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Quacktivists beware; he’s talking about you!
Author:Amy Tuteur, MD
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148 Responses to “Sorry quacktivists, reality stubbornly refuses to conform to your particular brand of nonsense”
Amy Tuteur, MD
Dr. Amy Tuteur is an obstetrician gynecologist. She received her undergraduate degree from Harvard College in 1979 and her medical degree from Boston University School of Medicine in 1984. Dr. Tuteur is a former clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School. She left the practice of medicine to raise her four children. Her book, Push Back: Guilt in the Age of Natural Parenting (HarperCollins) was published in 2016. She can be reached at DrAmy5 at aol dot com... More
Only slightly OT: remember Kelley with eager hands? This is her latest project before the birth of her next child, eating lots of dates. This is the link she posted as to her reason why http://thepeacefulbirthproject.org/2013/10/ancient-wisdom-and-research-agree-amazing-fruit-eases-labor-and-prevents-postpartum-hemorrhage/
If only I’d known about this, I could have prevented the prematurity AND the pph!
I’m sure eating dates is all well and good, but I’m a bit skeptical whenever the woo-mongers attribute all-healing powers to any one fruit/vegetable/herb/concoction/dance/invocation/whatever crap they come up with.
X food has some health benefits: Plausible hypothesis.
X is a miracle food: Nonsense.
The “about page” of that site almost reads as a parody! http://thepeacefulbirthproject.org/mentoring/about/
“birth junkie, and lover of mamas and babies”
You know, Dr. Amy uses birth junkie as a pejorative. But just go ahead and co-opt negative language. Then get back to work on “limbic imprinting” zygotes, whatever the heck made-up thing that is.
And keep crying for women who suffered the horrible trauma of a safely-performed c-section and letting the nurse bathe the baby. Me, I’ll cry for families who lost babies due to lack of basic medical care, but maybe we just have different priorities.
Oh, wait. I understand now. You sell supplements. That makes you a SCAM artist, not a kook. Good to keep my categories straight.
Apparently, “womb parenting” became her passion.
Okay, that’s creepy. My relationship with my unborn child belongs to me, tell the weird lady to stop edging in on it. My own mother is bad enough.
Wow, a test sample of 114 people. Yeah, that’s representative of a whole population. Even the abstract doesn’t really point to that big a deal. 96% vs 79% spontaneous labor with that population isn’t a big deal.
The differences ARE statistically significant, but the numbers are small, and it appears that women weren’t randomized to dates vs no dates. And women who will eat lots of dates for a natural birth are more likely to be pro natural birth, which could explain their greater dilation at hospital admission. Induction and use of pitocin might also be partly dependent on maternal preferences and actions.
Still, 6 dates per day is a fairly harmless tonic. I wouldn’t go shouting this study from the rooftops, with its lack of blinding and combined sample size of 114, but if you want to eat dates during lat pregnancy to ease labor, I can’t see a reason NOT to.
Except if you have GD. Those things are full of sugar.
True. 6 dates would probably take up the carb allotment for the entire day, maybe even exceed it.
mmmmm dates.
Does sticky date pudding count?
The day I start taking gynecologic advice from the Koran (or from someone who can’t spell “enzyme”) is the day I’ll retire to Bedlam.
I like dates. I say so in the same way that my seventh graders frequently say, “I like pie,” even if we are actually only taking about pi.
lol
I often find reality rather dick-ish. ( You win again, gravity!) However, when I try to fight reality, that is when my life becomes truly difficult. The older you get, the more important acceptance becomes. Without it, adaptation is impossible.
I fight authority, authority always wins.
Do you do it outside the club, The Cherry Bomb? Or with Jack and Diane in Little Pink Houses?
I make it hurt so good on a lonely ol’ night in the small town I live in.
Love those lil’ ditties!
http://www.sarahbuckley.com and she is a Medic herself as well as a mother.
Oooh, so much fun on one page! And she’s endorsed by Ina May, so you know she’s legit. All that talk of ‘gentle birth’ somehow only made me thing of Gentle Ben the bear. I like how she’s ‘bilingual’ because she speaks ‘mother’ which is now apparently a separate language.
Because it’s so unusual to be both a doctor and a mother.
But, you see, it only COUNTS if you birthed your babies at home, and believe in the mystical power of wombyn kind to bring forth life without the need for intervention, and Breastfed until your children are old enough to drive.
The rest of us are just slaves to the man who have been brainwashed to believe our bodies are lemons and poison are children with chemical formulas.
I paraphrase somewhat.
In the US anyway, many poisonous cleaning chemicals are lemon-scented.
coincidence? I think not!!
Obviously that should say “and poison OUR children with chemical formulas”.
It seems I type with a Northern Irish accent when I get annoyed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-Ulster_English
Well, I speak “pre-schooler” which is way more useful in this household.
I would be more impressed if she spoke “teenager” fluently.
It is quite an art to be able to listen and speak with teens
I’m confused. Sarah Buckley’s website is clearly labeled as “Sarah Buckley, MD” but then in her “About Sarah” section it says that she “gained the qualification MB, ChB, equivalent to MD in the US.” Why is she using the MD credential if she is not a MD?
British and Irish doctors enter a 5 or 6 year medical degree straight from school and qualify MB BCh or MB BS or equivalent.
There is no pre-med/ med school.
It’s hard in with anatomy/physiology/biochem and patient contact from day one.
“MD” is a specific post graduate degree which most UK Drs don’t obtain. All of us get post-graduate specific specialty qualifications-MRCGP, MRCS etc, which are roughly equivalent to US board certifications.
MB BCh, like the American MD is the degree which entitles you to call yourself “Dr”. UK Drs starting residency in the US don’t have to retrain and get a US MD to call themselves “Dr”.
I guess she calls herself “MD” because her audience is American, but I wouldn’t exactly call it a misrepresentation.
Thanks for the explanation! I’m not saying that she is less qualified than a MD. I just think it’s odd to prominently use a credential that she didn’t technically earn.
Yeah, I personally wouldn’t do it, but I can see why she might.
Oh in case you were wondering
I’m MB BCh BAO MRCGP DRCOG and in the process of getting DFFP.
Oh, and my university gives medical students a BA, just because, so I have one of those too.
You could make a lovely alphabet soup with those letters 🙂
Oh, and I now know she’s a Kiwi, but the same system applies in Australia and NZ. Colonialism etc,
I once watched a horror movie called Dr. Butcher, M.D., but in that case, M.D. stood for ‘medical deviant’.
I actually went to a Dr Butcher once. The only doctor in town who had a spot free that day. Maybe some others had also seen the movie.
I know a Dr Love, a Dr Johnnie Walker and a Dr Johnny Cash.
Oh hang on, Dr Buckley has taken a break from clinical practice to write her books and whatnot.
NCB doesn’t feel the need to call her “Dr” Buckley though…funny that…
Touche!
Her professional testimonial page is off-line… hehehe
http://www.sarahbuckley.com/testimonials/#professionalreview
And that’s why I love the Wayback Machine.
http://web.archive.org/web/20130522180325/http://www.sarahbuckley.com/testimonials/
“To heal birth is to heal the earth”
No, it really, really isn’t.
Give money to Planned Parenthood International or MSF if you want to save lives.
“Healing birth” in this context is about making people who are already in positions of privilege feel validated about their choices.
Somalia has a maternal mortality rate of 1000/100,000 births.
While NCB is getting all het up about the right to refuse interventions and quietly bleed to death at home, they are ignoring the fact that women and babies are DYING from lack of intervention.
NCB needs to check its privelege.
Birthing at home because “the hospital is only 5 minutes away” assumes a hospital, transport and equipment.
First world privilege is right! There are so many countries where women are denied pain relief in labour. Give a damn about that, NCB proponents, and maybe I’ll care a little about those poor women whose biggest gripe is being ‘coerced’ into takin pain relief.
That is something that really bothered me about the whole NCB movement. That those women choose to give birth at home when they could go to the hospital while women in my country would like to give birth in a hospital but they can’t. Or if they can, there is no guarantee they’ll be treated well; even more so those who seek care at the hands of the public health system.
Planned parenthood spends a lot of time getting women to use abortifacient contraceptive drugs and encourage abortions. Tell me something how is this saving lives????
How many unborn babies are being killed…I think it was about 41million in total in the States last year since abortion came in… yes that right 41 million human beings.
And pray tell me how this will save lives in Somalia? Explain please.
You guys are just as brainwashed as you claim the NCB folks are, and frankly just as dumb.
Sally
It is very, very simple.
A Somalian woman has a 1% chance of dying in childbirth. If she has access to effective contraception to control her family size she will face that risk perhaps 4 times in her life. If she does not, it could be 8, 10, 15 times.
50% of unwanted pregnancies end in abortion. The countries with the highest rates of abortion are in Africa. The majority of abortions in Africa are unsafe.
Unsafe abortion kills 500,000 women a year. Women knowingly risk their lives to end pregnancies because they cannot afford to feed another child. Forcing them to bear children who will die of disease and starvation, reducing the family’s ability to feed and provide for older siblings, and risking the woman’s life in the process is NOT a good solution, and doesn’t “save babies”.
Giving those women access to contraception so that they don’t become pregnant in the first place, or, when that fails, giving them access to safe abortion will save THEIR lives.
Saving the lives of these women might, in turn, save the lives of their other children. A major risk factor of dying before the age of five is your mother dying.
The position that providing access to reproductive healthcare of all kinds is an ethical and moral one based on evidence and experience.
None of the commonly used contraceptives are abortifacients.
Abortion is the ending of a pregnancy. Pregnancy begins at implantation. Some contraceptive methods work, in part, by preventing implantation. This, by definition, prevents a pregnancy from occurring and is not abortifacient. No woman is forced to use such a method if she had an ethical or religious objection to it, but YOUR objection to such methods do not give you the right to deny them to women who do not share such objections.
This, exactly. Planned Parenthood doesn’t “encourage abortions”, if they did they wouldn’t offer affordable birth control. They strive to PREVENT unwanted pregnancies, not just end them.
Sorry they do push abortions, that’s a fact even in the US where contraception is readily available.
Well that’s circular. For some of us, contraception is so readily available _because_ of clinics like Planned Parenthood.
For sure. When I was 22, uninsured, and broke, they provided my annual exam and contraception, and they helped me fill out the paperwork to apply for state assistance so that it was all free.
Those evil bastards.
I’m seriously waiting for the evidence of how PP “pushes abortions.” I won’t hold my breath.
Same here. And Sally, you know that providing abortions accounts for only 4% of PP’s services each year? 4%. The other 96% of us visited PP for birth control, counseling, screening exams etc. Think of how many millions of women that represents. You and your ilk want to take us back to a time when a woman had no choices, a time when abortions were illegal and often fatal.
No I don’t
So you are against contraception and also against abortion, so what are women to do ? Not have sex? Chastity belts? Condoms? Large families for those that can and recurrent miscarriages and still births for the rest of us?
Yes abstinence and self control is an option, and whats more its incredibly empowering because it is a personal choice. But because it requires effort and self-discipline folks discount it as an option.
And natural family planning when practiced effectively is as efficient as other forms of contraception, though as with any form of contraception only as effective as the humans using it.
No, Chastity belts went out in the medieval times.
NFP requires the co-operation of the male partner- which is often not possible for women in the developing world where marital rape is considered an oxymoron.
Yes this is true.
Over and out.
It’s empowering to you. Empowering to me is having access to contraception and abortion (and sex with my husband whenever we want to). I hope to never need abortion, but I’m grateful to have that option. It’s not up to people like yourself, Sally Kinnish, and I hope you are also uninterested in taking those options away from other women.
How is my attempting to put the alternatives taking away the choice … please explain. I can say why for example that i don’t think folks should wear high- heeled shoes and a podiatrist and orthopedic surgeon could tell you all the reasons why you shouldn’t wear them BUT IT DOES NOT REMOVE YOUR CHOICE TO WEAR THEM does it????
So… you’d call yourself pro-choice then?
My husband and I are done having children. I’m 30 years old. Are you REALLY suggesting my husband and I abstain until I go through menopause? That doesn’t sound “empowering” to me, it sounds like self-torture and possibly grounds for divorce. You can’t possibly be serious. I don’t discount abstinence as an option because it requires self-discipline, I discount it as an option because I like having sex with my husband.
Also, NFP works for some people, but I imagine those women cursed with irregular cycles wouldn’t find it so foolproof.
Abstinence is empowering in marriage? Are you kidding? How incredibly naive and insulting! Not to mention the claim its discounted because “it takes effort and self discipline”? Wow. Yeah. You may not have said this is religious, but I don’t feel at ALL out of place saying it clearly is, because you’re spouting all of their offensive, closed minded propaganda.
You don’t know me and I find your ‘Ad hominem’ attacks offensive. I am not closed minded because NOWHERE have I said that folks shouldn’t have the choice, though I did say much earlier in the Com stream ‘as you may have gathered I’d rather they didn’t’, but that it should be FULLY INFORMED CHOICE and the alternatives to abortion as Dr. Kitty says should be talked about too. Dr Kitty disagrees vehemently with most of what I have said but at least she replied with respect. Plus I have been in a long term relationship (almost 27 years) myself and am absolutely and personally aware of the dynamic in a relationship where sex is involved.
Naive as a midwife!!!…I have over the course of almost 40 years in healthcare seen a great deal of humanity, including every sexual permutation and then some, including in the LGBT community.
NFP and condoms aren’t universally acceptable either…
*cough* Orthodox Judaism *cough*
The Catholic Church isn’t a big fan of condoms, either.
Telling people that using condoms is wrong is ridiculous.
I will apologize for the “bullshit” comment – that was posted accidentally and I tried to delete it – but I saw you replied to it (and now can’t find it).
Ok apology accepted but really not needed because I get the strength of feeling and why you responded in the way that you did, (see my last comment response).
“Yes abstinence and self control is an option, and whats more its incredibly empowering because it is a personal choice.”
Nonsense: conception requires two people. This is only an option for women if all the men they ever encounter also practice it.
Or have you talked yourself into believing that no man ever takes advantage of a woman, ever?
Choosing an effective method of birth control is empowering.
Relying on the “personal choice” of another human being is NOT.
Actually, although planned parenthood does a lot of stuff, the abortions are the money maker for them. I wish they stuck to contraception.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2013/05/07/_3_percent_of_planned_parenthood_s_services
_are_abortion_but_what_about.html
How do you figure that? I see Planned Parenthood advocating for keeping abortion safe and legal, true. I have yet to see them launch an ad campaign offering 50% off your abortion if you bring a friend in for one with you, or telling women to get abortions so they can be like a celebrity.
Please elaborate on how PP has tried to convince women to get abortions- because I’ve never seen it.
Don’t you know? If they don’t actively try to prevent women from getting abortions, then that must mean they are “pushing” it.
You are ignorant, narrow minded and a terrible nurse if you push obvious, easily provable lies that hurt women AND babies. You don’t know jack shit about women, contraceptives or abortion.
Well considering I’m a woman myself that is so far wide of the mark as to be ridiculous…plus I have spent my entire professional career working in women’s healthcare. I know first hand all about abortion both surgical and medical and contraception in detail as a professional not just as a service user.
So would you want someone to force you to have an abortion (eg the one child policy in China), or would you prefer to use your own moral guidance and intelligence to make your own decision within the legal framework of your country? So how about other women doing the same?
BTW, I’m sure you realise that abortion is not a new thing and that infanticide is also a large part of human history (and still is to this day).
Why on earth would I want anyone to force me to have an abortion (e.g.under the one child policy in China). Please explain the logic of your comment.
How is putting the alternative viewpoint removing any of the choice from women…and I would wish that all women are allowed to use their own moral guidance and intelligence to make their own decision as you put it. However if the other point of view, that contraception and abortion is not that absolute panacea for all ills isn’t put, how is that choice to be truly informed.
Of course I am aware that abortion and infanticide are as ancient as mankind itself.
Until you are in the position to make that choice for yourself and your child, you really should get off your high horse. The “alternative view” is one thing, but you have flat out said things that are WRONG (I.e. Factually incorrect) in the name of your religious view.
Actually if you read my responses I haven’t said that anywhere. Talking of high horses, why don’t you get off yours i.e. that the only solution ‘the panacea for all ills’ is abortion and contraception. Additionally you are rather jumping to conclusions about the reason for my objection being on religious grounds too. I have not mentioned religion of any sort kind or description anywhere.
What qualifies you to make the decision for me as to whether this is the best course of action ? Where is my choice and where too my freedom of speech? Where is the balance in this consistently biased discussion.
“the only solution ‘the panacea for all ills’ is abortion and contraception. ”
What other panacea are you proposing? So far you’ve been denigrating one set of choices and failing to supply any others.
1) To bravely keep the baby, 2) Family placement or unrelated adoption and 3) yes it is right that financial assistance be provided to enable this to happen – Social benefits (yep I know the system is very different in the US) Churches, Charities, adoption agencies.
This has surely got to be a whole lot more positive than going for abortion. These options are rarely if ever discussed… only the abortion option.
So after I have the two kids I want with the spacing that I want, I just keep on having babies and sending them out for adoption? Or what if I want to set up financially a little first, do I adopt out those babies first and then buy the house and then keep the ones after that? Except I’d also have to be careful being constantly pregnant because it would be hard to do my job if I was pregnant every year.
Oh but hang on – I have a rare genetic disease. Anyone adopting any kid of mine has a 50/50 chance of needing expensive medication and ongoing medical care for the rest of their lives.
I’m not in the US either, so at least have free medical care and social security. Except I don’t want to be on social security, I want to have a job and my career.
Sally- do you believe a woman has a right to an abortion if her life is at risk?
How big does the risk to her life have to be before abortion becomes acceptable?
1%?
5%?
10%?
50%?
90%?
Those options are discussed Sally, IF THE WOMAN WANTS TO DISCUSS THEM.
Many women don’t.
Many women don’t have any regrets or second thoughts about their abortions and didn’t find them particularly traumatic.
Many women would find going through pregnancy and birth and giving up the baby more traumatic than an abortion, so there is no “got to be a whole lot more positive” about it.
You make a lot of assumptions about how women ought to feel.
That is is always “braver” to have the baby, that abortion is always negative, that artificial birth control is always disempowering and unhelpful. I’m sure sometimes that may be the case, but I can’t say it applies for the majority.
OK, I hear you, but there is also the opposite assumption by the pro-choice lobby that there is no is no downside, and by the same token sometimes abortion and contraception are not always positive things and the fall out is not always evident till much later on. Thanks for the link re mental health earlier which I did access and read and is a really good report and balanced too.
BULLSHIT.
You could reply without the ‘expletive deleted’.
Do you really think that women are unaware of these other options? How stupid do you think we are?
Also, where are you getting your information from?
I’m going mostly off of anecdotes of friends who’ve used Planned Parenthood for various reasons — checkups, HPV vax, contraception, and yes, abortion.
No I don’t think we are stupid – I’m a woman too as well as a HCP. No I don’t think that these options are always considered seriously – and an appropriate discussion with a a health care professional could be just what is needed to help someone come to an informed choice.
I am copying and pasting Dr. Kitty’s reply here to one of my comments earlier.
“I work with a very religious Catholic GP who doesn’t prescribe any
contraception, won’t refer for sterilisation and would have kittens at
the idea of the morning after pill. Which is fine because his patients
know that about him and have a choice of at least 5 other Drs in the
practice. If anyone does see him and doesn’t know the score, he says
“let me stop you there, I don’t deal with artificial birth control
methods” and sends them straight next door to the closest Dr who does.
He’s never rude, judgemental or obstructive, and I can respect him for that, without agreeing with him in the slightest.”
Would you mind explaining what Dr. Kitty’s post has to do with my question? Thanks.
I think that my reason for adding this was that if folks feel that they are not getting a balanced discussion from someone like Dr. Kitty’s colleague in the comment above, there are others who will put the alternate view.
A discussion covering all the options/risks is appropriate (and see another of Dr. kitty’s comments in response a bit further down though). Sometimes stating the obvious or to use an SBAR term ” declaring the emergency” can bring clarity and focus and help in the decision making process, even if you think you are aware of all the alternative options.
Sally, you did misunderstand one thing.
My colleague doesn’t try to provide “balanced” info.
Literally the ONLY thing he says about contraception is “I don’t prescribe that, you’ll be wanting to see one of the other GPs” before phoning one of us to ask if we can see his patient next.
He’s more than happy to teach NFP to the few who want to learn it, but as he has a very, very large family himself (it’s not Duggar big, but it is at the point where you need a minibus for a family outing) I’m afraid he isn’t the best advertisement for it.
Oh Ok. Thanks for the clarification.
Sally, I want to leave you a couple of links.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfeminism/2012/10/how-i-lost-faith-in-the-pro-life-movement.html
http://www.upworthy.com/guess-what-222-million-women-want-worldwide-but-cant-get-no-not-ryan-gosling
This is where I’m coming from.
You and I won’t agree, and that’s ok.
Maybe I’ll change the mind of someone else who reads this page, maybe you will.
But always, at the heart of this are real women, real families making the best decisions they can in what are often very difficult circumstances, and they deserve understanding and empathy.
So that’s all I’m going to post on this topic.
Thanks for that but I can’t access the links.
“But always, at the heart of this are real women, real families making the best decisions they can in what are often very difficult circumstances, and they deserve understanding and empathy”. Of course and that’s the level of care I give… at least we can agree on that.
I’m a bit surprised he gets away with that, to be honest. I’m happy to hear he isn’t preachy about the issue, but contraception is considered medical care, is it not? I’m surprised he’s permitted to bring his personal beliefs into a professional setting in such a way.
“This has surely got to be a whole lot more positive than going for abortion. These options are rarely if ever discussed… only the abortion option.”
It may be more positive in your opinion, but not everyone agrees. Keeping the baby is not always “brave”, either – in some cases it would be downright foolish or selfish to do so.
It has also not been my experience that abortion is the only option discussed – every discussion on the subject I have been a part of has discussed the possibility of adoption, at the very least.
Telling you you are wrong isn’t touching your free speech. What qualifies YOU to make the decision for ANYONE WHO IS NOT YOU as to whether this is the right course of action?
Touche buster…What qualifies you to make the decisions too… and talk about pot calling kettle black, pray tell who is saying that I am am wrong … why you are of of course. But you seem to think that it is OK to tell me that I MUST approve of abortion and Must approve of contraception.
What qualifies ME to make the decision for MYSELF and MY CHILDREN? I don’t give a shit if you approve or not – it isn’t your damn body. What qualifies ME to be offended by YOU? MY SON. My first son, who was aborted. By my loving choice, by his father’s loving choice, by his family’s loving choice, he was spared a life of pain and misery. Don’t bother mourning my son as a tragic victim. He is already mourned by people who loved him enough to let him go.
I find everything about your posts to be too offensive and infuriating to continue this mockery of a dialog.
Dear Kumquatwriter,
By my comment above I meant that the pro-abortion camp consistently expresses the viewpoint that no-one can be allowed to hold the alternate view i.e I am being told that I MUST approve of abortion and I MUST approve of contraception and as such I have had my freedom to choose what to believe taken away, and that decision has been taken out of my hands entirely, and my freedom is removed.
I did not express it very well in order to make the meaning crystal clear, as I have now, leaving it possible for my comment to be misconstrued.
For the record S is absolutely right when she/he says. “Kumquatwriter, I don’t think Sally means her comments below as a personal attack.
I don’t think she realised her audience”.
How could I know…
“By my comment above I meant that the pro-abortion camp consistently expresses the viewpoint that no-one can be allowed to hold the alternate view i.e I am being told that I MUST approve of abortion and I MUST approve of contraception and as such I have had my freedom to choose what to believe taken away, and that decision has been taken out of my hands entirely, and my freedom is removed.”
Not a single person here has told you that you HAVE to approve of abortion or contraception. People are arguing your reasons for disapproving of those things, because the reasons are either A) illogical or B) untrue. Using deliberately instigating language such as “the murder of a child” isn’t going to convince anyone to take you seriously, either.
Your above statement is both blatantly untrue, and hypocritical. Correct me if I’m wrong, but your previous comments have certainly made you come across as if you wish abortion and contraception were not options for women who chose them; however, you believe that your freedom to chose is being taken away? Other women having access to healthcare you disapprove of takes absolutely zero choice away from you. You still have the choice to forgo contraception and not get an abortion. It’s the women who DO want these things that have to fight for their freedom of choice and bodily autonomy. You think YOUR pro-life freedom has been removed? Talk to some women in China who tried to have more than one kid.
“How could I know…”
Of course you couldn’t know… but if you felt totally justified in writing “the murder of a child is always emotive” and other such rhetoric BEFORE you knew, and you feel bad about writing it now that you know, perhaps in the future you should think about what you write, and how it might effect others. I hope you feel thoroughly humbled and ashamed, so maybe you can avoid being so sanctimonious in the future, and perhaps avoid shoving your foot firmly in your mouth.
((((Kumquatwriter)))) this is a beautiful picture of your love and of you and your son. I am sorry.
Kumquatwriter, I don’t think Sally means her comments below as a personal attack.
I don’t think she realised her audience.
I’m sorry if by starting this I have caused you distress.
Please accept my apology.
I do. She struck a nerve for me – one that doesn’t get struck that often.
“However if the other point of view, that contraception and abortion is not that absolute panacea for all ills isn’t put, ”
Nobody is claiming that, but for unwanted pregnancy abortion and contraception are one of the solutions.
Actually, I don’t mind owning the assertion that giving women the power to control their family size and free themselves from the cycle of constant childbearing and the resultant poverty and misery that often entails is one of the best ways to address and alleviate human suffering.
I think you mean that when women contact PP to end a pregnancy they are treated like grown ups, their decision is respected, nobody tries to talk them out of it and an appointment is scheduled as quickly as possible.
Which is called providing non judgemental care which respects patient autonomy in opting for a procedure she has a legal right to choose.
Nobody tries to talk them out of a made decision, but I have had more than one friend walk into PP and walk out without a scheduled abortion because in the counseling it was determined that the women *didn’t* really want the abortion but felt hopeless. They walked out instead with lists of OB, referrals to programs to help them, etc. (At least in my area PP doesn’t do OB care, though they will help you find it.)
From what I’ve heard, they also provide other services such as STD/STI checks and cancer screening. I can access those though easily through the healthcare system in my country but many American women can’t. Planned Parenthood helps to make those things affordable.
Yes, they do provide those things. The comment I had originally typed mentioned that as well, but as the conversation had deviated from PP saving lives to PP “pushing abortions” I left it out.
I wonder how many women have been helped by early cancer/STD detection from access to affordable screenings at PP. Heck, some of them might have even survived to have babies that they didn’t abort! Fancy that!
The other thing, Sally, is the forms of contraception (birth control pills, injections, implants and hormonal and copper IUCDs) you object to are the forms of contraception that women in the developing world LIKE.
They like them because they do not require the co-operation (or indeed the knowledge) of their male partners- unlike condoms and NFP.
They like them because they are more than 98% effective.
They particularly like coils and implants because they are long lasting and require a visit to a clinic only every 3, 5 or 10 years. Which is good if such a visit takes days and costs more than you make in a month.
They may be making choices you don’t agree with, but they are choices that make total sense to me.
I personally can’t get upset about the idea of a zygote or early embryo numbering less than 50 cells failing to implant in the uterus of a woman using a contraceptive method because she doesn’t want to get pregnant.
You can feel upset if you want to, but don’t expect everyone to join in.
OK I buy that – wasn’t expecting everyone to join in but to engage in a thought process before trotting out the jargon in the same way that you consistently accuse the the NCB folks of doing and with good reason. I am very familiar with contraceptive methods as I am a Nurse /Midwife who works in a busy maternity unit with over 7500 deliveries a year and it’s a Tertiary Referral Unit which takes all the complex cases from the region rather than from the immediate catchment area.
So you’re good at delivering babies for women who want to have them.
Do you counsel all women against methods of contrception which prevent implantation by telling them it is asking an abortion? Because it isn’t, unless you change definitions of pregnancy and abortion.
I do hope you don’t, because that is not giving truthful unbiased information to patients. Which is sanctionable by the NMC.
Of course I don’t, and I am a Supervisor of Midwives so I don’t engage in sanctionable behaviour.
Glad to hear it.
Although, from my experience midwives don’t get involved much in contraception provision.
That’s what GPs and family planning clinics are for.
There is a world of difference between saying”as this method may prevent implantation of a fertilised egg some women do not find it acceptable for ethical or religious reasons” and “I cannot condone the use of such methods, because I believe they are abortifacients”.
I work with a very religious Catholic GP who doesn’t prescribe any contraception, won’t refer for sterilisation and would have kittens at the idea of the morning after pill. Which is fine because his patients know that about him and have a choice of at least 5 other Drs in the practice. If anyone does see him and doesn’t know the score, he says “let me stop you there, I don’t deal with artificial birth control methods” and sends them straight next door to the closest Dr who does.
He’s never rude, judgemental or obstructive, and I can respect him for that, without agreeing with him in the slightest.
I don’t think it’s that uncommon for CNMs to do family planning here.
I think Sally is in the UK, and other than handing out the “contraceptive choices after having a baby”leaflet MWs don’t usually get involved.
GPs usually sort it out at the post natal appointment.
http://www.patient.co.uk/health/contraception-after-having-a-baby
This is the standard NHS info leaflet.
Oh silly me, should’ve caught that from the “even in the US” bit of bullshit. People here like to make shit up about Planned Parenthood too.
Yes, CNMs are very much involved in family planning in the States. Placing IUDs, prescribing all manner of birth control, and even prescribing/
performing non-surgical abortions.
Thanks for this reply!
It is very, very simple. Life starts at conception, pregnancy at implantation. If the drugs prevent implantation it is an abortifacient.
I am not stopping anyone from using those methods if they want though you’ve gathered that I would rather they didn’t. I am trying to point out that they are not without consequence either.
It is absolutely terrible, horrendous, an humungous tragedy that 1/2 a million women die from unsafe abortions but it is as terrible, as tragic, that millions and millions of babies have been killed, are being killed and will continue to be killed because of the support for abortion without looking at the consequences.
Just sayin’
I am telling you that “abortifacient” has a very specific legal and medical definition which is based on the ending of a pregnancy, not the ending of “life” and which you are deliberately misusing because it is more emotive to do so.
The consequence of abortion is that a child will not be born who otherwise would have been born. No one pretends otherwise. Sometimes that is the best outcome in that situation.
I want abortion to b safe, legal and rare, not because it is difficult to obtain one, but because fewer women should be in positions where abortions are necessary.
Safe, effective woman-controlled contraception is key to that.
Disagree if you want, but at least use words in a truthful way, your use of the word abortifacient iisn’t.
Killing a child is emotive and don’t let anyone tell you anything different.
I don’t believe a zygote or embryo is a child.
Again, legally and medically I’m correct.
How about you pay for their child care expense? Like the examples from above, some women chose abortion because they can not offer another child. If you want abortion to stop, then pay for for child expense or help the family pay for the care. It is not against your ethic believe, right?
To be strictly correct in legal terms you are correct but morally ethically…..
No morally or ethically about it.
Legally, medically it is not abortifacient, so use of the term is incorrect.
As a nurse you should know better.
You do realize that, in the absence of contraception, only about a third to a quarter of zygotes implant in the first place. Do you hold a funeral every time you get your period after having sex?
Oh …pluh-ease be sensible. nope of course not. However the difference is there isn’t a device or drugs affecting what is happening
Um… you have NO idea if that’s the case. What you mean is that you are not specifically using a device or a drug to affect what is happening. But given that your entire premise is flawed (“life begins at conception, but it only counts if you ARE using a device to prevent implantation, otherwise all these non viable conceived lives are you know, acceptable byblow”), I suppose you can proceed to make up any old rules you want about what counts and what doesn’t.
Why don’t you try being sensible? There are goodness knows how many miscarriages a year–far more than there are abortions, certainly–and yet you and your ilk manage not to stagger around crippled by the tragic scope of losing all those potential humans. Why is this? I suspect it’s because even you understand on some level that a cluster of cells without a discernible nervous system is not the same as a fully developed baby. The idea that you feel more moral obligation to an unimplanted blastocyst than to an adult woman’s autonomy and right to self-determination is frankly disturbing, especially in someone professionally involved in women’s reproductive health.
It’s no less disturbing that you seem to believe that women should be forced to choose between being tied to the yoke of endless reproduction and child-rearing, perhaps beyond what she can physically or economically bear, or needlessly abstain from the potential joy and fulfillment of sexual intimacy for long periods. You may come from an ideological background that devalues women’s sexuality; you may even, as you profess, find abstinence “empowering,” but you have no right to project your backward, archaic sense of moral judgement on any other woman. There is nothing morally wrong with controlling one’s fertility or enjoying a healthy sexual relationship. In fact, I question the integrity of anyone who concerns herself with restricting or demeaning the reproductive choices of others. It seems to me that such positions often have more to do with a deep seated need to feel superior and to dispense judgement than they do with any enlightenment of feeling or understanding of the human condition.
So would only grieve if someone murdered your child and not if they died of say cancer or something? Because that is the logic you are using right now.
When you cook eggs for breakfast, do you say you’re cooking chicken?
>>>”It is absolutely terrible, horrendous, an humungous tragedy that 1/2 a million women die from unsafe abortions but it is as terrible, as tragic, that millions and millions of babies have been killed, are being killed and will continue to be killed because of the support for abortion without looking at the consequences.”
False.
If people cared half as much about actual children as they do about embryos, the world would be a better place. Why not put that energy into making a better world for the children that actually exist?
RIP Savita Halappanavar.
Not from Somalia, I know, but her name and face flash through my brain every time someone tries to explain how safe, legal abortion doesn’t have the potential to save lives.
The overwhelming infection this woman had killed her and the TOP/abortion would not have saved her. Frankly a cynical attempt by pro-abortion faction to hijack the case to support their own ends rather than look at the facts.
Sally, that was NOT the finding of her inquest. Which I have read.
It found that ending the pregnancy in the first day or two of her hospital admission, when her health was at risk, the infection would have been halted and it would have saved her life.
By the time the sepsis became life-threatening and the abortion was legal in Ireland it was too late.
Remember, the finding of her inquest was NOT natural causes, it was medical misadventure.
Which conclusion was hotly debated by many OBGYNs – they could not say that with 100% absolute cast iron certainty, so how the Inquest reached this conclusion based on ? what evidence/research .
I would imagine based on her notes, blood results, vital signs, PM report, drug chart etc. it was certainly the opinion of the expert obstetric witness.
In other words evidence available only to the expert witnesses, coroner and jury and not to the armchair experts.
Who was the congressman/doctor who diagnosed Terri Schiavo as not being in a permanent vegitative state based on watching the video of her?
Meanwhile, the people who actually examined her were found to be correct.
“Since abortion came in”…by which you mean “since abortion was made legal”.
Of course we don’t have statistics for how many abortions were carried out prior to that time. Dying from a botched or septic back alley abortion doesn’t happen so much though.
A safe first trimester abortion is safer for a woman’s physical health than continuing a pregnancy to term, and the most reliable evidence suggests induced abortion is unlikely to have adverse psychological impact either.
About 40 million abortions happen worldwide annually.
The rate is about 28/1000 women aged 15-44, higher in Latin America (32) and Africa (29) and lower in developing countries (17-24). These differences reflect differing access to contraception rather than criminalisation of abortion.
Cite: http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_IAW.html
Cite:http://aomrc.org.uk/publications/statements/doc_download/9432-induced-abortion-and-mental-health.html