up the SAHDS!

oh, man.

i totally love and respect all the stay-at-home-dads (SAHDs).

mine is the best!

you guys take shit from patriarchal bastards, deal with whiny kids all day, and support your partners' decisions/rights to have a job outside the home.

i had a hard day today. i worked all night last night (7p - 7a) and couldn't really sleep well today. but he kept the kids, had them stay relatively quiet, read them books, homeschooled, took them for a hike, drove around until the 2 yo fell asleep, and made me coffee for when i woke up. fucking awesome. i am too lucky.

i like my job. i don't love it; it's a job, you know? but i surely like it better than any job my partner had when i was pregnant, new mothering, and/or going to school. and i make twice as much money as he did. that helps.

i have recently added some links (see right) to some SAHD and radical parenting blogs.

SAHD blogs:

• daddy dialectic
• lesbian dad

radical parenting blogs:

• anti-racist parent
• ariel gore
• my mother wears combat boots
• rad dad

on another note, i linked to laura shanley's blog on free birth (aka unassisted childbirth).

on still another note, i'm seriously thinking about getting my IUD out. i have the mirena. i have been unexplainably depressed lately, had zero libido (hey, that kind of rhymes) and have gained a bunch of weight. but mostly it's just uncomfortable all the time.

i just don't want to have any more babies. it's a conundrum.

rebel grrls and wise women

i had a greeeaat birthday.

i had a fabulous party thrown for me and got to hang with some totally rad (literally - radical) friends.

my favorite part for sure was hanging out with some of my younger, hip, beautiful lady-friends. i just think they are so smart, life-loving, and sweet.

the best part was all the talking about women's health issues.

we talked about some important topics:

• birth control pills

their possible risks, benefits, why susun weed condones their use

• baby-havin'

how one can both love and fear it and how it's a biological urge that must be respected.

• medical abortion

how one can respect, choose, and regret it. how it's definitely not our favorite option.

• Fertility Awareness Method

how it almost always works when you use it and almost always doesn't work when you don't. most of the young women i know who have had unplanned pregnancies in the past few years (including me) were "using" this method, but one of the wise women i used to live with has successfully used it for years and had no such unwanted pregnancy.

• menstrual extraction

where can we gain info on this? how do we find some people who were involved in the 1990s spread of the technique/ practice of it? wouldn't it be empowering if we could perform this on ourselves safely?

• herbal abortion

how we need to gather, dry, and distribute the readily available, relatively safe, native herbs we can use for these purposes. also, we need to learn how to propagate other non-native herbs.

• UTIs

herbal healing including another native herb: trailing arbetis, which has healed my chronic, tenacious, recurrent UTIs a couple of times when nothing else has worked.

it was awesome. i had a great time.

if anyone has any info or comments on any of these things, holler at me!

and now for something completely different...

check THIS out!

setting the record straight. or curvy...

i guess the last couple blogs that i have posted have been pretty critical of homebirth midwifery.

i've gotten a couple of comments that have been very anti-homebirth, and although i didn't expect them, i'm not very surprised. i don't agree with their positions.

i feel the (probably purely vain) need to clarify my positions.

my beliefs

i passionately believe in homebirth.

i had a homebirth. i would have another and would consider having an unassisted birth if i could find a place to have it that was close to a compassionate hospital with an OB dept.

i believe it is a woman's right to choose where and with whom she gives birth.

i believe homebirth is the best option for any healthy woman who believes in the power of her body and trusts the power of birth.

i believe that the state of homebirth midwifery in this area is unfortunate. i have hope that things are changing, but as of when i had a homebirth with my son 2 years ago, my choices were slim and my family and i were disappointed with the care i received. i believe it is directly related to the criminalization of homebirth midwifery in this state.

worst of the worst

i was just reading navelgazing midwife's blog about post-partum hemorrhage and thinking about home birth.

i never really thought about the possiblity of there being a problem with both baby and mom when i had my home birth. wow. what an ignorant mama i was.

thankfully i had a great outcome - as most mamas do. but what if i hadn't? what would my midwife have done? she had no birth assistant with her, no apprentice, no partner, no doula, no nurse, no midwife's assistant.

who would she have saved?

i live at least 50 minutes away from a hospital with an OB dept or an OR.

in my opinion, this is what the criminalization of midwifery is forcing us into.

illegal = less midwives = overworked = territorial and competitive = unsafe.

the midwives around here really need to start

1. taking care of themselves
2. working together
3. preparing for the worst

on the other hand, i think of wanting to have an unassisted birth and where that would leave my partner if something terrible happened.

i think i just won't have any more babies. it's too complicated.