labor

...[M]en get a lot of praise for the “extra-credit work” they do in regards to domestic labor (the actual house cleaning and keeping work) and emotional labor (the invisible work that ensures the rest gets done) no matter what day of the year.

When my son came out of surgery seventeen-and-a-half years later, I held him and cried with him and said I was sorry. I regret circumcising my son!

A nurse in Jacksonville, FL thinks it’s hilarious to use newborns like puppets for her own amusement. This is NOT how nurses treat babies!

My most precious memories are of the births of my own children, and right next to those, the memories of all the mommas and daddies and babies I have witnessed become families.

When I got pregnant for the third time, I was determined to have an unmedicated VBAC. I had big plans. This VBAC was going to be my birth experience salvation. It was going to be empowering and amazing and heal all my hangups. I was going to be a mama goddess and everything was going to be perfect. I was wrong.

It felt like I was being knifed in the stomach. My husband suggested a shower. I grabbed him, looked him in the eye and said, “I know you’re trying to be supportive. But if you really want to support me, GET ME AN EPIDURAL NOW.”

Judith Shulevitz recently noted in the New York Times that although “unmarried childless women have overcome every barrier to opportunity you can think of... Mothers, on the other hand, aren’t doing nearly as well.” According to Shulevitz, this is because the feminists of Hillary Clinton’s generation focused on demanding equality for women in the workplace.

While people asking about our plan likely have good intentions, the conversation opens you up to so much judgment about how you’re planning to give birth.... Birth plans are personal, between parents and their care provider. We all make choices for our families that we feel are best, and at the end of the day, that’s what matters.