Marlene, snoozing in a zoo in Warsaw, was shared with the world by Leszek.Leszczynski on flickr.
I don’t know quite what we’re celebrating yet, but today we have bonus CAKE! With otter decoration. Own up! Which Hoydenizen is having a birthday or other joyous event this week? This photo comes courtesy of Shindigs Girl on flickr.
Please feel free to use this thread to natter about anything your heart desires. Is there anything great happening in your life? Anything you want to get off your chest? Reading a good book (or a bad one)? Anything in the news that you’d like to discuss? What have you created lately? Commiserations, felicitations, temptations, contemplations, speculations?
Categories: Life
Soggy here, innit? 
In memoriam: Diana Rigg 
Getting out the ‘yes’ 
100 books by women in 2016 
Hoyden About Town 
I’m currently hating work and stuck in the midst of a sticky situation with friends. Friend A is pro homebirtrh, supporting Lisa Barrett no matter what, yay homeopathy for treatment, boo rules around home birth etc. Friend B is currently fighting for better licensing and training due to the piss poor ‘care’ she received that ended up with isoimmunisation and 33 week premmie with lots of issues. Both of course on Facebook, blogs and stuff. And I find myself of the licensing end of things because it just feels like yet another round of women getting second class care because they don’t really matter. But it’s not like the hospital route is that much better either, but at least it isn’t overrun with magical thinking and different ways of knowing and ‘trust’ in birth.
I think there is quite a lot of magical thinking in interventionist hospital birth. Try to find the evidence for inducing suspected macrosomia, or for routine electronic fetal monitoring. Then look at the stats.
True, it isn’t evidence based, not nearly as much as it likeS to think. And the slowness of the evidence based practice coming into effect is ridiculous (hospitals/staff still fighting the lay still, no food, no water BS? Jesus, that freaks me out). But I still can’t deal with garlic for GBS, RHogam is unsafe and unnecessary, ultrasounds cause autism, babies with heart defects are ambivalent about being born and positive thoughts being the reason for good outcomes.
Neither ‘side’ is where I want to be, not truly. I don’t like either extremity.
I can really empathise with Geek Anachronism over the “birth divide”, and how difficult it is to locate the sweet spot of evidence-based care, given that’s really where most births should be happening.
*****
I’ve discovered I have a major peeve about “nature or nurture” – firstly, both words are horrifically misleading – in biology, we’d talk about “genes” and “environment”, and secondly, it’s very rare that the answer is anything but “it’s a very complex interaction of both”, particularly when it’s Homo sapiens. The phrase “nature or nurture” I think ends up constricting people’s thinking more than anything.
GA, I tend to think that the difficulty of accessing midwifery care outside the or independent of the hospital system that’s not incompatible with my belief systems (for reasons I won’t go into here, I don’t much like the term ‘skeptic’ as applied to me, but let’s say skeptical and materialist) is largely the fault of the medical establishment’s excessive control of midwifery. Autonomy for midwives with access to insurance and with a system of supportive, compatible medical backup would result in more independent midwives in general, presumably including many whose practice is supportive of my preference to have Rhogam administered and take hypertension medication, since those are pretty mainstream positions.
In terms of general issues, my pregnancies are medium-risk, I guess, and one of my most personal peeves about pregnancy and birth care in Australia is care transfer. There are very very few arrangements where a pregnant person who develops pretty much any complication whatsoever is not immediately and permanently severed from continued clinical contact with the people who had been hir midwife or midwifery team in hospitals that notionally have team midwifery or case-loading midwifery. Of people I know who were originally in birth centre style programs, the bulk of them had to birth in the care of strangers in the end (risked out for pre-eclampsia inductions, breech presentation, etc).
People who have a higher risk at the start of their pregnancy like I do do not have any option within the hospital system to develop relationships with midwives in the first place. Midwives attended and monitored my induction from beginning to end; why, given that I was always at higher risk of having a medically indicated induction on an unripe cervix, is the medical system set up so that my birth attendant at my difficult, extremely painful (but thankfully quick), birth, had to be a complete stranger to me?
I do wish there were more independent midwives who could collaborate with my medical specialists and lead the birth attendance for any non-Caesarean birth I had but it’s not midwives primarily standing in the way of that being possible.
In non-birthing news, although as my son gets older I find myself returning to birthing grumpies after a nice time away from it, we had cupcakes today. Cupcakes, oh yeah, two adult sized and one small cupcake! My son hasn’t quite gone traditional child yet in only eating the icing, but I can see that phase coming soon.
I’m sad to be missing the Sydney Hoyden meetup and Marriage Equality event tomorrow, but I’m also glad we’ve chosen to have a weekend at home recovering from Hell Colds and general weariness. I hope everyone going has a great day.
Had a massage then went to a hens night last night. I am still so exhausted! But it was excellent fun, and we had a dance class and lots of laughing so I’ve probably done my exercise for today already.
I feel like things are incredibly busy here right now, though by most able-bodied standards I imagine it’s quite sedate. School holidays start next week, my partner had minor surgery last week, I’ve got a trip to the vet tomorrow, and (in spring news!) I’ve just set my first dozen fertile eggs in my Shiny! New! (dull, secondhand, but I heart it anyhow) incubator.
The Lad is currently doing karate, soccer, and swimming. Footy has just wound up, and cricket is about to start; he’ll add choir to that line-up next year, and possibly surf club at the end of next year. Blimey, it’s a whirl; and it’s also the birthday party season now.
Sounds pretty busy to me, Lauredhel! But also like fun – I only have vague memories of incubators and chickies, but awww, cutest evah! I hope it’s lots of fun watching them pop out!
For a moment of sweetness, this week’s Radio Times had an article asking various of the people associated with Doctor Who who their heroes were from the series’ history. Karen Gillan, rather than a character, chose Stephanie Carey, her stuntwoman.
I have about three thousand examples of productions of Henry VI and two of King John. How do I make them work in the same chapter? How??
How does one make King John work with anything, really?
/unhelpful
Huge Postcrossing haul today, 2 post cards and one envelope containing a post card each for the kids, two Chinese coins and a little card for me as the sender was worried that the letter would be too heavy if zie sent me a big card as well! A lovely surprise. I’m really enjoying postcrossing, although I’ll have to go somewhere soon so I can get some from somewhere else as I’ve almost exhausted the local supply.
Clive Hamilton blasts “feminism” for putting evil ideas (like serving their country on the front line) in pretty girl’s heads, and making them want high-ranking, blokey jobs and such. Apologies for a possibly an unfair summary, but I was rage-blind when I read this:
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/women-at-war-is-the-final-surrender-20110929-1kz77.html
Thanks Perla, I just did a quick hit on that and I will go back and publish it now. It is rather rage inducing.
NEW from Geneva: Jovial Douche.
(Why does that remind me of Clive Hamilton?)