Thank You, Eve Ensler

As I'm sure almost everyone has heard by now, Mr. Todd Akin made a very poor decision during an interview on Sunday. Since seeing that interview, I have been at a loss for how to adequately express how I feel about his horrendous statements.

This morning I found what I had been looking for. Eve Ensler, author of The Vagina Monologues had written this response to Mr. Akin.

I will copy the text of her post for those who don't want to click over to The Huffington Post's site.

Dear Todd Akin, 

I am writing to you tonight about rape. It is 2 AM and I am unable to sleep here in the Democratic Republic of Congo. I am in Bukavu at the City of Joy to serve and support and work with hundreds, thousands of women who have been raped and violated and tortured from this ceaseless war for minerals fought on their bodies. 

I am in Congo but I could be writing this from anywhere in the United States, South Africa, Britain, Egypt, India, Philippines, most college campuses in America. I could be writing from any city or town or village where over half a billion women on the planet are raped in their lifetime. 

Mr. Akin, your words have kept me awake. 

As a rape survivor, I am reeling from your recent statement where you said you misspoke when you said that women do not get pregnant from legitimate rape, and that you were speaking "off the cuff." 

Clarification. You didn't make some glib throw away remark. You made a very specific ignorant statement clearly indicating you have no awareness of what it means to be raped. And not a casual statement, but one made with the intention of legislating the experience of women who have been raped. Perhaps more terrifying: it was a window into the psyche of the GOP.
You used the expression "legitimate" rape as if to imply there were such a thing as "illegitimate" rape. Let me try to explain to you what that does to the minds, hearts and souls of the millions of women on this planet who experience rape. It is a form of re-rape. The underlying assumption of your statement is that women and their experiences are not to be trusted. That their understanding of rape must be qualified by some higher, wiser authority. It delegitimizes and undermines and belittles the horror, invasion, desecration they experienced. It makes them feel as alone and powerless as they did at the moment of rape. 

When you, Paul Ryan and 225 of your fellow co-sponsors play with words around rape suggesting only "forcible" rape be treated seriously as if all rapes weren't forcible, it brings back a flood of memories of the way the rapists played with us in the act of being raped -- intimidating us, threatening us,muting us. Your playing with words like "forcible" and "legitimate" is playing with our souls which have been shattered by unwanted penises shoving into us, ripping our flesh, our vaginas, our consciousness, our confidence, our pride, our futures.
Now you want to say that you misspoke when you said that a legitimate rape couldn't get us pregnant. Did you honestly believe that rape sperm is different than love sperm, that some mysterious religious process occurs and rape sperm self-destructs due to its evilcontent? Or, were you implying that women and their bodies are somehow responsible for rejecting legitimate rape sperm, once again putting the onus on us? It would seem you were saying that getting pregnant after a rape would indicate it was not a "legitimate" rape. 

Here's what I want you to do. I want you to close your eyes and imagine that you are on your bed or up against a wall or locked in a small suffocating space. Imagine being tied up there and imagine some aggressive, indifferent, insane stranger friend or relative ripping off your clothes and entering your body -- the most personal, sacred, private part of your body -- and violently, hatefully forcing themself into you so that you are ripped apart. Then imagine that stranger's sperm shooting into you and filling you and you can't get it out. It is growing something in you. Imagine you have no idea what that life will even consist of, spiritually made in hate, not knowing the mental or health background of the rapist. 

Then imagine a person comes along, a person who has never had that experience of rape, and that person tells you, you have no choice but to keep that product of rape growing in you against your will and when it is born it has the face of your rapist, the face of the person who has essentially destroyed your being and you will have to look at the face every day of your life and you will be judged harshly if you cannot love that face. 

I don't know if you can imagine any of this (leadership actually requires this kind of compassion), but if you are willing to go to the depth of this darkness, you will quickly understand that there is NO ONE WHO CAN MAKE THAT CHOICE to have or not have the baby, but the person carrying that baby herself. 

I have spent much time with mothers who have given birth to children who are the product of rape. I have watched how tortured they are wrestling with their hate and anger, trying not to project that onto their child. 

I am asking you and the GOP to get out of my body, out of my vagina, my womb, to get out of all of our bodies. These are not your decisions to make. These are not your words to define.
Why don't you spend your time ending rape rather than redefining it? Spend your energy going after those perpetrators who so easily destroy women rather than parsing out manipulative language that minimizes their destruction. 

And by the way you've just given millions of women a very good reason to make sure you never get elected again, and an insanely good reason to rise. 

#ReasonToRise 

Eve Ensler 

Bukavu, Congo

Thank you, Eve, for finally putting into words what I was unable to.

 

Chasing Rabbits And Herding Cats

If you chase two rabbits, both will escape.
- Unknown Author

This has been the story of my life the past few weeks. I've written about it on here before, and thankfully things have slowed down quite a bit since that morning when I drove off without my daughter.

Sadly, I realized the other day that Little W is 6 months old. Six months. Half of her first year of life has already passed me by. The time when she will change the most, grow the most, has already happened. It went so quickly, and I don't feel like I really got the chance to enjoy it.

I desperately want to roll the clock back and trade all those stupid PTA meetings and events for more time with her. All the waisted hours making phone calls instead of just sitting and enjoying nursing her or just holding her.

I knew it would go fast. I knew I wouldn't remember everything, and yet, I still didn't manage to find the time to take more pictures or videos of her. Other than a few very dark pictures from the day she was born, I really don't have any pictures of her and I together as a newborn.

I feel pretty lucky that this time around I've managed to hold the PPD at bay, but I find myself wondering if it isn't starting to creep in. I also wonder if my heart is trying to talk my brain into a third baby, something that just isn't in the cards.

I think I'm having such a hard time with Little W growing up because I know that she will be the last baby I nurse, the last baby I snuggle and coo to that is just mine. Someday I'll have grandbabies (probably), but that's different.

I had difficulty coming to terms with my pregnancy when I was carrying Little W. I found myself wishing everything away. I was so busy worrying about how it was all going to work out that I missed out on the joy. I didn't take the time to just stop and enjoy the feeling of life growing inside me. Now I look back and think, "What I wouldn't give to have just one more day of my pregnancy back."

This is all new emotional ground for me. With The Angry Midget, I didn't have all these regrets, I didn't have the sense of loss as she grew older. For a long time I planned to have more children, and I figured that if I missed something, there was always the next one. I think some of that might have been the PPD talking. It made it hard for me to connect with The Angry Midget, and it made it really hard to feel anything in general.

Now I know that this is my last shot, and I don't want to miss anything.

But I've already missed six months.

Time: Can I have some now, please?

I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see.
- John Burroughs, essayist and naturalist

I have been trying to finish a post that I started almost two months ago, but every time I sit down to work on it, something happens, and I'm pulled away. It seems like there just isn't enough time to do what needs to be done. There isn't enough mom to go around.

This week is staff appreciation week at my daughter's school. The 3rd VP PTA Board position is in charge of fundraising and Staff Week.

I'm the 3rd VP.

It has been no secret with my family that I have found being on the PTA Board very stressful. Add to that the fact that I gave birth this school year and have been dealing with breastfeeding issues, a slow growing baby, a six year old who is suddenly acting out at school and at home, a husband who is in danger of losing his job (which means no insurance, or income for our family) and has been sick off and on for more than two months, a furnace that's trying to kill us, and the ever increasing cost of everything but no increase in paycheck size dilemma that most families are facing these days, and you get a very stressed Mama.

This week it seems to all be coming to a head.

We got the furnace fixed, so it won't kill us in our sleep. The down side is I had to use the money set aside for getting us significantly out of debt to do it.

After some drama, the second to last fundraiser is finally behind me (I hope).

Staff appreciation week had a bit of a rough start, but I think things are smoothing out.

My husband's job is no more secure than it was before. That still makes me a little ill when I think about it, so I just try not to. It's not exactly the "Ostrich Approach" but it's working for now (mostly).

Then Monday night happened.

Ahhh, Monday...

Monday my husband came home from work early. He never does that. Ever. It doesn't matter how horrible he feels, he toughs it out to the end of his shift. He asked me to call the doctor in the morning. This is also very out of character for him, so I knew he was really bad off. At the appointment, the student doctor writes it off as a 24 hour bug, and is ready to let him out the door. Then the ARNP comes in and starts talking to him. She does a physical exam, palpating his abdomen, and tells him that she wants to do blood work because she's concerned it's his gallbladder. Initial results come back that there is no sign of infection of any kind, so that rules out food poisoning and 24 hour virus. More signs that point to a gallbladder issue.

We are supposed to hear back today about his blood work, and if further testing will be required.

Yesterday, in the doctor's office, I was fine with this. It was no big deal, everything would work out ok. Now, 24 hours later, it's a different story.

I've had to wait for blood work results before. Hundreds of times. I've been impatient, because I needed a Rx refill. I've been nervous because my baby's health was at stake.

I've never had this feeling before though.

I don't even know what it is.

But I have a suspicion it's fear.

Deep down, I know everything will be ok. No matter what the results are, I know it will all work out. But...

But then there's that voice that pipes up every once in a while that says, "Not always, not always."

So, that's where I'm at today.

Waiting.

Waiting for someone else's blood work to come back.

Waiting to hear, "It will all work out."