard sticking to one thing for a full twelve months. I've done long rituals before but never anything more than a few days. My grieving ritual for my cat involved a month long process so this will be very much like trying to get a hummingbird to stop flapping and flitting. Not really my strong point.
Oh, well. It's a good time for death and rebirth. Better late than never.
Friday, October 25, 2013
Thursday, September 5, 2013
My Birth Experience--Good and Bad
Milk drunk: beautifully written
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kim-simon/milk-drunk-breastfeeding_b_3494130.html
I've always been a total control freak and more intellectual than earth mother type. I approached pregnancy the same way. My husband and I put off having a baby until we were established career-wise and financially. My work as a teacher never did get stable and I went through three positions until I finally realized I would never have a baby of I waited for tenure. I was 33 when I conceived.
We tried to time it so I wouldn't miss out on another teaching opportunity, but sure enough I didn't conceive right way. Duh! For some reason I thought we'd get it the first month we tried. Part of it was stress. I think I might have skipped an ovulation out of shear stress and rage at my position. I was in a really messed up job where I was being sabotaged and attacked from all sides. Not a great environment to be open to conception and new life.
The moment the classes ended I conceived that week. Funny how that worked. I noticed fatigue immediately, before I had even taken the test. I had been peeing on sticks for three months between ovulation tests and pregnancy tests to keep track of ovulation and periods. I have actually been keeping track of my cycle since I was 18 in various books. I track my cycle, moon phases and mood swings.
There is a correlation between those things.
We read everything we could get our hands on, watched Pregnant in America, Business of Being Born, read Ina May Gaskin, Bradley Method and got the CDs for hypnobirthing. Didn't use the CDs.
That summer in the first trimester my cat was dying of cancer and days after I had moved back home from Elmira, grandma fell down the stairs and ended up in the hospital. About 6 weeks later she died. I guess her body couldn't handle the trauma and just couldn't recover. Frankly, I think it had more to do with the fact that her care kept getting transferred from one doctor to another, and they didn't seem to be checking her chart but just starting her over again on new meds every time. Not sure they know what the hell they are doing at that hospital. One doctor even called her loony right in front of her. She gave him the finger. I loved her. She had such spunk.
My cat died a few weeks later. I had her cremated and did a lot of candle-lighting and praying for her. I really had a hard time with her death. I found in Starhawk's book: Pagan book of Living and Dying, some really good chants for helping the soul pass on. It helped to say them every night and light a candle. I did some yoga to try to relax. I was having some really bad insomnia and rages over the job situation. I couldn't let go of the resentment. Four college degrees and permanent certification and I'm less likely to get a job than a kid fresh out with their BA.
I did a part-time gig that Holiday Season. 12 bucks an hour but I couldn't handle more than 4 hours a day. I wanted to but after 4 hours on my feet I was ready to sleep for four hours. They were really good with the pregnancy though. I could pee when I needed to, drink when I needed to and stretch out if necessary and they were not bitchy at all like some employers. Although that may have been cause I was a 2-month temp.
Then, right after that job I threw my back out while vacuuming. Damn relaxin hormone. I went to a chiropractor whose name I got from my midwife. Dr Christopher was great. Eileen, my midwife, attributed the earlier labor to getting adjusted regularly like I did after the injury. It was so painful. My L vertebrae were so out of alignment one leg was 3.5 cm shorter than the other. His wife also had Eileen as her midwife with their third child. Really cool.
I should probably mention that I started with a regular obstetrician. An older man who seemed really cool. He was really friendly and seemed personable. It was on the third visit with my husband that we mentioned the midwife. The previous week we had visited with Eileen and wanted to know if I was a candidate for home birth. I was completely healthy and everything looked good. We mentioned it to the OB and he about lost his shit. He was pissed you could almost see him shaking. He said stuff like he hoped she knew what she was doing, was educated, and we need to do what's best for us. Then he practically ran out of the office. Woh! That was a close call. Considering what happened with the birth itself I'm glad we had my Amy, my doula, and Eileen.
In January, a close friend died from a drug overdose. Since her cancer in high school she was on and off pain killers and got addicted. She had been clean for 6 months and must have relapsed badly. She didn't make it through. I still have all the letters we mailed each other. We wrote actual letter, not e-mail or texts. It's wonderful to have those things.
As for the early labor, it wasn't that early. I had my daughter about 3 weeks short of my due date. I ate eggs, and venison and whole milk. I did not restrict my eating, just tried to keep it natural and balanced. She was more than ready to come out and fully developed. Usually women with their first babies are late so I think we did well.
I actually went into labor about 4 weeks early. We had just had the baby shower that Sunday, and Monday night was my last Natural Childbirth class with Amy. I was having cramps. Amy made a joke about how I was going to call her later that night in labor. Sure enough, I woke up about 3am Tues. morning with broken waters. Not a lot. It was maybe a couple table spoons. It turns out baby's head was fully descended against the cervix and her skull acted as a plug keeping the fluid in mostly. I called the midwife and Amy that afternoon. No rush to get started. I had an appointment with Eileen Wednesday morning anyway so we just kept that appointment.
There were some contractions but they were really mild. Eileen confirmed my waters had broken Wed and sent me to the store for blue cohosh drops. We could only find black so we tried that. It did help the contractions come on. Hubbie and I went out for dinner at a Mexican place. I was hoping spicy food would help. Wednesday night was bad. Amy came over for a few hours but birth plateaued so she went home in the morning. Thursday night was another bad night and Amy and Eileen were there. Eileen brought a young midwife in training with her. Really nice girl. Yolanda I think her name was. She had a very calm and calming presence.
Again the labor subsided by morning. Friday again things built up really bad. Eileen tried massage to help with the contractions and stimulate things along. It was horrible. It turns out later, I found out I wasn't dilating. My uterus was doing its work but the cervix wasn't opening. I think it may have been psychological. I wasn't ready to let her go even though she was more than ready to come out. By Saturday morning I was done.
At about 4 am we headed to the hospital. Eileen checked me in. Amy had gone home so hubbie called her to meet up there. Eileen then had to leave because another woman was going into labor. I had asked for the epidural at that point so the birth became medicated and she couldn't really maintain her position in that setting. We had talked about it before we left and she said maybe I just needed it to relax. I'll fall asleep and wake up fully dilated. That's kinda what happened actually.
The first anesthesiologist was a cool guy but I desperately wanted to eat so they gave me food then made me wait for a few hours. Fear of puking and suffocating on the puke. They starve you at the hospital. The anesthesiologist on duty who gave me the needle was a dick. It wasn't the same guy. Everyone at the hospital was really cool about my contracts. Whenever they came they would stop talking and wait, check to see if I was okay and out of it, then pick up the conversation thread. This guy talked over me the whole time then gave me this sneer like I was an invalid. "Did you understand what I just said?"
My husband even hollered at him when I was contracting. "She's having a contraction. Dude, she's having a contraction." It didn't seem to penetrate this guy. Wonder where he was loaned from. He got the prick wrong too. My right leg jerked and went cold. He had to take it out and stick it in again. As it turned out, it was still off. My right leg went totally numb but my torso and left leg felt no numbness at all. I actually and glad about that because I was still able to feel the contractions later when I was in full labor and control the progress.
I remember the attendant who interviewed us being shocked when we mentioned 5 days of broken water with no infection or complications. Eileen was doing an internal victory dance. On one of my checkups after the birth she said she had mentioned such a thing to OB and other doctors and no one would listen to her that women could go beyond 12 hours of broken waters without complications. My case totally confirmed that. Hospital policy is to freak out when a woman gets close to 12 hours of broken waters labor.
The catheter sucked and it burned and bothered me horribly. But the epidural seemed to sedate me. I was able to sleep a bit. Nurses came in every hour and checked things. They gave me like 6 bags of hydration. I was so bloated with water it was ridiculous. After noon I woke up with this rush of energy. It felt like my whole body was one big vise-like force. I've never felt suck pressure and I yelled. I need to push now.
Amy had arrived by then and got me focused. She had told me she had never seen anyone so focused during a contraction. The woman she had assisted before me had gone through the whole birth process in 3 hours. Really fast progression. Mine was the exact opposite but she had a hard time reading me. I had the signs of the different stages but I was too calm and focused. It was the yoga and the spellwork I think. I was so used to focused and subtle pressures that I applied that same mindset to birth. Eileen had mentioned later that my distance swimming training when I was younger must have helped as well. It's hard to unlearn those mental habits once they've ingrained themselves.
A female attendant checked my cervix. It sucked. I think a male attendant had done so before her the first time I yelled about needing to push. I remember crying, kinda hysterical. I didn't want his hands in me. Rape-victim trauma mental space. The female attendant came later and checked me again and pushed aside the little lip of cervix left. Oh, that sucked!
Pushing wasn't too bad. Probably because it was non medicated contractions and in my head I was progressing. Catheter was gone and I could still feel the uterus contract. I was able to "ride the wave". I was pushing a little bit too long. The OB who checked me warned that the cervix could swell so Amy adjusted her coaching. She cut me off on 8 instead of letting me push longer. Worked like a charm.
No swelling problems at all.
I think I was pushing for maybe almost 2 hours. I remember my husband snapping at the male attendant, what was he doing? He had put a needle in the IV and gave me something. Apparently I was given pitosin because the baby wasn't descending fast enough for their liking. No consent. This brought on a couple of interventions that if they had just given me another hour I might not have needed. The ice pack on my arm wouldn't have been necessary. Pitosin burns your vein when it goes in. I ended up having an episiotomy because the baby's head got stuck and I wouldn't stretch anymore.
After the cut she slid right out. The cut hurt really bad. It was not just a pinch. I'm squeezing my kegels in memory of it. I remember the attendant joking, "Wow, that epidural didn't do anything for you." If they had given me that extra hour I may have stretched a bit more without the pitosin rushing things. I'd been in labor 5 days with broken waters, another 45 minutes was not going to make that much of a difference.
First words out of the attendant's mouth was "It's a girl."
My husband snapped at her. "Do you have to do that now?"
"We need to know for the paperwork."
"Right now? Aren't there more important things like is she alive and breathing?"
Hubbie and I wanted it to be a surprised so it kinda ruined the fun discovery part.
I remember being in a bit of a daze. I think I might have been in a state of shock. There was nothing but me and my husband. Then all of a sudden there's this living creature that came out of seemingly nowhere. My head was still trying to wrap around it when they put her on my stomach. I was like "Shit. What now?"
One of the nurses stuck around a bit to help the baby latch on. We tried for about 15 minutes. She was having trouble. I think she was just really exhausted.
I got pretty much abandoned by everyone except my hubbie after that. They did bring me a meal and hubbie took off his shirt and kept her close to his chest. The nurse who brought my food turned off the warmer. That wasn't needed. Hubbie is a great source of furnace heat. It felt like a couple of hours before an attendant finally came and helped me clean up and change. I had to use 2 maxi pads, the big puffy kind, to catch the bleeding.
We got moved to a room. Apparently the hospital was getting slammed. It was full moon. Eileen even had 3 births close together. I was 4 weeks early, one was on time and one was 2 weeks late. She usually tries to space everything out but her patients didn't comply this time.
I got some flack at the hospital for breastfeeding. They wanted me on a schedule and if I didn't seem to be feeding the baby enough they would give her formula. We did rooming in so we could spend time with her. I couldn't stop holding her. Hubbie went with her every time they took her to weigh her and draw blood. He was like a hawk. They gave her sugar water at one point claiming it would help numb the pain of a blood draw. All it did was make her really awake, hyper and cranky. Then she crashed and wouldn't wake up for hours.
The food was pathetic. I was so hungry I could have eaten 2 servings or 3 of everything. Tom let me have his a few times and got stuff from the cafeteria. A woman came around with juice boxes and crackers. I ate everything she would give me. Seriously, bring your own food. They don't feed you enough. I had never felt so hungry and thirsty before. OMG
It was so strange trying to get used to just her existence. Diaper changing, feeding and listening to her breathe. I didn't experience that rush they talk about at the birth. It could have been the drugs but it may have just been my mindset. I went into shock rather than euphoria.
My mother-in-law brought in a babycarrier for us. We didn't plan on a hospital birth and so didn't even have a bag packed. Hubbie had to go back to the house to get stuff later that night after the birth. When it was time to leave, the nurse ran all over looking for a wheel chair. One of the women at the desk tried to tell her that they don't do that anymore. Mothers have to walk out. The nurse was like, "I'll find you a chair. That's ridiculous." I totally agree.
I put the baby in a onesie and mittens and covered her up with blankets in the chair. I got wheeled out and we got into the car. It was a bit eerie. Coming home with another person.
We had also gotten another cat from a friend of a friend and they had to do their pecking order determination over the week that we had all those people in and out as well as being gone for 3 days with the birth. Poor Shortcake. She didn't know what was up. She lost her companion Georgia 6 months prior and has to deal with this new cat and a baby all in one week.
We tried co-sleeping. It didn't work. I couldn't sleep with the sound of her breathing. It kept waking me up.
I think worrying kicked up my adrenaline. I kept checking her breathing. We tried for about 2 weeks before I switched things up.
Breastfeeding on demand was tough. Eileen tried to help but we just struggled along and I was getting anxious. I managed to find a lactation consultant. She calmed my fears and told me if I was worried about her getting enough to combine nursing and pumping. She really did talk me down and told me I was doing fine, just keep working at it. My baby might be a little behind the curve because she was born before her due date.
Eileen was the one who introduced me to the nipple shield. That helped. I used a combination of things. I nursed her as much as I could then followed with pumping to get the extra out. I used the nipple shield to help her latch and prevent some of the pain. Eileen warned prolonged use would decrease milk production so I started with the shield nursing her then would remove it to nurse without. It took about 2 months but we managed to nurse without the shield eventually.
Sleeping moved around a lot. Baby started sleeping downstairs on the couch in a little bed we had for her.
It was actually a plastic coated changing pad that attaches to the top of a dresser. We used it as her bed for the first 2 months. Her sleeping patterns changed so much we had to keep adjusting things. She slept with us in her bed for the first week. Then downstairs on the couch in her bed for a few weeks.
My boobs were so sore from trying to nurse on demand that I finally gave her a pacifier. I just couldn't do it anymore. My nipples were purple. Ange mentioned limiting the time to 45 min or less then breaking for 2 hours. This would get her to nurse seriously instead of just sipping for extended periods. I also moved her to her swing. Hubbie rigged it so we could plug it in and not go through so many batteries. That swing was the only thing that could calm her and get her to sleep. She slept in it downstairs with me sleeping on the couch for a few months.
I lived on that couch downstairs for months. Hubbie went back to work after the first 4 weeks and I wanted us to stay downstairs to try to keep the noise away from him so he could sleep and get to work. That was a great fear of his. Falling asleep at work and getting disciplined or fired for it. He managed.
His biggest issue was my emotional instability. The sleep deprivation would send me into crying fits and rages. I remember screaming and slamming the front door over and over again. He ended up using some sick days to give me a break when he could. Those breaks were always limited because of my breasts being a source of food. I either had to pump or be there to feed her, even if I did manage to get out of the house.
I hated taking her out in public too. She would cry and be cranky and it just wasn't worth it. I had more than a little resentment over it.
At one point he was going to run out and get formula at 2 am just to he could feed her and I could get some sleep for a change. I really got upset. The idea of failure just flooded my head and I couldn't stand it.
I went back to work, substitute teaching, part time in June when she was 4 months roughly. Figured out the pumping routine at the school. They were good. They had a privacy room for pumping and would work with my schedule to get more than one break for pumping according to my needs. Really advanced attitude considering federal guidelines are still being drawn up now to support nursing mothers.
We had to get over the traveling issues because we had to travel quite a bit that spring. My uncle died in march. I visited my mom and dad in April and then dad died in July. I had to breastfeed in the car and at mom's house. She let us have her room those times and bought a traveling cradle for her then later a crib.
Mom died this past April as well. She went into the hospital before Christmas 2012 and spent the last few months at a nursing home. We brought baby up to see her as much as possible. I'll have to write about that bullshit surrounding my brother later. Total nightmare. Still not resolved as the estate is still being worked out.
I managed to nurse for a year and a half. At one point she was losing weight and it totally was the book's fault. What to Expect When You're Expecting specifically said that you should not nurse and feed puree foods at the same time as it was too many calories. It specifically said to "replace" a nursing with a feeding of puree food. So baby wasn't getting the milk fat she needed and started to lose weight. We were down to 4-5 feedings a day not including puree. She was really skinny by 12 months. I started giving her whole cow's milk as soon as we could to compensate. My milk was drying up after that whole mis-information.
I hate that book and threw it out. I was so pissed.
She's 2 and a half at this point. She's strong and healthy and will eat anything. Loves tomatoes. No allergies or gastric issues. Good sturdy genetic stock. I cover the nutrition thing in my previous blog post.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kim-simon/milk-drunk-breastfeeding_b_3494130.html
I've always been a total control freak and more intellectual than earth mother type. I approached pregnancy the same way. My husband and I put off having a baby until we were established career-wise and financially. My work as a teacher never did get stable and I went through three positions until I finally realized I would never have a baby of I waited for tenure. I was 33 when I conceived.
We tried to time it so I wouldn't miss out on another teaching opportunity, but sure enough I didn't conceive right way. Duh! For some reason I thought we'd get it the first month we tried. Part of it was stress. I think I might have skipped an ovulation out of shear stress and rage at my position. I was in a really messed up job where I was being sabotaged and attacked from all sides. Not a great environment to be open to conception and new life.
The moment the classes ended I conceived that week. Funny how that worked. I noticed fatigue immediately, before I had even taken the test. I had been peeing on sticks for three months between ovulation tests and pregnancy tests to keep track of ovulation and periods. I have actually been keeping track of my cycle since I was 18 in various books. I track my cycle, moon phases and mood swings.
There is a correlation between those things.
We read everything we could get our hands on, watched Pregnant in America, Business of Being Born, read Ina May Gaskin, Bradley Method and got the CDs for hypnobirthing. Didn't use the CDs.
That summer in the first trimester my cat was dying of cancer and days after I had moved back home from Elmira, grandma fell down the stairs and ended up in the hospital. About 6 weeks later she died. I guess her body couldn't handle the trauma and just couldn't recover. Frankly, I think it had more to do with the fact that her care kept getting transferred from one doctor to another, and they didn't seem to be checking her chart but just starting her over again on new meds every time. Not sure they know what the hell they are doing at that hospital. One doctor even called her loony right in front of her. She gave him the finger. I loved her. She had such spunk.
My cat died a few weeks later. I had her cremated and did a lot of candle-lighting and praying for her. I really had a hard time with her death. I found in Starhawk's book: Pagan book of Living and Dying, some really good chants for helping the soul pass on. It helped to say them every night and light a candle. I did some yoga to try to relax. I was having some really bad insomnia and rages over the job situation. I couldn't let go of the resentment. Four college degrees and permanent certification and I'm less likely to get a job than a kid fresh out with their BA.
I did a part-time gig that Holiday Season. 12 bucks an hour but I couldn't handle more than 4 hours a day. I wanted to but after 4 hours on my feet I was ready to sleep for four hours. They were really good with the pregnancy though. I could pee when I needed to, drink when I needed to and stretch out if necessary and they were not bitchy at all like some employers. Although that may have been cause I was a 2-month temp.
Then, right after that job I threw my back out while vacuuming. Damn relaxin hormone. I went to a chiropractor whose name I got from my midwife. Dr Christopher was great. Eileen, my midwife, attributed the earlier labor to getting adjusted regularly like I did after the injury. It was so painful. My L vertebrae were so out of alignment one leg was 3.5 cm shorter than the other. His wife also had Eileen as her midwife with their third child. Really cool.
I should probably mention that I started with a regular obstetrician. An older man who seemed really cool. He was really friendly and seemed personable. It was on the third visit with my husband that we mentioned the midwife. The previous week we had visited with Eileen and wanted to know if I was a candidate for home birth. I was completely healthy and everything looked good. We mentioned it to the OB and he about lost his shit. He was pissed you could almost see him shaking. He said stuff like he hoped she knew what she was doing, was educated, and we need to do what's best for us. Then he practically ran out of the office. Woh! That was a close call. Considering what happened with the birth itself I'm glad we had my Amy, my doula, and Eileen.
In January, a close friend died from a drug overdose. Since her cancer in high school she was on and off pain killers and got addicted. She had been clean for 6 months and must have relapsed badly. She didn't make it through. I still have all the letters we mailed each other. We wrote actual letter, not e-mail or texts. It's wonderful to have those things.
As for the early labor, it wasn't that early. I had my daughter about 3 weeks short of my due date. I ate eggs, and venison and whole milk. I did not restrict my eating, just tried to keep it natural and balanced. She was more than ready to come out and fully developed. Usually women with their first babies are late so I think we did well.
I actually went into labor about 4 weeks early. We had just had the baby shower that Sunday, and Monday night was my last Natural Childbirth class with Amy. I was having cramps. Amy made a joke about how I was going to call her later that night in labor. Sure enough, I woke up about 3am Tues. morning with broken waters. Not a lot. It was maybe a couple table spoons. It turns out baby's head was fully descended against the cervix and her skull acted as a plug keeping the fluid in mostly. I called the midwife and Amy that afternoon. No rush to get started. I had an appointment with Eileen Wednesday morning anyway so we just kept that appointment.
There were some contractions but they were really mild. Eileen confirmed my waters had broken Wed and sent me to the store for blue cohosh drops. We could only find black so we tried that. It did help the contractions come on. Hubbie and I went out for dinner at a Mexican place. I was hoping spicy food would help. Wednesday night was bad. Amy came over for a few hours but birth plateaued so she went home in the morning. Thursday night was another bad night and Amy and Eileen were there. Eileen brought a young midwife in training with her. Really nice girl. Yolanda I think her name was. She had a very calm and calming presence.
Again the labor subsided by morning. Friday again things built up really bad. Eileen tried massage to help with the contractions and stimulate things along. It was horrible. It turns out later, I found out I wasn't dilating. My uterus was doing its work but the cervix wasn't opening. I think it may have been psychological. I wasn't ready to let her go even though she was more than ready to come out. By Saturday morning I was done.
At about 4 am we headed to the hospital. Eileen checked me in. Amy had gone home so hubbie called her to meet up there. Eileen then had to leave because another woman was going into labor. I had asked for the epidural at that point so the birth became medicated and she couldn't really maintain her position in that setting. We had talked about it before we left and she said maybe I just needed it to relax. I'll fall asleep and wake up fully dilated. That's kinda what happened actually.
The first anesthesiologist was a cool guy but I desperately wanted to eat so they gave me food then made me wait for a few hours. Fear of puking and suffocating on the puke. They starve you at the hospital. The anesthesiologist on duty who gave me the needle was a dick. It wasn't the same guy. Everyone at the hospital was really cool about my contracts. Whenever they came they would stop talking and wait, check to see if I was okay and out of it, then pick up the conversation thread. This guy talked over me the whole time then gave me this sneer like I was an invalid. "Did you understand what I just said?"
My husband even hollered at him when I was contracting. "She's having a contraction. Dude, she's having a contraction." It didn't seem to penetrate this guy. Wonder where he was loaned from. He got the prick wrong too. My right leg jerked and went cold. He had to take it out and stick it in again. As it turned out, it was still off. My right leg went totally numb but my torso and left leg felt no numbness at all. I actually and glad about that because I was still able to feel the contractions later when I was in full labor and control the progress.
I remember the attendant who interviewed us being shocked when we mentioned 5 days of broken water with no infection or complications. Eileen was doing an internal victory dance. On one of my checkups after the birth she said she had mentioned such a thing to OB and other doctors and no one would listen to her that women could go beyond 12 hours of broken waters without complications. My case totally confirmed that. Hospital policy is to freak out when a woman gets close to 12 hours of broken waters labor.
The catheter sucked and it burned and bothered me horribly. But the epidural seemed to sedate me. I was able to sleep a bit. Nurses came in every hour and checked things. They gave me like 6 bags of hydration. I was so bloated with water it was ridiculous. After noon I woke up with this rush of energy. It felt like my whole body was one big vise-like force. I've never felt suck pressure and I yelled. I need to push now.
Amy had arrived by then and got me focused. She had told me she had never seen anyone so focused during a contraction. The woman she had assisted before me had gone through the whole birth process in 3 hours. Really fast progression. Mine was the exact opposite but she had a hard time reading me. I had the signs of the different stages but I was too calm and focused. It was the yoga and the spellwork I think. I was so used to focused and subtle pressures that I applied that same mindset to birth. Eileen had mentioned later that my distance swimming training when I was younger must have helped as well. It's hard to unlearn those mental habits once they've ingrained themselves.
A female attendant checked my cervix. It sucked. I think a male attendant had done so before her the first time I yelled about needing to push. I remember crying, kinda hysterical. I didn't want his hands in me. Rape-victim trauma mental space. The female attendant came later and checked me again and pushed aside the little lip of cervix left. Oh, that sucked!
Pushing wasn't too bad. Probably because it was non medicated contractions and in my head I was progressing. Catheter was gone and I could still feel the uterus contract. I was able to "ride the wave". I was pushing a little bit too long. The OB who checked me warned that the cervix could swell so Amy adjusted her coaching. She cut me off on 8 instead of letting me push longer. Worked like a charm.
No swelling problems at all.
I think I was pushing for maybe almost 2 hours. I remember my husband snapping at the male attendant, what was he doing? He had put a needle in the IV and gave me something. Apparently I was given pitosin because the baby wasn't descending fast enough for their liking. No consent. This brought on a couple of interventions that if they had just given me another hour I might not have needed. The ice pack on my arm wouldn't have been necessary. Pitosin burns your vein when it goes in. I ended up having an episiotomy because the baby's head got stuck and I wouldn't stretch anymore.
After the cut she slid right out. The cut hurt really bad. It was not just a pinch. I'm squeezing my kegels in memory of it. I remember the attendant joking, "Wow, that epidural didn't do anything for you." If they had given me that extra hour I may have stretched a bit more without the pitosin rushing things. I'd been in labor 5 days with broken waters, another 45 minutes was not going to make that much of a difference.
First words out of the attendant's mouth was "It's a girl."
My husband snapped at her. "Do you have to do that now?"
"We need to know for the paperwork."
"Right now? Aren't there more important things like is she alive and breathing?"
Hubbie and I wanted it to be a surprised so it kinda ruined the fun discovery part.
I remember being in a bit of a daze. I think I might have been in a state of shock. There was nothing but me and my husband. Then all of a sudden there's this living creature that came out of seemingly nowhere. My head was still trying to wrap around it when they put her on my stomach. I was like "Shit. What now?"
One of the nurses stuck around a bit to help the baby latch on. We tried for about 15 minutes. She was having trouble. I think she was just really exhausted.
I got pretty much abandoned by everyone except my hubbie after that. They did bring me a meal and hubbie took off his shirt and kept her close to his chest. The nurse who brought my food turned off the warmer. That wasn't needed. Hubbie is a great source of furnace heat. It felt like a couple of hours before an attendant finally came and helped me clean up and change. I had to use 2 maxi pads, the big puffy kind, to catch the bleeding.
We got moved to a room. Apparently the hospital was getting slammed. It was full moon. Eileen even had 3 births close together. I was 4 weeks early, one was on time and one was 2 weeks late. She usually tries to space everything out but her patients didn't comply this time.
I got some flack at the hospital for breastfeeding. They wanted me on a schedule and if I didn't seem to be feeding the baby enough they would give her formula. We did rooming in so we could spend time with her. I couldn't stop holding her. Hubbie went with her every time they took her to weigh her and draw blood. He was like a hawk. They gave her sugar water at one point claiming it would help numb the pain of a blood draw. All it did was make her really awake, hyper and cranky. Then she crashed and wouldn't wake up for hours.
The food was pathetic. I was so hungry I could have eaten 2 servings or 3 of everything. Tom let me have his a few times and got stuff from the cafeteria. A woman came around with juice boxes and crackers. I ate everything she would give me. Seriously, bring your own food. They don't feed you enough. I had never felt so hungry and thirsty before. OMG
It was so strange trying to get used to just her existence. Diaper changing, feeding and listening to her breathe. I didn't experience that rush they talk about at the birth. It could have been the drugs but it may have just been my mindset. I went into shock rather than euphoria.
My mother-in-law brought in a babycarrier for us. We didn't plan on a hospital birth and so didn't even have a bag packed. Hubbie had to go back to the house to get stuff later that night after the birth. When it was time to leave, the nurse ran all over looking for a wheel chair. One of the women at the desk tried to tell her that they don't do that anymore. Mothers have to walk out. The nurse was like, "I'll find you a chair. That's ridiculous." I totally agree.
I put the baby in a onesie and mittens and covered her up with blankets in the chair. I got wheeled out and we got into the car. It was a bit eerie. Coming home with another person.
We had also gotten another cat from a friend of a friend and they had to do their pecking order determination over the week that we had all those people in and out as well as being gone for 3 days with the birth. Poor Shortcake. She didn't know what was up. She lost her companion Georgia 6 months prior and has to deal with this new cat and a baby all in one week.
We tried co-sleeping. It didn't work. I couldn't sleep with the sound of her breathing. It kept waking me up.
I think worrying kicked up my adrenaline. I kept checking her breathing. We tried for about 2 weeks before I switched things up.
Breastfeeding on demand was tough. Eileen tried to help but we just struggled along and I was getting anxious. I managed to find a lactation consultant. She calmed my fears and told me if I was worried about her getting enough to combine nursing and pumping. She really did talk me down and told me I was doing fine, just keep working at it. My baby might be a little behind the curve because she was born before her due date.
Eileen was the one who introduced me to the nipple shield. That helped. I used a combination of things. I nursed her as much as I could then followed with pumping to get the extra out. I used the nipple shield to help her latch and prevent some of the pain. Eileen warned prolonged use would decrease milk production so I started with the shield nursing her then would remove it to nurse without. It took about 2 months but we managed to nurse without the shield eventually.
Sleeping moved around a lot. Baby started sleeping downstairs on the couch in a little bed we had for her.
It was actually a plastic coated changing pad that attaches to the top of a dresser. We used it as her bed for the first 2 months. Her sleeping patterns changed so much we had to keep adjusting things. She slept with us in her bed for the first week. Then downstairs on the couch in her bed for a few weeks.
My boobs were so sore from trying to nurse on demand that I finally gave her a pacifier. I just couldn't do it anymore. My nipples were purple. Ange mentioned limiting the time to 45 min or less then breaking for 2 hours. This would get her to nurse seriously instead of just sipping for extended periods. I also moved her to her swing. Hubbie rigged it so we could plug it in and not go through so many batteries. That swing was the only thing that could calm her and get her to sleep. She slept in it downstairs with me sleeping on the couch for a few months.
I lived on that couch downstairs for months. Hubbie went back to work after the first 4 weeks and I wanted us to stay downstairs to try to keep the noise away from him so he could sleep and get to work. That was a great fear of his. Falling asleep at work and getting disciplined or fired for it. He managed.
His biggest issue was my emotional instability. The sleep deprivation would send me into crying fits and rages. I remember screaming and slamming the front door over and over again. He ended up using some sick days to give me a break when he could. Those breaks were always limited because of my breasts being a source of food. I either had to pump or be there to feed her, even if I did manage to get out of the house.
I hated taking her out in public too. She would cry and be cranky and it just wasn't worth it. I had more than a little resentment over it.
At one point he was going to run out and get formula at 2 am just to he could feed her and I could get some sleep for a change. I really got upset. The idea of failure just flooded my head and I couldn't stand it.
I went back to work, substitute teaching, part time in June when she was 4 months roughly. Figured out the pumping routine at the school. They were good. They had a privacy room for pumping and would work with my schedule to get more than one break for pumping according to my needs. Really advanced attitude considering federal guidelines are still being drawn up now to support nursing mothers.
We had to get over the traveling issues because we had to travel quite a bit that spring. My uncle died in march. I visited my mom and dad in April and then dad died in July. I had to breastfeed in the car and at mom's house. She let us have her room those times and bought a traveling cradle for her then later a crib.
Mom died this past April as well. She went into the hospital before Christmas 2012 and spent the last few months at a nursing home. We brought baby up to see her as much as possible. I'll have to write about that bullshit surrounding my brother later. Total nightmare. Still not resolved as the estate is still being worked out.
I managed to nurse for a year and a half. At one point she was losing weight and it totally was the book's fault. What to Expect When You're Expecting specifically said that you should not nurse and feed puree foods at the same time as it was too many calories. It specifically said to "replace" a nursing with a feeding of puree food. So baby wasn't getting the milk fat she needed and started to lose weight. We were down to 4-5 feedings a day not including puree. She was really skinny by 12 months. I started giving her whole cow's milk as soon as we could to compensate. My milk was drying up after that whole mis-information.
I hate that book and threw it out. I was so pissed.
She's 2 and a half at this point. She's strong and healthy and will eat anything. Loves tomatoes. No allergies or gastric issues. Good sturdy genetic stock. I cover the nutrition thing in my previous blog post.
Saturday, August 31, 2013
Religion and the Root of Evil
Based on a previous post made on MySpace years ago in response to Christopher Hitchins. Myspace has since done away with the old blogs and site accessibility. (Sarcasm here) But if you send in a request you can get access in "a few short months" which in internet time is enough of an age to allow for the full evolution of a new species and its subsequent extinction. (The old post was waaaay shorter anyway)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Hitchens
It's common among atheist groups to say "religion is the root of all evil". As proof they will often cite holy wars and terrorist attacks seemingly motivated by religion. These religious beliefs are what motivated people to kill, destroy towns, cities, and attack little girls on their way to school.And I agree there are some crazy people wielding religion as a weapon and using it to justify their sadism. I also think this is a smoke screen and it's political bull that's the real motivation. The need to control others is strong in some people.
Perfect examples can be found anywhere around the globe. The gassing of Kurd civilians by Saddam Hussein; the killing of Shi 'ites and destruction of temples not adherent to his religious beliefs.
Also in the middle east, the continued attacks on Israel due to the hatred of Jews. They live surrounded by Muslims whose holy book declare Jews as villains. The book calls for their extermination. My hubbie and I had some conversations around this a few years ago when he studied the Koran. He basically summed it up (the English translation) "God is Great. We hate Jews and this is why."
We also have the Afghanistan Taliban whose religious beliefs regarding the control of women is infamous with torture, sadism, and imprisonment. A woman was raped to death in a soccer stadium as thousands were forced to watch for accidentally showing her ankle while standing up. Her escort had been killed at the picnic they had been having together for defending her from the soldiers. Women and children starved to death because they could not leave their homes to get food with no male relatives left alive to escort them. Little girls are still being attacked for trying to go to school.
Then of course, there are the ethnic wars of Africa, the oppression of native people in Australia and the Americas. All of these oppressions and attempted genocides have a religious component, an ethnic superiority flair.
In order to call something the "root of all evil" you have to break it down to it's lowest common denominator. Asking How and Why are two great ways to get to the lowest number on the multiplication tree of philosophical and psychological thought.
So let's do that: Why does religion exist? How did it become such an important part of how a person defines themself?
Ancient societies have a few factors that archeologists look for to determine when they have become a human society and ceased to be nomadic homo erectus type animals. One is burial. They begin to bury their dead.
Often these burials involved painting the body, dressing the body and burying them with something of significance like a weapon or a necklace. Other factors include, cultivating seeds, food preservation, domesticating animals, and ritual. Ancient societies begin to notice patterns in nature. They begin to celebrate those patterns and sometimes come to believe that they must enact ritual to support that pattern, like the rising of the sun after the longest night of the year, or dancing around a fire and wearing special items to bring on a great hunt.
From the development of an awareness of these patterns they begin to develop a sense of the future. They can predict that the sun will rise every day, the moon will follow a pattern of phases every 28 days, the seasons will follow a cycle. They plant, hunt and preserve food to survive these cycles. Eventually they are going to start asking questions about what happens after death and what force controls all these cycles? This is where the belief in spirits, the Gods and Goddesses of the old worlds come from.
Burial practices follow these beliefs. In order to conquer the fear of death, death must not be seen as the end. Ideas of an after life, or of a person somehow coming back after death begin to develop. We see this in burials where all the earthly pleasures and needs are taken care of. For example in ancient Egypt we see servants, concubines, food, musical instruments, weapons, clothes, etc, being left with the mummified pharoah. Spells are carved into the walls, the sarcophagus, and even painted into the linens wrapped around the body. These spells protect the body, the soul and give instructions for the spirit on his quest to the other side.
http://www.sextimeandpower.com/ (Great Book about women's menstrual cycle and pregnancy shaping society and even men's attitudes toward relationships)
http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Goddesses_and_Gods_of_Old_Europe_650.html?id=zKFFOoPlyjIC (Another classic powerful book on the archeological evidence of matriarchal societies and the transition to patriarchal dominance)
So religion came into existence to explain why the world is as it is. Religions explain the creation of the world, man's place in it, and give man a sense of partnership with the forces that shape the world and his own survival. Ritual is a way for man to try to manipulate nature. It became so essential to mankind because it defines one's tribe. A tribe has the same rituals, manner of dress, modes of speech, cyclical patterns and behaviors governed by those patterns. You know who you are by the tribe you ally yourself to. You know who doesn't belong in the same way. Besides age and sex, this element became part of the earliest sense of self-definition of a human being: name, age, gender, tribal affiliation.
Why do different societies war with each other?
When societies came in contact with each other they found their rituals, languages, clothing, and names of gods were not the same. As a result of this contact with each other they became nervous. This is where the crux of the matter of our problem evolves. When these people confronted differences in others, they couldn't predict the behavior of these other groups. They were too different. From this inability to know what the other would do in any situation, came fear of each other. Specifically they feared violence, death, and theft of resources.
If the two societies that are so different could not agree on a set of rules to keep their relationship friendly, then war would often follow. That fear would lead to violence. I guess they may have thought that if they struck first they could save themselves, and this other evil group would be destroyed so any other society they might have come across would be spared as well. We see this in some modern propaganda where the other group is labeled immoral, evil and set on the destruction of our pure and moral society. Religious fanatics often use this argument against atheists and anyone who supports free will and a secular legal system.
How did social laws evolve? Why are laws different everywhere?
The friendly group would lay down laws to govern how people treat each other. These laws became the social contract of the society. In some cases severe punishments were visited upon those that acted in anti-social ways. What constitutes anti-social was highly relative to the society in question.
For some societies like Greece, homosexuality was tolerated and even endorsed. Some philosophers believed wasting one's seed on a woman was deadly to a man's sanity. A waste by itself at best. Other societies would punish homosexuality with torture and/or death. Some societies didn't even have a word for such a thing, it had not been publicly brought up.
The Chosen Ones?
The success of a society over another was often called God's Gift or Favor. It was believed that their god was stronger than the other group's and therefore enabled the victory. In the past few millenia, groups have claimed that the other god doesn't even exist, or is actually an evil deity or demon. Those people have been misled by evil and must be rehabilitated or converted to save their souls.
The truth to why some societies are successful and generate invention, technology and massive food production is actually tied up in geographic luck. It has nothing to do with gods or even necessarily intelligence. If you happen to be born in an area of the world with large spaces of good farm land that can support thousands of varieties of crops, animals and insect life, it's only a matter of time before you domesticate those resources and a small number of people become food producers while others have the luxury of free time to pursue art, invention, music, government, academia and eventually exploration and conquest.
Western Europe was one such perfect breeding ground for such success. The area now known as China was another fantastic place for agriculture, plant and animal diversity and thus invention and art. Really good book on this: Guns, Germs and Steel
http://www.pbs.org/gunsgermssteel/ (There's a book and a documentary)
(Summary so far: Humans developed religion to explain cycles of nature, to help them try to manipulate nature for their benefit and eventually created social roles around these beliefs. Not to mention to dispell fear of death. When they came across people who were different they attacked out of fear or created strict rules governing behavior in order to get control of their fear of each other. Fear leads to violence and destruction.
Eventually the cart was placed before the horse. The same beliefs that unified a society enabling working together so they could evolve and invent and explore other worlds, became the justification for their success. Actually it was luck combined with intelligence that created powerful societies, not god.)
How does religion affect us today? Why is it still such a sensitive issue?
So what we have now is religion as the remnant of an old tradition that enabled us as a group to identify members of our tribe. Tribal members, people who we take for granted are safe and follow the same set of rules, are accepted. Outsiders are still pressured to convert or are attacked. We use this same mentality toward politics, education, even simple interest groups we are involved in.
Human beings value their own lives and the lives of those they love. As such they seek communities where they feel safe. They define that feeling of safety as groups of people they have stuff in common with. Laws support that sense of safety, and historically this has included segregation in America. We are still segregated economically. In some places, like Northern Ireland, segregation is still used to try to prevent violence. When the laws fail or are not equally enforced, people become afraid and vigilantism rocks the community. People start to hide, leave, and economies and governments fall often into war. War is what kills, encourages others to be aggressive and destructive and to annihilate the lives of the "others".
So the root of all evil is not religion. Religion is a manifestation of a human being's emotional need to belong to a group where they feel safe. It's the fear that motivated that need to belong that brings about violence. Fear of difference, fear of unpredictable behavior from the foreign tribe, fear that the different tribe is going to take your stuff including your life, is what brings about war. War is a violent attempt to control the behavior of others. Do as we say or your life is forfeit.
Control of others motivated by fear of differences is the rallying sentiment behind abortion clinic bombings, terrorist attacks, genocide, persecutions of all types and women in particular. For some reason men and even women are terrified of other women expressing themselves sexually and controlling their reproduction. I really don't know what is bug up their butt. All I can say is maybe the answer is in The Handmaid's Tale or some other female exploration of dystopic societies in fiction.
So Fear is the root of all evil. It leads to aggression, an attempt to control other's behaviors in order to make them predictable and thus safe. Or dead. Dead works too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Hitchens
It's common among atheist groups to say "religion is the root of all evil". As proof they will often cite holy wars and terrorist attacks seemingly motivated by religion. These religious beliefs are what motivated people to kill, destroy towns, cities, and attack little girls on their way to school.And I agree there are some crazy people wielding religion as a weapon and using it to justify their sadism. I also think this is a smoke screen and it's political bull that's the real motivation. The need to control others is strong in some people.
Perfect examples can be found anywhere around the globe. The gassing of Kurd civilians by Saddam Hussein; the killing of Shi 'ites and destruction of temples not adherent to his religious beliefs.
Also in the middle east, the continued attacks on Israel due to the hatred of Jews. They live surrounded by Muslims whose holy book declare Jews as villains. The book calls for their extermination. My hubbie and I had some conversations around this a few years ago when he studied the Koran. He basically summed it up (the English translation) "God is Great. We hate Jews and this is why."
We also have the Afghanistan Taliban whose religious beliefs regarding the control of women is infamous with torture, sadism, and imprisonment. A woman was raped to death in a soccer stadium as thousands were forced to watch for accidentally showing her ankle while standing up. Her escort had been killed at the picnic they had been having together for defending her from the soldiers. Women and children starved to death because they could not leave their homes to get food with no male relatives left alive to escort them. Little girls are still being attacked for trying to go to school.
Then of course, there are the ethnic wars of Africa, the oppression of native people in Australia and the Americas. All of these oppressions and attempted genocides have a religious component, an ethnic superiority flair.
In order to call something the "root of all evil" you have to break it down to it's lowest common denominator. Asking How and Why are two great ways to get to the lowest number on the multiplication tree of philosophical and psychological thought.
So let's do that: Why does religion exist? How did it become such an important part of how a person defines themself?
Ancient societies have a few factors that archeologists look for to determine when they have become a human society and ceased to be nomadic homo erectus type animals. One is burial. They begin to bury their dead.
Often these burials involved painting the body, dressing the body and burying them with something of significance like a weapon or a necklace. Other factors include, cultivating seeds, food preservation, domesticating animals, and ritual. Ancient societies begin to notice patterns in nature. They begin to celebrate those patterns and sometimes come to believe that they must enact ritual to support that pattern, like the rising of the sun after the longest night of the year, or dancing around a fire and wearing special items to bring on a great hunt.
From the development of an awareness of these patterns they begin to develop a sense of the future. They can predict that the sun will rise every day, the moon will follow a pattern of phases every 28 days, the seasons will follow a cycle. They plant, hunt and preserve food to survive these cycles. Eventually they are going to start asking questions about what happens after death and what force controls all these cycles? This is where the belief in spirits, the Gods and Goddesses of the old worlds come from.
Burial practices follow these beliefs. In order to conquer the fear of death, death must not be seen as the end. Ideas of an after life, or of a person somehow coming back after death begin to develop. We see this in burials where all the earthly pleasures and needs are taken care of. For example in ancient Egypt we see servants, concubines, food, musical instruments, weapons, clothes, etc, being left with the mummified pharoah. Spells are carved into the walls, the sarcophagus, and even painted into the linens wrapped around the body. These spells protect the body, the soul and give instructions for the spirit on his quest to the other side.
http://www.sextimeandpower.com/ (Great Book about women's menstrual cycle and pregnancy shaping society and even men's attitudes toward relationships)
http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Goddesses_and_Gods_of_Old_Europe_650.html?id=zKFFOoPlyjIC (Another classic powerful book on the archeological evidence of matriarchal societies and the transition to patriarchal dominance)
So religion came into existence to explain why the world is as it is. Religions explain the creation of the world, man's place in it, and give man a sense of partnership with the forces that shape the world and his own survival. Ritual is a way for man to try to manipulate nature. It became so essential to mankind because it defines one's tribe. A tribe has the same rituals, manner of dress, modes of speech, cyclical patterns and behaviors governed by those patterns. You know who you are by the tribe you ally yourself to. You know who doesn't belong in the same way. Besides age and sex, this element became part of the earliest sense of self-definition of a human being: name, age, gender, tribal affiliation.
Why do different societies war with each other?
When societies came in contact with each other they found their rituals, languages, clothing, and names of gods were not the same. As a result of this contact with each other they became nervous. This is where the crux of the matter of our problem evolves. When these people confronted differences in others, they couldn't predict the behavior of these other groups. They were too different. From this inability to know what the other would do in any situation, came fear of each other. Specifically they feared violence, death, and theft of resources.
If the two societies that are so different could not agree on a set of rules to keep their relationship friendly, then war would often follow. That fear would lead to violence. I guess they may have thought that if they struck first they could save themselves, and this other evil group would be destroyed so any other society they might have come across would be spared as well. We see this in some modern propaganda where the other group is labeled immoral, evil and set on the destruction of our pure and moral society. Religious fanatics often use this argument against atheists and anyone who supports free will and a secular legal system.
How did social laws evolve? Why are laws different everywhere?
The friendly group would lay down laws to govern how people treat each other. These laws became the social contract of the society. In some cases severe punishments were visited upon those that acted in anti-social ways. What constitutes anti-social was highly relative to the society in question.
For some societies like Greece, homosexuality was tolerated and even endorsed. Some philosophers believed wasting one's seed on a woman was deadly to a man's sanity. A waste by itself at best. Other societies would punish homosexuality with torture and/or death. Some societies didn't even have a word for such a thing, it had not been publicly brought up.
The Chosen Ones?
The success of a society over another was often called God's Gift or Favor. It was believed that their god was stronger than the other group's and therefore enabled the victory. In the past few millenia, groups have claimed that the other god doesn't even exist, or is actually an evil deity or demon. Those people have been misled by evil and must be rehabilitated or converted to save their souls.
The truth to why some societies are successful and generate invention, technology and massive food production is actually tied up in geographic luck. It has nothing to do with gods or even necessarily intelligence. If you happen to be born in an area of the world with large spaces of good farm land that can support thousands of varieties of crops, animals and insect life, it's only a matter of time before you domesticate those resources and a small number of people become food producers while others have the luxury of free time to pursue art, invention, music, government, academia and eventually exploration and conquest.
Western Europe was one such perfect breeding ground for such success. The area now known as China was another fantastic place for agriculture, plant and animal diversity and thus invention and art. Really good book on this: Guns, Germs and Steel
http://www.pbs.org/gunsgermssteel/ (There's a book and a documentary)
(Summary so far: Humans developed religion to explain cycles of nature, to help them try to manipulate nature for their benefit and eventually created social roles around these beliefs. Not to mention to dispell fear of death. When they came across people who were different they attacked out of fear or created strict rules governing behavior in order to get control of their fear of each other. Fear leads to violence and destruction.
Eventually the cart was placed before the horse. The same beliefs that unified a society enabling working together so they could evolve and invent and explore other worlds, became the justification for their success. Actually it was luck combined with intelligence that created powerful societies, not god.)
How does religion affect us today? Why is it still such a sensitive issue?
So what we have now is religion as the remnant of an old tradition that enabled us as a group to identify members of our tribe. Tribal members, people who we take for granted are safe and follow the same set of rules, are accepted. Outsiders are still pressured to convert or are attacked. We use this same mentality toward politics, education, even simple interest groups we are involved in.
Human beings value their own lives and the lives of those they love. As such they seek communities where they feel safe. They define that feeling of safety as groups of people they have stuff in common with. Laws support that sense of safety, and historically this has included segregation in America. We are still segregated economically. In some places, like Northern Ireland, segregation is still used to try to prevent violence. When the laws fail or are not equally enforced, people become afraid and vigilantism rocks the community. People start to hide, leave, and economies and governments fall often into war. War is what kills, encourages others to be aggressive and destructive and to annihilate the lives of the "others".
So the root of all evil is not religion. Religion is a manifestation of a human being's emotional need to belong to a group where they feel safe. It's the fear that motivated that need to belong that brings about violence. Fear of difference, fear of unpredictable behavior from the foreign tribe, fear that the different tribe is going to take your stuff including your life, is what brings about war. War is a violent attempt to control the behavior of others. Do as we say or your life is forfeit.
Control of others motivated by fear of differences is the rallying sentiment behind abortion clinic bombings, terrorist attacks, genocide, persecutions of all types and women in particular. For some reason men and even women are terrified of other women expressing themselves sexually and controlling their reproduction. I really don't know what is bug up their butt. All I can say is maybe the answer is in The Handmaid's Tale or some other female exploration of dystopic societies in fiction.
So Fear is the root of all evil. It leads to aggression, an attempt to control other's behaviors in order to make them predictable and thus safe. Or dead. Dead works too.
Friday, August 30, 2013
New BirthCenter in Buffalo-- Above Abortion Clinic!
http://www.buffalonews.com/city-region/medical/birthing-center-to-open-in-buffalo-in-the-fall-20130824
I really hate talking about abortion publicly because people (surprisingly mostly women) get crazy emotional and hysterical about it. But this event is both really cool and fodder for angst.
I personally love this idea. The women who would use a birthcenter are most likely well educated on birth choices already. Often, these are women who would have a home birth but due to distance or the smallness or construction status of their dwellings can't have it at home. Before this, the closest birth center was near Batavia about an hour drive from here.
The lowest rate of natural birth and highest rate of C-sections is in the lower classes. Doctors tend to withhold information from patients and poor patients are especially susceptible to being manipulated by doctors. Plus they may lack access to computers and other resources to research their choices.
Since these clinics tend to serve poor women without health insurance or medicaid only, this is a great place to have a birth clinic. Poor women who want to keep their pregnancy can get medical checkups, take classes on birth and babies, and the alternative choice is staring them right in the face in the same building. Not to mention on average, according to the article, it is $8,000 cheaper to have a birth center birth instead of a hospital birth.
I met with Dr. Morrison when I was under Eileen Stewart's care. I love Eileen. She's a total sweetheart. We felt very supported by her. She didn't bug me about gaining too much weight like a lot of doctors will do. She checked up on my nutrition, recommended healthy natural ways to deal with the sniffles I got during the winter while I was pregnant. She gave me the name of the chiropractor I still go to now.
There have been only a few serious complaints against this idea of having the center with the abortion clinic. One includes a question of women not being comfortable going to an abortion center to give birth. I don't believe that the type of women who would give birth with a midwife would be so closed minded that they would protest this. Anyone who is educated isn't going to confuse the two things.
There was one responder who basically tried to imply that you can't trust an OB/GYN who provides abortion to also birth live babies. I think they were trying to imply that she would kill the babies of parents who wanted them. Besides the obvious malpractice suits that would follow, a doctor who has taken an oath to do no harm, won't do that.
Yes, there was a news story about a male doctor who would kill babies removed from the womb in the third trimester. The man must have been a jack-the-ripper type serial killer. He was breaking the law in that third trimester abortions are illegal and the babies were basically born alive. He killed them after taking them out. No mentally stable doctor would ever pull shit like that. He was a serial killer with anti-social personality issues.
Dr. Morrison has decades of experience birthing live babies as does Stewart. It would have been nice to have interviews with patients and mothers of these women to get a real feel for how great they are. The article was definitely missing that. Can't wait till it opens and the first year of births can be counted and celebrated.
I really hate talking about abortion publicly because people (surprisingly mostly women) get crazy emotional and hysterical about it. But this event is both really cool and fodder for angst.
I personally love this idea. The women who would use a birthcenter are most likely well educated on birth choices already. Often, these are women who would have a home birth but due to distance or the smallness or construction status of their dwellings can't have it at home. Before this, the closest birth center was near Batavia about an hour drive from here.
The lowest rate of natural birth and highest rate of C-sections is in the lower classes. Doctors tend to withhold information from patients and poor patients are especially susceptible to being manipulated by doctors. Plus they may lack access to computers and other resources to research their choices.
Since these clinics tend to serve poor women without health insurance or medicaid only, this is a great place to have a birth clinic. Poor women who want to keep their pregnancy can get medical checkups, take classes on birth and babies, and the alternative choice is staring them right in the face in the same building. Not to mention on average, according to the article, it is $8,000 cheaper to have a birth center birth instead of a hospital birth.
I met with Dr. Morrison when I was under Eileen Stewart's care. I love Eileen. She's a total sweetheart. We felt very supported by her. She didn't bug me about gaining too much weight like a lot of doctors will do. She checked up on my nutrition, recommended healthy natural ways to deal with the sniffles I got during the winter while I was pregnant. She gave me the name of the chiropractor I still go to now.
There have been only a few serious complaints against this idea of having the center with the abortion clinic. One includes a question of women not being comfortable going to an abortion center to give birth. I don't believe that the type of women who would give birth with a midwife would be so closed minded that they would protest this. Anyone who is educated isn't going to confuse the two things.
There was one responder who basically tried to imply that you can't trust an OB/GYN who provides abortion to also birth live babies. I think they were trying to imply that she would kill the babies of parents who wanted them. Besides the obvious malpractice suits that would follow, a doctor who has taken an oath to do no harm, won't do that.
Yes, there was a news story about a male doctor who would kill babies removed from the womb in the third trimester. The man must have been a jack-the-ripper type serial killer. He was breaking the law in that third trimester abortions are illegal and the babies were basically born alive. He killed them after taking them out. No mentally stable doctor would ever pull shit like that. He was a serial killer with anti-social personality issues.
Dr. Morrison has decades of experience birthing live babies as does Stewart. It would have been nice to have interviews with patients and mothers of these women to get a real feel for how great they are. The article was definitely missing that. Can't wait till it opens and the first year of births can be counted and celebrated.
Thursday, August 29, 2013
Garden Techniques and Trials
Being interested in developing survival tactics in case the shit hits the fan has been a growing interest of my hubbie and I. My friend also married a man who is into survivalist and farming techniques. So food has become a bit of an obsession. Most specifically, ways that make us chemically independent through soil management, cooperative planting to get multiple crops from the same box, and pest control. Here's a bit of an overview on our successes and mistakes.
2008 We have no backyard here so we set up gardens at my father-in-law's house four years ago. He doesn't mind letting us use his dirt as long as he can eat all the tomatoes he wants. The first year we had raised boxes using wood borders about 12 inches up. We planted two 5 foot by 5 foot boxes and one large box about 5 feet by ten or twelve feet. We used wooden borders only this first year. We also got grandma to let us put four square boxes of five by five at her place.
We planted about 5 boxes of tomatoes with carrots and turnips in between rows. We also had two boxes of corn with squash between the rows. The squash didn't take. I think we weren't getting enough pollinators. It may have not been getting enough sun either.
We did get a ton of tomatoes. We ended up canning almost 60 quarts that year and didn't have to buy tomato sauce until the following March or April. At the end of the year we put the garden to bed with leaves piled up over the dirt.
2009 My husband got a copy of the Seed Savers Exchange catalog Fantastic source for organic and heirloom variety seeds. Really interesting and rare varieties.
http://www.seedsavers.org/
He decided the following year to do a garden of all purple veg. We got Cherokee purple tomatoes, German extra hardy garlic, purple beans, carrots. We stacked tires and planted Peruvian purple potatoes. We got about 40 lbs of potatoes out of those tires and wanted to do it again the following year but got cited by the city court for littering because of the tires. We had to take the garden down and so didn't get a second year of potatoes in 2010.
That second gardening year we also planted rhubarb. Made fantastic pies. We saved seeds at the end of the year as well to replant in the fall.
Corn is pretty easy; you let it dry then twist your hands around the cob to rub the seeds off.
Tomato seeds have to be spooned out of the choice tomatoes and put in a jar. Cover with wax paper with a couple of holes poked into it. Let ferment about 2 weeks or just until the sliminess is off the seeds. Then spread on a paper towel to dry out. Bottle and store.
Beans; let husks dry and crack out seeds. Don't keep any veg in plastic bags too long, it molds.
Garlic; just save the bulbs you want to re-use. Dry the bulbs well then store in a paper bag.
The beans didn't work out as well. The peas couldn't get enough water and so wilted after the first harvest. Cabbages and carrots failed. Carrots didn't grow very big and the cabbages and brussel sprouts didn't grow more than a few inches until they died. Poor year for tomatoes too. Good thing we didn't need to live off of it.
We stored the rhubarb roots in sand and planned to put them back in but didn't get around to it. After two years there's no point. The roots are dead. We had to take them out of the soil in the first place because of the citation. It was one of the things we were growing in tires as well. Hubbie and I joke that if we had painted the tires pretty colors maybe the city would have let us be.
We also might be under tighter scrutiny because we live so close to CanalFest. They want outsiders to think the city is a pretty and well-kept place. Crazy branches of above ground potato shrubs don't look pretty. They look like weeds.
2010 I was working in Elmira so the garden didn't get very well taken care of . Hubbie planted tomatoes and garlic and that was about it. Saved seeds again. Small harvest of tomatoes. Enough for sandwiches and that was about it.
Hubbie built a wire support system for a wild grape vine in his dad's backyard. No grapes this year. Cut it all back down to about 2-3 feet from the ground.
2011-2012 This was the year our daughter was born and her first year and a half with us. Way too exhausted and buisy. Hubbie did most of the gardening. We did not water like we should have. I did start planting garlic bulbs around my roses to keep the aphids off. Works great.
Again, sustaining our tomato and garlic harvests. Hubbie had started research on bee-keeping. In his gardening research he found many of the plants we were having trouble with were pollinated by bugs. That first year we had planted sunflowers and marigolds around the garden which attracted pollinators so a good harvest. The next few years we kept it weeded and no flowers so no pollinators.
He thinks that had a huge impact on productivity. The corn was hand pollinated the first year we planted it. We decided not to plant it again after 2008. To much labor and water involved. Good corn though.
First and second year vine branches. No grapes again. Might be linked to pollinators.
2013 This year has been off to a great start. We got 34 quarts on tomatoes in the first three weeks. We would have gotten more if we didn't get hit with early blight. I lost more than half of my roses and one box of tomatoes suffered badly losing almost all of their leaves. We sprayed with organic copper spray and they seem to be coming back.
A few other things to help counter blight is to cover the soil with wood chips or shredded wood to stop rain spattering spores up onto the plants. When you water, don't get the leaves wet. Keep the hose close to the ground or set up an irrigation pipe to direct the water over the roots or even feed water into the soil directly by placing the pipe perpendicular to the ground and a few inches deep. Drill holes before putting it in the ground. Saw a southern farmer do this. We plan to do this with our own garden when me move to a place with a yard,
Tons of pollinators this year as well. We left two boxes fallow and ended up with boxes of wild flowers. Wild mustard greens and flowers seemed to really do the trick. They grow about 6 feet high and the bees love them. I also left some milkweed in the garden for any monarch caterpillars that might be around.
The German garlic we have been using seems to not be doing as well. I told hubbie I want to get some new bulbs in. We had a bad year last year 2012 when we didn't manage to cover the beds with leaves like we should have and the bulbs were severely undernourished. This years crop has fewer cloves than previous. The cloves are huge but the bulbs are not 5-6 cloves like they used to be but more 4 or less cloves per bulb.
Garlic needs about 18 inches or more of leaves and greens piled onto it when it is planted in the fall. It's a heavy feeder and the composting greens and leaves help feed it through the winter and the spring. It also needs to be rotated to a different location every year on a three to four year cycle. Same with tomatoes. Garlic attracts nematodes and really drains nutrient from the soil.
I've made sauce twice using our tomatoes and garlic. It feels great to know where your food comes from.
There's this sense of pride and pleasure knowing we created this and nurtured and now are enjoying directly the food we grew. Getting a paycheck is not the same. Money is a symbol of value. Food is real value.
2008 We have no backyard here so we set up gardens at my father-in-law's house four years ago. He doesn't mind letting us use his dirt as long as he can eat all the tomatoes he wants. The first year we had raised boxes using wood borders about 12 inches up. We planted two 5 foot by 5 foot boxes and one large box about 5 feet by ten or twelve feet. We used wooden borders only this first year. We also got grandma to let us put four square boxes of five by five at her place.
We planted about 5 boxes of tomatoes with carrots and turnips in between rows. We also had two boxes of corn with squash between the rows. The squash didn't take. I think we weren't getting enough pollinators. It may have not been getting enough sun either.
We did get a ton of tomatoes. We ended up canning almost 60 quarts that year and didn't have to buy tomato sauce until the following March or April. At the end of the year we put the garden to bed with leaves piled up over the dirt.
2009 My husband got a copy of the Seed Savers Exchange catalog Fantastic source for organic and heirloom variety seeds. Really interesting and rare varieties.
http://www.seedsavers.org/
He decided the following year to do a garden of all purple veg. We got Cherokee purple tomatoes, German extra hardy garlic, purple beans, carrots. We stacked tires and planted Peruvian purple potatoes. We got about 40 lbs of potatoes out of those tires and wanted to do it again the following year but got cited by the city court for littering because of the tires. We had to take the garden down and so didn't get a second year of potatoes in 2010.
That second gardening year we also planted rhubarb. Made fantastic pies. We saved seeds at the end of the year as well to replant in the fall.
Corn is pretty easy; you let it dry then twist your hands around the cob to rub the seeds off.
Tomato seeds have to be spooned out of the choice tomatoes and put in a jar. Cover with wax paper with a couple of holes poked into it. Let ferment about 2 weeks or just until the sliminess is off the seeds. Then spread on a paper towel to dry out. Bottle and store.
Beans; let husks dry and crack out seeds. Don't keep any veg in plastic bags too long, it molds.
Garlic; just save the bulbs you want to re-use. Dry the bulbs well then store in a paper bag.
The beans didn't work out as well. The peas couldn't get enough water and so wilted after the first harvest. Cabbages and carrots failed. Carrots didn't grow very big and the cabbages and brussel sprouts didn't grow more than a few inches until they died. Poor year for tomatoes too. Good thing we didn't need to live off of it.
We stored the rhubarb roots in sand and planned to put them back in but didn't get around to it. After two years there's no point. The roots are dead. We had to take them out of the soil in the first place because of the citation. It was one of the things we were growing in tires as well. Hubbie and I joke that if we had painted the tires pretty colors maybe the city would have let us be.
We also might be under tighter scrutiny because we live so close to CanalFest. They want outsiders to think the city is a pretty and well-kept place. Crazy branches of above ground potato shrubs don't look pretty. They look like weeds.
2010 I was working in Elmira so the garden didn't get very well taken care of . Hubbie planted tomatoes and garlic and that was about it. Saved seeds again. Small harvest of tomatoes. Enough for sandwiches and that was about it.
Hubbie built a wire support system for a wild grape vine in his dad's backyard. No grapes this year. Cut it all back down to about 2-3 feet from the ground.
2011-2012 This was the year our daughter was born and her first year and a half with us. Way too exhausted and buisy. Hubbie did most of the gardening. We did not water like we should have. I did start planting garlic bulbs around my roses to keep the aphids off. Works great.
Again, sustaining our tomato and garlic harvests. Hubbie had started research on bee-keeping. In his gardening research he found many of the plants we were having trouble with were pollinated by bugs. That first year we had planted sunflowers and marigolds around the garden which attracted pollinators so a good harvest. The next few years we kept it weeded and no flowers so no pollinators.
He thinks that had a huge impact on productivity. The corn was hand pollinated the first year we planted it. We decided not to plant it again after 2008. To much labor and water involved. Good corn though.
First and second year vine branches. No grapes again. Might be linked to pollinators.
2013 This year has been off to a great start. We got 34 quarts on tomatoes in the first three weeks. We would have gotten more if we didn't get hit with early blight. I lost more than half of my roses and one box of tomatoes suffered badly losing almost all of their leaves. We sprayed with organic copper spray and they seem to be coming back.
A few other things to help counter blight is to cover the soil with wood chips or shredded wood to stop rain spattering spores up onto the plants. When you water, don't get the leaves wet. Keep the hose close to the ground or set up an irrigation pipe to direct the water over the roots or even feed water into the soil directly by placing the pipe perpendicular to the ground and a few inches deep. Drill holes before putting it in the ground. Saw a southern farmer do this. We plan to do this with our own garden when me move to a place with a yard,
Tons of pollinators this year as well. We left two boxes fallow and ended up with boxes of wild flowers. Wild mustard greens and flowers seemed to really do the trick. They grow about 6 feet high and the bees love them. I also left some milkweed in the garden for any monarch caterpillars that might be around.
The German garlic we have been using seems to not be doing as well. I told hubbie I want to get some new bulbs in. We had a bad year last year 2012 when we didn't manage to cover the beds with leaves like we should have and the bulbs were severely undernourished. This years crop has fewer cloves than previous. The cloves are huge but the bulbs are not 5-6 cloves like they used to be but more 4 or less cloves per bulb.
Garlic needs about 18 inches or more of leaves and greens piled onto it when it is planted in the fall. It's a heavy feeder and the composting greens and leaves help feed it through the winter and the spring. It also needs to be rotated to a different location every year on a three to four year cycle. Same with tomatoes. Garlic attracts nematodes and really drains nutrient from the soil.
I've made sauce twice using our tomatoes and garlic. It feels great to know where your food comes from.
There's this sense of pride and pleasure knowing we created this and nurtured and now are enjoying directly the food we grew. Getting a paycheck is not the same. Money is a symbol of value. Food is real value.
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
"Fox News Contributor's Sexist Comments on Women's Health Care Spark Outrage"
http://shine.yahoo.com/healthy-living/fox-s-sexist-comments-on-women-s-healthcare-spark-outrage-172914267.html
ME: Insurance companies save money two ways with men: fewer doctor visits and they are more likely to let themselves die than seek early diagnosis. They lose money from men with lower premiums and treatments that are sky high because of late stage 3-4 diagnosis. Often only when it is too late. This math doesn't make sense to me. "Charge them lower premiums because they are more likely to die before we have to pay for treatments."
Insurance companies make money off of women with higher premiums and cheaper treatments because women are more likely to get diagnosed early with regular check-ups. Yes, the checkups are costly, but that's maybe 50$ per checkup which comes to about 100$ a year with a reg checkup and gyno checkup. (Although papsmear lab fees are way inflated.) Alternative therapies are paid for out of pocket. "Charge them more now to punish them for not letting themselves die."
Responder:
Health care rates are also based on risk (and actual history of claims)
Why do older people pay more for health insurance then younger people? Why does a 64 years old female pay more for health insurance than a female of child bearing age?
The Dr. may not have stated his point well, but in most age groups women have higher health care costs than men. BUT- health care premiums are spread over an age group-- for example: a 24 year old married female pays the same health care insurance as a 24 yr old unmarried female-- even when pregnancy and childbirth costs are factored in.
So, if females have a higher risk factor than males (based on years of actual claims)- then isn't it sexist
and discriminatory to charge males the same premium as females? Won't males be subsidizing
the health care costs for females?
ME:
Men have a higher risk of cancers, strokes and heart disease when compared to women. Women have a higher rate of pregnancy and birth than men do. So we reward men by charging them less despite a greater risk of accident, heart attack and stroke. Then we punish women for giving birth by charging them more. It still doesn't add up.
And shouldn't men contribute to the cost of pregnancy and childbirth considering it was sperm from a male plus the egg from the female that created that child in the first place?
ME: Insurance companies save money two ways with men: fewer doctor visits and they are more likely to let themselves die than seek early diagnosis. They lose money from men with lower premiums and treatments that are sky high because of late stage 3-4 diagnosis. Often only when it is too late. This math doesn't make sense to me. "Charge them lower premiums because they are more likely to die before we have to pay for treatments."
Insurance companies make money off of women with higher premiums and cheaper treatments because women are more likely to get diagnosed early with regular check-ups. Yes, the checkups are costly, but that's maybe 50$ per checkup which comes to about 100$ a year with a reg checkup and gyno checkup. (Although papsmear lab fees are way inflated.) Alternative therapies are paid for out of pocket. "Charge them more now to punish them for not letting themselves die."
Responder:
Health care rates are also based on risk (and actual history of claims)
Why do older people pay more for health insurance then younger people? Why does a 64 years old female pay more for health insurance than a female of child bearing age?
The Dr. may not have stated his point well, but in most age groups women have higher health care costs than men. BUT- health care premiums are spread over an age group-- for example: a 24 year old married female pays the same health care insurance as a 24 yr old unmarried female-- even when pregnancy and childbirth costs are factored in.
So, if females have a higher risk factor than males (based on years of actual claims)- then isn't it sexist
and discriminatory to charge males the same premium as females? Won't males be subsidizing
the health care costs for females?
ME:
Men have a higher risk of cancers, strokes and heart disease when compared to women. Women have a higher rate of pregnancy and birth than men do. So we reward men by charging them less despite a greater risk of accident, heart attack and stroke. Then we punish women for giving birth by charging them more. It still doesn't add up.
And shouldn't men contribute to the cost of pregnancy and childbirth considering it was sperm from a male plus the egg from the female that created that child in the first place?
Monday, August 12, 2013
Intelligence, Atheism and the need for Religion
Reading article about Atheism and
Intelligence.
I agree with the assertion of the
article that people who are of high intelligence tend to question and
challenge the concepts of religion. Most notable of these is the
tendency of atheists to see themselves as the shapers of their own
fate. (Brave movie connection as well. "Fate be changed") Intelligent people tend to
be more successful because of their level of education and their
problem solving skills. “Jesus take the Wheel” is not a concept
they could accept.
One of the things that draws people to
paganism is this concept as well. I remember when I first started
studying the authors that I read included Laurie Cabot, Scott
Cunningham, and DJ Conway. There are others as well that I have read
since then, as well as researching eastern religions and LeVay
satanism.
Almost all authors of note in these
communities will mention the role that an individual has in shaping
their own lives. Some of these authors will stop at thinking positive
and letting positive things come to you. Like attracts like. This
concept is most common in eastern philosophies and new age occult
books.
Paganism and Satanism go a few steps
further. The Goddess does not want us to be door-mats. We must defend
ourselves if attacked and go after what we want to achieve. Satanism
holds it a “sin” to be stupid in the sense that one must not
assume others hold the same values and would act the same way in any
given situation as the "believer". There is also a tenet of holding
one's domain sacred and any who would disrespect one in their domain
should be treated aggressively and removed. This does not reflect
the belief of “turning the other cheek” as in Abrahamic
traditions.
LaVay wrote of the concept of
manipulating probabilities with spells and ritual. If you seek to
find a job and you only have a 40% chance of getting a job at that
particular company or in that job field, then a spell could tweak
that probability. Say the energy you send out increases your chances
to 60%.
The next step is action. In witchcraft,
authors and teachers speak of silence about the spell. The belief is
that if you talk about it you could dilute the energy. This
especially makes sense in talking to others about your goal. Their
negative ideas and cynical comments can decrease your drive to
succeed. Their inability to believe in you and affect your ability to
believe in yourself. Peer pressure works powerfully in our society.
This low opinion of your abilities will affect your tone of voice,
your posture, and your attitude in interviews and at fairs. Not to
mention, being a witch is not exactly accepted in our society yet.
You still have to put yourself out
there in order to make things happen. You can do all the spells in
the world but if you don't mail out your resume, browse listings and
go to job fairs, nothing will happen. You have to network and put
your name out. This is where atheists get it right as well.
You cannot rely on an accident or luck
to make things happen. Often people who do this end up with things
they did not want. This can happen in magical communities as well. If
you read an event as a sign that you should take that job or date
that person, the sign could be wrong. Because of that “magical”
indication that you were meant to be, you might ignore warning
signals that it's actually wrong for you; warning signs of an abusive
relationship or a really stressful and traumatizing job position.
Stubbornness in your ideas can lead you to try to stick it out hoping
it will get better or you'll get stronger so you can take it.
[In my younger years I have made this
mistake a few times with an abusive relationship as well as a job
that was harmful to my psyche. It took me over a year to shake the
abusive X and two years in a dead-end job to realize that I was
breaking down. The last few months of that job meant therapy so I
could finish the year and then PTSD symptoms and breakdowns for two
years after. It was very difficult to enter a classroom again and
took a year of subbing to be able to function normally without
out-of- control emotional responses to my environment or the kids.
I'd over-react to slight things sometimes, and be apathetic to things
that needed strict attention. I even had a breakdown when I witnessed
a student fight. I managed to get out of sight and it was my planning
period, but it shook me and I had a really tough second half of the
day. I manage fine now. I'm in a really good place at this point in
my life. ]
This is where non-religious people get
it right. They don't see spiritual signs at all and so can remain
open to analyzing relationships and job environments in a more
reasonable way, not to say they don't make mistakes out of fear,
addiction, or co-dependence. Since you only have one life, there is no afterlife or reincarnation, you'd better get it right and enjoy the heck out of this one.
When bad things happen, sometimes
religion can be comforting. But it can also keep one from growing
beyond the experience. If one becomes dependent on a deity
intervening, and everything that happens is meant to be, it can lead
to paralysis. No decisions are being made, no improvements or
emotional processing of anger or grief occurs. It can actually
contribute to making things worse or an emotional breakdown from
refusing to process the events and feelings.
This can be clearly seen in fascist
groups that refuse to accept a scientific explanation when it is
staring them in the face and their very lives depend on it. Global
warming is one such event that many are still sticking their heads in
the sand about. Watching glaciers fall apart, watching the oceans
warm and species die out as storms become more deadly, should be
enough to turn believers into every reasonable person. However,
religion is not reasonable. It is faith and “you can't fix faith”.
(Shepard from Firefly)
Some even intentionally litter and
waste our resources believing if they destroy the planet it will
bring about the second coming sooner. They look forward to and work
toward the destruction of all life on earth with glee. Very scary
people.
The other side of this double edged
blade is that ideologies can bring about great changes. Sometimes
religious people do some amazingly altruistic things as a result of
compassion they learned from religious leaders. However, Atheists do
not have religion but they do have ideology and compassion. This
belief in something greater than us is not dependent on religion and
ritual. You can believe in creating a healthier planet for the human
species and not need the motivation of God's Will.
I don't think getting rid of religion
is a good idea. It's part of human expression and experience. Our
symbols and myths come from religious history. We study human
nature, experience, and psychology through these myths and symbols.
It is such ritual and symbols in my religion that helped me process a
traumatic childhood. I was able to use the energy of deity and these
mental-imagery techniques to develop a sense of positive
relationships and my own growth. Religion was a very powerful
psychological and emotional tool. Again, therapy is expensive.
Religion can definitely be practiced on the cheap.
But we also need to be careful. When
misused, religion can be dangerous and fascist. We must never pass
laws for religious reasons or persecute people for religious reasons.
Religion is a powerful force of oppression and a sense of
“other”-ness. Those who are not of the same religion can be
demonized and dehumanized. This is how atheists get support from
history and psychology in claiming religion is the root of all evil.
Religion is like a gun. It's not the
tool that is evil but the hand that holds it. Compassion can lead
one to use it to help others, defend the weak and support a just
society. If the hand holding it is driven by fear then great
injustice occurs.
And this is where small minds become
influential. When one lacks education, one lacks a deep sense of
reason. The higher in the academic tiers one gets (usually but not
always) the greater one's sense of reason, the greater one is able to
analyze a situation and question fallacies of that reason. You have
to be able to be objective and sometimes put your emotions aside.
This requires many years of cognitive training as well as simply
growing up so your cerebrum can fully form. Many who rush to
judgment or are dragged around by emotion lack this training. They
are even suspicious of this training and develop a fear of those who
are highly educated.
Some intellects can suffer from
fallacious paths of thought. If they become too dependent on reason
and then something in their logical chain of thought is off, then
they can become tyrannical. Compassion is essential when dealing
with genius. A genius without compassion can endorse eugenics and
other genocidal tendencies. (Examples in literature and TV abound.)
We're seeing this now in our political
parties. One appeals to religion, conservative values and fear. The
other appeals to humanitarianism and compassion—even to the point
of fostering dependence and learned helplessness.
(Need to discuss Selfishly motivated
Altruism later)
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Brave movie review from a Feminist English Teacher
8/10/2013
I've been chewing over this for a few
days now. My husband and I watched some reviews of Brave the movie on
Youtube. The first thing that I noticed was an almost total lack of
female reviewers. The males seemed to be doing most of the talking
and it all sounded the same. Almost like they were copying each
other. The complaints listed a sudden change in the tone of the movie
when the queen changed into a bear, a total lack of understanding as
to why she turned into a bear and not some other magical effect, and
a lack of adventure or meaningful action.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzWoeQ-GWAU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzWoeQ-GWAU
Hubbie and I had some great discussions
about where the reviewers were missing the point. There were things
they were not taking seriously, belittling, overlooking and
misjudging. I dismissed the men mostly because the movie focused on a
relationship and its evolution between two females. Men really can't
understand that just because they are men. It's a genetic loss on
their part. Hubbie, as a male, made some great points about
socialization and the female perspective. He really is in touch with
his feminine side. It's nice to see.
A recent edition of SageWoman
included tons of articles on gender and spirituality and the third
wave of feminism which seeks to include gender, sexuality,
socio-economic status, race and men's roles in feminism. These are
things that were overlooked during the second wave and this new breed
of feminist seeks to include these things in the discussion. Some of
my ideas come from this edition as well as books on motherhood,
growing up female and my own literary analysis.
First, one must understand there are
two types of fairy tales: masculine and feminine. The masculine
fairytale often involves a boy leaving home to reclaim his destiny or
reclaim his crown. Sometimes it was stolen by an evil uncle, or
sometimes this fate lies in the claiming of a woman or magical
weapon. He travels far and wide, meets many allies and gathers
magical tools. The conflict he comes across is often a magical beast,
a maze of problems he must solve to claim the maiden or weapon, or
the slaying of the evil wizard/uncle. Male stories are everywhere.
The Athurian Legends, Merlin, Legend of the Seeker, Star Wars, etc.
are all male fairy tales or legend story arcs. Stories that fall
outside of the fairy tale like UP and Finding Nemo have male leads.
They would have been just as good had it been a mother and daughter
separated and searching for each other, or a grandmother figure and
girl scout flying away in a balloon house. The socialization of our
society makes the default of these stories masculine. It probably
just didn't occur to the writers to make the characters female, even
as it would have no impact on the direction of the story. Or perhaps
the only time they think of using female characters is during a
female story arc.
The feminine fairy tale consists mostly
of an impossible home life. She must flee for her life as in Snow
White; or she is kidnapped like in Tangled, the story of Rapunzel; or she seeks an escape from abuse like in Cinderella. All of these
stories feature a romantic lead who saves the princess. In Snow White
it's the seven dwarves who act as father-figures keeping her safe
until the prince can take her away and keep her safe for good. In
Cinderella it is her beauty that attracts the prince and marriage
that is her rescue from domestic violence. In Tangled it is a
handsome rogue who gets her out of her tower. Even though she starts
out as her own agent of change, he takes her fate into his own hands
when he cuts her hair off, thereby taking her choice away from her. It is
only by accident that her tear brings him back from death. Neither of
these events come from her choice, her intelligence, skill or her
intentional action.
Brave is different because Merida very
much takes an active role in her choices and the direction she takes
in life. She is her father's daughter and like many 2nd
wave feminists, she rejects the subtle and familial focus of her
mother. She sees what her mother has to teach her as useless and
silly. She goes along with it to be dutiful but when she is put to
the test, she aggressively turns her back on it.
2nd Wave feminism seemed to
focus on career paths and masculine traits as a way for women to gain
equal footing with men. The side effect of this was to belittle
stay-at-home moms, feminine traits like cooperation, the
subconscious, emotion, relationships and family, peace and diplomacy.
To accept these female traits would have been tantamount to treason.
It was believed that to be valuable one must be masculine because
femininity is not valued in our society. Ambitious and professional
women rejected femininity and female friends. Merida in the beginning
is most definitely a masculine character whose values lie in combat
skills, aggression and action.
Elinor embodies the female traits of
subtlety, diplomacy and a quiet strength that literally parts the
waves of the battle in the great hall. Her silent presence is highly
respected and revered by the men of the court. Her soft-spokenness is
powerful. Her tapestries, which might be sneered at as a useless
female activity, are historical records of events and people in the
kingdom. It is from these tapestries that history gets recorded for
future generations. Her recounting of the Legend of the Four Princes
is part of the kingdom's oral history.
In our society, oral history is often
considered women's history, since men wrote their stories down and
their stories involve men's victories. Women preserved the wisdom of
female stories such as the women of the Bible or Goddess mythology.
The also re-interpreted male stories. Examples of this include a
feminist attempt at a re-interpretation of Genesis. In that version
Eve chose willingly to eat of the tree of Knowledge. She understood
the risks, she was not a victim of the serpent and her gift to her
children was free-will which she had determined was worth the price
of pain and death.
The men and Merida sneered at the oral tradition, saying they had already heard it before. They saw it as merely entertainment. Elinor saw it as a lesson to be meditated on and then lived. Merida would learn this as she got to know her mother as a person separate from her role as queen.
The men and Merida sneered at the oral tradition, saying they had already heard it before. They saw it as merely entertainment. Elinor saw it as a lesson to be meditated on and then lived. Merida would learn this as she got to know her mother as a person separate from her role as queen.
This leads us to the next point. Not
only is this story different because it focuses on two women and
their relationship, but it is a female adventure. By this I do not
mean it ends in marriage as do traditional female fairtytales. The
adventure is domestic/local and subconscious. Merida does not leave
her home like Cinderella and the other fairytale princesses. This is
instead about internal change, revelation and a shift in perspective.
Male adventure usually revolves around violence, weapons, attacking
and traveling far away. The men in the hall when they set up their
barricades and throw spears at each other while arguing over who will
marry the princess, covers the male point of view in this story. The
film only shows this for only a few minutes because it is not the primary
narrative thrust.
The female narrative in this case is
triggered by a physical change of self. When Elinor turns into a bear
it is both accidental and very much intentional. Merida did not plan
it. However, we know something is going to happen involving bears
because of Mor'du in the beginning and because of the obsession the
witch has with bear carvings. The story of the four princes plays
heavily in this as well. When we put these three foreshadowing clues
together, it should not have been a surprise to anyone that Elinor
turned into a bear. Nor should it be a surprise that Mor'du is the
fourth prince. So I reject this idea that people were surprised,
disappointed or felt the narrative made a complete 180 degree turn at
this point.
This is also not a surprise because
this is a Celtic tale. Anyone who knows Celtic legends or mythology,
even just King Arthur, should have seen the animal shape-shifting
“twist” coming from a mile away. Merlin was said to have turned
Arthur into different animals to try to teach him the wisdom of each
animal and how seeing through another's eyes could lead to wisdom.
Elinor's experience does just that for both main characters. This
animal tradition still exists today in modern Shamanism.
Being changed into a bear takes Elinor
out of her element. She must leave the castle which is her domain,
the place where she is the master and teacher. She follows her
daughter into the forest. Elinor doesn't have a clue about the forest
and the animals. Her daughter for the first time becomes her teacher.
Elinor starts to see Merida as the intelligent and capable young
woman she has become and ceases to regard her as an empty vessel to
be filled with her own knowledge or as an extension of her own
identity. An acknowledgment of their separateness occurs. From this
separateness a relationship of equals can emerge. They begin to see
each other as people and not just as roles or positions like princess
and queen. Stripping away the civilized social roles enables them to
just be people with each other. Elinor as a bear is taken out of her
element and gains an opportunity to really learn who her daughter is
as an individual. This is a major trans formative moment. I am a bit
concerned that so many overlooked it in the reviews. This scene seems
to embody the whole point of the adventure and the character
evolution that was the primary focus of this film.
I believe this also answers the problem
that Adrienne Rich wrote about in Of Woman Born. She talked
about mothers as being symbols, or place holders for their children.
Society and children failed to see mothers as human beings with their
own identity, their own interests and separateness.This led to the isolation and neglect of the mother in the domestic sphere and from this came stress, depression and even violent reactions like child-abuse and
suicide. This story provides a healthy example of a mother and
daughter who come to see each other as independent people, and not as
social roles, as I've said earlier. Finally, a mother who is also a
person in her child's eyes.
The lessons that Merida learned from her
mistake, from the change her mother went through, the loss of the
face and body of the woman she knew as her mother, the loss of that
comfort she remembered in her childhood dream when they sang to each
other, came to full fruition in two scenes.
The first one shows us how much Merida
learned from her mother's tutelage on how to be a princess. She takes
on her mother's character traits to an extent, in order to gain the
attention of the crowd of warring men. She imitates her mother's
walk, posture and voice projection as well as careful slow and
diplomatic speech. However, when the men start to shout over her, she
channels her father's forceful presence yelling, “Shut it!” She
also invokes the feminine oral history of the four princes. She does not allow
the men to dismiss this tale and explicitly reveals the lesson of the
story and how they can all do better if they learn from it. Some
have said that she compromises in order to make her family happy. I
don't see her compromising here. I see a change. She has gained new
wisdom and is changing how she views herself and her place in the
world because of it. She has integrated both masculine and feminine
traits and used both to get attention, hold the floor, and get her
point across and not be shouted or bullied out of her power.
I believe this Merida has resolved the
conflict left us by the second wave feminist war of the sexes and
found a peace within herself with both aspects of self. It is the
hope the third wave of feminism has for both men and women. To value
equally the masculine and feminine traits within ourselves, our
spirits and our society. With this integration we can find peace with
each other and hopefully create a healthier society, as Merida did by
laying down new rules for her kingdom. The tradition that took power away from women to choose their mates, and took power away from the
princes to choose their brides as well, was tossed aside in favor of
a new tradition that would honor free-will and each individual having
a say in their own life and destiny. That is true liberty.
The second scene is brief. Her father
tries to kill her mother/bear. Even though Merida in the earlier
scene has accepted the lessons of her mother and has made peace with
her feminine side, she still is fierce and dons the power and action
of her masculine side, that she learned from her father. Her tosses
her aside and she is restrained but she flips the men aside and
fights her own father, defeating him with her sword, a most phallic
symbol. She has succeeded both mother and father and has become fully
a whole and powerful person who wears the traits of male and female
equally and fluently.
The tradition of fairy tales told to
children is one that was intended to teach children the lessons they
needed to know in order to be successful in society. What happens to
children who disobey their parents, who are greedy or gluttonous, or
who trust the wrong people? These same tales also give the answer,
like the witch when she said “Fate be changed; look inside. Mend the bond torn by pride”. They
give children a blue-print on how to navigate the threats and
problems of childhood and adolescence. Our modern Young Adult books
like Harry Potter and Sweep Series do the same for children today.
Now I come to why I think some of the
reviewers, including the female reviewers surprisingly, had such a
problem fully comprehending the importance of this film. I asked many
questions regarding this and it took me a while to formulate potential ideas as to why the misunderstandings occured.
At first I thought it might have
something to do with a lack of understanding of fairytale structures
and specifically Celtic mythology. The magical creatures, the shape
changing, all seemed to be a struggle for some viewers. The witch was
a real person, not a jealous and evil character, but benevolent and
funny. She had a sweet yet feisty personality. She was not like your
average witch in a fairy tale. She was a helper and not trying to
destroy the princess to eat her, use her magical hair, or kill her
out of jealousy. She was a great cartoon crone, in the pagan sense.
Perhaps these viewers, who were all
younger than me, were not familiar with King Arthur and animal
shamanism. They didn't know about or understand the connection of
experiencing life in another's body in order to gain new wisdom.
There is a long tradition of taking on the form of an animal. In
tribal societies they do so in order to get into the mindset of the
prey they will be hunting. There are elaborate hunting rituals that
men engage in before they leave as a party to hunt and get food.
Still practiced today in some parts of the world. So perhaps the
concepts presented from this culture were just too foreign for these
younger viewers to handle or process.
Could it be a lack of imaginative
childhood? I remember when I was young, my friends would spend hours
on this vacant lot we called “the jungle” with trees and bushes
and wildflowers. We would make up stories and act them out. Not
reenact movies we had seen or books, but make up totally new stories
and improv our way through them. My back porch was a time machine (not literally) and
jumping off one side would get you to the future and the other would
take you to the past. I don't know how kids in their teens spend
their imaginative years or how young people in their 20s now spent
their free time as kids. Did they watch TV and play video games? Did
they leave the house at all? Is that imaginative play essential to
truly understand metaphor and symbol and allegory? Could they not see
the layers and depth of the story, the characters, their evolution,
etc. because of this missing skillset? We know in wild animals that play is essential to that animal's
survival. They learn hunting skills, grappling, killing, and social
cues from their play. Why would humans be any different? Boys are
exposed to certain types of toys that encourage math and science and
girls get toys that encourage babies and homemaking even today. We
protest this knowing that what they play with can program their
interests and skill sets even as young as one. The type of play our
children engage in will shape their brains, the social connections
and knowledge and thus determine their ability to live a full and
enjoyable adult life. So could there be a stunting of imagination in
our children because of a loss in free-thinking and imaginative play?
The last possibility leads me to
socialization. The last point also involved socialization through
play, but this question regards gender role training. Because our
society belittles females and female traits, it might be hard for men
and women to take anything seriously that focuses on a female point
of view. This occurs to the point that having a female character "just
because", like female characters for UP which could be a
gender-neutral story, doesn't even enter the minds of writers as a
possibility. The only time female characters are added is when a girl
is needed for a female role. Mother, daughter, token female to
appeal to a wider audience, housekeeper or servant, victim to be
rescued and evoke the viewer's emotional reaction. Even in princess stories from Disney the supporting cast is all male like the bug and alligator in The Princess and the Frog. FeministFrequency
on YouTube covers a series of tropes describing in full these female
roles in video games and how harmful these stereotypes are to females, males, and society as a whole.
Because society cannot take female
points of view seriously, viewers do not believe that their
perceptions and experiences have any value or lesson to teach. They
violently reject or simply overlook these women and accompanying
female traits as superficial, vain, girlie, and as having no impact
on society. Much like Merida did in the beginning of the film. She
learned later they did impact her ability to be powerful in society.
Stories about girls are often stories about mean girls, girls
fighting over a guy, girls being sexual or being sexual objects.
Mothers and daughters are almost never addressed in films and when
they are they are always fighting. Even in “chick flicks” they
are at odds with each other. Trying to find a healthy mother-daughter
relationship is impossible. This movie presents a troubled
relationship but, like a good fairytale, it gives us a pathway, a
vision, out of the conflict and toward resolution and understanding.
It's a way for our young people to envision what it would be like to
really appreciate one's mother and to see her as a person. It is
troubling when a female reviewer says repeatedly and with contempt
that she just doesn't care about Merida as a character at all and
this conflict is the same as all others.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnev3eTmKCU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnev3eTmKCU
In How to Be a Woman by Caitlin Moran, the author
discusses something she describes as her imaginative landscape. In
the book she focuses on visions of sexual pleasure, but I believe her
concept applies to this as well. In order for us to be able to see
ourselves in healthy relationships, we have to have examples. We
have to have seen it on TV or in real life, or read it in a book when
we are in our formative years so we can add it to our imagination.
Once we have that vision in our heads, it becomes like a landmark. We
are conditioned to look for that because it feels good and makes us
happy. It becomes a ruler to measure our relationships and something
we can use as a model to create our own happy and healthy
relationship. If we don't have these visions in our imagination we
are lead to believe it is not possible or does not exist. People who
have seen nothing but broken and antagonist relationships aren't
going to know how to construct a healthy one. They need a model to
follow, and clear signs to read so they can steer their relationship
right. It is the legacy of a conflicted familial past that so many
cannot accept a clear example of a healthy and happy family.
For Example, Pop Psychology authors have made millions of dollars teaching visualization as means to achieve happiness. "If you can dream it, you can do it."--Walt Disney
For Example, Pop Psychology authors have made millions of dollars teaching visualization as means to achieve happiness. "If you can dream it, you can do it."--Walt Disney
This imaginative landscape that is
seeded during a person's youth combines socialization with
imagination. You can't imagine it if you've never “seen” it and
you can't create it if you can't imagine it. Therapy is expensive and
fairytales are cheap.
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