Gisele Bundchen and her privileged breasts.

“I think breastfeeding really helped. Some people here think they don’t have to breastfeed, and I think, ‘Are you going to give chemical food to your child, when they are so little?’ There should be a worldwide law, in my opinion, that mothers should breastfeed their babies for six months.” [Gisele Bundchen in Harper's Bazaar, qtd. in The Daily Mail]

Hi, Gisele! I’ll try to speak loudly because I’m not sure you can hear me all the way up on top of your mountain of privilege: NOT EVERY WOMAN CAN BREASTFEED. NOT EVERY WOMAN WANTS TO.

Now, I’m not a mom, I’ve never had a baby latched to my breast, so I can’t speak about personal decisions. At any rate, they’re personal, which means they aren’t mine to make for anyone else. (You following me, Gisele?) But off the top of my head I can think of many reasons why some women would be unable to breastfeed for six months.

Babies born with galactosemia absolutely cannot tolerate breastmilk. I think it’s great that your baby is healthy but some aren’t and it’s probably a good idea to remember that sort of thing when you’re proposing worldwide laws based on your own sense of superiority. We wouldn’t want to harm “your child, when [s/he is] so little” by feeding him/her the very thing that causes illness, would we?

Sometimes it’s mom’s health that prevents breastfeeding. Mothers with HIV can transmit the infection through breastmilk. Mothers with untreated and active tuberculosis also should not breastfeed. And mothers going through chemotherapy or taking Tamoxifen should not breastfeed. I know, I know, you aren’t HIV-positive, you don’t have TB, and you aren’t going through chemo, but do remember, dear, that you’re saying “worldwide” and in some places of the world TB is still a huge problem, as is HIV. What’s your recommendation here? Don’t have babies if you aren’t in perfect health? Don’t have babies if you can’t predict with 100% accuracy when you will be diagnosed with a disease? If you are diagnosed with a disease–even during your pregnancy–don’t receive medical help for it?

Then there’s time and money. Now, you’re a supermodel and your husband is a hunky quarterback and I’m pretty sure you both have money to spare. You can hire help, you can take time off from work, you can do a lot of things that ease the burden of breastfeeding. But sometimes other people can’t. I know, it’s pretty shocking. Sometimes mothers have to go back to work before that six months of yours is up. Sometimes they have to go back way before that. Maybe it’s really hard for them to take time away from a demanding job to pump while they aren’t at home. Maybe they can’t afford to be tired at work because they’ve been up at all hours feeding their precious bundle of joy. Maybe they’re poor, maybe they’re single parents, maybe they’re just exhausted.

I know I’m barely touching the tip of the iceberg of reasons why some women can’t or won’t breastfeed for Gisele’s recommended six months. My point is that you can’t know a woman’s reasons for not breastfeeding and you absolutely shouldn’t judge.

GOT THAT, GISELE?

Campaign to End Chronic Pain in Women!

On May 19, the Overlapping Conditions Alliance will launch the Campaign to End Chronic Pain In Women with a goal “to improve the quality of women’s lives by raising awareness of chronic pain conditions that disproportionately impact women, as well as the neglect, dismissal and discrimination faced by women suffering from chronic pain. ”

[Source & More Information]

DV is NOT a pre-existing condition

“U.S. insurance companies in eight states are not barred from using domestic violence as a pre-existing condition to deny coverage. … A study from the National Women’s Law Center says that in Idaho, Mississippi, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota and Wyoming — as well as the District of Columbia — local laws do not bar insurers from citing domestic violence as a reason to deny policies to applicants.” [Source]

“In 1995, the Boston Globe found that Nationwide, Allstate, State Farm, Aetna, Metropolitan Life, The Equitable Companies, First Colony Life, The Prudential and the Principal Financial Group had all either canceled or denied coverage to women who’d been beaten.” [Source]

Let’s talk about why this is wrong, shall we?

Are you doing it?

Spread the word. Prevent breast cancer.
National Feel Your Boobies Week, October 9-16, 2009

I am Dr. Tiller

This website was created as both a memorial to the lifework of Dr. George Tiller and as a living testimony to the courageous lives of abortion providers.

Here you will find stories of individuals who have dedicated their lives to making abortion safe, legal, healthy, and accessible to women and girls. These people may be nurses, counselors, escorts, volunteers at abortion funds, or abortion doctors themselves. You will not see the faces of these providers to protect their safety. What you will see is the story they decide to share – how they came to abortion work, what their function is at their abortion clinic, or their personal abortion story. We want to humanize these individuals to convey the kindness, courtesy, justice, love, and respect they have for women and the health care choices women make. We share our stories in hopes of ending clinic violence, to alleviate the shame associated with the abortion experience, and as an homage to Dr. Tiller’s outstanding and courageous life work.

I am Dr. Tiller

Countering Anti-Choice Terrorism by Melissa Harris-Lacewell, The Nation

…abortion, like all American healthcare, is profoundly shaped by structures of privilege and access. Wealthy women in urban areas with private insurance who have long term relationships with physicians have more access to privacy and to termination services than do other women. Poor women, teenagers, rural women, women suffering with domestic violence, and uninsured women are much more likely to have to risk some level of public scrutiny of their decision to seek an abortion. They cannot request a D&C from their private provider, they must seek out a clinic. Even during the dark years of back alley abortions when all women seeking abortion were at risk, it was the most vulnerable women who carried the heaviest burden of infection, illness, and death.

[Original Article]

George Tiller needs more than candlelight vigils by Gloria Feldt, Salon

That’s why today, after what happened to George Tiller, I know that the only thing that will assuage my personal grief over his shocking loss is for leaders across our nation to join me in expressing outrage at this heinous crime, this domestic terrorism. And yes, they need to call it out in exactly those terms. That’s what it is.

[Original Article]