Life

Apr 2013

When I first approached Meg to do an interview with me about early motherhood, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to get out of it exactly. It’s not so much that Michael and I are even in a place where we want kids yet, but I’m definitely in a place where I want to be able to talk about wanting kids without having to spiral down into hyperbole. So much of what’s available for conversations about parenting is either fear-mongering, or condescending, or prescriptive, and none of it allows for me to safely express my anxieties about having children in a space where I feel like I’m being given platform for honest discussion (both online and off). And if the 500 plus comments from our open thread on the subject are any indication, I’m willing to bet that the same goes for a lot of you.

Over the past few years APW has played the role for me of best friend’s big sister, who will tell it like it is. So, I thought maybe an old fashioned sleepover-type confessional could be the answer. As some of you might know from Meg’s pregnancy announcement last year, Meg and David are choosing to keep their family life pretty private, so this might be the most I ever get out of her on the subject. Meg will be the first to tell you that she’s no expert on child-rearing (her words were “I’ve been at this for exactly four and a half months. You can call me in for expert advice when I’ve had ten kids.”) Which means that this interview is not meant to be in any way prescriptive, nor is it meant to represent the experience of all new mothers everywhere. Rather, in the same way that I once found solace in these pages hearing that marriage wouldn’t fundamentally change who I am if I didn’t let it, and that a career move isn’t a prison sentence, this interview gave me the reassurance that having children doesn’t mean getting on a roller coaster ride and enduring it until it’s time to get off. When Meg and I first started talking about this interview, she told me, “I don’t want to offer any advice on motherhood, other than the magic that is overnight diapers. The rest is just thoughts from the trenches. Your mileage may vary.” I think that just about sums it up. So here is part one of Marriage And Early Motherhood (part two to follow next week). May it spark a non-terrifying conversation that makes you feel a little better too.

—Maddie

That Gut Feeling

Meg: Are you going to set the scene? Wisteria. A lime popsicle. The sun. Chicken enchiladas, cooked by Meg’s husband.

Maddie: [Laughing] Yes. The enchiladas were really good. Ok, so one of the first questions people asked in the comments of our open thread was about the issue of confidence with the decision to have kids. Because I think a lot of people are concerned that if you aren’t 100% certain that you want, want, WANT a baby, that you have no business having one. And I’m curious what your take is on that?

Meg: Yeah, I think that’s bullshit. There’s this Elizabeth Gilbert quote in Committed where someone says to her something like, “Having a baby is like having a tattoo on your face. If you’re not sure about it, you shouldn’t get it.” And I just don’t think that’s true. There are very few decisions in life that you’re that sure about, period. Right? And I think that probably anyone who is 100% sure about having kids and never has any questions about it, that is where I might question whether or not you knew what you were getting into. Because you’re committing to a very big life change, and the scary thing about having kids is that it’s the one of the few things in your life you can’t get out of. The dirty secret about marriage is that if it doesn’t work you get a divorce. Yeah, it sucks, and it’s going to fuck up your life but you move on. The scary part about having a kid is that it’s irrevocable. So if there isn’t some part of you that’s like, “Uh, is this a good idea?” I just worry that you haven’t applied your analytical self to it.

Maddie: I feel like there’s this thing that’s happening, where there’s celebrity pregnancies are really oddly sexualized, and then in educated, urban communities there is this glorification of pregnancy and motherhood. I’m curious how you anticipated, and also dealt with that. Because that’s something I’m scared of… having to explain why I’m either bottle feeding or not using cloth diapers, or on the flipside having to explain doing all those things… I guess, it’s the whole mainstream versus indie thing.

Meg: Right. In some ways we were protected because we’re so early in our friends circle having kids.

Maddie: Which is hilarious also.

Meg: Right? Because I’m, what? 32? But we have a couple of friends who have kids… our friends who have kids have kids who are either five or thirteen (we have a lot of friends that got pregnant right after high school, or are a little older than us, or who just don’t have kids at all.) There was no one that was contemporaneously having children. So we were able to do things the way we thought were logical, which has led to some interesting social moments later, when we were around parents, because we, like, didn’t know that everyone got an infant car seat and it just didn’t seem logical to us, so we didn’t get an infant car seat. We got a convertible car seat, and then we didn’t have an infant carrier to carry the baby around with and I totally looked like I was making a political statement when I was out with other mothers. But that sort of protected me in some ways. I did feel a lot of pressure around the, what I call the Cult of Whole Motherhood: give birth at home, don’t have an epidural, don’t ever bottle feed, etc. Though ultimately a lot of that stuff worked itself out. I sort of fundamentally (no surprise here, the whole site is built around this) am just not a dogmatic person. So I went into labor being like, you know it might be nice not to get an epidural, but we’ll see, I had a pretty precipitous labor so—our doula actually said it was the most intense labor she’d ever witnessed—so I got an epidural. I had milk supply issues right away, so I supplemented with formula. Because it seemed like the baby was going to starve if we didn’t. And now, he’s 95% breast fed. So I sort of worked it out by doing what was logical. But there does have to be a certain amount of just tuning out what different people want you to do.

Do Your Hormones Eat Your Rational Brain?

Maddie: Shifting to post-baby, one of the questions that really struck me in the comments of the open thread was whether or not you can avoid your own hormones? And this idea that there’s a lot of inevitability built into having a kid, in that you can say you’re not going to want to do X, or you can think you don’t want do Y, but once the baby’s there and your hormones kick in, it’s a whole new ballgame.

Meg: Sort of yes, sort of no. I think the way the narrative is built is really damaging. You’re not going to become a new person unless on some level you want to become a new person or are secretly hoping you’ll become a new person or are just really embracing that. So this whole idea that “You just don’t now, you just don’t know”—I think in the big picture I don’t know that that’s actually true. I knew I wanted to keep working, and people said “Oh you just don’t know, you just don’t know,” and, well, no. I know who I am, right, so I do want to keep working.

However, you don’t know what your hormones are going to do. But the idea that your hormones take over your rational brain is not true. I was not aware the I was physically going to go through withdrawal having the baby in daycare, I was going to be physically shaky at first because my hormones were at conflict with my rational mind. My rational mind wanted to be at work, but also my baby was happier in daycare, I was happier with him in daycare, but my hormones were telling me something else. So yes. In some ways you can’t avoid your hormones and they are super powerful, and they’re going to do what they are going to do, but your rational mind is still as much in play as ever.

Maddie: When it comes to a lot of the other stuff that I think people try to caution you about: the lack of sleep, how much attention they need, how many physical needs they have, I know a lot of people expressed concern over just being able to function as they know themselves in those early days and whether or not they could physically survive it. Continue reading Marriage And Early Motherhood, Part I

Posted in: Entrepreneurship, Gender & Feminism, Life, Marriage, Reclaiming Wife | 181 Comments »

Apr 2013

Letter From The Editor: The Good

Dear APW,

Life is complicated right now. I don’t mean that as a euphemism for bad. Not like Facebook’s “It’s Complicated” relationship status (though yes, David and I often discuss changing our relationship status to “It’s Complicated” on a random day, and sitting back to enjoy the made-for-Facebook drama that would ensue). I actually mean life is complicated, in that there a lot of things going on, and a lot of different levels at which I’m supposed to be operating. New parenthood is a bit of a trip, and I really do mean that in the best way. (Two people used to live in this house, and now three do. One of them was made by the first two people. WHAT IS THAT?) It’s straight up complicated.

I had this blissfully ignorant idea that when I got back from maternity leave, I’d just hit the ground running, same as I ever was. This seemed reasonable to me because, let’s be honest, while I technically took four months off for maternity leave (that’s one month for extended labor and three months for the baby, for those of you keeping track at home), in reality, I took one month off (December. The month after I gave birth.) and a couple of other months without full responsibility, but sometimes lots of work. So really, how different was it going to be to be back at work?

Quick answer: Lots different.

Long answer: Oh My God.

Here is the thing: I did, in fact, hit the ground running. There were something like four major projects vying for my attention when I got back. Some sucked (legal). Some were awesome (Pantene Beautiful Lengths, other secret projects that are yet to be revealed). Some were in the middle (accounting, piles of paperwork). So I worked, and did. And also, I didn’t sleep much. Perhaps you have not heard of four-month sleep regression? But yes, it’s a thing, and yes, it’s timed to hit right about when lots of (American) women go back to work and start getting settled in. High five, system! So, with all that, it turned out that one big project didn’t happen: loads and loads of writing. And of course that one thing that didn’t happen, became the thing that consumed my brain. Continue reading Letter From The Editor: The Good

Posted in: Entrepreneurship, Life, Meg's Thoughts | 37 Comments »

Mar 2013

Saturday Link Roundup

For me, one of the best parts about this week has been the way so much of our public conversation has turned around discussing the nature of marriage, thanks to the two marriage equality cases in front of the Supreme Court this week. Yes, sometimes I listened to the “debates” (I’m not even going to dignify them by not quoting that) about marriage on NPR made me feel like I’d fallen down a rabbit hole and landed in 1995, when one of my debate topics was marriage equality (really? We’re still talking about this shit?) But the fact that we were talking about what marriage means, and how it’s changing, was so encouraging. And now, on to the links.

Wedding-y

In light of Liz shaving her head for children’s cancer and hair donation, a kick-ass bald bride with alopecia areata.

Disposable AND compostable plates and things… in colors? Yeah, you’re welcome.

Our own Emily (also of Emily Takes Photos) explains Raw photos vs. Jpegs. This was a big controversy when I got hitched, and it turns out photographers not wanting to give you raw files is not some big scam. It’s because they’re not that pretty, and they’re pretty much worthless to the laywoman (hey large chunks of data). This is why I shoot on my fancy camera in Jpeg, even though Maddie scolds me when she has to edit those photos.

Buying a cancelled wedding. I can’t decide if this is brilliant, or logistically almost impossible. But hey, go shopping.

This article on this history of queer African American women and marriage is fascinating.

Reclaiming Wife

The Atlantic, with a not terrible case for young marriage. Obviously not for everyone, but for those looking to justify a decision already made (thats from the married at 21 Maddie, who submitted this link), this one isn’t terrible. And this line: “Marriage actually works best as a formative institution, not an institution you enter once you think you’re fully formed. We learn marriage, just as we learn language.”

My friend Jordan of Oh Happy Day lives in a 500 square foot apartment with her husband and two kids (Seriously, it’s really small in real life. Way smaller than it looks in these pictures.) She’s one of the worlds most visually talented ladies, and she makes to WORRRKKKK, which I find so empowering. No, you don’t need to have it all to have kids. (Her kids used to sleep in a closet, and not like Harry Potter).

A writer with a baby. Or pregnant, and not ready to join the cult of motherhood. I could have written this when I was pregnant. Thank god, being a mother IS just being a writer with a baby.

General Interest

We’ve been getting emails lately asking if APW can delve into the structural underpinnings of feminism, ie, what feminism is to the APW staff, and how it works on this site (because, really, we can’t tackle what feminism is for every feminist everywhere, so we’re gonna limit this). It’s such a good request (What? They’re not teaching feminism in school these days?) and we’ll get on it. In the meantime however, reading If I Admit That ‘Hating Men’ Is a Thing, Will You Stop Turning It Into a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy? is a damn good place to start. Seriously. Read it. All of it. And then send it to some men in your life.

There’s no such thing as a “perfect” feminist. One brillant bit is here, “I blame this Capital F Feminism concept that there is a code a “public feminist” is supposed to follow that doesn’t allow us to be fucking people with insecurities and desires and mental illnesses and a list of mistakes like any other human.” (Said as a public feminist). Because divided we fall, indeed.

This story about woman owned indie retailer Nasty Gal in the New York Times pretty much made my day. It explores the difference between bootstrapping and Venture Capital (and why VC doesn’t always get us), and reminded me of my abiding love for women small business owners (and how tough as nails they always are). Continue reading Saturday Link Roundup

Posted in: Life, Meg's Thoughts | 21 Comments »

Mar 2013

Saturday Link Roundup

I’m sorry Saturday Link roundups are late, but since I often wait to read things I subscribe to on paper (I’m old school like that), I had to do an angry reading of most of New York Magazine’s The Feminist Housewife out loud to David over the breakfast table. Sadly, I can’t just provide you with a video of the reading, with David’s commentary included, so I’ll just have to sum it up below. Let’s do this thing!

Wedding-y

A United Methodist church in North Carolina has stopped performing marriages of all kinds in part to protest the passing of Amendment 1, which outlaws same sex marriage. In a statement, the church said, “This is being adopted as a sign of our commitment to love and justice for all people.”

If you live in the East Bay and are planning a wedding, stop by and say hello to some of the staff at Mad For Love tomorrow! There is free cake! Champagne! I’ve been told a Photo Booth! And I’ll be there signing books from 12-2 (though the party gets going at 11).

A fascinating read on the history of the diamond industry and how the illusion of scarcity was created. Thanks for sending us the link, Mira!

Reclaiming Wife

The buzz(not)worthy article of the week, The Feminist Housewife, has, on the plus side created some great conversations about feminism. While I’m in favor of both big-tent feminism, and feminist (women and men) choosing to stay home with their kids, you can’t just slap a feminist label on anything and call it good. This article is equal opportunity offensive, including such gems as, “Why can’t we just be girls? Why do we have to be boys and girls at the same time?” and “All [men] agree that no matter what the gender revolution prescribes, it is still paramount for men to earn a living and support their families, which also implies taking a backseat as caregiver.” Plus! Quotes from ‘researchers’ that lead off with, “My sense, is that younger women are more open to the idea that…” Awesome.

But wait! The article, is no surprise, mostly misrepresentations. I almost punched a hole in the wall when I got to the bit where she tried to call the amazing Rebecca Woolf unemployed, and then anti-feminist. I might or might not have YELLED the whole paragraph about Rebecca to David, followed by, “WHAT TOTAL BULLSHIT.” Turns out Rebecca, and most of the women quoted in the article, were pretty livid too.

But the commentary on the article is great. I don’t tend to link to Jezebel, but nailed it. The Forbes article on why women are vital to the American economy is an important conversation I’m glad we’re having. And Christina M. Kelly’s (Sassy Hat tip) article on ACTUALLY being a feminist housewife is phenomenal.

Now! On to other things! NPR’s Linda Holmes weighs in with her take on Amazon Mom, the new program geared to parents with young children. Her argument against gendered marketing is pretty spot-on, but this remains my favorite part: “Moms are dads! Dads are moms! Cats are dogs! Chairs are tables! Words have meanings, you see.” You also should have seen my face when David told me he signed up for Amazon Mom. Hint: it went from confused to rageful right quick. Continue reading Saturday Link Roundup

Posted in: Life, Marriage, Meg's Thoughts | 58 Comments »

Mar 2013

Saturday Link Roundup

Wedding-y

East Side Bride has always has done Groom Style better than anyone else.

This video proves two things. One, that it’s generally dubious to wear a fancy suit near a body of water. And two, nature obviously thinks that your proposals should be even grander.

Because you guys are the coolest, APW-er Sasha put together a Spotify List of all of your first dance songs, compiled from this open thread. That’s dedication, y’all.

Let’s face it. The big news of the week (particularly if you’re religious, as I am, or Catholic, as other APW staffers are) is the new Pope. So on that note, did you know Catholics can get their weddings blessed by the Pope in a mass ceremony in St. Peters Square? And everyone wears their wedding attire. While I do have disagreements with the church on the definition of marriage, this is still awesome.

Also awesome? The story about the two guys whose Jet Blue flight attendant signed up to be their New York State witness will restore your faith in humanity. Plus, she brought cupcakes.

For those of you doing your own wedding flowers (respect!), long time APW sponsor Blooms By The Box just launched a DIY Flowers 101 project. Helpful.

Reclaiming Wife

Reader Jen sent us this link as a follow up to the kids/no kids conversation. NPR: Is having kids a rational decision?

Amy Christensen, from Thursday’s post on risk and learning to ride a motorcycle, has a great article on her blog in response to a video that went viral this week about a guy pushing his girlfriend off a cliff (literally) and about why taking risks needs to be a choice you make on your own terms.

This reader submitted link, Marriage Is For Losers is written by a therapist, and it’s as smart as it is emotional. He talks about letting our marriage be a radical rebellion to the way the world tells us to live. “Maybe we need to be formed in such a way that winning loses its glamour, that we can sacrifice the competition in favor of people.” Read it, then do some thinking (I’m going to be pondering it for awhile).

General Interest

This post, I‘m Tired Of Having To Be A Feminist, nails the way I’ve been feeling about the Marissa Mayer / Sheryl Sandberg news cycle. “Women are still being treated as a discrete group, a special interest lobby and an unpopular one at that.” I’d like to live in a world where we can agree or disagree with Marissa Mayer’s decisions as a CEO (or decide we don’t know near enough about the situation, and it actually might not be our business), not as a woman. The fact that we’re not there yet makes me tired.

A Jessica Valenti link a week seems to be the standard around here, eh? She Who Dies With The Most Likes Wins is a few months old (hey, I was having a baby), but it’s a must read. This bit is solid gold, “I had to choose between being likable or being successful, I’d choose the latter every time. Yes, the more successful you are—or the stronger, the more opinionated—the less you will be generally liked. All of a sudden people will think you’re too “braggy,” too loud, too something. But the trade off is undoubtedly worth it. Power and authenticity are worth it. And in a world where women are told to be anxious about everything—that we can’t “have it all” but will forever be searching for it—saying that ambition and success are actually pretty great can be a radical message.” For women, success is a life liability (particularly among other women, oddly). And we’ve got to stop this nonsense, for all our sakes.

A debate popped up a few weeks ago on APW about body image and dress forms, and for me, the real issue was much broader: we live in a culture where super small bodies are treated as the norm. The issue is so prevalent, that it can be hard for people with the best intentions to work around it. So this article on ‘realistic’ mannequins at an H&M in Sweden is awesome. Also, if you ask me, those mannequins look hotter than the normal terrifying variety.

This NPR story about a father who hacked Donkey Kong for his daughter so she could play Pauline and rescue Mario, made feminist Meg cheer. It also made parent Meg (it still sounds like a lie when I call myself a parent) cry. Listen to it in full, it’s a good one.

And speaking of NPR, I found this New York Times article about how NPR wants younger listeners, aka, “People that Tweet,” really interesting. I think every blogger I know is an NPR listener, as are most APW readers. So what gives? Are we not vocal enough about it? I’m not sure, but I’d like NPR to invite me to their next “Weekend in Washington” to blog about it. I mean, RIGHT?

And closing out the week with awesome, you guys helped Liz raise 211% of her goal of money for children’s cancer research. She’s also now bald! Updates on that to come…

Posted in: Life, Meg's Thoughts | 40 Comments »

Mar 2013

Liz Shaves Her Head for Children’s Cancer

This is Liz. You know Liz. Liz that writes Ask Team Practical every Thursday. Liz who just gave you advice on engagement rings this morning. Liz who writes at Happy Sighs. Awesome APW staffer Liz. Amazing feminist Liz.

Looking at this picture of Liz, I bet you’re saying to yourself, “Hot damn, Liz is beautiful.” And she is. But how much of your reaction to Liz’s beauty has to do with the fact that her face is framed by super long and wavy hair? If I were to be honest, I’d tell you that Liz’s hair plays into the way I react when I see a picture of her. Why? Because I’ve been socialized to think of long hair as feminine and beautiful. Hell. Other than a few ill-advised bobs in the late 80s (I have thick wavy hair, why did anyone let me do that to myself?), I’ve always had long hair. I insisted on growing out my hair around the time I learned to talk, and that was that. It’s easy for us to associate hair with women’s beauty, because our whole culture does it.

Tomorrow, Liz is going to find out how much value the world gives to a woman’s hair. Tomorrow Liz shaves her head.

Liz is shaving her head to raise money for St. Baldrick’s, which funds childhood cancer research. Kids with cancer have forever altered the course of some APW staffers lives, and there is a huge funding gap when it comes to cancer research. As a new mother who’s had health scares, this St. Baldrick’s page made my breath catch and tears well up in my eyes. The average age of diagnosis for adult cancer: sixty-seven. The average age of diagnosis for children’s cancer: six. Children who die of cancer loose an average of seventy-one years of their lives. But all types of childhood cancer combined receive only four percent of federal funding for cancer research.

So tomorrow, Liz shaves her head in an effort to raise $2,000 for cancer research, and then she’s donating her hair to make wigs for women with cancer. She said in her original blog post about it, “Cancer is such a big word, I don’t know that I ever allow myself to fully think about the dark enormity of it. But, not having control over the way you look and feel about yourself is something I can grasp. These small ones who are undergoing treatments have a whole range of giant concerns that I can’t fathom, and having no control over the way they look and feel about themselves is just the smallest tip of the iceberg.”

When I heard that Liz was doing this, my first reaction was, “Liz is such a bad ass. I could never do something like that.” Which is such an easy way out, right? But it turns out, Liz is terrified. Well, she’s terrified but thought that sounded too negative, so suggested maybe she was “excitriffied” or “overwhelmed.” Liz isn’t doing this because she’s braver than the rest of us, Liz is doing this because she’s scared. She told me yesterday, “Two years ago, when I first went to support a friend at a St. Baldrick’s event, I noticed that while there were dozens of people going up, one after the other, to shave heads and beards and mustaches, there were hardly any women. And I grew indignant! And then, I realized that it made sense, because I completely would not be willing to shave my head, charity or no. That’s… well, no. Don’t they hold walks for that sort of thing? I’m terrified of shaving my head. I’m afraid of how I’ll feel about myself, how people will look at me and treat me, and yeah, it all makes me feel sort of shallow and self-interested to admit that. But, I guess that’s sort of the point of helping one another. If I only gave what didn’t hurt, it wouldn’t be very giving at all, would it? Facing this one small kind of fear helps children who are also facing it, but in addition to a whole ton of other scarier, darker fears. When I think of it that way, it’s not very hard, after all.”

Because Liz is doing something scary and brave, the APW staff and APW readers close to Liz have stepped up to try to support her as best as they can. Maddie pointed out that Liz’s donation page reads like a who’s who of the APW community. I can count about fifteen donors who have written wedding graduate posts, and that’s just people whose first and last names I know.

So this is where you come in. Liz hasn’t made her $2,000 goal yet, and we’d really like her to surpass it. If you have something you can donate (and yes, $1, or $5, or $10 totally counts), please consider giving it here. But regardless of if you can donate finanically or not, please consider supporting Liz with some words of encouragement in the comments. I’d love if she felt the support of this community as she does this scary thing tomorrow.

Here is to you Liz! You are continually an inspiration to all of us at APW (not to mention being one of the funniest, gustiest, and kindest people we know).

—Meg

Posted in: Life, Meg's Thoughts | 56 Comments »