Wet Feet

Pregnant Teens

Look among the pregnancy books in your local bookstore, and imagine you are a pregnant teen. Everything is geared toward those women who get pregnant on purpose, or if it wasn't on purpose, it was not unwelcome. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, for you.

If you are a pregnant teen, the messages are in chorus: you are ruining your life and the life of your child.  This no choice you would want to visit upon yourself or anyone you love. This is a one-way ticket to poverty and hardship and life without possibility.

The sources that contradict this message are few. Girlmom and Ariel Gore will spill the secrets of teenage motherhood, how it can be a good thing, something to celebrate, something to revel in. A challenge that makes you a better person, that can actually help, rather than hinder, the achievement of your goals.

And now there's another resource. Hope, Joy and a few little thoughts by Rachel Brignoni not only dispels the myth that teenage motherhood will spell the end of yourself (she went on to earn her degree and work at a Fortune 100 company) but offers, as the title says, hope and joy to those in a crisis pregnancy.

Her message is a valuable one. "In an effort to decrease teenage pregnancy, most campaigns stress associated poverty, hardship and limited opportunities for success" she writes. "These messages are intended to prevent teenage pregnancy, but offer little hope for those who become pregnant."

Teenage pregnancies are as natural as rain, as the wind. There is no preventing them completely. It is irresponsible for us as a society to dismiss and shame teenage mothers. They can, and do, make good mothers, in this culture and in many others.

She goes on to write: "The lasting effect of these messages can weaken your power, so I encourage you to disregard them immediately...It is critical to let go of disparaging thoughts and find new hope that will result in love and support. these new messages will be vital in empowering yourself."

And she hits it exactly: when encountering a pregnant teenager, instead of thinking of the loving couple she can benefit by aborting her own motherhood, we should focus on enabling her own empowerment.

Needing support does not disqualify a woman from deserving her child. The most prepared and mature mothers still need support. Children cannot, and should not, be raised in a vaccuum. It may be trite, but it really does take a village. We can all be the village.

Balance

I was having a conversation with a friend of mine a few weeks ago, and I asked him (never married, childless, single 30-something man who is, no, not my boyfriend) a question. "What makes a good mother?"

"One who sets herself aside in favor of her children" was his answer.

One who sets herself aside.

On one hand it's true. My needs become exponentially less important. I will throw myself in front of a bus to save my girls without a second thought. As would most of us mothers.

On the other hand, where is that line between "less important" and "not important"?

Immersing one's self in motherhood is part of the process. But there comes a point where the self is asserted again. For a long time I was happy with no interests of my own other than the things related to mothering. There was a time when the only books I read were child-rearing-related, where all my internet bookmarks had to do with slings, cloth diapers, and mothering.com. I can't say I was unhappy or unfulfilled that way. It wasn't a problem until the rock met the hard place.

Around the time I got divorced I swung the other way and all my interests had nothing whatsoever to do with my kids and everything to do with me me me.

I am aware that the drastic swing my life has taken, from one extreme to the other, has not been immediately beneficial to my kids or, really, to myself. But it had to be done. And for the first time in a year, I've been finding that balance between my needs and theirs. Or, trying to. Or, trying to undo the damage from the swinging. Or, becoming aware of the damage wrought and the need for balance. Or, or, or. You know what I mean.

I can't help but wonder, however, how I would have done things differently if I had known.

I am interested in your thoughts on this matter. Have you found a balance? How?

fever dreams

yesterday the little bug i thought was nothing blossomed into a night of sweat and fever for the three of us. naomi's headache got so bad she had blurry vision. her imaginary friend, tenna-coles, told her she might need glasses. in my fretting, i googled her symtoms. my first hit was a cdc page about biological warfare and what symtoms to look for in the event of an attack. yikes.

we are all feeling much better now thanks to a fresh dose of advil.

last night i had one of those dreams when i have illuminating, healing conversations with people who are unreachable in real life. this time is was with e's parents.

in the dream, they came over to my house and let their kids play with my kids and didn't treat me like the shit on the bottom of their shoes or the hand grenade that will blow their beautiful life to bits.

they talked to me like they did before i gave them my firstborn. we laughed. we joked. we were friends who could work through anything. i awoke with my guts churning with betrayal.

2 3/4 Years

It doesn't seem that long ago that I was finishing my LLL certification.

Today is the first Tuesday of the month, thus it is meeting time. Every month I almost forget to go. Every month I am at least ten minutes late.

It's been on my mind for a long time that I'm not living the LLL lifestyle anymore. Since I got divorced, since I weaned, since I started sending a child under 2 away every weekend, these are things that are not compatible with the LLL way as most people within the organization see it. There are many things about LLL that I love, but there are many more things that annoy me. The fact that we have a healthy membership but no leader prospects speaks to the inflexibility of the organization to accept lifestyles divergent from the 50's style nuclear mold.

I stuck with it for a long time because I love the new moms. I love the new babies. I love the excitement of the group when I say something that resonates with them, that perhaps they hadn't thought of before. I love the women who come back month after month, bringing their babies that grow into toddlers before my eyes.

I decided during today's meeting that I was going to be done. When I brought it up with another group leader, we decided that before my official retirement I'd get Jo through her last stages toward certification and I'd lead one more meeting. The meeting is April Fool's Day (ha!!) and the topic will be Myths and Truths about breastfeeding. We meet at Essene Natural Foods at 4th and Bainbridge at 10 am, and if you want to stop by and introduce yourself, or just spy on me, that would be awesome.

It would also be awesome if you'd like to leave some myths (funny, damaging, benign, weird, or whatever) you've encountered about breastfeeding in the comments. Help me make my last meeting a good one.

I'm still going to be an advocate of breastfeeding, I'll still help any mother who needs it, I'll still smile whenever I see a mother whipping it out in public, and I'll feel a little wistful that I no longer can use that method of shocking people.