There’s a story currently making the Internet rounds that purports to be a tale of heroic anti-vaxxing birth warrior parents who are being harassed by child protection authorities for their unconventional choices.
Hermine Hayes-Klein, of Human Rights in Childbirth, was appalled at the way a young couple, Rachel and Dustin, was treated. Rachel had an unanticipated breech birth in a hospital; refused all testing and refused vaccines. The hospital called child protection authorities who determined that the baby should be put in foster care until a court hearing. Hayes-Klein was so appalled that she represented Rachel and Dustin pro bono in a court hearing on parental competence.
[pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Is a hospital is being vilified for daring to hold white parents to the same standards they would have held parents of color?[/pullquote]
…[M]y phone started blowing up about a young man’s social media post that his wife had just given birth at a Portland hospital, and after refusing vaccines and arguing with hospital staff, their newborn was being taken by DHS (Oregon’s department for child protective services)…
Ms. Hayes-Klein chose to portray Rachel and Dustin as persecuted because of their birth choices, but I can’t help wondering if this has nothing to do with birth and everything to do with white privilege. Situations like these arise with families of color each and every day but the folks from Human Rights in Childbirth aren’t rushing to represent them.
Why might DHS have been called?
1. The family was homeless, living in a van and wandering the country.
… They drove to Costa Rica, but didn’t find their home there. They sold the car and flew to Sacramento, where they began a journey by hippie van, greyhound bus etc. up through places in Northern California and Oregon. Rachel saw midwives along the route, was having a healthy pregnancy, and hoped to give birth in her new home with a midwife when the baby came. It was due on September 22 based on her LMP. By early September, they were in Oregon and their housing situation had not resolved itself. Rachel flew back to Florida where she could stay with her mother when she gave birth. But then she decided that she really wanted to be with Dustin when this baby came.
On September 19, Rachel flew from Florida to Portland, from which she intended to travel south to where Dustin was working and living on a farm in Southern Oregon. She went into labor on the plane. By the time they landed at PDX, the flight attendants were aware that she was in labor and had an ambulance waiting at the airport. They took her to the hospital…
2. They had no visible means of support.
3. The mother had no prenatal records of any kind and could not prove she had received care.
4. The father had an arrest record, which Hayes-Klein dismisses out of hand.
This couple are dreadlocked vegans in their 20s, who used to have a shop in Florida where they sold hemp clothing and products among other things, we all know this kind of semi-psychedelic shop. Hemp is associated with cannabis, which is still illegal in Florida, and the police came into this shop many times and harassed them. They had confrontations with police several times and even arrests for “disorderly conduct.”
5. The parents refused drug testing.
In contrast, Hayes-Klein implies (though does not state) that DHS got involved because of the parents’ alternative choices. When the baby was found to be breech, she had breech vaginal birth.
… The doctor rubbed the ultrasound wand over her belly, and said, “The baby’s breech! Prep her for c-section.” Rachel was asking what that meant, and the doctor was answering “You’re going to be numb from your chest down.” Rachel asked, “Have any of you ever delivered a breech baby naturally?” They all indicated, no. Before they could wheel her to surgery, the baby’s body came out of her vagina. She was pinned back by her arms and her legs pulled up and back. The doctor put her hands on the baby and started “delivering” it. There was a loud snap. The baby’s arm was broken at a right angle. Her apgars was 4 and 8…
And:
Later that morning, the pediatrician came in and wanted to give the baby vaccines and do blood work on “mom.” Rachel said she would prefer to wait till the next day to discuss any more injections on the baby or herself… The doctor said that they were leaving him with no choice but to call DHS.
Then:
A little later, Dustin and Rachel were cuddling with the baby. The door opened, and a social worker entered with 4 fully-armed police in bullet-proof vests. Rachel remembers a nurse with them saying, “Why didn’t you get an ultrasound?” Dustin angrily objected that this was an intrusion and a violation of their rights. They told him to go get his ID from the hippie bus, and then he was blocked from re-entering the hospital. The baby was taken to a different floor from Rachel, and she would only be allowed to see it for feedings…
Hayes-Klein rode to the rescue:
There in the quiet hospital hallway were two fully-armed policemen in bullet-proof vests. I looked in the door beside them, and there was this weeping young mother, hunching her bare shoulders toward the door and holding her precious baby to her breasts. The baby had just fallen asleep nursing in her arms. I started crying immediately; maybe it’s unprofessional, but what can I say; this is who I am. I walked in and said, “I’m on your side.”
Who was on the baby’s side? Hayes-Klein doesn’t say.
The next day I went with them to the DHS meeting to form a safety plan …
On Monday we went to the hearing. Suffice to say that the judge did not want to discuss the merits of the DHS action itself, but tabled those until a trial of the case on October 28. She agreed that the baby could be returned to Rachel under a safety plan that included following all doctors’ orders.
Hayes-Klein presents a touching photo of the reunion. I’ve blurred the faces; the impact of the picture for me is how white and blonde everyone is.
… The reunion that followed was healing balm to the wounds on my heart from seeing their separation on Thursday. Little baby was asleep and looked sort of closed in. Her parents fell on her, weeping and cooing. Her mama untied her from the car seat, and baby started to cry. Rachel lifted her up to her heart and she stopped crying. I helped them into an enclave with benches where they could cuddle together as a family. Baby snuggled to mama’s breast and started to relax. Then she opened her eyes. And as her father wept and said, “Daddy’s here baby; I’ll protect you; everything’s all right,” she started to smile.
I don’t doubt for a moment that these parents love their baby, but that was not the issue. DHS requested a safety plan because they were concerned for the baby’s SAFETY, fearing that the parents did not have the knowledge or the means to properly care for her.
Hayes-Klein recognizes that the hospital professionals were trying to do what they thought was right (and, although she doesn’t mention it, what they were almost certainly legally REQUIRED to do), but:
The problem is the power imbalance, and the destructive momentum of child-protective cases if their merit is not scrutinized closely at their outset. Judges rely on hospital workers as the front line that see many cases of genuine neglect and abuse that need state intervention. Cases like these raise the need for judges to be aware of how triggers and power can work together to lead to child-neglect complaints that are really about doctor-patient conflict. One place to start is by making clear for everybody that the parents had the right to informed consent and refusal on all the interventions they are charged with medical neglect refusing…
Yet Hayes-Klein fails to present any evidence that breech birth and refusal of vaccines had anything to do with calling DHS.
Hayes-Klein tells a story of heroic lawyer representing heroic parents who became a target of a punitive DHS investigation in retaliation for unconventional birth choices.
I can’t help wondering if we are looking at a situation where a hospital is being vilified simply for daring to hold white parents to the same standards they would have held parents of color.
Oregon continues its lousy midwife game: http://www.oregonlive.com/tualatin/index.ssf/2016/07/waterbirth_center_didnt_know_b.html
Freaking racists are now begging for money on a gofundme for a new car. Guess the ‘hippie van’ doesn’t quite cut it anymore, omg…
i posted a response on this lawyer’s FB write up to someone’s question about why vitamin k would be required (broken arm, internal bleeding) and hep b (must have within 12 hrs if mom is positive or refuses test) and refusing these may be why they were charged with medical neglect – it was promptly deleted :/
Okay, this is where the lawyer can officially be called a POS with a penchant for cavalierly risking the lives of babies.
For sure. I’m a hippy mom and I gave birth at a birth center with a Nurse Midwife…even I find this whole thing fucked up. I’m so irritated by this lawyer, this gofundme, and these parents. It was not the hospital’s fault and these assholes were endangering their baby. That kid did not need a broken arm and this “hands off the breech” thing they keep repeating is ridiculous and reckless. The notion that if you just don’t touch the breech baby or mom it’ll all work out fine. Well as you can see in the article linked above by Concerned Anon a baby died with a short cord around it’s neck when Andaluz midwives in Portland tried that.
I can’t help but wonder, why was the 9 months pregnant and ready to give birth woman the one who flew so the couple could be reunited, not the presumably healthy and mobile man? Is there a warrant out for him in Florida? Is he not welcome at his in-laws house? Is he so self-centered that it never occurred to him to inconvenience himself by flying to his pregnant partner’s side when she wanted him there?
They have money for last minutes plane tickets, but not rent. I love that.
OMG. This is one of the comments on their GoFundMe page. I cannot.
$25
Martin Bishop
23 hours ago
4
I believe this case should properly be viewed as ethnic discrimination, recognizing people like Rachel and Dustin are part of an ethnic minority being discriminated against by more conventional members of society. Special protection is needed with regard to protecting minority philosophy, religion, customs, culture, food, more’s– things once dismissed as “hippie” are now, after a couple of generations, a distinct identity, akin to tribal affiliation.
He needs to check what his weed’s adulterated with
Self-righteous indignation is a hell of a drug.
I don’t think he’ll get far with this, “hippies” are not a protected class.
Uggggh
What?? I want to know what that guy is smoking. Hippie is now an ethnic group…uh huh….
I love the title. If this was a Black dreadlocked couple, with her refusing a drug test and him, with priors, being forcibly kept out of the hospital while calling himself a warrior, there would not be a movement to send them money.
Right off it would have been quickly queried that he has mugshots and/or arrests records that can be found with a Google search for the years 2008, 2009, 2013 and 2016 – and it’s not just disorderly conduct.
The hospital staff and police were there and can’t be faulted for checking into the the baby’s safety.
I hope the best for everyone.
Sadly, you’re absolutely right.
Besides the Jains, what is the percentage of vegans who are persons of color? Seems like all the ones I’ve met, except the Jain classmate, are white and middle class.
You get Hindus, Sikhs and Buddhists who do it too, not as high a percentage but some. I think it’s rather less common in people who don’t have roots in the Indian sub-continent. I’ve not come across many black vegans!
The Jains I worked with used to drink milk and eat cheese, so they were not vegans. I have read that some Jains are vegans but as far as I know it is uncommon.
As far as Hinduism goes cheese is a very common part of their diet and vegetarian curries in India usually include cheese or eggs.
Yeah, there’s a lot of vegetarian non-white cultures, but vegan is much more rare…
Before b12 supplementation was available, wouldn’t veganism have led to an early and painful death? That’s the kind of thing people notice.
Vegetarianism, with eggs and milk products included, provides enough B12 to get by. Veganism, if supplements are not used, can and does lead to illness if not death. But B12 is used only sparingly in the body and is recycled so it takes years to run out. I did once see the blood smear of a patient who was a strict vegan. His hematocrit was 6% (normal is about 40% for a man). His blood looked like blood contaminated other bodily fluid rather than actual blood. He came in because he felt tired. No duh, guy! It took a while to convince him that he could take B12 injections without violating his principles (they’re made from bacterially manufactured B12). Happy ending ultimately but scary for a while.
I worked with a doctor from India and her faith meant that she wasn’t allowed to eat flesh or fish, and she couldn’t eat vegetables that grew underground, only those that grew in the light. Can’t remember what it was though-it led to some interesting meals (not eating potatoes in Ireland is unheard of!)
That’s Jainism.
All life is sacred, so they avoid killing insects too.
Part of their religious beliefs include a holy fast, ending in death, although from what I understand this rarely actually happens in practice.
I was opted out of Religious Studies classes by my parents because it clashed with my Latin GCSE.
My mother gave me an encyclopaedia of world religions and told me to read that instead. It comes in handy sometimes.
I’m a terrible person, because I can’t think of Jainism and Judaism without thinking of an old Prairie Home Companion sketch about Bobism, a religion founded by a guy named Bob. “We were gonna name it after my wife, Judy, but it turns out they already had that.”
That actually sounds really interesting to me. …okay, so i might be a nerd
Back when I worked in bookselling, one of the local private schools had a “World Religions” class that the high schoolers had to take. I thought this a rather good idea; the text was something like what Dr. Kitty described, with each section written by some authority on that religion and giving a breakdown of what’s believed, how it’s acted upon, how not to (generally) give offense, that kind of thing. Call me a nerd too, I suppose 😉 , but it sounded pretty cool.
The other time it came in handy was when my father in law died and my daughter started asking weird questions about what people did with dead bodies and why.
So we talked about burials, cremations, burials at sea, Towers of Silence, mummies, donating your body to medical science etc.
She seemed happier knowing that he *wanted* to be buried, but that there were other options available because she didn’t like that one.
But killing plants is OK?
No, hence the ban on vegetables that grow under the ground, because you have to uproot the whole plant. But harvesting fruits, beans and other things that grow above ground can be done without killing the whole plant. Cereals are ok too because they are annuals, I guess.
Ooohh, that’ why.
I was wondering what was so wrong with underground vegetables, like they were evil or something. Makes more sense if it’s about not killing the plant.
Bronson Alcott (Louisa Mae’s father) banned “non-aspirant” vegetables at Fruitlands, his utopian commune. LMA is not one of my favorite authors, and I have no in-depth knowledge of her work, but I suspect Mr. March’s near nonentity status in Little Women reflected her opinion of her father.
*nerd hat on*
Oh, LMA actually revered her father, to a pretty unhealthy degree. While she could see some of the issues with Fruitlands (she wrote a fairly biting essay about the experiences they had there) she considered the man pretty much the epitome of what men should be. She died two days after he did; when they told her he had died, she answered something like “then I can go too.” Because, you see, she’d have been abandoning him by dying first, bad daughter! *facepalm*
Bleargh.
Thanks for the information. That doesn’t make me any fonder of either Alcott.
Quite. I enjoy Little Women as a nostalgia thing: loved it as a kid, so it’s a bit like a comfort food in book form. Each time I go back and read both it and Alcott’s other works as an adult, though, I get a new perspective on some aspect of her thinking, and it’s rarely a positive one, even given the time and place in which and about which she was writing.
For example, I recently reread both “Little Women” and “Work,” the latter being a lesser-known novel of hers. The blatant racism against non-English-Europeans is nauseating, and the less-blatant but decidedly present anti-black racism is, too. People of African descent, usually former slaves, are always portrayed as good-hearted and noble but intellectually very simple and in need of white “rescuers” and leaders; the Irish and Germans are always poor, dirty, lazy and rude; and the French and Italians, while cultured, are overemotional, dramatic, and often insipid.
Throw in the emotional blackmail of children that Bronson Alcott/Professor Bhaer (a lot of Bhaer was drawn on her own father, which both explains a lot and is very creepy) used as discipline, and…yuck.
Man, going back to re-read books I loved as a kid can be either wonderful or so disheartening. Little Women and the Little House books definitely fall into the latter category.
Indeed! About the only really positive thing I get out of the Little House books, nostalgia aside, is that they always make me really, really hungry and give me the urge to cook–especially “Farmer Boy.” I seem to remember that LIW wrote “Farmer Boy” as a sort of food porn thing–she’d never had the kind of security and plenty that Almanzo grew up with, but she had a hell of a lot of fun imagining it and writing all that down! Six kinds of pie at each meal, several main course dishes, etc, etc. To which I say, good for her!
There is a scene in one of the Little House books where Pa and some of the other men dress up in blackface and put on a show, and everyone thinks it’s hilarious. I remember being weirded out by that even as a child…
Presumably Jain.
There are a lot of super crunchy black people who are vegan. There’s a vegan soul food place where I live. Some Rastas are vegan.
There’s a soul vegan restaurant in Atlanta that we go to when we visit and they are black Zionists. I don’t know if all black Zionists or even most are vegan or vegetarian.
Outside of Ethiopian Jews, I didn’t even know there was such a thin as black Zionists.
The Facebook Group “Im vegan & Im black, it actually happens!!” has over 12,000 Black vegans on it, Most Black vegans I meet don’t know about the group so the number isn’t even a reflection.
I wish there were more but I’m sure there’s more than you think.
Interesting.
I didn’t really think any number, just that in my multiracial inner-ring burb, I’ve seen maybe 1 black person in either the vegan or American vegetarian place. (The Indian and Lebanese restaurants are a different matter.) All the vegans and most of the vegetarians i personally know happen to be white.
Maybe black vegans don’t feel the need to tell everyone they meet about their food choices.
My only vegan friend is a black university professor. He’s Afro-Caribbean-American, I guess would be the term.
I know a lot of white vegans, but my most vocal vegan acquaintance is East Asian.
#1: With the faces blurred I was very confused as to why there were three women in the photo. Got it now.
#2: Loving the necessary nipple-shot-for-good-measure on the gofundme.
#3: When I close my eyes, this is EXACTLY how I envision Brooke.
Translation: they worked in a head shop
Translation: they were selling K-2 and spice
That about sums it up.
Probably “bathsalts” too.
Speaking of spice: one of my dear friends gave it up 2 years ago today, and I am so proud of him for turning his life around.
They have an Amazon wish list!
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ls/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_ip_wl_o_24w7xb8E9EJDS/158-7890889-4207603?ie=UTF8&lid=279TR4OWQRM5Y&ref_=cm_sw_r_cp_ip_wl_o_24w7xb8E9EJDS&ty=wishlist
And its all…supplements? What?
A fuckload of supplements, and those same Hyland ‘homeopathic’ teething tablets that were once recalled for having a non-homeopathic amount of belladonna in them…
ETA: And a ‘probiotic’ supplement for babies.
They still have belladonna. Homeopathic, schmomeopathic – I’m not treating toothache with poison, even succussed poison.
Also, isn’t the baby a newborn? What do they need with teething tablets when they don’t even have a car seat or home for the baby yet? Teeth are some months down the road.
Well, if you’re gonna make a wish list, planning a few months ahead isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I agree those two are loony in general, but I did have diapers on my baby registry that were bigger than size 1, and a teething ring or two
I wish I would’ve put more baby-proofing crap on my baby registry.
It’s not about helping the baby. It’s about signaling their supposed moral superiority through their choice of brand names.
Unless, of course, you’re Richard III – but in that case you still don’t need Hyland’s, because the teeth are already there.
It may be prudent to note that Rappaccini’s Daughter was a work of fiction
Hey, they did ask for some diaper pins. (although I notice almost nothing else is even for a baby but supplements for a vegan mother).
Well, unless you’re very careful and have a good grasp of nutrition science, a vegan diet will leave you depleted in one or more essential nutrients. Most vegans I know use some sorry supplements, generally beer yeast but also spirulin or other algal extract.
They might also use a Jain or Buddhist cookbook, but that would mean stepping out of their comfort zone, I guess.
Yep, but for the most part you will never hear a vegan say that.
Jeez, wouldn’t want to use something real, like a specific multivitamin. Oy.
No, because some real supplements are in gelatine capsules, thats pork, as a vegan you don’t want that. 🙂
I tried going vegan for a while in college. It was a lot of work. I stuck with vegetarian. :p
One of my grandfather is vegetarian (most of the time, he’s really vulnerable to woo and has a new fad died every few months)
He tried Veganism a few years back. My Grandmother was the one making the food, she didn’t mind not eating meat when she was eating with him since she could still eat it for lunch, or when she was alone, or just make herself an additional portion of meat if she felt like it.
But veganism meant making 2 completely different meals every single day, and she wasn’t going to do it. My grandfather is a terrible cook. After 1 month of basically eating very bland tomato soup, he gave up.
I married a vegetarian, so it works out pretty well. Also, we live in NorCal, so there’s a lot of food options. :p MrR isn’t immune to woo, but he’s better than most about food woo, so I haven’t had to work with gluten-free or organic or any of that bullshit.
How do you go vegan in college? Doesn’t that mean no Ramen Noodles?
I honestly can’t remember. I just remember feeling tired and pissy a lot. I love me some eggs, and getting a big source of my protein and calories taken away didn’t go well. Lots of beans and rice and dark greens and orange veggies, which is great overall, but wasn’t really enough at the time.
I’m happy that CA passed that initiative saying that eggs sold in the state have to come from chickens with enough room to move around a bit, so I don’t feel as guilty about eating them. I’ve thought about urban chickens, but the dogs wouldn’t get along well with them. And the coyotes would probably take them in short order.
I buy free-range eggs by choice, but when my SIL told me about that law I was worried about how it would affect low-income families. Eggs are a really good, really cheap food – but free-range is like $5/dozen here, vs. $1.29 for the other kind.
It doesn’t mandate free range, just coops big enough for the chickens to turn around in. Eggs are still cheap.
That’s good, then.
I have two chickens in a tractor coop. It keeps our weimaraners out and there are some with a floor to keep foxes out, so maybe that would be an option if you really wanted to get some.
I’d like chickens too, but I am pretty sure that would just attract more rats. And then my cat would bring me more decapitated rats. She’s sweet like that.
Oh, my dogs do that too! They’re usually alive and damp though, and the dogs exhibit the symptoms of a cane toad high thanks to the placebo effect.
Is vodka vegan? because if so, then I was vegan in college.
Apparently vodka is vegan. Awfully fancy drink for college, we just drank cheap beer.
We used Grain Alcohol on special occasions.
No frat party would be complete without a trash can full of grain alcohol, 7-up (and/or grape kool-aid) and sliced up fruit!
Trashcan Punch! Don’t eat the fruit….
What? That’s the best part!
vegan is an insane amount of work imo, particularly if you have young kids. Between toddler pickiness and their different needs from adults, giving him chicken and yogurt makes my life easier
Yes, it is very difficult with kids. And it can be dangerous too. No animal products means no B12 and not that much iron, just as two examples. I can live with the fact that my husband needs iron supplementation, but my kids, no. They should eat whatever they want.
AND: it doesn’t work. How much brainwashing do children need until they can say no to their friends, school meals, etc if meat or unhealthy sweets or whatever is served? Out of the house they will eat whatever their friends eat, and even more so, if the offered food is forbidden at home.
Hell, even being a responsible meat eater is hard with kids. Pre-kids, I aimed to have the majority of my meals be meat-free although I still ate meat 3-4 times a week. Then my six month old daughter’s blood test came back borderline anemic, and she fought me on the poly-vi-sol with iron and wouldn’t eat good plant sources of iron. A slice of liverwurst, on the other hand, she took to readily. From there, it has just developed into food preferences that are either not very nutritious (plain pasta) or a vegan’s worst nightmare: steak, chicken, ham, eggs, milk, milk, milk, milk, milk…
She’s actually shaping up to be a good eater and does readily eat vegetables, including the ones that would have helped her anemia as an infant, but the whole family’s habits have shifted and I don’t feel like battling with three-year-olds on this point just yet. Someday, though.
God is real because cheese.
Edit: unless you’re lactose intolerant. Than evil is real because cheese.
Hard cheese has little lactose left in it, the bacteria having eaten most of it, so it’s probably evidence that god is marginally merciful.
I’m an atheist, so I defer to Tim on the matter:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oy3FMnpyqWU
Not to mention the fact that a baby needs a LOT more fat for good brain development than an adult…
It’s one big, stuffed, online shopping cart of SAD.
Chlorella is believed to help heal you after surgery. I have been told that “it’s one molecule away from being a red blood cell”. My father in law had tons of it in his pantry. It’s woo tastic.
Totally read that as cholera 😛
Me too!
me three
If they are selling cholera supplements, then the woo has gone to far.
Also, I want some. Purely for collectors interests, mind.
XD ‘one molecule away’ let me guess, It’s only missing hemoglobin.
hey, there’s barely any difference between between H2O and H2O2!
I went and looked up WTF it is. It’s algae. It’s an erythrocyte-load of molecules away from being one. :p
Well, look at that. You can buy encapsulated sand! More evidence of their screwed up priorities. The diaper pins are the most reasonable item on the list but i don’t know that cloth diapering is a feasible option unless you own a washer.
Washers are part of the consumerism machine, man. You can wash your clothes down in the river for free.
Oh, the poopy diapers will sort themselves out.
You can always get the dog to do it….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwRftnDGQAc
If you’re REALLY in tune with your baby, you can just do elimination communication!
Is that like telepathic potty training?
Pretty much, as I understand it.
And inflict all natural cholera from dirty diapers on people downstream, yay!
Welcome to India!
The cilantro extract is 60% alcohol. For those not up on their woo, this stuff is touted as a cure for vaccine injuries and for clearing toxins IN CHIlDREN. They are proposing to give this stuff to their newborn. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fb067f2bb281a2a5646778327c93fa5414a5f68f2d5c43fabf40464f44a4f39f.jpg
a: that’s vile, and b: all alcohol is organic by definition, they could have saved money by grabbing a bottle of Night Train.
AACCK! I’m one of those who find cilantro an abomination to the taste buds. Even a copious amount of alcohol couldn’t change the fact that stuff is VILE and needs to be banished.
I couldn’t stand it until I was well into my 20’s (I also didn’t care for onions). For some reason my tastebuds changed.
ME TOO. I cannot eat it. Nothing that it’s touched. I’ve randomly read this kinda has to do with genetics, but what I’ve read says that people of similar gene hate it because it tastes like soap. I do not believe it tastes like soap. Can’t describe, because my aversion to it is so strong, I cannot accurately describe its repugnance, although I know it is not “soapy-ness”.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/20/cilantro-aversion-gene-study_n_1901124.html
It is awful. I don’t think I ever had my mouth washed out with soap, but that’s what I imagine it would taste like. Blech.
This is really interesting. I love cilantro. Like, LOVE it.
I not only hate the taste of cilantro, but it also makes me sick. Cilantro is the devil.
I agree. 100%.
I was not up on my woo. So thank you…….. I think.
it’s ok though. It’s organic alcohol. so it has to be good.
This is concerning.
I totally agree with this post, that white privilege probably did play a big part in getting this story attention. Honestly I don’t think POC should have their children instantly removed from their care, either, but where safety is concerned this seems to have been a reasonable reaction.
But I have to admit to some discomfort when we’re mocking their requests for assistance and a Gofundme account. People are free to contribute to that or not, as they desire. But I don’t think they’re morally reprehensible for asking for financial help through those avenues.
Maybe it’s because I’ve been poor – and yes, no doubt their situation is due to their own poor or ill-considered choices, but I see no reason for them to have to starve (or, more importantly, for their baby to starve) and jump through a number of moral hoops until they show the proper amount of shame before they are helped. It just, to me, smacks of that same white and/or class privilege we’re always discussing, along the lines of “Oh hey, if you’re on food stamps how DARE you purchase steak”. As though they have to prove they’ve suffered an arbitrary amount of shame before they deserve help.
The sneering over the cell phones got to me a little bit – a cell phone isn’t a luxury anymore, particularly if you have no permanent address. You have to be able to call to find work, to apply for assistance, etc. I doubt they paid for their own plane tickets.
I don’t know, I agree with this all in spirit – and I do not think the hospital behaved badly in any way. If anything the couple sounds troubled, perhaps (and I think it is likely) with addiction. But the person I have the most disdain for in this situation is the lawyer who is exploiting these people and their story in service of her own agenda. Yes I think the parents are sketchy and I don’t think it was wrong to insist on some safety precautions before releasing the infant back to them. And yes, I think white privilege definitely played a role in their getting what I consider to be fair, but not demeaning, treatment. I doubt the same would hold true for minority parents.
I just am trying to reserve some compassion for them, too.
I agree that compassion is important, and I agree with you about the cell phone comment. I have similar issues with conservatives bitching about kids with iPads in public housing. Connectivity isn’t a luxury these days.
However, when the wish list has items that range from more or less useless to actively harmful – that challenges my compassion muscles. High-alcohol tinctures to ‘detox’ their baby from vaccines? Potentially poisonous teething tablets?
Yeah, I do see what you’re saying, I just wanted to record somewhere that some of this mocking makes me uncomfortable for the same reasons this story was brought to our attention in the first place – privilege, though in our case it’s more class privilege than just white privilege.
I feel the same way as some others. If that list had things like cribs, car seats, bouncy seats, baby slings, diapers, and even breast pads, nursing bras and other nursing and baby gear, I wouldn’t roll my eyes. But this list isn’t practical. I’m all out of sympathy.
Somehow, I’m not surprised if their list isn’t practical. That is probably not an adjective often used on them.
Even if the list was full of practical things. What had they been doing the 7 or so months one usually have to get ready to have a baby?
It’s not like their apartment complex burned down with everything they owned.
True, but I’d still be more sympathetic if they were listing practical things. It would show they finally figured out that they have to actually care for the baby. I give some credit to eventually figuring things out, even if you were an idiot before.
Ditto. If they are that poor, they shouldn’t be having kids because they can’t afford them.
A cell phone really isn’t a luxury but a necessity. It’s pretty damned hard to find a job or do much of anything else without one. So yeah, that rubs me wrong as well.
I think that my issue is that their narrative is all about how they are being victimized for leading an “alternative” lifestyle. That’s disingenuous at best. And if their wish list was filled with cloth diapers and organic cotton onesies, I would probably sigh, but at least that’s stuff that their baby really needs. Instead, it’s herbal supplements and a box of diaper pins. The priorities are way out of whack, and that bugs the hell out of me.
Maybe we should frame it this way – if these 20-something dreadlocked vegan owners of a “hemp” shop were black people – pretty sure they’d be in jail.
If Hermine Hayes-Klein really wanted to do some good in the world, she’d call attention to the systemic racism in healthcare and try to help people who are truly victimized by the system.
Instead she appears to be taking up her own favorite causes: vaginal breech birth and vaccine refusal.
Reeks of privilege.
The irony to me is that the mom got the vaginal breech birth she wanted along with a pretty standard drawback from vaginal breech births – an infant with a broken arm.
Better a broken arm than HIE from asphyxia, IMHO.
I harbor immense disdain for the way in which gofundme is exploited (mainly) by people of my generation for, yes, handouts. This is not to say gofundme is always used for this purpose, but I have seen gofundme pages for $10,000 to start a vegan food truck business (Brooke) – get a small business loan or save it up! Or one to help a 16-year-old buy her first car – get to work!
I sit on the other side of the fence with the whole “don’t shame people’s choices that land them in shit” thing. I grew up piss poor, too. But I was piss poor because my mother got to make a slew of dumb ass decisions – over and over and over – because her parents, the government, churches, and unsuspecting generous people bailed her out and refused to “judge” her. It perpetuated a totally reckless lifestyle that severely affected her children as well. Had she known that she’d truly be up shit’s creek if she did “X” fucked up thing again …well things may have been different and she might have had to think twice at least once. I think there’s a lot of shame in what these people did and are doing and I won’t mock them, but I do cast shame and judgment on their decisions.
Please tell me Brooke really did that.
She totally did.
It’s totally true. She had the gofundme link on her twitter page.
The campaign is no longer available but ended with $0 in donations. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b635a4fa4f1a2fb06407eb051ee456fb599ac08d259054167dc560276a8842ee.jpg
I wish I had kept the ss of the description of the goals of the truck. I remember that the word “implications” was used, which means that someone thought of all the smart sounding words and threw that one in for good measure.
Two very dumb woman from close to where I live got caught in Australia, smuggling an incredible amount of cocaine.
Someone home had the nerve to start a ‘go fund me’ to help them pay for their court fee. (It was quickly taken down after harsh critics)
This is way off topic, but I have never contributed to any Go Fund Me until this week.
I just turned 31 a couple of days ago. Just for context of age of my cohorts. a girlfriend of mine from high school just lost her husband this week. She has three babies, youngest 3. I donated $100. It stung a little, I’m not fucking ingratiating myself, but goddamnit that meant something to me, I can say that. I didn’t do it to sleep better at night. I just keep thinking about logistics: even if her husband had a GREAT life insurance policy (Aside: come on 30 year olds, lets be honest with ourselves about how great those policies are, it’s like a couple more bucks a month. Like one fucking pumpkin spice latte a month. So call your local fucking Needle Nose Ned Ryerson and sign up, ffs). Anyway, even if her husband’s life insurance was great, it still stings to steal away money from your children to put your poor husband’s body in the ground, when you’re still trying to figure out how to tell that three year old why their daddy’s never coming home again.
In a week, we’ve come up w/ $30K. It’s hardly recompense for the lost love and support and advice and not to mention wages of their father, but I guess it’s something.
It was a car accident, btw. Some car flew across the median from oncoming traffic. All three babies were in the car. They were driving home from school. Babies are, thankfully, physically ok.
Life is so fragile. I feel like I have so much to be thankful for.
Plus, you have to pay for the funeral before you even get that life insurance money and you have to pay upfront. My husband and I have talked a lot about how much life insurance we need on each of us. I realized recently that we need to increase mine because if I die while my kids are young, he will need help to pay for childcare which is expensive here. We have a large one on him because I know it might take me at least a year to find a career job because I have already been at home for three years and it will be harder for me to find a job in my field. I do keep my license up to date for that reason as well.
They can’t support themselves, period. This money will be a stopgap and in a month or two it will be gone. They have chosen to not bother to be contributing and responsible members of society. In fact, one has an arrest record.
I am a pot smoking hippie (and it’s finally legal in my state, yay!), but I also make an income to support myself and my family. I will mock people who moan and cry about being treated unfairly when they are young and able-bodied and choose to mooch off society. Go work at McDonalds, get 2-3 jobs like I had to in my early 20s when I was a college grad and could not find employment in my field at first. It sucked, but I did it. There is no reason at least the guy could not have done that until he found more stable work that allowed them a place to live. They chose to do this to themselves.
The lawyer is almost certainly lying when describing how the birth happened (or relaying without thinking twice the lies told by the parents). The mother asks is “anyone of you” had already attended a “natural” birth, and everyone in the room, doctors and nurses, say no? Give me a break!
Even worse, the way this question is framed implies that the mother, contrary to the hospital staff, has already been at a natural birth. Her own? In that case, what happened to the baby? There are things missing in this story.
Well, the question was apparently “have you ever delivered a breech baby naturally” – to which the answer really should be no!
The description of “fully armed policeman in bullet-proof vests” seems a bit excessive for any child welfare case – but it could certainly be that they were wearing a standard uniform which included a bullet proof vest (or the lawyer chose to interpret something she saw as being a bullet proof vest). Also when did it go from 4 policemen to 2?
There are certainly issues with overly armed and equipped police going too far, but those are issues primarily born by the nonwhite.
Also, when newborn babies smile, isn’t it gas? Not really a social smile.
Is there any merit at all to the gas claim? I don’t see why a newborn couldn’t smile for reasons that aren’t gas. I’ve never smiled because I had gas.
Policemen are typically fully-armed. I don’t really see why they should partially remove their standard uniform and accoutrements when they’re on duty.
ETA this is not to address the issue of the militarization of the police or police brutality as a social issue. It’s addressing whether or not the couple were acting childish by expecting a cop to not look like a cop, and exaggerating their appearance to make them sound like they were virtually in combat gear.
I think it’s more that early things that look like smiles are more like grimaces or involuntary movements.
And I think the lawyer most likely skewed “standard uniform” into something that sounded like OMG SWAT team! I saw BeatriceC’s discussion of social workers taking police officers along and that really makes a lot of sense.
I have a relative who moved up through the ladder of the prosecutor’s office. He got lots more death threats in family court, where he had sometimes to take people’s kids away, than in the major crimes, where he was convicting (among others) gang members of murder.
“And I think the lawyer most likely skewed “standard uniform” into something that sounded like OMG SWAT team!”
Agreed.
Newborns don’t smile. The “social smile” comes at 6-8 weeks”.
“the question was apparently “have you ever delivered a breech baby naturally” – to which the answer really should be no!”
Most OBs have delivered at least a few breech babies vaginally between precipitous labors and breech Twin B’s in appropriate candidates.
All policemen (regular beat cops and traffic cops) wear stab vests as part of the uniform in the UK because we have knife crimes more than gun crimes here.
I also love the , “she flew here” and when that did not work out the way she wanted “she flew there” . Last time I checked someone had to pay for the plane tickets…I wonder who gets to pay her hospital bill…
I agree that cell phones are almost a necessity of modern life, particularly with a baby. I do find a lot of this “Gofundme” stuff distasteful.
As far as them starving, it seems like they’d be candidates for food stamps (and no one on here brought up buying steak on food stamps plus they’re vegan) and WIC, which gives money for the mom to purchase healthy foods as well. I’m always seeing different foods in my grocery store labeled “WIC approved”.
Oregon has so many resources for people who are needing assistance with food. Burrito brigade hands out VEGAN burritos every Sunday, there are restaurants where you can order three and four courses that serve only families in need, there is a produce and veggie program that gives access to those who live at or below 200% of the poverty line (no income verification required). Plus the programs you mentioned.
That sounds great!
I was also uncomfortable with the cell phone comments. Let’s stop pretending they’re a luxury item, everybody.
But I also have trouble having sympathy for this couple. If they were black, not only would their child have been taken away, but we wouldn’t even be hearing about them, because this lawyer lady wouldn’t even have them on her radar. Everyone involved would be making entirely different types of judgements.
They can afford to fly all over the country (and even halfway around the world) seemingly on a whim, or even worse, to dodge arrest warrants. But they have a gofundme for basic necessities for this baby they’ve known is coming for 9 months. That’s my issue.
I somewhat agree with the cell phone. You really need one today (especially since they don’t have a home, so no landline) But it depends one what kind of phone they have. I have many friends and family who are struggling with money yet always buy the latest freaking iphone every 6 months with extremely expensive 80$per months plans.
Eh, my friend has nearly the cheapest TracPhone plan and they got refurbished phones that were up to date smart phones that were that year’s model. They spent almost no money to buy those phones. The 80 per month plan, I’d look askance. Not the phone itself.
Note: TracPhone are super duper cheap plans, can be just 10 bucks a month.
http://www.oregonlive.com/tualatin/index.ssf/2016/07/waterbirth_center_didnt_know_b.html
Why didn’t Andaluz keep their posted statistics by single year? Why haven’t they posted their statistics for 2015, despite their website stating they release them every fall?
I had read this story prior to the lawyer’s spin. Interesting how different it all reads. According to a post by the father they had gone to Oregon “for work” and didn’t yet have a home, and no local friends or family. Nothing of course, about the arrest record. Having worked as an RN on a high risk perinatal floor I can say it isn’t unusual to temporarily temporary take custody of a newborn if the story doesn’t add up, if the newborn tests positive for drugs, or if the infant may be released into a high risk situation. This is done for the good of the infant, and hardly resembles this story, complete with storm troopers and bullet proof vests.
Every state I’m familiar with allows CPS worker to ask for police escort if they feel the parents might react a little more badly than normal (because no parent reacts well to having their children removed). Every social worker I know, and I know a few, always bring the police with them for a removal because you just never know what’s going to happen and they’d rather keep everybody, including the child, safe. Additionally, every police force I’m familiar with has a gun belt with a semi-automatic handgun, a taser, and a flashlight, and a bullet proof vest as part of their standard, daily uniform.
The social worker here likely asked for police backup because this was a hospital with a lot of infants, new mothers and visitors in the immediate vicinity and didn’t want to take any chances that the removal would go badly.
My hospital had the policy that if a baby or child was to be released to social services always had to be escorted by security from the room where the baby was to the vehicle taking them away. The other thing was that police escort was highly recommended if one or both of the parents had any history of violence.
I have three good friends who work for CPS in their various states. All three of them take the cops with them every time, no matter what. They’ve had too many coworkers injured or scared for their lives during removals. It’s just not worth it to them to go without.
It’s terrifying being the one having to carry that little one away. I will never forget the way one mother looked at me. The parents who come along ten feet behind so you can’t ask them to step away and just stare at you the entire time sadden and scare me.
I couldn’t do it.
It is sad all the way around.
It’s sad all the way around but having 1 little brother who we fostered from a bad situation and 2 foster sisters who were taken from an unstable but eventually re-united situation, I have less sympathy for the parents than a lot of people. My little brother was physically abused and malnourished, being “cared” for by his substance-abusing grandparents when his alcoholic father left him there. His mother was hospitalized long term. He was a toddler. It was years before he trusted anyone and he had almost daily tantrums/breakdowns. Mostly to see if we were going to leave him too. His mom/birthmom was the only one who wanted to do the right thing, she couldn’t take care of her kids herself but she came to visit and wrote to him and was happy for him that he had a safe, stable home and people who love him.
My grandmothers 2 foster daughters(they are my aunts but my age so feels weird to call them that) came from a similar situation, youngest of a large number of children, of alcoholic abusive parents. Fetal alcohol syndrome, worst for my youngest aunt. I feel sorry for the birth parents but leaving children in a situation were their parents do not want to stop drinking and the children don’t have a stable source of food, a safe place to sleep, or clean clothes to wear to school isn’t right either.
Social workers are overworked, underpaid and have a high burnout rate… not sure what the answer is..
Absolutely! These aren’t jack-booted Nazis; they are there for the protection of everyone. Speaking from experience, I can tell you that when this is done it is done carefully, but it’s always a very touchy and stressful situation.
They probably were still selling “hemp products” if ya catch my drift.
Yeah- that was my thought as well.
Maybe this https://www.revealnews.org/article/in-secretive-marijuana-industry-whispers-of-abuse-and-trafficking/ is why he couldn’t get work
I also enjoy (I’m a bad person) the fact that they were dumb enough to drive to Costa Rica, only to find that the laws in Costa Rica about vaccination are quite strict. Yes, they didn’t find their home there – and five minutes on Google would have told them so.
You minions have pointed out so many of the highlights. I’d like to add this one: “their housing situation had not resolved itself.” Bad housing situation! It sounds like someone thinks that for non-dreadlocked conformists, housing just magically appears. Or housing knows when to be born, and it wasn’t ready yet? I tell you, that passive voice has my hackles up. Everything is on the evil hospital, personnel, cps, police, but these nice vegans shouldn’t be expected to have a safe place for the baby to live. Arrgh.
I had the same thought. “Had not resolved itself”? WTF?
I’d like the pile of papers on my dining room table to resolve itself before my family gets home.
All this time, I’ve thought I had to do things like clean the bathroom. From now on, it can resolve itself!
Can we publish a best-selling book about this? We need a synonym for the secret, because that’s taken.
Alternatively, I’d clean your bathroom if you’d sort my papers. I rather like cleaning but hate tidying with a passion.
I’m a better cleaner than sorter, but it might be easier sorting someone else’s papers.
I like tidying and organizing, but despise cleaning. Let’s team up!
My dream come true. You don’t live in southern California, do you?
Virginia. We almost couldn’t live further apart! Shame. Imagine the trouble we could’ve gotten into!
Oh god the laundry. What I wouldn’t give for laundry that would fold itself.
For me, the junk my toddler insists in dragging out. I would like the play dough and dough toys along with those annoying little bits of dough that are on the carpet to resolve themselves. Maybe I can start an amazon wish list and a gofundme and everything will work itself out.
It means they hadn’t found an apartment.
Yeah, I was just struck by the phrasing, as if they expected an apartment to present itself to them instead of the other way around.
She was living with her mother, then chose to fly on 19 September (with a due date of 22 September based on LMP!!!?) because she wanted the baby’s father at the birth. How about having him fly to her mom’s house. She went into labor ON the plane. She had a housing situation, but (totally spitballing here) maybe she did not like her Mom’s house rules, who knows.
She’s luck she did not deliver on the plane or on the tarmac at the airport.
I’m guessing the mother didn’t want this homebirth crap in her house.
or if she is like my cousins who are vegan, maybe she expected her mom to cook and provide food for her but raised a fuss if it was not the all natural, organic non-GMO food she wanted (guess what, if someone else is feeding you and buying your clothes, etc try being happy with what they are trying to provide. And yes I am pulling this out of thin air, but they very much remind me of my cousin and his wife.
Or maybe her mom reminded her of inconvenient stuff. “I fed you formula, and you turned out just fine.” (I mean, yeah, she didn’t, but you know what I mean…)
Having worked for both the Housing Department of a Local Authority and then the Homeless team of the same Local Authority, unfortunately that’s a common attitude.
The number of people who just couldn’t comprehend that not paying their rent or not bothering to fill in forms for Housing Benefit would see them in court/being evicted used to depress me.
I remember one woman who had come close to being evicted 4 or 5 times but someone (the fathers of her kids, her parents, charities) had always bailed her out. We had the conversation about her not getting into that mess ever again just before I left to go and work for the Homeless Service. Approximately 5 months later guess who turned up as a Homeless case having finally been evicted for not payment of rent. It wasn’t her fault though, it was those evil Council workers who had deprived her kids of a roof over their heads. Who knew spending your rent money on something other than rent was a bad idea…
We also had a scheme where families could get second hand goods for free when they got rehoused, including stuff for babies (clothes, toys, pushchairs). The number of people who didn’t want second hand stuff amazed me too. If you don’t have a chair and you can’t afford to buy a new one, surely a second hand (but clean) free one is awesome?
I can see it from both sides when it comes to second hand baby furniture/cribs etc. Some baby furniture later turns out to be dangerous, the company sends out a recall, they try to publicize them pretty widely, but a couple years later you may not know about them. Happened to me, the convertible highchair/activity chair we bought new had a recall, the latches were defective and the chair could unexpectedly drop from one position to the other, with the baby in it. Second hand, or loaned furniture can turn out to be dangerous, my mom had an old crib that got handed down through the family for 20+ years It had to be broken up and sent to the dump as it had: dangerous paint, bars way to far apart, and a slide-in bottom board that could slip out and drop the baby on the floor….
I can understand that too although it was a charity with very stringent donation rules who had in house carpenters and electricians to check the furniture was safe before it was allowed to be handed out. People declining on safety grounds, I have zero issue with. People declining just because it’s second hand I find slightly odd when they can’t afford or don’t have alternatives.
There is a company whose name I shall not say (don’t want to give them publicity) who would sell you a sofa worth £1,020.51 at 13 pounds a week over 156 weeks. You end up paying £2,028.00 for said sofa and yet I had tenant after tenant who would rather do that then take a steam cleaned triple checked second hand version for free. That’s a bad enough deal even ignoring the fact that far too many of them didn’t keep up with the payments and ended up with the Sheriff officers chasing them for bad debts.
Then maybe I’m just cynical. We could also get certain brand new items for people if they met certain criteria and the number of people who got upset because they couldn’t pick the colour or brand of their kitchen appliances or get paint which wasn’t white never failed to make me lose a bit of my faith in humanity.
I don’t get it either. My daughter is in her last year of college and I introduced her to the local thrift and consignment stores in her area, also the local second hand furniture stores. She found some great pieces that she could afford and with the clothing stores she can sell clothes she has outgrown. My sister was the one who taught me to go to yard sales in the upscale neighborhoods to find great baby toys(Fisher Price, etc) for peanuts. Some of the baby clothes look brand new.
The Goodwills and St Vincent de Pauls in our area have some _amazing_ clothing. Especially for babies and little kids, who grow out of stuff so fast – it seems like a terrific option.
Absolutely! There are a lot of kids’ resale shops in my area, and I shop at them almost exclusively for the kids’ clothes. One has racks and racks of onesies for all of $1 each, and most in very good or new condition. Since I live in a semi-tropical climate, babies don’t really need or want more than a onesie on for much of the year. I also got DD a Ralph Lauren outfit for Christmas last year that I think ran me all of $6.
There are amazing deals to be had. Especially if you are savvy and ask for the month calendar at Goodwill, which tells you which color tags will be 1/2 off which weeks. We have had great success on the local Buy Nothing page, not just clothes and toys offered for free, also baby gear like cribs, diaper genies and baby swings. If someone had a tight budget and was expecting a baby, they could also post an ask on Buy Nothing, and people are happy to gift their baby gear.
Oh, hey, they have a GoFundMe account.
https://www.gofundme.com/2qa95dg
The husband is a healthy vegan who hasn’t had a cold in 2 years so the wife didn’t need blood work!
What could possibly be wrong with that?!
I liked how he said it was 6 police officers. These people can’t keep a story straight.
(the comments section and comments for donations make a fun read too, “This could be any of us. We are a vegan, unvaxxing, unschooling, homebirth family. “)
They need like every single thing one would need for a baby. How can they even claim they were prepared? I feel like if the law hadn’t gotten involved, they were not going to concern themselves with food, clothing, shelter, car seat, or baby bed.
I think what really bothers me about that is that they both manage to have working cell phones.
So many things bother me. Am I really supposed to feel sorry for some brats who squandered their money to carelessly take a hippie vacation? Like I dunno, put that car money towards an apartment deposit and don’t buy plane and bus tickets? Maybe look into social programs like WIC and Section 8 housing instead of going to Costa Rica? Get free prenatal care you qualify for so you can find out your baby is breech before you go into labor so your baby doesn’t have to have its arm broken in order to save its life!
I noticed they claim they need a car seat but this story here mentions the baby in a car seat. That kind of irritates me, too. I am pretty sure they don’t let you borrow car seats and require you to give them back.
☝ This x 1000
I was thinking the baby was in a car seat owned by CPS when they were reunited after the hearing.
You are probably right. That didn’t occur to me.
And can afford to fly all over the place. That’s what really gets me.
Maybe they’re organic vegan phones.
ugh, organo-vegans are the absolute worst.
This couple reminds a little of my mom.
Which is more than enough reason for a CPS referral.
Was this your mother? (skip to 3:40)
http://www.tagtele.com/videos/voir/63620/
Close enough. 😀
Ouch! I’m sorry.
‘Sokay. She was interesting and talented, and I loved her. She used to say that I was 30 at birth, which turned out to be a handy thing, because I ended up doing more of the parenting. That said, she was also a strong influence on who I became (how could it be otherwise?) and reason for lots and lots of stories. She died young, when I was 13, and I still miss her and wonder how she’d have grown up.
My husband eats only organic and vegan. And I love him quiet a lot. He does not have dreadlocks, has a legal job where he earns a lot of money (teacher, around here they earn a lot of money), so that I can be a white privileged (but not blond) stay-at-home mom (only for a couple of years, as I’m a teacher too and love my job too, and no dreadlocks either, although my hair is very dark and curly). He helps in and around the house, with the kids, just loves to change diapers with our toddler, does all the cooking, ok, some hemp clothes,… So not entirely the same league than these people.
Oh, sorry I didn’t read everything, it’s not about organic vegans, but about organic vegan phones…
I probably should have said “organo-vegans are generally the worst”. Since you’ve not mentioned yourself being a vegan, my guess is you husband has a live and let live mentality? My issue with the vast majority of organo-vegans is they want to push the vegan (and organic) lifestyle. I don’t care what they eat, why should they care what I eat?
I think it’s all in how some of them present themselves, just like with anything else.
The only organo-vegan we ever ‘see’ are generally the young ones who define themselves as organo-vegan, living in vans, braging about it and judging everyone who isn’t like them.
Most organic or vegan people are probably totally sane, normal people, who don’t bothers other with their own personal food choice, so you just never know they exist.
true
Well, I think he would like a magic world, where everyone is vegan and peaceful, and uses non violent communication, and and and. But he knows, that the real world doesn’t work like that. Just try to force our 8 years old son to eat beans and lentils, and no cheese, just try. Or, tell my father that my husband is vegan. “What? Not even Mozzarella in his Lasagna? What does he eat? That can’t be tasty!” And myself, I have an excuse: beeing pregnant or lactating makes hungry and makes me want to eat cheeeese! Mmmm. So, live and let live is the only way we can exist as a family.
I get your frustration at the situation, but maybe try not to judge people based solely on their diet.
I’m in school for vet med at the moment and am a vegetarian (and have been since high school, over 15 years ago). Many of my classmates are also vegetarian and there are also a good deal of them who are vegans. I’m most certainly biased, but I would say that we are an educated, intelligent group of people who are not afraid of hard work. We had to work our assess off in undergrad in both courses and extracurriculars to even be considered for admission by our school.
We’re not all the same – we’re just not about pushing our dietary choices on other people. I’ve lived with my partner for 10 years now and he still eats meat and we’ve never had an issue. I told him when we started dating that I don’t care what he eats – his body, his decision- but that I will not buy it and I will not cook it – because that is MY decision. It’s never been an issue.
As with any group/lifestyle choice, you’ll have some pushy, noisy ones, but they typically do not represent the majority.
I get what you are saying and as I replied to someone else, I should have said generally. My experience with the organo-vegan crowd is they want to push their lifestyle choices on everyone else. I don’t care what other people eat, why should they care what I eat? Your approach with your partner is the ideal, you do what you want and your partner can do what they want.
(as an aside, I have had vegan friends, so it isn’t that I am anti-vegan, simply anti-vegan agenda)
Fair enough, I should have read further down!
It’s my fault, sometimes I type things that in retrospect that come off as offensive.
Uh, just curious, but what does a vegan or vegetarian veterinarian do when confronted with the prospect of caring for commercial livestock? Are there personal moral emotional considerations there or is it strictly for the money? If the latter, is your heart really in your work, then? How to you inform the livestock owner of your personal conflict of interest, or do you? Are they teaching courses in veterinary medical ethics these days and, if so, who teaches them and what does the curriculum look like relative to commercial livestock production medicine?
These are all questions that have crossed my mind when observing new veterinarians making farm calls at our place. Always left wondering because, of course, it is not PC to simply ask about these delicate emotionally charged things it seems.
You can likely assume that vegetarian veterinarians are typically capable of separating their own personal beliefs from their work. They are one type of educated medical professional. Where I live, vet school is very, very competitive.
You’re making assumptions about vegetarians that don’t really bear up – speaking as a very long-term vegetarian with many vegetarian friends. Like that it’s always an ironclad ideology. Or that it’s actually a conflict of interest for them to treat livestock. For a lot of people, it’s just something they prefer to do with their diet.
Also, trade “PC” out for “polite” and you’re on track with that last statement.
Well, we’re not comfortable “assuming” anything about the people who work with us and our livestock around here. We take our caretaking role very seriously — it is our first priority, it is our passion and it is our livelihood — and we expect no less from the folks who accept our pay for services rendered; they need to embrace it as more than just a livelihood. Expertise and passion always show through in the quality of results.
And I’ll stick with “PC” since that’s the more accurate terminology. Let’s reserve “polite” for those occasions when someone’s vacuous beliefs are too obtuse and sensitive to withstand any exposure to facts, truth or reason…those situations where it is thought to be impolite for anyone to question or disagree for any reason.
Question away, it doesn’t bother me.
Exactly. You said it better than I did.
All of the vegetarian/vegan vets that I know work with horses, dogs and cats. Not with livestock.
There most likely are a few of them, but most of them will probably not chose farm animals.
We do have medical ethic classes, but I don’t really think there is much of a conflict of interest there.
I don’t believe a vegetarian vet who decides to work with livestock would be any less good than any other or offer a lower quality medicine. If anything, they care greatly for animal well being. They would not allow animals to be mistreated or let them suffer for no reason.
Those in my class were actually vegetarian/vegan before they started vet school. They all chose to be for personal reason and all respected others for not following the same path.
No one I know became so during the course of the curriculum, despite farm and slaughterhouses visit being part of the curriculum. Probably because the way we were exposed was very practical and science based. None of the ‘meat is murder’ propaganda. We are explained the animal welfare, health and economic advantages and disadvantages of different farming style (including free range and organic) The reasons why things are done the way they are. And yes, it includes lecture on how the proper way to kill animals in slaughterhouse and why we do it that way.
There are or course some aspect of it all that vets are less in agreement with. But the whole farm industry is far from being as cruel as some people are trying to paint it to be.
And the other aspects of veterinary medicine are not all rosy either. Just look up at how many perfectly healthy dogs and cats are put down in shelters every single year.
Exactly. I wouldn’t hire a vegan veterinarian any more than I’d hire an airframe and powerplant mechanic that only traveled by train.
How would you know they were vegan?
Funny. I wouldn’t let someone’s dietary choices dictate their employability – but sure, I’m the biased one.
? I recommend feeding them a diet that meets their nutritional requirements, as any veterinarian would. Why would my personal dietary choices have any bearing on a diet that I choose for my patients? What an odd thing to ask.
I have two dogs, a cat, a snake and I ride horses. They all get the appropriate commercial diets (Science Diet j/d for one dog, Iams KO for the other, science diet indoor wet and dry for the cat and frozen mice for the snake).
Also, most livestock (cows, goats, sheep) are herbivores- they eat grasses, legumes and grain. Some feeds can contain blood or bone meal, but those shouldn’t be fed due to mad cow/scrapie concerns.
I’ve been some level of vegetarian since I was 12, and I have heard every single nasty judgment or oh-so-original anti-vegetarian joke by this point. The stereotypical smug vegan might be godawful, but people who eat meat are also well-represented in the preachy asshole competition.
Whenever I say that, someone who eats meat will pipe up like, “Hey, not me, I don’t care.” Right, most people don’t and shouldn’t care about someone else’s diet. But people will broad-stroke categorize vegetarians and vegans as a group of judgy eaters, and be utterly oblivious to the ridiculous statements that vegetarians put up with from people who eat meat.
(My husband and child are not vegetarian, in case I have to present my credentials as someone who doesn’t care about the diets of others.)
I find it curious that you’re just now in vet school having graduated from high school 15 years ago. That would put you way outside the norm for vet med students and would ordinarily disqualify you from consideration for admission by most programs, without some exceptional mitigating circumstances.
“…we’re just not about pushing our dietary choices…”
But then you immediately follow with this: “I told him when we started dating that I don’t care what he eats – his
body, his decision- but that I will not buy it and I will not cook it –
because that is MY decision.”
You just couldn’t leave it alone, could you? This is what makes vegetarians and vegans so difficult to be around.
I don’t see what’s ‘being difficult’ about what she said. If my boyfriend decided to become vegetarian, I would do the same: Do as you wish, but I’m eating meat and when I make the food I’m not making 2 meals. And I would find it 100% fair that he asks me to cook my own meat if he’s the one cooking and I don’t want his vegan burger.
He/she should have just stopped at, “…we’re just not about pushing our dietary choices…”
The spousal-training comment just undermined what he/she said about not being pushy.
So…..letting her husband eat meat is being pushy? How so? She was actually showing an example of how she’s absolutely not pushing her belief on other: Hey husband is eating meat, and she’s 100% fine with that.
“So…..letting her husband eat meat is being pushy?”
No.
You’re missing the irony of his/her statement, “…we’re just not about pushing our dietary choices…”, but he/she couldn’t resist sharing the spousal training example.
Oh so now letting her husband eat meat is somehow training him?
She said she wasn’t pushing her dietary choices and provided an example of exactly how she wasn’t pushing her dietary choices on other.
And you are going off with: OMG look how pushy she is.
That’s like if I was saying that I’m really a cat person, but my boyfriend really likes dog. So I got a cat and he got a dog. And then you come around saying ‘OMG stop pushing your cat love onto others!’
Try to have forward vision to extend this arrangement into what happens when family comes to visit for holidays, or worse yet, when children come into the picture.
It’s actually very easy to see. I do have a vegetarian grandfather.
We go to his house, we eat whatever he makes or bring our own food.
He comes to our house, he eats whatever we make or bring his own food.
You know……just like every one out there does whenever anyone goes eat at anyone else’s house, regardless of if they are vegetarian or not.
As for kids: well as corblimeybot said: her child are not vegan. Ruby’s hypothetical kids probably wouldn’t either.
You are inventing a problem that does not apply in any way to Ruby.
If you have a living grandfather, that means you’re young. I’ve seen enough of these trainwrecks in the making to know better. Give it 20 or 30 years and you’ll figure it out.
Well, so far, 50 years with my grandmother, in my life since the day I was born 27 years ago. Still no problem. I even lived with them for 2 years when I was in college. And I ate whatever the hell I wanted. And my grandmother is not vegetarian either, my mother and her brother where not raised vegan either.
You are the one who is judgmental and pushing his beliefs here.
“You are the one who is judgmental and pushing his beliefs here.”
Uh-huh. It’s that kind of smug superiority that required the U.S. to bail you out of two World Wars. So keep it up, we’ll bail you out of the next one, too, I’m sure.
Wow, so you went from vegetarian to world war? What does that have to do with anything?
And actually, I’m Canadian. You didn’t bail us out of two world war. If anything, you are technically the only one who ever actually invaded us. so yea…
I’m 40 and I have a living grandmother. The rate she’s going, I may be 50 before she passes away. How long until I’m experienced enough?
We are expecting my grandmother to bury us all.
Both of mine are dead, as is one grandmother, and the final one is on her way out due to cardiovascular issues. I guess that makes me old and wise by their standards.
*snort*
It was worth a try! Ahahahaha
I’ 52 and my grandfather is still alive, still living on his own, and addicted to Facebook.
Kentucky or Alabama native?
Because all the centagenarians you know are from those states? my family’s from Connecticut and Massachusetts, where we’ve lived since before 1776.
Oh, I’m sorry, sweetie. Did you mean, “centenarian”?
So smart are you Massachusettians! Now I’m not surprised that you’re frequently referred to as Massholes. I used to think that people said, “Masshole” just to be mean, but now I know better.
That’s okay, Flutterbunch. I don’t always bother to proofread.
“That’s okay, Flutterbunch. I don’t always bother to proofread.”
Uh-huh. Privileged d-bags don’t always bother to know what words mean before they use them.
But that’s OK, I’m sure there are enough people that consider you to be a special snowflake to stoke your ego.
Hope you didn’t break a nail composing your post.
Centenarian means a person who is 100-109.
And thank you, my toddler does think I’m wonderful. Of course, he also thinks he should eat 6 apples a day, so his judgement isn’t so great.
JoeFarmer, wow.
Families deal with things. I’ve been to Thanksgiving dinner served simultaneously to vegetarians, folks on the Atkins diet, and the nut-allergic. Everybody ate, no one felt slighted, and no one died.
And yeah, Atkins diet, so this wasn’t recent. All the family members are still happily part of the same family.
Families and friends do visit and it’s never been an issue. How are you not grasping that nobody seems to care about our dietary arrangements as much as you seem to?
You are young, aren’t you, very naive and inexperienced. To say she “lets” her husband eat meat without comment (which is a comment in itself) is a classic little jab to control and dominate — it’s a tacit granting of permission to eat meat, which obviously must be a bad thing but will be tolerated by a long suffering spouse or a benevolent dictator. Same way she might complain to friends she permits him to go out with the guys once a month or she allows him to drive when they go out together in the car or she tolerates his snoring, that sort of thing. Joe is correct — it is one of the ways vegans and vegetarians make an annoying nuisance of themselves, rather like spoiled children in grown up bodies.
Wow, you really are way over sensitive on the subject. How was she supposed to word it to not offend your very sensitive nature?
They are two adults, who had an adult discussion and made a very functional deal. Like, you know, mature couples are supposed to do.
Nope, not over sensitive, just over scrutinized on the non-issue of eating meat. It’s food and we eat food. So what? It’s simply not an issue…unless some proselytizing vegan arse insists upon making it an issue, a non-stop nagging issue.
Oh well, Azuran, I will be magnanimous and let you be argumentative. I just won’t interfere with your penchant for argument but I won’t start it and I won’t encourage it. That’s generous of me, isn’t it?
Wow, look at you pretending you are the reasonable one. You are the one attacking a very reasonable woman in a totally healthy relationship.
Yeah, OK, now play the woman card. So much for casual equality and mutual tolerance in a relationship. And making meat eating a gender issue feeds into your feminist undercurrent. The usual manipulation. Exquisitely complex, no? Sorry we’re not fooled by it…so politically incorrect of us.
A mere reference to Ruby as a woman is playing “the woman card?” I’ve got your number. You think getting belligerent and abrasive over anything you perceive as effete or weak makes you a big bold tough alpha male.
I think I’ll mosey over to GoFundMe for seed money for a prehistoric human wilderness preserve where guys like you can hunt big game with whatever weapons you can fashion from stones and plants. Bringing back mastodons and aurochs is unrealistic, but wild boar could suit the purpose. I could also market this to the paleo crowd and food-as-nature-intended crowd. The unassisted birthers would be clamoring to get in, but I wouldn’t allow them, for obvious reasons.
Heh, heh, heh, so you’re the model alpha female, eh? How many husbands have you pissed through so far? Every fault was theirs, no doubt, simply not trainable. And kids? How many of those screaming pooping little nuisances have rudely interrupted your diesel-powered superwoman career track? I guess your estrogen got the better of you here, launched you into another hysterical attack on evil men folk. Sure, set up a GoFundMe and while you’re at it enjoy a GoFuggYou too…if that doesn’t threaten your aggressive bull dyke posture.
If you had read some of my postings before shooting off your e-mouth, you would have spared yourself the embarrassment of classifying me totally wrong. I am a modest introvert, with a non-prestigious job that suits my non-ambitious nature, a teenage daughter that is absolutely wonderful, and a quiet lifestyle centered on reading and cooking. I am divorced because my XH alienated me through his narcissistic religion and religious narcissism. I follow this blog because Dr. AT is spot-on in her take-downs of the pseudoscientific and misogynistic NCB ideology. The self-righteous humble-bragging passive aggressive NCB’ers is not the only online menace. The BSD swaggering, mansplaining, blowhards of the alt-right and manosphere are another. Slink back there and commiserate with your pals about those damn feminists and pencil neck geeks who have surpassed your Paleolithic cronies.
Heh, I must be clairvoyant! I took your advice and there it is, just as I guessed — you have an ex-husband who was always wrong when you were always right and a baby that bored you until it became old enough to be less needy. Nice, real nice.
You are welcome to your alternate reality. Too bad you insist upon inflicting it upon us. My congratulations go out to your ex — now there’s one lucky dude to get a divorce, and I bet he knows it, too. I’d like to think he’s regrown a pair since you tried so hard to emasculate him. Hope he’s not so damaged by your twisted training that he can’t find happiness with a normal female somewhere.
Oh well, keep perfecting your man-hate. Didn’t mean to interrupt that important work. Carry on Maud, carry on amazon she-warrior!
Who left open the door to the Stone Age?
Well, I see where the ‘retarded sexist farmer’ stereotype is coming from.
But unlike you, I’m not going to judge all farmers based on your behaviour.
Heh, and circling back to the original ploy — ‘that man’s behavior isn’t my ideal; I permit him to be male but I won’t support the reality of it. I mention it only in passing and not to draw attention to my dissatisfaction with it, of course, but to point out how it is not my fault; lord knows I’ve tried to change that man but he’s retarded and I am a long suffering unappreciated genius.’ Yeah, we get it, so that’s enough girls. You’ve beaten this dead horse quite enough already.
What exactly is “the reality of it”?
Reality: “the world or the state of things as they actually exist, as opposed to an idealistic or notional idea of them”
As you used it, you seemed to be making reference to the reality of being male. If I misunderstood, sorry. If not, I’m curious about what that means.
Well there you go with the drama and innuendo — “being male” is simply what it is, no more, no less. As a rule, males are obsessed with different things (not all commendable, of course), but usually nuances of food at mealtime are not noticed by a hungry man. Drama playing out over dietary philosophies pretty much goes over our heads. It’s just food and idle chatter. It’s not like it’s NASCAR or a corporate merger or the mathematical analysis of the Mars landing or the latest technology in air impact wrenches. All stuff that, for the most part, we do not constantly throw up in our significant other’s face…well, maybe the NASCAR a little bit, but hey, you know how men can be.
I definitely see drama, but it’s not in my post. Good day.
“Nuances of food at mealtime are not noticed by a hungry man…” Tell that to my husband, the cook in our family, and a good one at that.
The 1950s called: it wants its attitude about gender roles in a marriage back.
Well… at least your definition of what makes a man is is just as archaic and shitty as your definition of what makes a woman.
What the hell are you even blabbing about?
Nobody is ever a perfect match in everything. Being in any kind of relationship requires compromises on both side every single day.
Nobody here advocated changing anyone. No one here has even tried to change anyone.
You don’t even have any kind of logic.
Ruby and her partner both eat what they want. And somehow you perceive that as Ruby forcing her view on her partner?
But Maud had her X-husband try to push his religion on her…..and somehow that’s ALSO Maud trying to push her beliefs on him and emasculate him?
Mighty defensive there, Az, mighty defensive. Now that’s not the aggressive in-your-face spirit of Oprah or The View. Anyone would think you’re parsing words and oversimplifying the rhetoric to give the impression of innocence. View it from our reality: it ain’t easy living with a drama queen, especially an orthorexic one. We just want food when we’re hungry and we like meat as much as we like pizza and beer. Always have, always will. And that’s what torques you girls off? It makes no sense.
You know that many men are also vegetarian/vegan right? Where do my meat eating grandmother and vegetarian grandfather fit in your sexist rant?
Meat eating is not a defining masculine trait. Being vegetarian has nothing to do with being a man or a woman. You are just being sexist.
So really, how should Ruby had dealt with this. Should they just have just lived together for 10 years, while absolutely never talking about it?
Jumpin’ Jeebus, it’s just food. What the heck is there to talk about, as long as there is enough of it and it isn’t spoiled? Of course veganism, as an affliction, isn’t unique to women. Kudos to your grandma and grandpa for eating what they each preferred. Obviously one didn’t make up a bunch of dopey rules about eating or about talking about eating and apparently they didn’t snipe away so hurtfully at each other over it that they couldn’t get along over the long haul. Meal time rolled around and they simply ate and that was that…and that is as it should be. Meat is food, it simply is and there is not one single thing wrong with that, nothing. To suggest there is is to push a vegan agenda and apparently someone thinks it will help the cause to spin the enjoyment of meat eating into a masculine fault. I think we’ve pretty much covered the weaknesses in that approach to vegan lobbying. You think we’re retarded but we’re more perceptive than you think, I guess.
Dude, are you two people? Because you’re the one who had a problem with Ruby’s comment about her and her parter being totally happy with their lives.
No, I’m not two people. The Dutchess complains she has her hands full with one of me as it is, two might kill her, poor thing.
I don’t even remember how all this mess got started (which is soooo typical of these awkward touchy-feely domestic dramas), but I’m pretty sure I only agreed with JoeFarmer that there was clearly some nefarious spouse-training at play, that, not surprisingly it wasn’t going well and that might be the underlying cause of all the frustration. That and I may have acknowledged it was a clever spin by vegans to frame meat eating as a masculine fault, the better to push their agenda.
I wouldn’t ordinarily get caught up in any of this sort of girl talk, instead I’d make the excuse I have to go out and get chores started. That’s why I should never retire, and this hot mess today only reinforces the soundness of judgement in that plan.
I’ll refresh your memory of how this started. It started because you are a sexist man with low self esteem who is imagining everything a woman say is an attack on men.
Oh, yeah, that’s right. It was the man-hating thing and the meat-hating thing and then I came along and blundered into the buzzsaw. Yep, shoulda seen that comin’. But hey, look, I probably should go out now and get chores started and leave you girls to your hen party. Don’t wait up for me, OK?
Well of course, ’cause girlz r meen.
Ah, we’re so dumb! I can’t believe we didn’t notice that it’s only okay when a MAN does those things. Us silly women!
It’s only okay when a man does it, apparently, according to this guy.
Are you having a stroke?
“The storm had now definitely abated, and what thunder there was now grumbled over more distant hills, like a man saying ‘And another thing…’ twenty minutes after admitting he’d lost the argument.”
Douglas Adams, So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, #4
Stroking in his parents basement seems likely
This is probably the most attention he’s gotten from a woman since his Grandma sent him a birthday card
I suspect he’s imagining that the regulars here are awestruck by his forceful command in destroying our beliefs in gender equality and justice. Nope, we see him for the petulant brat he is. I normally wouldn’t presume to speak for anyone but myself but on this point I’m confident.
Couldn’t you have a gathering area of the preserve for the women?
My god you really like reading hidden messages in everything. I referred to her as a woman because she is a woman, nothing more, nothing less. If she was a child, I would have called her a child, if she was a man, I would have called her a man.
You really have a problem if you think calling a woman a woman is playing any kind of card.
Heh, now the innocent linguist. Not exactly an original play.
It’s not a play, and it’s not trying to be original. It’s stating a very single fact.
Ruby is a woman so I called her a woman, that’s all there is to it.
I smell an MRA, everyone.
yeah, just a bit.
I do other things for a couple days, come back and wow, who let the MRAs in? Crikey.
I didn’t know referring to myself as a woman was ‘playing the woman card’. Damn. I’ll have to be more careful from now on.
meat eating a gender issue? My husband is vegan, and he does all the cooking here. I try vegetarian, but eat meat occasionally. If his vegan meals don’t suite me, I can always add cheese, or fish or eggs, or make myself something completely different. Our kids eat whatever they want. Meat, they can eat at their grandparents, or in restaurants or at parties…
I drive, as my husband doesn’t like driving. Am I the man in our relationship? Well it must be confusing this gender mixe up, as my middle kid called us both, not mama or papa, but mapa, when she was 2 years old.
I’ve seen meat eating vs. vegetarianism framed as a gender issue many times, primarily by insecure misogynists.
You’re the one making an issue of it, berating people who have merely stated their preference and a live-and-let-live attitude regarding others’ preferences. I don’t have a dog in this fight. I eat meat but I don’t care who else does or doesn’t.
‘Course I wasn’t the one who “merely” stated my preference that someone not do something I disagree with by showcasing my willingness to permit it and tolerate it. Hey, maybe I don’t care for how someone breaths, you know, all in and out and sometimes kinda loud, but I’m the bigger person and I will permit them to keep on breathing…it’s a personal sacrifice I am willing to make. That’s just the wonderful person I am and everyone needs to be told about it.
Odd that it’s never been an issue in our relationship when I make it a ‘non-stop nagging issue’…. weird.. I can’t remember ever having an argument with my partner about this… it must be because I have him so well trained and dominated. Clearly by making him food that doesn’t contain meat (and him doing the same for me with meat on the side for him if he wants) I’m ruling with an iron fist. Go me!
In the end doesn’t it boil down to whoever cooks chooses the menu?
Suggestions are welcome in our house but there are certain things I won’t cook especially when pregnant because my morning sickness won’t tolerate them.
There are also certain things my husband can’t stand, mushrooms for one and prawns for another but he “lets” me cook with them as long as they don’t make it onto his plate unless disguised in a stew or pie.
Who knew he was trying to “control and dominate me”…
Yup-people eat what the cook feels like making.
Whoever the cook on a given day might happen to be.
I “let” my husband go out with the boys once a month, and he “lets” me go out with the girls just as often. We’re nearly 20 years into our marriage and it’s working pretty well. I also tolerate his snoring and yep, he usually drives when we all go out together, primarily because I’m better at dealing with the kids. I’m not vegetarian, but my husband likes some food I don’t and I like some food he doesn’t. Each of us cooks our own food in those cases, and includes cooking some for the kids if they like it.
OMG! The degree of “spousal training” in my house is insane! It could not be compromising so we are both happy. Nope. It’s spousal training!
Please, everyone, stop feeding the troll.
I must be the husband super trainer over here! I don’t “let” my husband even choose what we eat everyday. I mean, he can go eat wherever he chooses while he’s at work but I must be soooo controlling that he is scared not to take the lunches I make for the week. Even worse, I do the meal planning and the grocery list then he goes to the grocery store with me and has to help schlep the food he didn’t choose around. Many of the meals happen to be vegetarian or vegan, mwhahahaha.
Whenever I ‘let’ my partner make any kind of meal, it always end up being potatoes.
I left him alone for a week to go see my family and he ate nothing but potatoes.
My husband would just eat cottage cheese and olives and have some beer for dinner.
My fella can hang out with his friends whenever he wants. He also does sports on his own. I’ve never cared when he’s gone out to the strippers for his brother’s/friends bachelor parties, he drives his car when we go out and I drive mine when we take it (sometimes we’ll switch it up if one of us isn’t feeling well or has had something to drink).
Any other questions you have about modern relationships I can answer?
I don’t let my husband drive, but then he’s only joking when he asks. Not being able to tell asphalt from oak tree from 5 feet is a problem.
Evidently, couples are not allowed to have different opinions or dietary choices. And by that I mean that a woman should do whatever her man wants. (sarcasm).
I know it’s 8 days later, but I just saw your comment and wanted to share that I know my dog-person husband really loves and respects me because he didn’t say a single word about disliking cats when I brought home a stray kitten, and only mentioned it in passing months later. He even patiently helped introduce the terrified kitten to our large, boisterous dogs! (after I dewormed, flea’d, and litter trained the kitten of course.)
You think that’s spousal “training”? Really? My XH destroyed our marriage with his constantly escalating religious excesses that he expected me to follow. If he had been as fair and reasonable as Ruby, I might still be married,
Spousal training? How about, he can fix his own food if he’d like to eat meat, because he’s an adult and knows how to take care of himself. Some marriages function quite nicely with the husband and wife taking it in turns to prepare the family’s food.
That’s a somewhat less than brilliant concept until you bring children into the equation.
But you sound like one of those, “It’s all about me” people, so I’m sure children would really cramp your style.
HAHAHA yeah, you really got me. Funny thing, though: I have two kids. I know how this whole family thing works. And guess what: my husband loves to cook. Did I just blow your mind?
You seem scarily sheltered.
We can both be selfish 😉
3 kids, and my husband is learning to cook because I’m going back to work, and equal division of chores is a thing. In fact: he tidied,vacuumed, and did laundry with a 3 year old ‘helper’ while I was at work today. Truly, this is the end of times!
My blind bard cooks every time he’s home before 6
Men can’t cook, EVERYBODY knows that. Duh.
(obvious sarcasm).
My dude is more annoyed at the idea that people think he’s helpless in the kitchen just because he’s a man than he is about any dietary choice I make.
How is Ruby not “leaving it alone” by stating that she won’t interfere with her partner’a food choices, but neither will she facilitate his meat consumption? I’m an omnivore, and I don’t like when vegetarians and vegans get pushy with their philosophy, but I found nothing in Ruby’s post that could be described as judgmental or overbearing.
Since when? When my wife was in vet school, she was about that same age, and she wasn’t either the oldest in the class, nor were older students all that uncommon.
Do you actually have knowledge of vet school admissions or are you making shit up?
“Do you actually have knowledge of vet school admissions or are you making shit up?”
Yes, I do have knowledge. See this: https://disqus.com/home/discussion/skepticalob/birth_warriors_or_just_beneficiaries_of_white_privilege/#comment-2931866737
Feel free to ask my husband if my being a vegetarian makes me difficult to be around. He doesn’t care at all. That’s true for every couple I know where one member is vegetarian and the other is not. If you’re having a hard time around every single vegetarian you know, you should ask yourself if you’re the problem.
Vet school admissions aren’t the only thing you don’t know anything about.
“If you’re having a hard time around every single vegetarian you know…”
I never said that. Maybe you should improve your reading comprehension skills.
“Vet school admissions aren’t the only thing you don’t know anything about.”
Ya, sure. Maybe you should quit making stuff up to make yourself feel better.
Non-traditional students are extremely common in professional programs, including veterinary medicine. I don’t know why you’re under the impression that these programs are allowed to discriminate based on age. I’m in medicine myself and graduated high school well over a decade ago. I just started university later than most, after I’d married and had a family. I have classmates in their forties and I know a large number of non-traditional veterinary students as well.
Here are admission statistics from Iowa State’s Vet Med program:
Class of 2019 median age 24
Class of 2018 median age 24
Class of 2017 median age 24
Class of 2016 median age 23.7
Class of 2015 median age 23.6
Just to check and make sure that ISU isn’t some kind of anomaly, I checked the UC Davis Vet Med program:
Class of 2020 average age 23
Class of 2019 average age 23
So, no, I don’t believe your claim that, “Non-traditional students are extremely common” in veterinary medicine programs, which is what I was talking about initially.
That’s a median age. It means half the class is older than 24 when they start the program. I wasn’t even 24 when I graduated.
For the records, in my school, only half the class is picked right out of college (which puts them at around 18-19 years old)
The other half are students who are older and have already complete at least 1 year in another kind of degree. Most have actually completed another kind of degree (3-5 years) before making it in vet school. And some even get in after doing another job for years.
When we started, there was a 45 years old woman in my class, and at least 6 people over 30, 3 of them already had kids. We had a 35 years old doctor from Morocco. Every single class had at least 1 person who was over forty, a few people between 30-40, and around 1/4 of the class being somewhere between 25-30. One class even had a 55 years old man.
And the actual low number of older people is not because they discriminate by age. It’s just that very few people that age are ready to go back to school, get up to date on their prerequisites for the class, and then do another 4-6 years.
But if they do meet the requirements and apply, their chances of getting in are the same as anyone else.
But then you immediately follow with this: “I told him when we started dating that I don’t care what he eats – his body, his decision- but that I will not buy it and I will not cook it – because that is MY decision.”
You just couldn’t leave it alone, could you? This is what makes vegetarians and vegans so difficult to be around.
What are you talking about?! Of course a vegetarian wouldn’t cook meat for their spouse. Ok, the minority who are vegetarian solely because they think it’s healthier, and not because they think animals shouldn’t be killed, they might cook meat for a spouse… but most vegetarians eat that way primarily because they think it’s wrong to kill animals, and what rational person would ever expect someone who feels that way to cook meat for someone else?!?
How on earth is it “difficult to be around” a vegetarian who refuses to cook meat for you? Get up and cook your own damn meat. Problem solved.
I cook quite well for a male of my age. Better than my spouse, in fact. But like “MaineJen”, you have quite an air of selfishness. Hope that works out for you.
…what exactly is your point here? You cook well, but you wouldn’t be okay with cooking your own meat if your wife was a vegetarian? Doesn’t that sound awfully selfish?
Makes you wonder what else his wife isn’t entitled to refuse to do for him, lest she be deemed ‘selfish’ for having a personal preference that doesn’t align 100% with his wishes.
I’m 31, in my 3rd year of vet school and I graduated high school in 2004.
There are some people in my class who got into school right after their 3rd year of undergrad (the minimum requirement here), some who did undergraduate degrees, some who did masters, some who did tech school and worked in practice and some mothers in their 40s.
I’m not sure how me cooking someone a meal that doesn’t contain meat makes me difficult to be around but okay.
RubyRed “I’ve lived with my partner for 10 years now and he still eats meat . . . It’s never been an
issue.”
Please forgive me for acting nosy – I am honestly curious.
Have you thought about what you will do if you and your partner have children to raise together in the future? Will you raise them with the option to eat meat, like their daddy? If so, will you stick to “not buy” and “not cook” meat for the children?
Has your partner thought about how to handle that?
I have friends like this who had a kid. My understanding is that each parent is allowed to teach the kid their ways, and the kid chooses. I think in the earliest years, the kids were strictly vegetarian, but as they grew older the meat-eating parent offered them meat, and they ate it. The vegetarian parent won’t prepare meat for the kids, but it’s really not a big deal between the parents. If each member of the couple is truly accepting that everyone should make their own choices about what to eat, it need not be a conflict.
For someone who believes their choice is the only moral choice and that it’s their job to prevent children from being immoral, it could become a conflict, of course.
We’ve talked about it. We’re thinking something pretty much like what “guest” posted directly below.
Our home is almost entirely vegetarian, not because I’ve forbidden meat in the house or anything but because my fella is lazy and doesn’t want to make or plan his own meals, and when he’s making dinner it needs to be something we can both eat.
I’m imagining we’ll keep on pretty much the same as we are now – vegetarian meals at home, order whatever you want when eating out or at a party or whatever. He/she/they can make their own decisions with regards to what diet they want to follow. No pressure either way- I really don’t care what other people eat.
One must have some way to phone home for money.
True. Yet they’re not doing that. Strange, no?
Mom cut them off after the last phone call?
Or she’s too embarrassed to phone home. “Hey, mom, yeah, we’re flat broke and have nothing for the baby because we spent 30 weeks flitting about instead of getting ready to have a baby, can you help? Oh yeah, and we’re in trouble with the law again. Luv you!”
And mom is now mulling over whether she wants to raise her daughter’s baby, or let her grandchild be placed in the foster care system.
Yabbut, how can you check on your, “Go Fund Me” page without one???
Panhandling by smartphone. Part of how things work these days, I guess.
sad. (also sad is taking a pic of your GF’s tata and posting it on your gofundme page)
Just be glad it wasn’t a “golden moments” pic asking for a free urinalysis…
If I could burn out my eyes and unread that, I would. Thanks for the image of wild bush.
I was going to add, “Hope this helps” at the end of my post, but I forgot.
I’ve heard of tata as referring to vag, so i had to run up and check the pic again. and then i was like, okay, booby. not fine-china.
Isn’t this what social services is for? But the office is probably full of brown-skinned people, so the fair-skinned dreadlockarians just open a go fund me page. PRIVILEGE. Right here folks.
“We have basic needs that are unmet, we even created our own destitution, but we’re above using the social safety net provided for indigent people like ourselves. GO FUND US!”
SMH
I’m curious if they plan on going to court Monday with their plan of care being, “Well, we were planning to mooch from others via this Go Fund Me page.” Based on the Go Fund Me comments, it appeared most people couldn’t actually give them money because well, they were in similar situations themselves.
No plan of care means possible removal from their custody again. Every time kids have been placed with me because of no housing, etc, the parent(s) had to show proof of income and have their house or apartment inspected before the child would be put back in their care.
I’m guessing GoFundMe is for people who wouldn’t dream of getting their layette and baby products from SVP, Goodwill or the Samaritans and their nappies and wipes from a food bank.
Surely some fellow vegan mamas can give them second hand slings and cloth diapers?
If you have money (even if borrowed or on credit) for a return trip to Florida (Delta seems to charge about $350 each way) you could have spent it on second hand baby necessities while you stay in a shelter, or towards a deposit on an apartment (you can get a 2 bed apartment in Portland for $1000/month, less I’m sure if you aren’t fussy about location or amenities).
People this poor at forward planning and budgeting should probably have some supervision and support if attempting to raise a child.
Both of our county hospitals refer low-income families to agencies (usually churches) that will help out with layettes and other items. A lot of us blue-hairs* belong to knitting groups that make booties, blankets, etc just for this purpose.
(*although technically, mine is salt and pepper).
The dude’s job was in southern Oregon. You can live even more cheaply out in the sticks than in Portland (which is pretty hipster-spensive).
Or she could have just stayed put with her mom for a bit.
Probably WIC and Snap did not have organic, vegan produce for her. Or all natural hemp diapers…
She planned to breastfeed. What else would they need?
Yeah, really! She could feed herself, baby and hubbies* with the all magical, thermodynamics-defying, VEGAN liquid gold! They seem to think their veganess is really important to mention for some reason.
*hubby
I was going to say that WIC provides milk for the mom, but then it occurred to me that milk is incompatible with a vegan diet.
You’re right! They’re planning on raising the kid non-vegan! Human milk is still milk…
There is some kind of loophole that human breastmilk is vegan because the mother willingly provides it.
We actually had a spirited discussion at dinner at college once on whether it’s acceptable to swallow after oral sex if you’re a vegan. (Some of the vegans involved said yes because of the ‘willingly providing,’ some said yes because it wasn’t intended as a source of nutrition.)
Honestly, the whole question of breast milk and semen was probably originally brought up by some anti-vegan person who wanted to trap them in a corner or something.
The vast majority of vegan/vegetarian chose this path because of their view on animal well being. Not because they think any animal protein is toxic. No animal is hurt in either cases, so of course it’s fine. It would be like telling someone she’s not vegan if she bit her tongue and swallow a little of blood.
Totally. I do vegetarian for animal well-being and environmental concerns, and I feel a little bad about loving milk and egg stuff, but I try to minimize my impact without taking enjoyment out of life. The sperm thing is just the thing for a bunch of geeky college girls to glom onto.
So the leather of my shoes is fine by that logic as it wasn’t intended as a source of nutrition.
They don’t mention attorney fees, but the gofundme is listed in the father’s name, on behalf of Hayes-Klein.
I suppose she’s gotten involved pro-bono.
They need help paying for all those plane tickets. (???) Also: kind of a bad idea to get on a cross country flight at nine months pregnant. Just saying.
They make me sick (although dirty, hippy vegans living on a commune often have that effect anyway). I’d like to get a hold of her parents and find out the real story because I think the truth starts in FL.
It’s my understanding that most communes involve some source of outside funding (parents? trust funds?)
The founders probably, these scrums probably just till the field, weave hemp bracelets and run the roadside farmstand in exchange for room and board (on a hippie bus, apparently).
Midwifing. A la Ina Mae Gaskin and the natural birth button rubbers.
I wonder if it’s as simple as – hippy-dippy son-in-law isn’t welcome at mom’s house…
That was actually my first thought. I have this vision of her parent’s living in Boca.
The reason she went back to Oregon is because is her mom wouldn’t have any of the homebirthing shit, is my guess.
I do wonder…if she hadn’t have started going into labor on the plane…she would have never ended up in the hospital in the first place.
If she were ever planning on a hospital birth, I would be shocked. Her breech baby might have gotten a lucky break with the flight-labor thing.
There ought to be something in the GoFundMe bylaws that forbid that, honestly.
Yeah. Their rules are rather loose.
“Fully armed police officers in bullet proof vests”.
So the officers were in their regular uniforms with standard equipment.
As opposed to “Partially armed” officers in non-protective gear.
right? I would have expected unarmed officers in tank tops and flip flops.
So I actually used the lawyer’s write up as a lesson for OK in critical thinking while reading. The particular lesson today was looking for bias and inflammatory language. The lesson went perfectly. When I read the line about the police he was initially outraged. Then I asked him to close his eyes and picture what the police are wearing every day when they’re just out on patrol. He thought for about a half second and he went “OH!” I kind of chuckled. He then said, so wait, this person just wrote it that way to get people to think it was worse than it was, since that’s just how the cops are always dressed. Bingo, kid. You got it.
I’m not such a bad teacher after all.
I worked at a school where the School Resource Officer wore a bulletproof vest. Honestly, I felt like it sent the wrong message. Previous SROs had worn button-down or polo shirts with pants, belt and gear. Of course, this was before school shootings became routine.
I don’t know what they expected. That the police would just strip in the parking lot and leave all their equipment?
That’ll cost ya extra!
She is a really horrible lawyer for posting all of those facts on the internet, when they still almost certainly have an open CPS file on their case. Really breathtakingly bad decision. I also wonder if she is even licensed to practice in CA.
That’s the first thing I thought. You can’t divulge any information on open CPS cases. I can’t even tell my parents almost anything about my current foster kiddo’s history, much less post it on the internet. And the kiddo is a TPR, never going back to birth family – actually, zero contact with birth family allowed, and on the adoption track.
I had temporary, emergency custody of my son’s girlfriend for two weeks while CPS did their thing and found a more appropriate foster care placement. I couldn’t even post pictures of them at the beach or some other outing, like I would have if I didn’t have custody of her, during that time.
OT — you’re a nice person.
My kids would disagree with you. So would MrC at the moment.
Isn’t being the limit setter and worst mommy in the world fun? I’m sorry it’s rough right now, you have an awful lot going on.
I’m always the party pooper. And MrC is irritated with me because he doesn’t handle change well and I’m a month into a complete rearrangement of the house. The furniture in this house basically has not moved since he bought it in 1994. There’s been some changes in the bedrooms, but the public areas haven’t changed at all. I’ve changed everything, and he’s not handling it well, even though he agreed to the changes. He’ll get over that soon enough.
Oh, I’ve heard that one. “Why are you always changing things just for the sake of changing them? This was perfectly fine!!”
In this case things simply weren’t working. With the addition of the macaw, we simply didn’t have enough space in the bird room anymore. In order to get them all in one room, a massive entire house reorganization had to happen. Pretty much nothing is where it was 2 months ago, at least in the rooms that aren’t bedrooms.
Sounds like my husband. He gets v edgy around change, but then learns to live with it.
We recently had a new kitchen tap installed-the old one was leaking badly. He hated it. A tap. He’s forgotten about it now.
He was also super-keen for me to get a job-knowing I needed to get out more-but struggled to get used to the reality.
Hope things settle for you soon.
With MrC it’s just one of the traits of his autism. Change is very, very difficult for him. I usually do things slowly, or when he’s out of town, but this last project was too massive for either of those options. I was going to demolish and redo one of the bathrooms while he was gone this time, but my hand injury put a stop to that.
Yep, I hated back to school time where everyone was posting pics of their kids and I was not allowed to. But apparently I can mail out Christmas cards with his photo. It’s weird what is and isn’t allowed.
Actually I see she is barred in Oregon where this case was, so there’s that. I still can’t get over her posting every single fact online. In my opinion, bad idea.
I know Douglas MacArthur wouldn’t like that.
He’s so chatty on my Oujia board! It’s like he never shuts up!
Don’t you know you shouldn’t mess with those things while pregnant? Bad things could happen to the baby before it comes Earthside! 😛
Giggle.
I’m calling bullshit on doctors in Portland being even remotely concerned about weed or them looking like people who smoke/sell weed. Or them not vaccinating. I’m in Eugene and weed is everywhere and there is not a single concern raised over it. Even though it’s a CLEAR violation of the recreational marijauna laws in Oregon I’ve personally witnessed people selling edibles on the street during a block party with cops all over the place not even raising an eyebrow. I’ve seen people driving down the street with pot plants in the back seat. “Hippie buses” are everywhere. It’s perhaps not “normal” for people to be living in a bus, but it’s far from unusual. I had to specifically initial for *each* vaccine my 1 year old got this week at his well visit and then also sign something saying I understood what he was getting and was OK with it. It was quite clear that the nurses and doctors frequently encounter people who don’t wish to vaccinate or want to do so selectively (and the vax schedule they are using is a bit more spread out than what our previous doctor in Idaho used, though still within the CDC guidelines). They aren’t calling CPS on them all, I can promise you.
That was my first thought. If hospitals in Oregon are calling CPS for parents who refuse vaccinations and ultrasounds, foster families will all be stacked 10 deep.
The lawyer’s story has as many holes as swiss cheese. Let’s see what I find reading between the lines:
1) The couple were already on a watch list for suspicion selling pot on FL; that is a side effect of running a semi-psychedelic hemp shop (or a hydroponics shop for that matter.) You know, plus the previous arrests.
2) She managed to get on a plane at 39.4 which is pretty damn unlikely to have occurred without some falsified paperwork.
3) The “prenatal” care may have already told her the baby was breech since she’s strangely ready to argue about a vaginal breech birth.
4) When her daughter is born with a broken arm, that’s totally the doctor’s fault for…..delivering the baby vaginally without major problems in a unplanned breech vaginal delivery? (Hint: Given a choice between a broken arm and an entrapped head with or without a nuchal arm, pick the broken arm.)
5) Mom’s not anti-blood work; she just wants to wait a few days. That’s not suspicious at all. I’ve certainly never had students who were worried about passing a drug test do amazing accurate math involving drug half-lives.
6) Isn’t this likely a situation where Mom’s desire for no blood work is overridden by public safety? I mean, doctors just delivered a vaginal breech from a woman who hadn’t been tested for HIV.
7) They have a cute group photo of everyone including the lawyer, but no one thought to snap some photos of the SWAT-team ready police officers?
8) The judge took one look at the medical reports of no prenatal care + drug test refusal and refused to waste anyone’s time on listening to the ‘merits” of the case.
Oh, your #5 is very much on point. And maybe it addresses Dr Kitty’s question below about why the woman flew to Portland. Recreational MJ is legal in Oregon.
Ah…
So a positive drug screen three days later is legally celebrating your new arrival, not illegally smoking weed in Florida while pregnant.
And my midwife told me it was totally safe to toke while breastfeeding.
It’s probably not illegal to smoke weed while pregnant if it’s legal to partake in general in the state, just as it’s not illegal to drink while pregnant. It would probably be some pretty substantial fuel for a CPS case, though?
ETA: Ah, here is the story I was thinking of:
http://www.newser.com/story/192264/breastfeeding-mom-refuses-to-stop-smoking-pot.html
Note that mom smoked pot through the pregnancy.
I doubt it would even come up without other evidence of risk to the child. It is definitely not illegal to smoke weed while pregnant here. They do require that everyone get literature saying that it can be risky while pregnant/nursing when you purchase, much like the signs in bars about drinking while pregnant. But that’s about it.
Maybe she had been branching out a bit? Pot’s legal there, shrooms, acid, etc aren’t. I agree with Mel, that “wait before doing my bloodwork” sticks out.
Oh yes, I suspect there were other things involved too. But just based on weed as the story tries to imply? No. Not in western Oregon.
Poor kid!
One of my woonatic younger cousin’s wife, also of the hemp-loving camp, told me with a straight face that THC and cannabanoids would not be transmitted through breast milk. Ever. And… even if it did, there couldn’t be any risks! Because natural.
Her SIL called me a member of the military industrial complex (because I spent a week at Fermi on vacation). So I guess it was par for the course.
Because the blood/breast barrier is far less permeable than the blood/brain barrier, which THC has to cross in order to work. It’s only permeable to antibodies that the kid needs. Seriously, how do they keep this shite straight?
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia Illinois?
My Father worked there for many, many years. I’m wondering when you went there. If after 1985, then my Father was already retired. I know the place very well. Worked there a couple of summers myself in the cafeteria during High School. Also, it is not far from where I live! Such a small world.
How cool is that! I was there around ’92. Our gracious hosts had us to some fabulous parties/casual get-togethers with the scientists in their homes. Might I have met your dad at any of those?
One treasured memory of the trip was that I met Dr Melissa Franklin (now at Harvard, but then leading the top team), when she basically introduced herself by metaphorically poking me in the sternum, saying “Are you gonna do science?!? We need more women in science!” I was immediately smitten (still am), and later lobbied (unsuccessfully, alas) to have her speak at my uni when I was with AWIS. They were still analysing the critical top data while we were there. Very exciting stuff.
The other stand-out of the trip was that things were quite different culturally when we did a day-tour at Argonne National Labs. One of our group (a high-school physics class I tagged along with as a nominally responsible adult) was an exchange student. They wouldn’t allow him entry to the lab. He was from Cern, for d_G’s sake.
Small world, indeed.
My father was an engineer there. He designed some of the superconducting magnets and alignment systems. He also worked in the meson area on some of the experimental equipment. By 92 he had already passed, so you would not have met him. But it sounds like you had a great time.
Prior to working at Fermi, my father was at Argonne. In fact, we used to have a brick of the uranium (depleted) that was used to shield the first reactor there that Enrico Fermi set up. My father just missed meeting Fermi, but the bricks were common keepsakes that many people had who worked there in that era.
I was very lucky as a child with him working there. I have been in the main ring tunnel, and in many of the experimental areas. Very cool stuff!
I’m surprised you had an issue with the exchange student. It is sad, since as far as I know, they don’t really do anything top secret there.
My brush with fame was getting to meet Dr. Leon Letterman. I actually met him several times, since he was the director of Fermi when I attended several events while working there in the summers. Lots of good memories from that time.
On reflection of my former students understanding of medicine and law, the mom might have been overly concerned about the effect that finding drugs in her system would have had on either a CPS finding – or she might have been mistakenly worried that a positive drug screen would have been reported to the police somehow.
If she flew Delta, they have no paperwork requirements for flying while pregnant, nor gestational age limits. Strange but true. Everything else in that story is horseshit and lies, but that might not have involved fabrication, just horrible judgement.
I hope all their flight attendants are trained to be emergency birth attendants!
I’m sure the qualifications to be a flight attendant exceed what’s required to be a CPM.
And we’ve already seen the flight attendants had more sense than most CPMs – they called an ambulance.
I know of a lay midwife who lists her past experience as a flight attendant as part of her qualifications for being a home birth midwife. (Or was it a life guard ?? Naw, I think it was a flight attendant.) Your comment jogged my memory.
Delta are clearly getting legal advice from a Certified Professional Lawyer.
That is NUTS.
Flying involves low oxygen and weird pressure differentials a long distance from medical assistance. Not great for heavily pregnant women.
Hey, if the lawyers are getting them off the hook… honestly I’m a bit conflicted about this. If you’re crazy or desperate enough (I’m thinking about women forced to travel for work or fleeing dangerous situations – mostly because I *just* saw a story about a secularist in the Middle East who flew out of there when she was 8mo pregnant), I’m not sure that the airlines should categorically be stopping you. I do believe that doctors should *strongly* recommend the safest strategies, and airlines should be transparent about the risks of flying to anyone with a health condition that may be contraindicated, but I’m agnostic about what their legal responsibilities should be, or what information they should be entitled to re: the medical status of their fliers.
Portland, yo. It’s a news-worthy story there when a white girl’s baby is vaccinated on schedule. I don’t believe for a moment CPS was called just for that. :p
I work as an RN in a Labor/Delivery unit in the Portland metro area.
1. We DO NOT call CPS if the family chooses not to vaccinate with Hepatitis B at birth and the mom is Hep B negative (verified with blood test).
2. The concern would be that we do not know the moms Hep B status, and if she is positive, the baby would need Hep B and Igg within 12 hours to help prevent transmission. If the status is unknown, we would immunize with both for the baby’s protection. Time is of the essence.
3. OBs ALL have had training in breech delivery. To say otherwise is preposterous. Most do not do breech deliveries often (only in emergencies or after a head down twin) because most moms elect for C/S instead of risking their baby.
4. Then there is the mom’s HIV status… ??
5. No one gives a shit about pot anymore… CPS will do NOTHING with a positive cannabis screen, unless there are many other red flags.
6. Not sure what hospital this went down at… but not all hospitals in the area have armed security.
MUCH more likely to be about not wanting to DC a baby into a borrowed hippie van with parents that have no clothes or equipment for it to survive
Why couldn’t Dustin fly out to Florida to be with his wife while she stayed with her mother?
Why was this a less attractive option than having her fly across country 3 days before her due date?
I mean, either way you’re paying for a flight, and one option doesn’t risk a delivery at 36000ft, and enables you to live in an actual house with your baby after it is born. There has to be some other factor there that influenced her decision to travel.
No airline I know will let you fly after 37weeks, even with a doctor’s note…I have difficulty believing an airline knowlingly let someone 39w4d fly *without* a doctor’s note.
I suspect this couple have a rather unique relationship with the truth, especially when it comes to telling it when it is not in their best interests to do so.
Thank you for saying that – thank you so much, because YES! I’m sure it happens, but airlines (and competent OBS) really, really don’t like someone that close to their due date (or even in the 3rd trimester at all) to fly, especially across the country.
Could be worse…
A Dr I know of falsified paperwork to say his wife was 28 weeks pregnant when she was actually 38weeks pregnant so that she could fly home to have the baby with her folks and they would spend less time apart.
The trouble came when they tried to take the baby home 4weeks later.
Because they were trying to get documentation for a clearly full term baby, not a 32week premature baby, the authorities smelt a rat, accused them of human trafficking/ buying a baby and it ended up with him having to fly out for a DNA test, the baby nearly ending up in an orphanage and a referral to the GMC for misconduct.
Oops!
I love the smell of karma in the morning.
The airlines in my areas have a no-fly after 28 weeks policy.
Delta currently has a sort of “don’t ask don’t tell don’t refund” policy for pregnancy and flying; they don’t care how pregnant you are, and no paperwork required. I thought it was odd, I was all ready to get a note from my doctor to fly at 30 weeks, but it wasn’t necessary.
It is stupid as FUCK to fly at 39 weeks + pregnant, just to be clear. But she may not have had to fudge for that.
Probably had something to do with his outstanding warrant for arrest in FL.
Well, that would do it.
Not so much “nomads” as “fugitives” then.
I will mention that Alaska Airlines has no restrictions on flying while pregnant. Our lady governor famously went into labor while on a work trip and flew home on AK air while in active labor and managed to get back in time to give birth to the baby in state. So there are a few airlines that don’t care.
IIRC, she looked small for most of her pregnancy, hence the conspiracy theories about it not being really her baby. I always assumed that was how she got on the plane in labor, because she didn’t look huge. Wow. I am completely squicked out by childbirth – whenever I read that anyone can deliver an easy birth, I mentally say except me. I’ve dealt with nasty accidents and blood in quantities, though not arterial, thank goodness, but show me someone giving birth and next you’ll see my most recent meal. Another reason I so don’t understand birth junkies. If anyone goes into labor on my plane, I’ll be the one hiding in the bathroom.
I flew at 34 weeks, was closer to 35 when I flew back. No questions asked.
I just looked up United Airlines’ policy:
https://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/travel/specialneeds/pregnancy/default.aspx
No questions asked until the 9th month. I believe SP’s baby was about a month early.
Nomads know what they’re doing, more or less. Wannabes we can’t be so sure about.
Nomads lose babies, cry, and soldier on.
I was thinking of how they deal with other questions like where do the best berries grow. Are there any vegan nomads who aren’t privileged hippies?
“I can’t help wondering if we are looking at a situation where a hospital is being vilified simply for daring to hold white parents to the same standards they would have held parents of color.”
If that’s the case then shouldn’t we hope the hospital rises to treat all people the way they treat white people rather than lowering itself to treat all people the way they treat POC? Although it also seems weird to assume that the hospital treats POCs badly.
I think itnis one of these case when POC are treated correctly and white people are giving wrong leeway.
Like that rich guy with “affluenza”. It is not that the courts should treat everybody like they treated him, it is that he should not have been given leeway.
White people are been given wrong leeway, sorry.
Yes. The (white) man who shot up the Planned Parenthood (
Robert Lewis Dear) had a “colorful” history including incidents that would have had more serious consequences if he had been a person of color.
I have a theory that the reason that more white men commit mass shootings is because their privilege may keep them from facing significant consequences of their actions prior to the shootings. They are seen as strange and odd, but not dangerous.
12 year old white boys waving realistic toy guns=good clean fun. 12 year old black boys waving realistic toy guns=dangerous thug.
White guy carries an AR-15 into Wal*Mart = “He’s exercising his second amendment rights.”
Black guy picks up a pellet gun in the sporting goods section of Wal*Mart= “OH MY GOD!!!! HE’S GOT A GUN!!!”
Although they can get ridiculous for PoC too. Had three boys in my care for a time because they were all sharing a small room in a 2 bedroom apartment. The parents worked, no criminal charges ever, and the boys really were only in the room to sleep. They each had a bed of their own that they fit in. But, since they were black…
Yet I know of white families who got their kids back where the kids sleep on a couch in the living room without their own room at all.