WHAT the fuck?!? (updated)

Yep, I used "fuck" in the title of my post today. In fact, I wasn't even going to post today (I'm tired, I have to work tonight, and I'm enjoying some pumpkin coffee). However, while perusing facebook this morning I came across a discussion that literally made my jaw hit the floor.

First some background: as some of you know, I like to piddle around on certain pro-homebirth/NCB sites; even though I can't comment on those pages, it's still excellent fodder for discussion within my private groups. Anyway, while scrolling through Peaceful Parenting's page (you know, the circ police who think everyone should breastfeed their kid until their wedding day) I came across this gem: a ten-year old in Mexico who was raped, had a baby, and stop the fucking presses, she is BREASTFEEDING THAT BABY.


Now what is one supposed to take from this article? Well, unlike most people, who would be HORRIFIED at a ten-year old being raped and forced to carry a baby, "Dr." Momma writes this: "She is recovering herself, and thanks to her milk, her son is now doing remarkably well for his tender condition."


Now if that's not amazing enough, she goes further to write: "an investigation is taking place to find whether or not this young girl was raped, and who the father of this baby is...

Legal age of sexual consent in Mexico is 12 years, and it is illegal to terminate a pregnancy unless a girl is able to prove she was the victim of sexual assault."

Let's recap what we've got so far: 

1. A ten-year old girl in Mexico 

2. Even though she's ten fucking years old, they're not sure if she was raped, so she'd better go ahead and have that baby

3. Even though she's only TEN, and had to have as The Good Doctor writes "A necessary surgical birth" (necessary maybe because she's fucking ten years old, her little body went into early labor, and TEN-YEAR OLDS AREN'T BUILT TO BIRTH BABIES), thank fucking god she's breastfeeding that baby, because not only should she be forced to carry that baby, she better keep it and breastfeed it too.

But you know what? That's not even the most amazing part of this story. What's amazing is the discussion on the article that's going on on Peaceful Parenting's facebook page - and hence the reason for this post. 

According to this lady: 

Yep, just 'cause she's ten, doesn't mean she was raped. Why? Because ten is ONLY two years younger than twelve, which (in Mexico) is the legal age of consent. Oh, she qualifies that with a "yeah, I think she was raped," but then again "we don't KNOW until the facts come out." So apparently the ten-year old could just perhaps be a MATURE ten-year old. We just don't know.

And then after a few other people express some dismay that 'ol Melissa would suggest that this ten-year old little girl might have totally been down with gettin' down, Melissa comes back a-firin': 

THANK FUCKING GOD this little ten-year old is "trying to see the silver lining" and doing what what good little ten-year old girls who've been raped, impregnated, and forced to carry the baby should do: breastfeed that baby. 'Cause CLEARLY that's what matters.

If you want to follow the rest of the discussion, check it out here; I have some wonderful friends who are continuing the discussion with Melissa.


Update: according to this story, an older male relative has been arrested in connection to this case. Apparently, Melissa Tullock Joers, it wasn't consensual. Imagine that.

Why I Do Not Get To Sleep Even After Working 14 Hours Overnight

All of this occurred during a twenty-minute phone call Husband was taking. I am now resigned to staying up until bedtime. 


Vlad (seeing me curled up on the sofa in a post-shift fuzz): "Hey, are you sleepin'?" (taps my face). "All the way sleepin' or just kinda?" I choose to ignore him at this point. He might just get bored. 


Vlad (making himself comfortable with his butt wedged up against my neck): "So how was work? Did you get to take a nap or was you just havin' a lot of fun?" Me: "Well, no. I didn't get to take a nap." Vlad: "Oh, RIGHT! You was doin' shots and pokin' people and takin' their temperature under their arms and inside their butts!" Kind of. 


Vladimir gets inspired.


Vlad: "Hey, lemme get you a blanket so you will have a nice nap!" (Finds a not-too-stained throw. Tucks it carefully around my feet, shoving it so that it's wrapped snugly around my chest and neck, and winds the remainder around my head and pulls it over my face). "There you go!" Again, an inspiration: "HEY. I hope you don't have the SICK. Let me check." Yanks cocoon from around my head, shoves hands behind my neck. "Well, you do not have a cold, because you feel hot." Pleased with his diagnosis, he again cocoons my head. 


A few minutes pass. I begin to think that he's wandered into the playroom to watch the iPad. 


"CHIEF." Again I am de-cocooned and a large brown eye is pressed up next to my eye, which he is now prying open. "HEY. I AM GONNA GO PEE." Thunders off down the hallway. A second later I hear the telltale sound of a five-year old enthusiastically releasing his water. Thunders back into the living room. 


Just as I realize that 1). I heard no toilet flush, and 2). No sounds of hands being washed, a finger is wedged into my mouth. Me (coming rather fully awake): "VLADIMIR YOU DID NOT WASH YOUR HANDS." Vladimir takes my face and cradles it in both his hands. "Mommy. These are the peein' germs. They make you the peein' sick. They do not make you face sick." Vladimir carefully re-cocoons my head, leaving a small breathing space for my nose. After a few seconds I begin to doze again. 


Vlad (rewedging himself with his butt against my neck, elbows resting comfortably on my head and my side): "So at work. When you're workin'. Do you ever see Doctor House and talk about MRIs and Streptococcus?" Me: "Um. No. Not really." Vlad: "Maybe you should take a look at that leg for him. Tell him to just shake it off." Me: "I might do that. Once I'm rested." Another comfortable silence, during which I slip into a half-dream imagining that I'm trying to re-cannulate an infant. 


Suddenly the pressure on my head, neck, and side are relieved, only to instantly be replaced by approximately 50 pounds of five-year old wrapped around my head with his knees slammed into my chest. "VINCENT IS IN HERE AND HE'S GONNA THROW THAT STUPID BALL AT MY FACE AND IT WILL HURT WHY WON'T ANYONE STOP HIIIIIIMMMMMM!!!!!" Which is actually a rather legitimate complaint, as Vincent has an arm like Sandy Koufax. 


At the sound of Vincent's ball hitting its mark, I shove a wailing Vlad to the floor and realize that a nap is just not going to happen today. 

The List of Stuff I Should Be Doing, But Am Not (because)...

I am messing around on facebook.

1. Studying up on ventilators and tracheostomies for pediatrics (workshop all day Wednesday. Which means I'll be reading like mad at midnight on Tuesday).

2. Taking Vlad to get his 'hawk re"hawked". He's starting to look fluffy.

3. Laundry. I may have to start delegating to Husband. Laundry blows.

4. Drawing up my anniversary/birthday/Christmas list for Husband. He needs to be prepared.

5. Decide on a surgeon for the revamp on Mary Kate and Ashley (Ashley needs a touch-up, but I'm thinking of going to silicone. Yays? Nays?)

6. Do a fall clean on the house before the MIL comes for Thanksgiving (which means this will get done approximately two hours before we pick her up at the airport. If I'm lucky).

7. Prepare a write-up on why you shouldn't be delivering a baby into fecally contaminated and Pseudomonas/E. coli/etc- laden pool water. Water birth is disgusting. Plus I want to see how many times I can work "fecal" into a five-page essay.

8. Math homework with Big V. Need I say more?

9. Epidemiology discussion for biostats. Yeah, I don't think it sounds like fun either.

So what's so captivating on facebook that I can't tear myself away? Well, as some of you know, I'm banned from a few pregnancy/childbirth pages; namely Birth Without Brains, Made to Blather Incessantly  (warning: this chick abuses capitalization, grammar, and exclamation points like no other), and The Madly Misinformed Mother (ignorance and an internet connection; can't get much better!). Why am I banned? Oh, for pointing out things like shoving garlic in your yoni to "treat" GBS colonization does nothing but make said yoni smell like an Italian eatery and can result in a horrific birth outcome, and for commenting that breast milk does not, in fact, elevate your little boob nosher to a position of reduced obesity, no illness, and enhanced intelligence (want to discuss this with me? Learn how to analyze scientific studies, then we'll talk; in the meantime you might start with Joan B. Wolf's "Is Breast Best" for a non-wooful take on breastfeeding mythology; The Fearless Formula Feeder has a great interview with the author, and Jessica Valenti has a hilarious reply to The Feminist Bleater's confusing analogy comparing breast augmentation to formula marketing).

So why do I still read these pages, even though I can't comment? Probably for the same reason football fans scream at the television during the game; it certainly doesn't affect the outcome, but there's always that hope that at least one self-proclaimed "birth junkie" will check herself and realize that what matters in pregnancy and childbirth is that you have a happy and healthy baby at the end - not that you get "natural" childbirth bragging rights.

And do not get me started with the anti-vaccination idiots. That's another post, for another day, for another session of procrastination. Back to facebook :).

Sh*t My Vlad Says

That's right! Thing 1 finally has his own facebook page! Go give him some love!

A Story by Vladimir

Typed as dictated by Vladimir the Great and Terrible.

Once, there was a hero and an Evil Scientist. The Evil Scientist cut food and made a huge monster. And a little one. The monster, who was FrankenFruit, had a face made out of a pineapple. So, the hero, he cut the pineapple up so he could eat it. Because pineapple is delicious.

So, anyway, Frankenfruit, he was just made out of all kinds of food and not just fruit. He had bologna for eyes. He had a big old orange for a nose. He had a big giant mouth made out of mayonnaise and carrots. The teeth were carrots. His tummy was big. Huge, actually. He also had a hotdog and a banana. For his wieners. 'Cause he had TWO.

SO the hero, who was giant tall and had an awesome mohawk and General Grievous wonderwears, decided this. He decided to EAT ALL OF FRANKENFRUIT to save his mother. Because his mother would just die if he did not eat all of his fruit. Allegedly.

So he got a big knife. And a sword. And his gun. Because heros take them everywhere they go. So he CHOPPED FrankenFruit and he SLASHED FrankenFruit and then he BLASTED Frankenfruit with his big giant awesome gun. Because he is awesome.


And then he ate all of his fruit so that he could have another General Grievous toy at the PX. The End.

Tomorrow we will tell the tale of the Actually Pretty Nice Skeleton and The Lame Zombie. The End For Real This Time.

THE END.

Oh there was a pear too. FrankenFruit had knees made out of pears.

How Your Breathing Affects Your Gas Bill

Yes, people, that's right: the very breaths you take within your home have a direct and dramatic affect on the price you pay for your gas utility bills...or so claims Judy R, a city employee of the Fairfield IL utility company.

Perhaps I should back up a bit. While attending school this semester, I have been spending a good deal of time at another residence in the same city as my school, thus leaving my house in Fairfield empty during the week. Cleverly imagining that I would be saving money on utilities during this harsh winter, I had been leaving my thermostat at home set at fifty degrees (fahrenheit, not celsius, mind you). After doing so for nearly a month and a half, I fully expected (as would many of you, I am sure) my gas utility bill to reflect that temperature. However, when I received my bill for the previous month, I was astonished to discover that not only had my bill increased, it had done so by nearly fifty-five fucking dollars. So yeah, I was pissed.

However, instead of flying straight to city hall and using my bill to inflict numerous papercuts all over the reproductive organs of the hapless gas-meter dyslexic who had recorded such a figure, I decided to give them the benefit of a doubt and instead placed a call (1-618-842-5016) to city hall: home of the gas utility people of Fairfield, where I spoke with Judy R.

After explaining to Judy R that I had not been staying at my home during the week, and had set my thermostat at a chilly (but not freezing) fifty degrees fahrenheit, and so was therefore confused as to how my bill had increased by fifty-five dollars, she told me this: that when a house is unoccupied, the gas utility bill always increases.

Naturally, this sounded like a big pile of poop. I expressed my disbelief in a less descriptive manner; instead telling her that I was a bit confused as to how that could be. And this, dear reader, was Judy R's explanation: when a house is constantly occupied by a bevy of (presumably) warm bodies, the heat that these bodies produce, and yes, the breaths they produce, contribute to the overall warmth of the house, therefore apparently taking about fifty-five dollar's worth of the burden of heating off of the heater.


Now i admit, I did not go to gas meter reading school, nor am I a gastroenterologist. In fact, i haven't even had gastroenteritis this year, so my interpretation of this astonishing phenomenon may be a weensy bit uneducated. However, when I asked Judy R to clarify exactly how a person could generate fifty-five dollar's worth of extra heat (thereby saving energy, rather than using it), she became angry that I was questioning the Breath Emission Theory of Gas Utility Reduction, proceeded to interrupt my inquiries and cut off my questions, declared that I was interrupting her, and hung up on me. At this point, Faithful Reader, I began to reconsider my earlier impulse to inflict numerous utility bill paper cuts upon the gas party responsible, but instead, I took a deep breath (and, according to the Judy R Breath Emission Theory of Gas Utility Reduction, saved a few bucks) and again dialed Fairfield City Hall (1-618-842-5016)...and got a busy signal. Six times. Upon the seventh(ish) call, it rang through, where I was again connected to Judy R. Instead of questioning her upon the sensitive subject of the Breath Emission Theory of Gas Utility Reduction, I calmly explained to her that I disliked being hung up on, and that I wished to discontinue my service with them, effective the first of next month. She interrupted (once again) and asked me where to send the final bill. Fed up at last, I informed Judy R that she could shove my final bill up her ass. Again, she hung up on me.

So, Dear Readers, I invite any and all of you to reach out and touch Judy R at the Fairfield Illinois City Hall (1-618-842-5016) and have her reveal how the Judy R Breath Emission Theory of Gas Utility Reduction can save you money! In the meantime, I am going to go out and find a few homeless people to breathe in my house until I move, (sort of a breathing-by-proxy), and hopefully save a few dollars. Peace out.


I wrote this nearly four years ago, when I was still in school and quite poor. To this day, I am still receiving that final bill. I send Judy R a Christmas card each year, care of the utility company, with a money order for one dollar to be applied toward that bill.

Guess What I'm Doing This Weekend!

My husband, my lovecakes, is taking me to see THIS:

...and I am ex-KITED!!!


Excited because it's Matt Damon?

Nope.

Excited because we'll be childless for approximately one hour and forty-five minutes?

Nope.

Excited because movies/shows/books involving viral or bacterial mayhem are my favorite thing ever?!?!?!?


YOU BET.