“We must rapidly begin the shift from a ‘thing-oriented’ society to a ‘person-oriented’ society.”
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr
I’m supposed to be ramping up book promotion before launch, but it feels gross. Everything does. I had planned to follow up my last post with a detailed account of my postnatal experience because everything from healthcare to the formula shortage stirred up a bunch of old angst pertinent to discussion that may be helpful to others, and I’m still going to get to that, but since then there have been two mass shootings: one close to home by a white supremacist targeting a black community in Buffalo, and another at a school in Texas.
Of course we have a mental health crisis in this country. It grows every time parents have to bury their children and children mourn their classmates or wake from nightmares in the aftermath. Otherwise, mental health problems are not unique to the U.S. or the demographics behind most shootings. Neither are violent movies and games, though there is a toxic element within communities contributing to the radicalization of young men. Many shooters identified as supremacists. Most have a history of hate speech, domestic violence, or both. Hate isn’t a mental illness. It’s learned, and deadly alongside fetishizing guns. Most people want background checks, red flags for abusers and the mentally ill, removal of loopholes undermining prior reform, and some semblance of training and responsible gun ownership – irrespective of political affiliation. Instead a minority of politicians and lobbyists subvert the will of the people, just like reproductive healthcare. And they lie and inspire men to kill. After Sandy Hook, a propagandist launched a harassment campaign against families. Others followed his lead, and continue to incite through lies. Politicians blame mental health but do not support mental healthcare.
I’m so sick of people insulting children and parents en masse with sweeping generalizations (in this or any other context). There are far more kind and thoughtful children than there are killers. Every tired “kids these days” retread dishonors the dead, like the children who died protecting one another, be it attempting to dial 911 or throwing themselves in front of a classmate, and they add insult to the unimaginable injury of parents. The kids are alright. Most don’t lack discipline (not to be confused with corporal punishment, which many shooters experienced besides) or morals. If anyone needs more (any?!) discipline, it’s those who abuse authority. Instead many people venerate the rich and powerful who behave worse than children and value money and possessions over people, and they defend their corruption.
“Pro-life” only seems to apply to the narrowest of circumstances. The term is a lot like “school choice” or “right to work”, pretty catchphrases designed to mislead voters and hide ugly truths. The former diverts funding from public schools (that could be used for, I don’t know, safety) to subsidize educations of the affluent while the poor are left with even fewer choices; the latter lets businesses circumvent worker protections. In the case of pro-life, it’s not about that at all. Otherwise the first priority would be pre and post-natal care.
My own experiences reflect a lack of consideration for moms and babies. I did receive decent prenatal care. And honestly, my maternity experience was probably better than most, but a lot went wrong. The anesthesiologist botched my spinal block. He did something horribly painful to my back, and I felt all these pulses of agonizing, radiating pain. I started vomiting. Then he got testy because he needed to finish. It’s supposed to be a single bee sting with immediate pain relief (yes, anesthesia can cause vomiting) – but I wasn’t even in pain before he jabbed me…and he wasn’t done. Surgery went okay, but the OB could have done a nicer job stitching my belly back up.
One son went straight to the NICU. The other was moved the next day due to jaundice. The maternity nurses were all from the same generation, and very anti-breastfeeding. They also got mad I refused pain pills (hospital charged insurance $1k for the one 800 mg ibuprofen I accepted) and spent too much time with my sons. I thought of them as the Triple Bs (if anyone’s testy, it should be the one who was sliced open). Every mother I met in the next year experienced similar. The NICU acted like it was my fault my sons failed to thrive even though they were supplementing with formula. The lactation consultant didn’t even see me until the third day. I was having problems and it hurt. A lot. She insisted the pain was normal. Spoiler: it wasn’t.
Once a nurse laughed as she told me about one son peeing in his own face and mouth because she was distracted changing him. Another time I found him with an IV sticking out of his head because he’d pulled it out of his wrists too much. I spent a lot of time observing staff talking and laughing while babies cried for food or clean diapers or maybe just human contact. I didn’t want to leave the hospital while my sons were in the NICU. The pediatrician suggested I request a room in the NICU. Everyone said no such room existed. The pediatrician contacted a social worker. I got the room until one son was released. Then I had to split time between home and the NICU until the second was released days later. I kept pumping, nursing, and supplementing. That Kelly book said nobody knows our kids better than us, unless we think they’re still hungry, in which case we’re wrong and bad and we should feel bad. And somewhere, buried in all the mom shaming, was a small paragraph vaguely alluding to feeding disorders.
I saw a lactation consultant at another hospital. She weighed one before and after I nursed. He lost weight. They had torticollis, which is jaw stiffness and not that rare in twins. Even bottle feeding was impaired. And everyone had missed it. I took them for occupational therapy for the next few months. Eventually I could nurse full time and sleep more than a few hours a night. Once I found out Nestle funded some bogus studies blaming SIDs on co-sleeping (if you consider drunk parents passing out on the couch co-sleeping) even though co-sleeping is the norm in many parts of the world that don’t have the same problems. Between that, and other debates, and getting slammed with cynical ads for losing weight and getting rid of “ugly” stretch marks, and those early days being a blur of fear and confusion, I was very much over our culture celebrating the idea of motherhood while exploiting the reality.
Years later we’ve had new moms dying due to health misinformation, ignorant discourse about the formula shortage, struggling moms caught in the middle, pregnancy forced on children who can’t advocate for themselves or their babies, school shootings, and the endless onslaught of misogyny, racism, lies…it’s all so very demoralizing, but I guess that’s the goal.
