Pregnancy IS Entertainment . . .

and I wondered what you were smoking!

Do you know how many people, including family, asked when we were going to "try" for a boy. First of all, what is wrong with DAUGHTERS? That is actually what my HUSBAND would say to people. We wanted two, and ONLY two kids. It didn't matter what their gender was, although we BOTH (truth) did actually LIKE having only daughters.

My husband got a vasectomy (agreed upon before our marriage) after our 2nd child was born.

Except for the support from/with your husband. My (now ex) husband wanted to keep trying until he got a boy. So I have 3 daughters. After my last daughter was born, I got out of there.

About 16 years after I left him, he (at the at of 42) married an 18 year and had another girl. Luckily, that little girl was removed from the home and put up for adoption. (My daughters have not seen him since 1996 and consider my (current) husband of 14 years their father).

I love having daughters (though having a 17, 15 and 13 year old at the same time led to some interesting days around here!!)

They ended up with 5 daughters.

mentality. Right after I got married, everyone was asking when we were going to have children (I was 17). It was like... marriage = babies. When I did get pregnant, perfect freaking strangers would walk up to me and touch my stomach and laugh at me when I got offended. That's STILL MY STOMACH...

Everyone acts like babies and babymaking are their business somehow...

After the umpteenth, "So you don't have children?" enquiry at parties, her husband affected a tragic look and said, "the state took them."

And the inevitable, "so are you going to have another?" if you do have kids. I got that after my daughter was born. All I could think was, "I'm forty, I've just had two days' worth of labor, and my preemie is still in the hospital. Oh yeah, I'm gonna get knocked up again right now."

I realized - fully and truly - at age 9 that motherhood wasn't for me. I've never had doubts, not even for a moment. I have actually been harassed about it at one of my jobs (Do you have kids? No. When are you going to - your time is running out. Never; I don't want any. You don't want any because you can't love anyone besides yourself! You are an evil woman! etc). Strangers have felt compelled to question me on this, especially when I was younger.

When my mother married in 1963, her gyno tried to send her to a shrink because she wasn't pregnant within months of her marriage. (I showed up 14 months later.)

Both she and her husband had/have dysfunctional families and thought that it would be a stinkingly bad idea to have kids and pass along their issues. I had another girlfriend, in college, who had hell's own time trying to find a doctor willing to tie her tubes because she was only 19. Some people don't want kids, and I find that self-knowledge to be a laudable thing. As a parent, I see people every day who should never have had children and I wish they'd had more self-awareness.

I ended up being on Depo-Provera for years. Not so bad - effective and easy, but not so great for my kidney disease but better than getting pregnant; I have a kidney disease that makes pregnancy a really horrible idea. Yet despite having a disease that no one thinks should be combined with pregnancy, because I was young, nullapara and unmarried - well, if I met the Right Man, I might have want to sacrifice myself trying to have a baby. I guess. Of course, these were the same doctors who told me I couldn't possibly have sleep apnea because I was "too young, too thin and too female" (I have severe mixed apnea). I was told I had fibromyalgia (I don't; I have a weird form of arthritis and kidney disease).

I finally found excellent doctors once I moved to California and I'm sterilized and my apnea is treated

I absolutely hate that doctors so often think that women's health issues are imaginary or psychological. I have thyroid disease, and it took years to get a proper diagnosis.

she has Sjögren’s Syndrome.

I know what that is because when my ANA came up positive, that's one of the additional tests I had (nope, just a positive ANA, allergy to sunlight and unrelated kidney disease, whew). Hope she's doing well!

her cry...nobody would believe her...yet when I WENT to the doctor, he discovered my illness right away (mom is not a patient of his). So it really made me think WTF.

She is doing well, thanks to medicine.



I can't believe I am the 1 in 10...but that is how life is.

I have primary idiopathic FSGS, a renal disease common in older hypertensive Black men. I am white, hypOtensive and female. My prognosis is the same, though Kidney disease all looks the same until the biopsy, but they were rather surprised at the results.

I also have ankylosing spondylitis, another condition more common in men. My form is much milder, though my shoulder and elbows are so destroyed I will be having a lot of surgery soon. Yay?

But removing the end of my clavicle will stop the pain (so will repairing the tendons). Replacing the joint on the other side sounds a lot scarier but on days like today, I'm willing to start sawing myself!

Even though I whine A LOT, I do know I'm pretty lucky

You are very strong IMO, shouldn't say that about yourself.

I work under the theory that even my itises can't stand the moaning, so maybe they'll leave!

Really, I get mopier around Dr visits, and I just got the "need everything replaced soon" news ... most of the time, I really DO know how lucky I am! I have insurance, I'm married to O- and there are plenty of people who would give anything to trade ailments with me.

You're awfully kind, though!

disease, it's probably the one to have. It's more like have a lobster clamped onto my foot all the time, instead of a bear trap around my leg.

Is that what it is like?

Yeah, some mornings my white blood cells start feeding on my joints and back all the way down my sciatic nerve and into each and every toe.

I have become good friends with pain.

Mom is in 4 times the pain I experience every day.

She is one reason I embrace feminism.

Both my parents understand that I'm neither looking for a marriage (if it happens it happens, but if not that's okay too) and both know I don't particularly want children. Both parents are okay with that. If someone tells me "you'll change your mind" it's not someone I'm close to, like a classmate at college. I just tell them "no, I won't."

My brother is CF, too. My (now) husband's parents are not concerned with our lack of reproduction.

When I get told I'll change my mind, I say Alzheimer's doesn't run in my family.

"... I Forgot To Have Children"



I had a t-shirt a long time ago. Think I will order a fridge magnet.

I also have "Why do I have to get married? I haven't done anything wrong!"


(I'm pro equal marriage, but think its an outdated system ... but am married anyway. Long story)

People will PRY, won't they, and shamelessly too--that woman's husband has some seriously good wit.

increase in obesity nationwide. It's a very curious thing.

I've never seen so much "body criticism" in all my years on earth, too. People are very demanding of some sort of impossible standard of perfection, both to one another, and to total strangers, even when their height and weight are proportional and they look entirely healthy.

And while the women have taken the brunt of the abuse and intrusive examination in this regard, the tables are starting to turn with regard to the men as well. Men are being urged to have "abs" -- a "six pack"--otherwise they are viewed as less desirable. It's by no means an equal playing field but it is an interesting shift in attitudes.

And then, on top of all that, there is the Cult of Celebrity. The paparazzi helped feed that beast, the papers print it, the curious public lives vicariously....and there you go.

I found out that some of these celebrities get paid "by the tweet" to sneak in advertisements to their "loyal followers." Talk about a No-Work, No-Show job! The celebrities don't even have to actually compose the tweets! It's all about selling "things"--clothes, fashion accessories, booze, all sorts of consumables--even absurdly priced, thousand dollar baby/toddler outfits. I think that is especially obscene.

And then, there's the whole "no boundaries" thing. People think it's "OK" now to ask anyone about everything and anything, to include that baby bump or that they saw so-and-so going into the dermatologist. Heck, if "Will and Kate" can't have any privacy, why should you, or me, or the couple down the street?

It's a very curious byproduct of modern society, this feeling that anyone can ask anyone about anything and this sense that people have some sort of entitlement to know what is going on in the lives of others. I do think the Cult of Celebrity contributes to all that.

Chest hair is so 70s.

Everyone is waxing everything, and bleaching parts of the body that were unmentionable back in the day!

As Doctor Smith used to say...

Oooooooooooooh, the pain...the PAIN!!!!

It's to sexualize the body more. What better way than to show much flesh? Weird culture we're in. So afraid of sex, and totally disapproving of it at the same time. Can't show a nipple! But putting electrical tape on it is just fine.

with it....

Oh well, it might get TSA off our asses when we go through airport security!

I'll tell ya, though, at my age, it won't be a delightful sight; probably closer to punishment! Lucky me that I'll only be affronted when I pass a mirror!

Oooooh, the pain! indeed!!!

would be my only clue that I'd passed a mirror.

I have no idea what either of you look like, but may I respectfully suggest this is the wrong group to make fun of your appearance We all get enough of that shit without doing it to ourselves!

I will now take the stick out of my butt

TMI!

YET.

Even nudists wear clothes sometimes.

or are we supposed to think that entertainment figures are the new royalty, and we need to be sure the succession has been secured?

Or am I supposed to think the only thing I could have in common with an entertainment figure is the potential to become pregnant?

Similarly, why should I be invested in the hook-ups and break-ups of people I'm unlikely ever to meet? If I want to read about romance, I'd pick up a bodice-ripper (not likely!), whose characters probably have more dimensions that many entertainment figures display.

Love them but...In any case, I think it's neat when I hear about celebs and people I know who are preggers. I imagine who the kid will take after, etc. It's really not so deep. You are talking more about the societal pressure for a woman to reproduce but once she's knocked up, then it's a whole new ballgame.

Happens in Wal-greens a lot.