Posts from — September 2010

Welcome back to IComLeavWe. It stands for International Comment Leaving Week, but if you say it aloud, doesn’t it sounds like “I come; [but] leave [as a] we”? And that’s sort of the point. Blogging is a conversation and comments should be honoured and encouraged. I like to say that comments are the new hug–a way of saying hello, giving comfort, leaving congratulations.

Here is the vital information, pure and simple (a more detailed set of rules follows below the list):

• The list opens the 1st of every month. It remains open until the 21st. You can add yourself at any point. The list is open to everyone in the blogosphere–blog writers and/or blog readers.
• Add yourself to the list by filling out this form: the list is now closed.  The November list will open on 10/31.
• Click here to cut-and-paste this bit of code to add to your sidebar (if you have the old code from another month, remove it and replace it with this one). You need to add the icon or a link to the current list on your blog (see below) and will not be added until it’s up.
• Commenting kicks off every month on the 21st. Please mark it somewhere (calendar, post-it note taped to your computer…), though I will be sending out an email reminder on the 20th. Commenting week runs from the 21st to the 28th. Every day, leave 5 comments and return 1 comment for a total of 6 comments. You are highly encouraged to choose the blogs you comment on from the participants list below, but this is not required.
• I will send a second email on the 28th to remind you to remove the icon from your blog.
• Read below if you want to find out about Iron Commenters.
• The commenting ends on the 28th. We catch our breath and the whole thing starts again the next month on the 1st. Drop in and out according to what is happening in your life between the 21st and the 28th.

1. Stirrup Queens (twins, books, writing)
2. Born From My Heart (motherhood, adoption, PCOS)
3. Aisha Iqbal (parenting, writing, life)
4. Musings of a Hormonal Egg Basket (pregnancy after IVF)
5. Maybe Baby . . . (or maybe the loony bin?) (IVF, infertility, life)
6. Riding the IVF Roller Coaster (IVF, ICSI, infertility)
7. Banking On It (on a break, ivf in 2011)
8. The Road Less Traveled (IVF, infant loss, embryo adoption)
9. Bio Girl (parenting, family, infertility)
10. A Half Baked Life (pregnancy after loss, cooking (mostly vegetarian)
11. Ready For My Bundle…. (infertility, adoption, family)
12. ErnieGirl (pregnant infertile birthmother)
13. First and Only IVF? (first ivf, 2 week wait, infertility)
14. Dragondreamer’s Lair (parenting, secondary infertility, crafts)
15. Grief, Interrupted (grief, acceptance, special needs)
16. The New Life of Nancy (life, schnarkiness, opinions)
17. The Other Life of Nancy (children, life after IF, parenting)
18. All in One Basket (hypothalamic amennorhea, egg donation)
19. Alex’s Adventures (iui, infertility, fear)
20. Whole Heartedly (ivf, hypothyroid, mfi)
21. College & Endo–AKA The Crazy See-Saw I Call My Life (college, saving for ART, relationships)
22. Not a Fertile Myrtle (azoo, endo, pcos)
23. Planting a Pumpkin Patch (loss, ttc, yummies)
24. Little Steps to Baby Steps (IVF #3, miscarriage, god)
25. Do I Have to Be a D.I.N.K.? (ttc, ivf, miscarriage)
26. Plans Change (adoption, infertility, teaching)
27. My Lovely Lady Bump (pregnancy, family, life)
28. Stolen fertility (infertility, emotions, thoughts)
29. Waiting for a baby bump (TTC, IVF, male factor)
30. Romancing the Stone (IVF, new baby, miracles)
31. As Fast As My Baby Can (infertility, ivf, unexplained)
32. Just Beginning (pcos, clomid, anovulation)
33. The Journey To 40 And Beyond (foster care adoption)
34. Storm in My Teacup (IVF, TTC, happy)
35. Life in the Waiting Womb (misadventures with infertility)
36. The 2 Week Wait (TTC, infertility, humor)
37. Cherish This Baby (PCOS, infertility, baby #2)
38. Ponderings on Infertility, IVF and Miscarriage (infertility ,ivf, miscarriage)
39. Musings of an Everyday Weight Loss Guru (weight loss, life, emotions)
40. Woman Anyone? (surprise pregnancy, unexplained infertility, baby#1)
41. Digital-Damita (frugal, green, technology)
42. The Infertility Therapist (psychological aspects, infertility)
43. Eggs out of Time (ivf, pregnancy, loss)
44. Find Joy Now (joy, adoption, life)
45. CD1 Again (infertility, life, appointments)
46. Our New Normal (preeclampsia, pregnancy loss, adoption)
47. Cradles and Graves (recurrent cord-related loss, IVF, freak of nature)
48. Can I Walk With You… (infertility, loss, Christian)
49. Someday (azoospermia, DI, anxiety)
50. Child Bearing Hip (loss, toddler, babies)
51. Keep Calm and Blog On (adoption, infertility, parenting)
52. SaM’s Town (twins, after infertility, photography)
53. Lil Family Blog (motherhood, lesbian, giveaways)
54. Are We There Yet (pregnancy, high-risk, anxiety)
55. More Room in my Heart (secondary infertility, male factor infertility, formerly athletic person)
56. My Hopeful Journey (positive support, advocacy)
57. On Tap for Today (life, humor, Boston)
58. Calmly Chaotic (ivf, icsi, design)
59. Flucky Mom (parenting, life, art)
60. Infertility And Me (MFI, azoospermia, pregnant)
61. Waiting Lisa (adoption, new baby, infertility)
62. Lifeslurper (donor eggs, over 40, IVF)
63. Your Great Life (fertility, family-building, support)
64. The Unfair Struggle (mfi, speedskating, life)
65. Searching for the Missing Piece (loss, fear, life)
66. Our Miracle In the Making…A Great Joy is Coming (pregnancy after multiple losses, immune issues, pregnancy after IVF)
67. Hearts Joined, Hands Fast (infertility, cycles, waiting)
68. I Blog Because of Peer Pressure (twins, toddlers, photos)
69. The Busey Life (pregnancy after infertility)
70. PrayingForPregnancy (hope and rpl)
71. Autism Mom Rising (autism, spirituality, overcoming adversity)
72. Finding Her Way (infertility, male factor infertility, life)
73. Enchilada Sunrise (knitting & spinning, bipolar, life)
74. Countering… (autism, community building, parenting)
75. Mommy In Waiting (ivf, ttc, mfi)
76. Chois-R-Us (adoption, waiting, life)
77. The Deep Breath Before the Plunge (infertility, options, ttc 4 yrs)
78. Walking An Unknown Path (ttc, infertility, G-d)
79. Baby Magnesi (MFI, TTC, depression)
80. The Panda Diaries (prepartum depression, art, life)
81. Infertility Doula (support, advice, news)
82. Creating a Family (infertility, adoption, adoptive parenting)
83. Life in the House That Asperger Built (autism, family, kids)
84. The King and Eye (autism, family, parenting)
85. Acting Balanced (family, life, reviews)
86. A Blog of Joy & (Dis)quiet (spirituality, life, G-d)
87. Biz Mommy (inspiration, blogging, working at home)
88. Project Baby (donor sperm, infertility, IUI)
89. Raising Cain (someday) (waiting, IVF, infertility)
90. Sharee’s Stolen Angels Blog (infant loss, hope, spirituality)
91. Whitterer On Autism (humor, family, autism)
92. The Rocky Road To Motherhood (IVF, infertility, life)
93. Autism Herd (autism, family, humor)
94. The (In)fertility Diaries (TTC, adoption, life)
95. Hobbit-ish Thoughts & Ramblings (pregnant after losses, life, cooking)
96. Silk Road Visions (shamanism, spirituality, dreamtime)
97. Laughing Through Tears (autism, twins, life)
98. The Birds and the Bees (ivf, unexplained, life)
99. Change of Plan (formerly Relaxing Doesn’t Get You Pregnant) (pregnant after bs, cynicism, sarcasm)
100. Sarah Q (infertility, pcos, marriage)
101. Here We Go Again (parenting, life after, humor)
102. All I ever wished for…. (infertility, IVF, life)
103. Venting Vagina (ivf#2, unexplained, testing)
104. Growing As They Grow (adoption, kids, life)
105. My Ordinary Miracles (success after infertility, toddler, twins)
106. Eating Myself to Life (2nd trimester, diabetic, crazy life)
107. NOT so Fertile Mertile (ivf, infertility, hope)
108. Time Well Wasted (infertility, IUI, positivity)
109. A journey of needles & herbs to the fertile land (infertility, traditional chinese medicine)
110. Wanna Bee (adoption, loss, craftiness)
111. Life by the Day (infertility, pregnancy, life)
112. I Spy A Family (motherhood, adoption)
113. Blawnde’s Blawg (multiple IUIs, PCOS, support)
114. Waiting for that Positive (TTC, emotions, life)
115. Outside My Head (family, photos, running)
116. That’s My Answer (question of the day, life, fun)
117. Quebecker’s Bilingual Blog (Quebec, life, pictures)
118. Waiting For Our Miracle (FET, IVF, PCOS)
119. Chasing Mommyhood (IUI#3, endo, ttc)
120. Inconceivable! (ttc, step-parenting, life)
121. For We Are Bound by Symmetry (ttc, infertility)
122. A Little Blog about the Big Infertility (IVFs, loss, bad eggs)
123. Out of the Fog (autism, parenting, acceptance)
124. Flogging the Muse (art, painting, creativity)
125. Barefoot and… (parenting, secondary infertility)
126. My Infertility Journey (motherhood, infertility, TTC#2)
127. We Wait in Joyful Hope (adoption, waiting, life)
128. The Denver Autism Wheel (sons, autism, optimism)
129. Write, Baby, Repeat (adoption, donor eggs, infertility)
130. Circus Children (life, love, miracles)
131. A Greater Yes (embryo adoption, pregnancy, faith)
132. A Woman My Age (adoption, infertility, parenting after 40)
133. My Infertility Woes (infertility, staying positive, adoption research)
134. Lily in the Valley (infertility, marriage, stepparenting)
135. Arizona Mamma (pregnancy, secondary infertility, pcos)
136. Infertility Unexplained (unexplained infertility, acupuncture, iui)
137. The Gist Fam (PCOS, faith, daily life)
138. My Infertile Confessions (pcos, gods will, infertility)
139. Getting There (adoption, waiting, life)
140. Life With Endo (endo, emotions, gi issues)
141. Hannah Wept, Sarah Laughed (infertility, life, foodie)
142. Salvageable (pregnancy, work, family)
143. Because Of Match.com (PCOS, infertility, IVF)
144. Tales of My Follies (injectables, waiting, day to day)
145. Trying Not to Scream (infertility, loss, trying again)
146. Going For It (preparing for IVF #2)
147. Attempting to Love Life Without Her (infant loss, foster/adoption, faith)
148. Random Thoughs from Angie (IVF, life, humor)
149. Junebug’s Musings (PCOS, moving, traveling)
150. The Infertility Overachievers (secondary IF, IVF, son)
151. The Fertilely-Challenged Black Sheep (ttc, infertility, life)
152. The Inadequate Conception (infertility, adoption, humor)
153. Infertile Follies (infertility, IVF, ectopic pregnancy)
154. Hello Goodbye (loss, ttc, parenting)
155. No Suzy Homemaker (IVF, RPL, stillbirth)
156. A Virtual Hobby Store and Coffee Shop (news, music, food)
157. Life and Love in the Petri Dish (pregnancy #6, recurrent miscarriage, hope)
158. A Nuttier Life (TTC, PCOS, randomness)
159. InDueTime (infertility, pcos, life)
160. Reach In, Reach Out, Reach Up (adoption, christ, infertility)
161. For The Love Of Harper (angel, daughter, grief)
162. Cloudy With A Chance of Hope (infertility, child loss, grief)
163. If Life Weren’t So IFfy (infertility, life, kids)
164. My Sweet Kenny (stillbirth & infertility)
165. the list is now closed.  The November list will open on 10/31

Q: What if I miss a day?

A: Catch up the next day by doubling your comments–12 comments instead of 6.

Q: What if I have two blogs? Can I sign up twice, listing both blogs?

A: Yes, but you also need to double your comments. If you have two blogs listed, you should be leaving 12 comments per day.

Q: What is an Iron Commenter?

A: Not for the faint-of-heart. People who wish to be an Iron Commenter and be entered on the Iron Commenter honour roll need to leave a comment on every blog on the participants list (exceptions are blogs that require you to have a special log-in, such as some LiveJournal accounts or other similar situations). You can spread out this commenting any way you wish over the whole week, but the final comment needs to be left by midnight on the 28th (EST). Reaching Iron Commenter status is done on an honour system. Please email me if you earn Iron Commenter status so I can add you to the wall of honour.

Q: Why do I have to add that bit of code to my sidebar?

A: The code is the latest icon (the icon changes colour every month so you know that you’re on the right list). This month, the icon is orange, the next month it will be green, etc. The reason is two-fold: (1) it enables more people to find out about IComLeavWe and (2) it gives you easy access to the current list once the commenting week actually begins and better ensures that you’ll use it. Too many times, people sign up and forget to actually do IComLeavWe and this icon gives you a daily reminder (with the dates on it) every time you open your own blog. The icon is linked back to the current list. On the 28th, remove the icon from your blog. A new one will be created for the next month.

Q: It’s the 23rd and I just saw this for the first time on my friend’s blog! I want to join the list–why can’t I?

A: Because IComLeavWe happens every month, once the list is closed, it’s closed. If you’re finding out about this on the 23rd, you can’t join the current month. But leave yourself a note to check back in a week on the 1st and you can sign up for the next month.

Q: You said the list closes on the 21st. Well, it’s still the 21st where I am. Why aren’t you moving my information onto the list?

A: All dates and times are U.S. Eastern Standard Time (UTC/GMT -5 hours). The list closes around 11 p.m. EST on the 21st.

Q: What if no one comments on my blog and I have no comments to return?

A: Well, that really doesn’t happen for the most part, but in that case, simply choose another blog and add an additional comment. The goal is to hit 6 comments daily as a minimum. Going over that is fantastic and encouraged.

Q: Mel, my question wasn’t covered at all. What do I do?

A: Email me; I’m quite friendly. It helps to place “IComLeavWe” in the subject line. You could also check this post which contains the history of IComLeavWe and see if you can glean anything there.

Looking for the comment section? It has been closed on this post. Use the form in the directions to add yourself to the list.

Part 1 of 2 because this post got too damn long…

Enough about my breasts; or, at least, let’s move them to a tangential subject as you tell me what you would have done with this blogging conundrum.

There have been times when I’ve had a particularly shitty experience with a business and I think to myself, “oooh, I could write a blog post about this and really crap on your store.”  And then my inner conscience says to me: “Smelly Melly (my conscience does a bit of name-calling from time to time), that’s not what blogs are for.”

And it stops me from writing those posts.

Just as doctors take a Hippocratic Oath to first do no harm, I believe writers should make a similar promise.  Words are powerful; words provoke people to action.  Therefore, I caution all people to think before you write — not just in the sense of venting your spleen, but also in the area of presenting information.

People understand when they are reading a blog post that it isn’t a medically-vetted source of information, but that doesn’t give us a right to be sloppy.  What we write or say really does matter.  And yes, for those of you sucking in your breath right now and about to hit the comment key, I do stand behind everything I said — all the time, but yes, even in the last three posts on my boobs.

Which is why I take offense when someone tells me in a comment that I have a larger responsibility than others.  We ALL have a responsibility to think before we speak and to make sure that our blogs reflect our ideas and beliefs (personal sites should reflect the owner’s ideas and beliefs).   To think about what we’re putting out there.  No one has a larger responsibility than another person.  We are all writers, and any writer on the Web — unless they have a private blog — has a reach.  Their words and mine — thanks to search engines, linking, and general blog reading — extend well beyond the person.  And that is a responsibility everyone needs to shoulder; I am not unique and everyone holds just as much responsibility as I do.

An overwhelming majority of the comments I received were supportive or, if disagreeing, did so respectfully.  One or two comments were crappy, but at least stuck with the content of the posts, so I left them up.  I can handle being told that I’ve abused my own space or that I’m over-sensitive and paranoid.

But I also received a comment on one of the breast posts that respectfully disagreed with me — but their argument contained an inflammatory statement that was not factually true.

I spent about an hour wondering what to do with this comment.  There are some bloggers who leave up every crappy comment they get.  I’m not one of them.  I’ve only removed two comments that I can remember in the last four years, but my feeling is that my blog is my home, and if someone walked into my living room and took a dump on the carpet, I would clean it up and remove it, rather than leaving it there.  I consider inflammatory comments (and they do have to be extremely inflammatory) to be the equivalent of a turd on my floor.  So I remove them and encourage the author to post their feelings they have about me or others on THEIR blog.  See, they can keep their crap in their own house.

But what to do with a comment that was written kindly-enough, but was factually wrong and inflammatory at that?  I knew that if certain people read it, they would be devastated, and I knew that it wasn’t true, so they would be devastated for no reason.  But this person had very politely written their disagreement with my post — following what I requested of readers.  Removing it felt wrong too.

In the end, I “unapproved” the comment so it went into a queue and wrote the blogger, asking her to provide a link to an accredited journal or major medical site proving her point.  If she could provide a link that showed the causation she claimed, I would not only eat my keyboard, but I would post her comment.

Because when it comes down to it, I feel a responsibility to monitor the comment section on my blog; even though that space belongs to you.  I once had someone post a comment on my blog about how thrilled they were about someone else’s loss in the blogosphere.  It was a clear-cut, immediate decision — I deleted it because it was hurtful and could cause emotional damage to the person as well as others (this was one of the two comments I’ve ever removed from my blog).  I try not to trod into the world of censorship, but there is a fine line when we’re talking about a space attached to my name.  You may say it, but it becomes just as much about me for leaving it up.

I guess I am not really a true believer in free speech.  I’m a believer in responsible speech.  Anyone can have any opinion, but that doesn’t mean that anyone can make up any fact to support said opinion — they’ve got to pull it from reality.  I don’t think we should be able to call free speech in order to write in someone else’s comment section crappy advice or pass along hurtful statements or manipulate others via twisting facts (I have fewer feelings about writing the same things on your own blog).  We have laws against libel and slander, but regurgitating wrong information/facts that you believe are right falls into a grey area.

And that’s the greyness I was faced with.

What would you have done with that comment?  Delete it?  Edit it without permission?  Unapprove it and ask for a link?  Leave it up without doing anything?

And as a side note, for what it’s worth, I struggled with whether to post this, and it wasn’t my intention to make this commenter feel badly.  I have utmost respect for her and I believe that she was told this idea as a fact and she repeated it without having the same experience I have in reading the actual studies (and not someone else’s summary).  I did everything I could in this post to conceal the person’s identity or even the fact in question, and I apologize if this person reads this post, recognizes herself, and feels chastised.  I truly wanted to hear how other people approach their comment box on their blog.

I am not sure how I came to speak so much about my breasts in a 7-day period (and I am sad to say that my breasts kicked off another post that I’ll write once I can organize my thoughts.  So that’s four posts about these luscious mammary glands in quick succession, though the last is more about how we comport ourselves on the Web.  Think of it has more of me flashing my tits rather than letting you take a long gaze).  I wrote the first post as a response to a “breast is best” post, I wrote a second as a response to the emails I received, and now, I wrote the third for BlogHer because they asked me to do it.

When they asked, my first reaction was no.  My sole desire this week was to write my damn sci fi book, and talking about breasts has gotten in the way of that.  I have received some fairly crappy emails, and I didn’t want to extend and expand the crappy email-getting.  But when I told Josh that I wasn’t going to do it, he pointed out that if I didn’t write about the Similac recall, someone else would.  And I would have to read THAT post.  And possibly have my head explode.  So writing this would actually be insurance against head explosion.

So I did it.

Feel free to skip if you have read quite enough about breastfeeding and formula-feeding, though I hope you’ll read my final post because it is more about the responsibility to bloggers and commenters than it is about titties.

And this is the post that I put up on BlogHer:

I wrote two posts this week about breastfeeding in reaction to a post about the “breast is best” campaign: one titled, “Breast is Not Best” and the other titled “Breast Bitch.” It was a week that at first seemed fairly quiet on the parenting wars front — and then the Similac recall bomb was dropped. And on a week where my breastfeeding posts would have simply been my request to stop using supremacy language in regards to a bodily function that is outside a person’s control, it became a gathering spot to see, “see, see, breast is best!”

Though people who think that way have sort of missed the point.

If you have a healthy, full-term child with no known issues and the mother has an ample milk supply and a desire to breastfeed, breast probably is best. I can’t say that it is always best because I can think of women who are taking drugs that would cross into their breastmilk and look at the scenario I set up and say, “well, there’s an example where breast isn’t best.” I can think of other scenarios — such as the mother brings in the sole income and will miss out on pay even though her job itself is safeguarded — and that doesn’t even begin to touch on all the situations that don’t match the first part of that statement.

I am all for people breastfeeding and I’m all for people formula-feeding — and I’m even for the people who go half-and-half with breastmilk and formula. I’m for co-sleeping if that’s what works for you, and I’m for children having their own room if that works for you. And if you have a half-and-half situation where they sleep in your room some times, I think that’s fine too. Do you see where this is heading?

The fact is that the choices you make to raise your child don’t affect me. If you breastfeed, it does nothing to change my life, and if you don’t breastfeed, it still does nothing to change my life. Which is why I don’t understand lactavists — those foot soldiers who see it their duty to burst into situations that don’t affect them and impose their will. A very different attitude of lactation consultants or doulas who offer support for people who choose breastfeeding. And before you start gasping and saying, “but women won’t choose breastfeeding if we don’t point out how evil formula is!” I’m asking you to pause.

Are you calling women stupid?

Are you saying that women can’t make an informed choice based on information presented to her by the medical establishment — who should be performing an impartial dissemination of the facts agreed upon by the medical establishment based on research? Do you believe women can tune out 30 peanut butter brands all working overtime to get them to buy their product, but they can’t tune out formula companies if the choice they made was to breastfeed? Those formula companies work hard to get women to use their products, just as all other for-profit businesses work hard to have your money flow in their direction. And we overcome those messages every single day. I believe women can overcome them from formula companies too.

What does affect me are hurtful campaigns from non-profits that use manipulation in the form of fear and guilt in order to do their work. I expect that from for-profit businesses and listen to (and mentally adjust) their statements accordingly. I don’t extend that same feeling to non-profits who are supposed to be passing along factual health information.

What does more damage than formula has ever done to a child is a campaign that uses supremacy language to quantify something that is unquantifiable since we can’t adjust for all other factors. To use fear in order to manipulate people. Or to use smugness to vilify women for their choices. We all know the saying that you catch more flies with honey, and certainly, I am much more willing to listen to someone who keeps an open-mind to my answer, but calmly lays out the facts than I am to listen to someone who tweets about how formula-using mothers are getting what they deserve with the Similac recall.

Because you’ve never stood in my exact shoes, because if you had, you’d understand why formula is far from the evil concoction you paint it to be. It’s the reason I have children instead of corpses.

I don’t feel strongly about breastfeeding or formula-feeding: I feel strongly about treating people well and respecting their choices.

I obviously have been dealing with a few rage issues this week … but moving on to someone else’s righteous rage issues …

The Washington Post had an article this week about the Sterling Hall bombing and how the FBI was renewing their search for Leo Burt (one of the four bombers) who has been at large for 40 years.  You can’t help but think about the bombing when you step into Sterling Hall.  I had a class on quantum mechanics in the building (oh, yes, a lesser known fact about me: I am a huge science nerd who loves physics just as much as I love talking about my reproductive organs — and y’all know how much I like to write a post about my ovaries).

More interesting than an article about the one bomber still at large is the story of Karl Armstrong, who served time for the bombing and returned to the campus to run a juice cart.  I still remember where I was standing when I learned that the friendly Loose Juice man was one of the bombers.

Because, it sort of gives you pause.  I mean, you’re standing there on Library Mall on a perfectly pleasant day, watching a man dole out juice, and it feels … sort of wrong … to be purchasing food from a man who protested the war by bombing a college building (and killing a man in the process, as well as injuring others).  And yet, he served time in jail, so isn’t it now his right — after paying the price for his crime — to rebuild his life?

I found out this week that he purchased one of my favourite Madison sandwich shops — the Radical Rye.  And I’m sort of wondering if patrons thought about it.  Or if they just shrugged their shoulders and ordered their sandwich.

If, let’s say, the Unabomber was released from prison and opened a fantastic sushi shop in town, would you eat there?

No really, where do you fall on the purchasing-tasty-food-from-former-bombers continuum?

*******

This weekend marks the one-year anniversary of self-hosting my site in this space.  And I still love it.  I haven’t even utilized all the great things one can do when they self-host.

(On a side note, if you are on Typepad and are freaking out about the buy-out and want to move to WordPress, Plaid House Designs, which is run by two ALI bloggers, is running a special.  They moved my enormous blog from Blogger to here last year.)

The reason why I moved this time last year was that I wanted to be in my new home and settled before the Creme de la Creme opened.  Which means, yes, the 2010 Creme de la Creme will be opening again in a few weeks.  I am giving you this heads up because I am tweaking the timing of things this year.  The list will open early — by early November — but it will close February 1st rather than at the end of March.  Which means that it will only accept new submissions for a month after it posts.

The reason is that it drags on for me (I do so much of the work prior to January 1st) and it drags on for you (how many people read the last few that go up in March/April?)  So in light of the fact that the list is best enjoyed during January, I am going to open early and close early.

What does it mean to be forewarned?  Well, the list is a first-come-first-up sort of deal, so if you want to be high-up on the list, you need to submit your post early.  So this next month or so is a good time to peruse your 2010 archives and see if you already have a post in-hand that you want to submit.  All posts will go up, but if you care where you go on the list, now is the time to pick so you can be first out of the starting gate.

And please, for the love, promise me that when the post goes up, you will actually read the whole thing through before submitting.  It saves me and you much frustration down the road.

By the way, this is the fifth Creme de la Creme.  Which feels like it should have some fanfare attached to it.

*******

And now, the blogs…

A Run for My Money has a post about knowing that she’s done with family building.  Despite the fact that their diagnosis was male factor infertility, her husband is having a vasectomy, just to give them the closure they need to know that family building is done.  I love this thought: “And that this time it was going to be goodbye for real. But this time it was on my terms and not at the mercy of infertility.”

DI Mom has a post about a question one should never ask another person.  Let’s play a game and see if you can guess what it is before you click over.  And then let her know if you were able to guess it.  For what it’s worth — I was asked twice this week.

It Is What It Is (or Is It?) has been writing a chilling series of posts this week about the accident that killed her brother, but the post I actually want to highlight came at the end of last week (sue me — I read it on Friday so I’m counting it with this week).  It’s about being stuck as she moves into the adoption process.  Read this gorgeous thought: “We string the days together, one after another, to create our experience of life. So, I think to myself, what’s it going to be? Is the quagmire of this process going to be the un-doing of the dream?”  You need to go over and read (and appreciate) the post as a whole.

Lastly, Negative Nelly Flips has a post about jealousy.  She explains that while she sailed through jealousy in other areas of life, it is hitting her hard now with infertility.  She needed to go into the baby section of a store and she writes, “I should be feeling him/her kick and worrying about the nursery not being finished and storing diapers up for the big day.  But I’m shopping for a baby that’s not mine.  And I’m no longer pregnant.”  While shopping, she receives more news, and she turns the jealousy inward by the end of the post, allowing it to eat her raw.  I hope that by writing the post and releasing it, she was able to find peace again.

The roundup to the Roundup: Would you buy the Unibomber’s sushi?  The Creme de la Creme is coming soon.  And lots of great posts to read.

Well, I guess the boob is out of the shirt now with that last post.  The “breast is best” campaign is a real sore spot for me (which I differentiate from breastfeeding support).  I think whenever we get into the realm of supremacy, feelings are going to be hurt.  And I’m not sure why that campaign works out of a place of comparisons (best!) rather than providing even-handed information.

Especially when their whole rallying cry is that this campaign is necessary because the formula companies don’t pass along even-handed information (and they don’t.  But then again, they’re a business and if you’re smart, you’ll take everything a for-profit says with a grain of salt).  I don’t really enjoy operating in the realm of two-wrongs-make-a-right.

Thank you for the comments — even the ones that disagreed with me because all were done so politely.  At the risk of further offending everyone, I do need to continue this conversation and get this off my chest, because the emails were not quite as polite as the comments.  Beyond writing this, the only other option that felt right to me was silence.  As in walking away from the blog a bit because I literally couldn’t let this go, and it has been eating me alive for the past two days, making me construct long internal arguments with fictional debaters in my head.  And by fuck, I have to let them out and simply hope that further conversation is as illuminating and polite as the conversation that took place in the last comment section.

What I perhaps didn’t convey well is that it’s not about the oh-pity-me-I-couldn’t-breastfeed story.  That’s sort of beside the point.  The reason I am still so emotional about it is because of the tremendous pressure I received to breastfeed — when I couldn’t breastfeed.  That I was told it was my fault and I wasn’t trying hard enough (and please, show me the book that says, “you should have your prolactin levels checked within the first few weeks if your milk doesn’t come in.”  If you can show me this book, I can guarantee you that it wasn’t at Barnes and Noble the night we read through every single breastfeeding book in the store during our hours away from the NICU.  We found a lot of books that said eat more/drink more/sleep more/pump more/take drugs.  But none that gave sound medical advice).

I am angry because the pressure to breastfeed is so great that women take harmful drugs (Reglan has a black box warning by the FDA, and it is a medication that interacts even with Tylenol) in order to try to build supply, when there is clearly a safer way to provide food for your child.  I am angry that the message given is “don’t give up!  People give up too soon!” when the term shouldn’t be “giving up” but rather, “making a different choice.”

Giving up, after all, is another term for abandonment, quit, or admit defeat.

I am angry because people confuse breastfeeding support (of which I have a lot to give) with encouraging people to breastfeed.  And personally, I don’t believe a lactation consultant should come to a hospital room unless called in the same way that I don’t think formula companies should give samples unless they’re requested.  The ball should be in the mother’s court.  And just because one side doesn’t hang back until called doesn’t make it right when the other side rushes in too.  It just makes them both wrong and manipulative.

And I’m angry because the “breast is best” campaign comes from a place of privilege that doesn’t take into consideration a plethora of possibilities, from adoptive situations to socio-economic class.  Yes, this is an argument steeped in socio-economic class, and formula for many working mothers is more insurance against job loss than it is about a choice of nourishment for the child.  Suggesting the expense of milk banks to the working poor (and reminding them that it’s the best!) is simply cruel.  Formula costs on average 19 cents per ounce.  Banked milk costs on average $2.25 per ounce.  Banked milk, even if I would have considered it, was entirely out of our budget.  And sorry, I wouldn’t have considered it.

Especially when we’re not talking about giving your child poison vs. giving your child life.  I — and perhaps you — were formula-fed babies who were able to reach adulthood despite our lower IQs.  And that is why I become emotional when I read posts about deceitful Nestle and how we should boycott their products.  Or how formula companies prey on women.  I see formula as the product that gave me the ability to have six-year-olds instead of corpses.  Therefore, I would never paint the makers of it with the same brush used to discuss tobacco companies or the fast food industry.

And I kind of sort of hate it when other people do it too.

I will happily lend my voice to creating change in the way breastfeeding women are treated in the workplace or public.  And I will happily support the creation of pumping rooms and cover for co-workers if they need to use them.  And I’ll happily eat my salad sitting across from your exposed breasts because hey, I have a pair myself and I’m fine seeing yours.

I will also encourage women to formula feed from day one if that feels best and to stop breastfeeding when the drawbacks (your emotional health, your physical health, your financial stability … and hey, let’s actually consider your happiness) loom larger than the benefits.  I will especially warn women away from taking drugs such as Reglan in order to build supply.  In fact, I’ll support them if they decide not to breastfeed for any reason ranging from I-just-hate-the-feeling to not-worth-my-time.

Instead of condemning formula companies, I’ll say, “thank you, Enfamil” in the same way I’d like to give a little nod of thanks to the makers of Ovidrel and Follistim and G-d knows what else I took.  Did I want to use your products?  Not particularly.  But damn, I am so glad you exist.

And so are our two kids.