My votes for Super Tuesday

I'm pleased California actually counts in the primary. My two top issues are health care and the environment. Clinton and Obama are similar on environment. Clinton favors health care for all which makes sense but I'm not sure will pass politically. Obama favors health care for all kids. It means adults are left out in the cold but who can vote against kids. Congress already has some healthcare for kids. So I'll vote for Obama.

I think America is more ready to elect a man whose father was from Kenya and mom from America than the wife of a former president. The Clintons have made a lot of enemies as well as friends. I am also impressed that Obama has lined up some key endorsements like Ted Kennedy and several unions. Clinton is very detail oriented a good thing. Unfortunately attention to detail doesn't make a president electable as Reagan and Bush Jr have shown. It's the ability to surround yourself with good people. Obama appears to have that trait. Since turnout is usually low I think if Barack can get out the vote on presidental election day he will win.

On state propositions:
I'm voting yes on reform to term limits. I think term limits are undemocratic and don't allow congresspeople to build up enough experience and longevity to allow them more free reign to make deals and not be so tied to lobbyists. And the same folks run over and over just in different jobs so it doesn't stop the politicians from coming back anyway.

I'm voting no on everything else. I think the Indian gaming agreements need to happen in Congress and not via propositions. I don't have time to figure out all the ramifications of the agreement. That's why I elect politicians. I have seen countless ads on tv and via US mail so clearly a lot of money is riding on this.

I don't like earmarking funds for specific things in the budget. The state Congress needs the flexibility to create budgets in good times and bad. If you don't like your Congresspeople then vote for better folks.

$30,373 medical bill $0 paid

We get bills like this all the time. This one was a relatively small one. Little T pulled his g-tube out and we weren't able to put it back in time. We had to go the Emergency Room and then Little T had an minor operation to widen the hole to put another g-tube back in.

The total billed costs which is what an uninsured person would pay are $30,773.50

Medical Inpatient $ 21,921.00
Outpatient charge $ 91.50
Diagnostic Testing$ 8,361.00

Our insurance actually paid $3,900 of the inpatient rate which is their contracted rate. They paid nothing for the other two charges "payment for this service is included in the per diem rate or per case rate fee paid to your provider."

We paid nothing as our insurance pays for all hospitalizations and ER visits that result in admittance to the hospital.

Moral of the story:
1. Uninsured folks get really soaked.
2. Get the best health care insurance you can afford
3. We really need health care reform in this country, because it's a crappy system where folks who are either too poor or too unable to plan to get health insurance pay the most.
4. I bet Medical/Mediaid also gets soaked as they probably have a higher negotiated rate than insurance.

Here Comes Another Bubble popped (sorta)

I'm annoyed that one of the funniest Youtube videos to come out in a long time "Here Comes Another Bubble" by the Richter Scales was taken down on request by the DMCA. In the meantime, all Youtube has is this very poor quality video of a live performance where you can't even hear the lyrics that well, but it's the best I can give you as an immediate link.

According to the Richter Scales blog, the video was taken down because Lane Hartwell complained it used her copyrighted images of Owen Thomas, a tv reporter for heaven's sake. So he's a public figure and therefore his images are in the public domain. Ironically the video's still at Valley Wag. (at least when I blogged this post)

I'd like to know which videos on youtube don't use some copyrighted images of public figures. Youtube would go out of business if every video had every copyright checked.

I replied tongue in check on the blog that I think if they hadn't made fun of Larry Page and Sergey Brin the founders of Google who own Youtube, it might have stayed up. Since Silly Valley is about this big, I'm actually friends of friends of the founders and I think they have a sense of humor, but people are afraid. And frankly it really is a bubble.

How I can resist but to blog about a video with several men singing "Won't you blog about this song" in lovely acapella tune? Plus the video includes a baby blogging.

Richter Scales, I wish you well and I hope your bubble video gets back up on youtube.

Up with Internet Freedom and satire. Down with silly legalese. Satire is protected under free speech. Get a clue Youtube and DMCA.

Reluctant Lactivist

I found out sometime last year that I'm a lactivist or at least the NY Times told me so.

Ironically when the article came out, much of my breastfeeding was a very private affair. You see, I was almost exclusively pumping due to my son's health problems. And there's really no discreet way to pump in public. Only Madonna wears huge breastfeeding horns in public.

My son would breastfeed once a day but only in the most private of circumstances. A dream (not a wet one) of those who would ban breastfeeding from public places.

But I never felt dirty or embarrassed breastfeeding. I've never received any comments or dirty looks or been asked to stop. Most of the time the world seemed oblivious to the fact that I was breastfeeding. With my daughter who has always been healthy and focused on food, we breastfeed anytime anywhere she was hungry.

Maybe it's living in Silicon Valley. Maybe it's because my Burmese mother taught me that breastfeeding was normal and natural and I watched both of my siblings breastfeed. Or maybe it's because I'm

half-British and so used to doing things discreetly. But I'm a lactivist, because I believe that women should be allowed to breastfeed in public. I also think breastfeeding should be discussed and taught to all moms.

I think breastfeeding like dancing is something you learn by watching other people do and doing it yourself. It's not something you can learn from some book. Also like any dance, it takes two people and while it's not PC to say so, some partners just can't dance. My breastfeeding dance is frankly more like the funky chicken then the graceful waltz found in the La Leche guides, but it took my son a long long time to learn to latch on properly. If he had been my first, I'm not sure if we would have learned to breastfeed successfully. But my daughter came first and she was extremely eager. The second try she latched on and would not let go. Hoover and barracuda accurately describe her breastfeeding style. So I was an experienced partner by the time by my son was born.

One thing did bother me. The article states that some lactivists compare public breastfeeding to gays holding hands. Once when I held hands with a woman, I got a shocked look. So the reactions I've received personally are the same. And in some states both can put you in jail. However I've never heard of a woman being beaten up or had her life threatened for breastfeeding in public.

Crossposted to Silicon Valley Moms Blog

So happy about my tea

I'm so happy to learn that my favorite tea Tetley advertises at least on its website "Tata and Tetley not only share a passion for tea but also a commitment to operate as a responsible business. Use these links to find out more about what we’re doing to manage our environmental, ethical and social impacts."

I had been debating if I needed to get a more expensive tea that I like less in order to have fair trade tea. I think fair trade is far more important than organic when it comes to foreign produce and of course tea doesn't grow here.

Stop Junk Mail by going online

I used to spend an extra five to ten minutes a day sorting through junk mail. That doesn't sound like much, but it adds up and as regular readers of my blog know, I have a lot on my plate without filling it with junk mail.

The standard advice is to pay $1 to get the Direct Marketing Association to remove your address online.

But then all the rest of the advice I read involves writing. Not so! You can do a lot of online.

To remove your name from random offers of credit and insurance for five years or permanently. If you want it to be permanent, you have to sign and mail something in, but that's one time.

A company or charity that you have already done business with is free to send you mail at any time and also to sell your name unless you tell them otherwise. But do you need to write? No! Go to the organization's web site and scroll down to the bottom of their site. Usually in tiny letters at the bottom, you'll see a Privacy link. That link will reveal pages of legalese and usually an email address where you can email to be taken off their mail list.

For organizations I like, I say email only. For organizations that I don't like, take me off your lists. For all organizations, put me on your do not call list and do not share my information with any other organization even affiliates of your organization.

This takes about five minutes to ten minutes per organization depending on how hard their web site is to navigate and how fast you type. However IME each organization sends a piece of email once a month. So it's time saved in the end. Also you're saving trees in that the company is not printing paper to send to you and the US mail is not transporting that mail to you.

Dear dog owner

Dear Dog owner:

My children love dogs. They really adore them in fact. Specific dogs that they know and trust.

You see my children recognize that each dog has his or her personality and training and that's how they judge dogs. I write his or her because my daughter always corrects me on the correct pronoun for dogs she knows. Both kids view dogs as sentient beings. My son greets dogs he likes by name. Both kids feel free to command dogs they know and expect the dog to obey. This makes for a much happier interaction as sometimes dogs do get over excited and forget that kids are two legged and not four legged.

My daughter thinks smaller dogs are "cuter" than bigger dogs but cute is only one factor in what makes a dog lovable. My kids' two favorite dogs are a lab mix and a golden retriever so clearly size isn't everything.

You say "My dog is great with kids." My kids want to make that decision for themselves after observing your dog. Please do not thrust your dog upon my children. If your dog is socialized your dog will not like it either. If my children take their time to observe your dog before they get close saying things to them like "You're afraid of dogs" will not help them get closer to your dog. If your dog is seen to be well trained or responds to correction my kids will approach your dog.

For those owners whose dogs are shall we say a bit excited? Perhaps your dog often strains on the leash or jumps up and is poorly trained or perhaps your dog is simply excited right now. My children can only judge what they see in the moment. These behaviors that you consider cute or harmless or expressing excitement can knock over my small children and make them cry. I don't think you should take it personally if my kids keep their distance. As soon as your dog settles down my kids will approach.

I've also taught my kids that some dogs work and should not be petted. For them these dogs wear a vest. They've also learned on their own that these dogs tend to hold more still. So if your therapy dog fits this description please don't take it personally if my kids don't pet your dog. They're still learning all the finer nuances of dogs. They're only 5 and 3 so they have some time yet.

Thank you for your understanding

Mom of two small keen dog observers and lovers

Friend's blog banned from hospital

Chicago Moms Blogger Mary Anne's blog from my son's hospital. Her blog now contains cute baby pictures,but yes she does write porn.

I'm amused by the idea of a hospital blocking cute baby photos and a bit sad since they do brighten my day.

I understand that the hospital doesn't want people even parents viewing photos of porn in what is essentially a public place.  Even in my son's room people walk in and out all the time.  I do agree that seeing a porn image without one's consent is sexual harassment and doesn't belong in a hospital,  especially a children's hospital.  But I read her mommy blog posts only. And I can read this blog and any other Mommy blog to my heart's content and some even talk about *gasp* sex. Ironically Mary Anne recently wrote a post Things I'm Scared to Blog About.

Don't worry Mary Anne. They're much more scared of you. I wish there was a better filtering system. What people *read* on their own PC or laptop is their own business and reading is something one has to make an effort to do while an image is something one can see inadvertently. I'm not sure what the answer is.

Do you think I should be able to read Mary Anne's blog from my son's hospital?

The night my world was poisoned

In the quiet while my kids and husband went camping I wrote the night my world was poisoned on Silicon Valley Moms Blog.

Reading is scary and unregulated

When my daughter turned four she asked begged me to learn to read. I'm a big reader myself. I had this inkling that maybe it was kinda young but she was really eager. We started off kinda haltingly as I tried phonics without success. Then we figured out she was more of a sight reader. By the time she turned five she could pick up a picture book and read it.

She also wanted to learn to write so I got her some writing workbooks. Through writing she's learning phonics. I found the workbooks vary a lot in quality. Some have directions that *I* found hard to understand. I recommend Spectrum which you can buy at Amazon or Borders.

Now she's a reader. She reads to herself all the time. She goes to the library and checks out tons of books. She really prefers books "with a picture on every page" aka picture books. As I've discovered the reading level on picture books varies a great deal and she can read all of them.

I've also discovered that I can no longer read my email in front of my daughter. No I don't get porn or anything but the odd Cialis ad makes it through my spam filter. Once my daughter walked up to the screen at just the right moment as I was deleting spam. She asked "Mommy why are you getting email about pills?" Long pause while I try to think of a truthful answer that doesn't get into much detail. "Well honey it's a commercial (we've talked about commercials before) They think I might want those pills but I really don't need them." "Oh" she said and walked away. Now I don't read email in front of her unless I know who it's from and what it's about.

The other day I talked to a librarian about my daughter's sticking to picture books. I wondered if it was okay. She said "Sure. Picture books go all the way from preschool to sixth grade in both reading level and content." I nodded my head. The librarian gave me a really serious look. She said "You need to be careful with these early readers. They can start reading subject matter that they have no idea how to deal with." I nodded my head thinking of Cialis. She looked even more serious. "You need to read the book before you let her read it."

I must have looked confused. I do watch an episode of every show I allow my kids to watch. I vetoed "Jon and Kate plus Eight" because those parents just snipe at each other constantly. They just seem so stressed to have eight kids with no other help. But picture books? I mean they're just picture books. Right?

The librarian walked me over to the picture book section. She gave me this book called The Tin Heart. The cover had a sweet picture of two girls and a tin heart with two pieces. I skimmed the beginning of the book. It started out innocently enough. Two girls in the Civil War. The father of one made a tin heart and gave each of the girls half of the heart. It talked a lot about their impending separation. All sweet and sad. Just at my daughter's level.

Then suddenly with no warning in the middle of the book.....runaway slaves. Now I understand slavery is part of the Civil War and part of our nation's history. And someday I will explain slaves to my daughter. And genocide. And torture. And Vietnam. And Guantanamo. But she's only five. She's still having trouble with the concept of "I won't be your friend anymore."

To say I was shocked is compare slavery to "I won't be your friend anymore." I was calling my husband on the phone as soon as I was home alone and babbling incoherently to him. It's not that I think picture books must cover subject matter appropriate to a five year old. It's that I expected there to be some warning. Some indication that the content is other than for preschoolers.

For example another book called Team Mates had on the cover an African American man in a baseball uniform and a white man in a baseball uniform. On the back it contained words like "segregation" and the "Negro Baseball Leagues". I skimmed that book and it talked about segregation and how there were two leagues and such. Nothing about slavery. As the sister of a special needs brother my daughter already unfortunately knows that sometimes people are mean to other people just because of the way they look or act. I told her she could read that one with a grownup.

Anyway I want to thank that librarian for giving me an education. You can bet that I'll be reading skimming all my daughter's books until I feel she's old enough to deal with any subject matter that might come up.

Even chapter books that feature sweet photos of a fluffy dog are not five-year-old safe. The back merely said it was about a dog from the pound and some sort of mystery. Midway through the book another dog dies. I asked my daughter if she wanted to read a book about a dog that dies. "No" she said firmly. That book went away too.

I'm also a little angry. I ask myself why books for kids aren't rated. I personally find reading and then imagining something to be infinitely more scary than anything I could watch or hear. I think it's because books are undervalued.

Don't get me wrong. I think the rating system for visual and aural media is far from perfect. I still have to watch/hear it before I'll give it to my daughter. However right there on the cover I have a good idea of what I might be getting into. I don't have to go halfway through before I realize "not appropriate".

Crossposted to Silicon Valley Moms Blog

My daughter's stardom leaves me frazzled while American Idol makes me feel maternal

A few weeks ago my daughter was proclaimed a star... at her preschool.  The whole thing filled me with anxiety. It combines all the mom things I totally suck at --producing crafts and baked goods.  Last year I at least got to do something I'm good at -- read a story.  But this year my daughter took over that role and read a book to the class.  Yes I'm really proud of her that she can read.  But let's talk about ME!

First and biggest anxiety was to produce a poster of my daughter's life.   I thought the first part will be easy.  I'm tech savvy like many Silimom and so I figure I can upload photos to Costco and get them printed.  I learned the hard way that printing photos yourself sucks up oodles of my time and produces worse photos.

But the Costco website wouldn't take my password and wouldn't email me my password. I felt doomed.  I can't even succeed at the one part I thought I could cover.  I panic and start to write this post.  As I'm writing FINALLY the password arrives.  I felt like a total idiot because my password is completely stupid.  I change my password to something less stupid.  Since I've just publicly announced I have an account at Costco.

The poster turned out to be pretty good.  It helps that my daughter can cut things herself now.  I actually can't cut properly.  Ironically using scissors to cut out shapes is one of the tests for Kindergarten Readiness.  Good thing neither Bryn Mawr nor Haas asked me for this test. :)

But another star moment for my daughter was when she sang in the Assembly at preschool.  She knew all the words and all the motions and she sang her little heart out.   But again I had the anxiety of trying to capture the moment on camera and not doing so well at that either.

Which brings me back to American Idol.  I already blogged about several reasons why the show appeals to me.  But I had forgotten that one big appeal for me is that I feel proud and maternal in a lesser but similar when "my idols" do well.  Maybe one of the reasons I like Sanjaya so much is that he sorta reminds me of my brother at the same age.  And Melinda just seemed so sweet.  Okay I'm not quite old enough to be Melinda's mother unless I had her as a young teen.  Even so.

During those weeks I got to be a proud stage mama with no real consequences and very little of the anxiety.  Yes I'm sad that neither Melinda nor Blake won.  But all I had to do was call a few times on the phone.  I did call for an hour and a half with Blake for the finale.  I knew it was a losing battle.  Jordin just outsang him that night.  But I did what I thought was right.  I'm sure they'll all do fine. 

I suspect I will buy Blake's album to hear what he does with his songs but I doubt I'll go to any top ten Idol's concert.  It would sorta ruin the illusion for me that they're my kids.  Yes I'm the Paula Abdul sort of watcher.  So sue me.  But please don't break my nose.

Crossposted to Silicon Valley Moms Blog

300 Calorie meal

After looking at photos of 300 calorie meals I think that's about how much I naturally eat at breakfast and lunch at home. That's about what my mother served me. Other than pregnancy the only time I've gained weight was when I dated someone who was fat and we ate out a lot. Then I figured out I didn't need to eat the entire portion of a huge American restaurant meal.

Eating a restaurant meal portion makes me feel horribly full but it often sneaks up on you. So I didn't feel extremely full until after the restaurant. I heard a fat person on Oprah say that she loves that feeling when you feel the need to loosen your pants and if you eat any more you might be sick. I really hate it.

Now at a restaurant I just tell myself as the plate is being put down "I can eat only half" of however much seems like a reasonable amount.

We have started eating out more because restaurants do serve higher calorie items that Little T likes like "burger fries." I eat less because the food has higher calories and therefore makes me feel more full.

Like today we ate at a deli. The bread is the same I would eat but a lot more salami and cheese and little mayo and mustard than I would eat on a sandwich at home. I ate half of the sandwich plus one bite. I also ate about 7 fat fries. I still feel full 2 hours later though not nauseatingly full. My husband ate the rest of my sandwich and part of his meal and some fries. He is gaining weight on this "new diet."

I have read research that people have a "set weight point." I think that's actually a simplistic answer. I think rather people have differing

• tolerance of fat - I just can't eat too much fat. It makes me feel full.
• the way foods taste aka food preferences - I can taste red no 5 and other artificial ingredients. They taste a little weird. I can't stand the taste of diet coke. I naturally prefer fresh meat and vegetables cooked simply. I hate preserved things. I have a friend who is the opposite and would choose diet coke and cheezits over stirfry any day of the week. I think McDonalds food tastes gross.
  
• amount of food needed to feel full - my husband clearly has a higher set point than I do
• feelings about being over full - my husband and I both hate it
• rate of conversion of excess calories to fat - I do not gain weight easily. I think this also varies by body part. Any weight I do gain goes to my belly first then my breasts and then my face. My arms and legs remain the same. To gain weight during pregnancy I had to force myself to eat several times a day. Not eating caused my nausea to be worse. In the first part of both pregnancies I actually dropped a few pounds.
  
• rate of conversion of fat to muscle/energy - In most areas of my body I am pretty static. I still have a fat belly from pregnancy. Otherwise I have dropped back down to my prepregnancy weight. I think I could work really hard to get rid of this belly fat but it would be very difficult. It has slowly gone down over time but very slowly.
  
• rate of metabolism - my metabolism is pretty high. It has slowed down since I was a teen and I think pregnancy slowed it down further.
• amount metabolism is affected by exercise and amount and type of exercise needed - I find I need to walk everyday to be happy. Faster exercise also makes me happy but I get "the runner's high" or feelings of well being just from walking. I walk fairly fast on my own but often I walk with kids. However when I can't walk due to injury I gain a few pounds which I drop after I start walking again. Oprah says she needs to work out an hour a day to keep her current weight. I just don't have time to do that.
• ability to do a task over time that has long-term benefits - My ability to do this is low if it's just for myself but I'll do anything for my family.
  

I think people who are fat most likely have the "gain fat" side of many if not all these factors. Both of my parents come from a long line of people who were well-fed their entire lives i.e they lived in prosperous farming communities. With a constant supply of food the body reacts differently and there are different selection pressures.

Few people except Jared Diamond talk about how a culture's access to food resources affects its ability to expand. I would say that coming from a heritage that includes low and inconsistent access to food promotes genes that all lead to being fat in a culture that has consistent access to very high calorie foods.

I guess what I'm saying is yes my observable weight point is set lower than many Americans and I exercise less than the recommended amount. I don't do a lot of hard exercise like going to the gm. In fact when I did the most time at the gym I was also gaining weight from restaurant food. My BP etc is all low. It's just from following my natural tendencies.

I think someone like Oprah who comes from a background of slaves and before that prolly hunter-gatherers has all the factors to make her fat. With a lot of hard work she overcame her natural tendencies to get to a lower weight. I think other fat people could do the same if they had the resources and time of Oprah. Some fat people do and some don't.

But I think saying "everyone has a set weight point" or "everyone can be an ideal body weight if they only followed my lifestyle changes" misses the point.

At this point in my life if I had to do what Oprah did to maintain my current weight I would be fat. I don't have the time to exercise an hour a day or rather I feel my family needs that hour more. I can often walk with my family. I just eat what I like when I like. I don't spend time craving foods that are bad for me. I don't deny myself much in the way of food. Yes I love chocolate but in moderation. But I also don't think I need to be worth a billion dollars to have Oprah's genes and not be fat. I just need the time and resources.

At my current socioeconomic level I guess I could force myself into weight loss lifestyle changes if both my children were functionally school-age. Not true for me now. I don't know if I would want to. I prolly might if I was convinced I would die too young. I dunno.

Blogging Against Disabilism Day: Are you or have you ever been insane?

A parent on my Special needs list sent a story about Depression in Mothers with Autism. Perhaps some of these mothers are truly depressed. But depression would make it very difficult to care for a child with autism. Depression is a mental illness -- an incorrect biochemical neurological response to stresses in the environment.

More than once, a friend who suffers from depression has said I'm depressed about my special needs son. I am not...anymore. I get sad sometimes. That is different. My life is stressful by any objective measure. And I think it is reasonable to be upset when you are the parent of a child has a debilitating disability or deal with one yourself.

Unfortunately I've also been medically depressed twice in my life. I had post-partum depression after the birth of both my kids.

I can't speak for anyone else, but depression feels different from grief or sadness. When I was depressed,I actually felt very little except hopeless. My post-partum depression was actually worse the first time after my healthy daughter was born and lasted several months. I felt I was the worst mother ever, not only disabled, but also just completely incompetent. At any moment, the state would discover I was "an unfit mother" and take my daughter away. If I did something right, it was only because of some book or someone else. If I did something wrong, it was the end of the world. I can see how for a few mothers who go for a long time without help, the end of the world might mean killing their own children. They are insane, but post-partum depression is a form of mental illness.

With my son, who was born so sick, being depressed meant feeling he was going to die (could be true) and I had killed him through my inaction (insane). Unlike with my daughter my situation was so dire that it was obvious I needed help.

I think this is the first time I have written this in public. The day my son was born, I did seriously consider dying. Not actual suicide. Just giving up. My son's birth had been very difficult and I was incredibly weak, so I felt I could just let go. But within hours after my son was born, a nurse whose baby had died came to talk to me. She helped me realized that a) I might just survive the death of my son and b) I still had a daughter who needed me. She didn't break the insanity --the feeling that I was completely to blame for everything wrong with my son took a while to fade. She did get me to promise to talk. She told me I was not a bad person to feel the way I did. That I didn't need to be ashamed. I started talking with her and then my husband, and eventually when I had time, I talked to a therapist. Day by day, issue by issue, I started to feel less to blame and eventually I could separate what was under my control and what wasn't.

I still feel grief or sad when my son is very sick, or something else
bad happens like my son gets denied a service or he or I suffers a setback. But depressed, no. I don't just sit there and stare at a wall. I cry and then I do something.

My reactions are sane as can be expected, given insane circumstances. My mothering body was designed to rally to protect my children from predators and try to treat them when they're sick for a few days. It doesn't cope terribly well with continued prolonged almost dying (fortunately that phase seems behind us), a infancy that lasted a year and some aspects of babyhood that are still ongoing at 2.5 years old. This is a wonderful and dreadful aspect of modern medicine. I have to laugh a little at those who claim the body can heal itself from all things. Left to his own device, or heck even left in a third world country, my son would have died at birth. Terribly sad, some might say depressing in the nonmedical sense, but it is the truth. Clinical depression is about untruth.

And no, I don't always feel things will get better. Sometimes this is in fact a rational
response. The doctors tell me some things will never get better. Depending on the day, I believe them or don't. But even in my darkest days, I feel small fleeting moments of happiness. I walk outside in the sunshine. My family hugs me. I feel love. I get frustrated. Grief, even grief that lasts for a long time allows for fleeting moments of other feelings. Grief is harder than not feeling at all and inaction which characterized depression for me. I struggle every day to try to make things better.

And here's where I find our current approach to mental illness to be so twisted. Our current approach is focused on if people "pose a threat to self or others." That is our requirement for locking people up. That makes sense to me. But how about the majority who are mentally ill, but not a threat i.e. need outpatient therapy? The first time when my post-partum depression was worse and lasted a lot longer, I posed no threat to anyone. Months went by and I sufferedin silence.

A lot of hand wringing over Vtech is about how Cho didn't get help. He did get help. He was seen by an outpatient facility who let him go "because he didn't pose a threat to others."

Sadly I think the current atmosphere makes it LESS likely, folks will get help for mental illness. People are watched closely for signs that they might "be a threat." Meanwhile outpatient mental health services are cut all the time. Most medical insurance drastically limit mental health benefits.

Unfortunately it's much harder to tell if someone is a threat than if someone is mentally ill. Strangely as my psychiatrist dad will tell you, becoming a mass murderer requires a certain amount of sanity, Cho did a lot of preplanning. He even sent off a tape before his second murder spree. In our society, premeditation means that the person is sane to stand trial. It requires an utter disregard of other people's lives to the point where you think you have the right to kill them. I'm not sure if that is sane or not, and it may well be associated with other forms of insanity, but it is not depression or schizophrenia or any of the other common forms of mental illness.

Yes, a few moms with post-partum depression actually kill their own kids. More likely are the moms who have fleeting thoughts about killing their own kids along with themselves and then feel awful about it, and the spiral down continues. And I know a call to watch out for moms with post-partum depression, because they might kill their kids would be so effective at getting moms to speak up about it. NOT.

Sadly the usual face of mental illness is not Cho. The face of mental illness is a homeless person talking to the air. Many homeless people have mental illnesses. A person who won't get out of bed for days because "there is no point". A mom who says "I can't love my baby." A mom who feels "I am the world's worst mother" and not for a moment as we all do sometimes, but for days and weeks. A person who feels pleasure in nothing. A person who honestly believes that there are strange faces peering out at from doorknobs and laughing. A person who feels that everyone is plotting against them. A person who is too scared of open spaces to leave the house. With the current stigma against mental illness, many are too ashamed to admit they have a problem until things get very bad indeed.

I have only experienced mental illness for a brief time and I was ashamed about it. I still feel a bit embarrassed to admit that I ever had this disability. And yet having post-partum depression was no more my fault than my movement disorder is. Both involve brain issues. With post-partum depression my brain just got scrambled due to hormones.

For me, a large part of that shame comes from "I'm not one of those who pose a threat." It's like admitting to having leftist tendencies while the McCarthy trials against Communism were going on. The huge association between mental illness and "being a threat". I would like to say that I feel this is totally and utterly wrong for most people and especially for those who receive the proper treatment. I'm not a doctor, but from what I read, it does not match the current medical understanding of mental illness either.

But yes, twice I've been truly insane. My strong beliefs about the world, my children, and myself were in direct opposition to reality. My insanity was only temporary, and I'm so grateful. Are you or have you ever been insane too?

Will be crossposted to Silicon Valley Moms Blog

Thanks for Autism Awareness month

To the people and parents living with autism, thank you for the gifts you've given me and my son!

My son and I don't have autism. But we're part of the special community lovingly called special needs. Your battles have give me several gifts. And for Autism Awareness month, I wanted to thank you and all those who have fought alongside me.

1. Thank you for showing the world that just because you move or act differently from most of the world, you are still a human being with intelligence and feelings.

I have a movement disorder. When I was a young child, I was diagnosed as mentally retarded by top neurologists. My parents knew otherwise. Top neurologists told them "You're just overachievers who can't accept your child as she is." Ironically my mom grew up with a sister who had Down Syndrome. So she knew a face of mental retardation. And gazing into my eyes, she knew that I was smart and told me so.

At school, kids regularly called me "stupid" and "retard" and "spastic". Only two teachers told me I was smart. I knew I was smart, but I also knew I perceived the world differently. It was not until I was 16 that a neurologist said "Of course you're intelligent. You have a movement disorder (a new exciting field at the time)." It wasn't until high school that two kids told me I was smart and treated me that way. My dad just said "Wait until college." Finally in college, everyone treated me as intelligent. It was a novel experience.

But it's a different world for my son. Lying in the NICU, extremely sick, I knew my son was intelligent and warm. He made a real effort to gaze into my eyes, though I could tell he was a huge effort for him to focus through the extreme pain. The day he was born, his nurse said "He's so engaging. He's a smart one." From that day, various nurses, doctors and therapists have all said similar things. He has multiple delays including speech, gross motor and fine motor.

He has come a long way, but no, he does not move or talk like a typical child. He also wears a bright red wrist brace and his left arm usually hangs stiff at an awkward angle. But he lives in a different world than I did. I'm amazed by my son's confidence and ability to engage people. Yesterday in the park, he sat with two boys prolly 8 and 10 and played in the sand right next to them. Everyone seemed comfortable. That was something I never had. Thank you boys, and thank you parents of those boys. And thanks to all those who worked so hard to change the world to make this possible.

2. Thank you for teaching me and the rest of the world how to better talk about disabilities. Thanks for standing up loud and proud. My parents came from the old school where we didn't talk about my disability. My parents still don't use that word. They call it my "shake" (I don't shake). I know it comes from a place of love. A place where admitting disability means shame. A place where they want me to live a normal a life as possible. I knew this and I never told my parents about the teasing. It was a pain I kept to myself. And I have greatly exceeded the doctors' predictions, so my parents did many things right. I know if they were parenting today, they would do things differently. They treat my son differently. We live in a different world.

3. Thank for pointing out that there is both joy and pain in having a child with life-long disabilities. You'd think that I'd have an easier time of it having an unrelated disability. But I struggle sometimes to tell the truth. I struggle because like my parents, I want so much for folks to see the joy, the intelligence, the incredible resilience of my son. He has taught me so much. But he also has his challenges. I want to say like any other child, because every child has challenges. But his challenges loom larger and are more serious than most children.

4. Thank you for sharing. Thanks to you, I have learned so many things about myself and my son. I have learned about a lot different resources in Silicon Valley. Thanks to you, my son has lots of therapy that has drastically improved his life. I take therapeutic riding which has improved my balance and wrist movement. I'm also on the waiting list for a service dog. I have learned about the world of sensory issues which many kids on the autism spectrum deal with as well as my son and me.

5. Thank you for the gift of hope and showing me a path to greater freedom. I've had hope for my son since the day he was born. But before I met you, I thought I was the way I was. I could not change in my late thirties. My wrists were degenerating every day. I kept spraining my ankle every year.

6. Thanks for teaching me a whole new vocabulary and different ways of perceiving the world. I learned these words for my son, but they have actually helped me a lot more. Thanks to you, I've been able to use the right words to talk about my issues. Before I stumbled around literally and figuratively and therapists said "We can't help you." Now they offer me exercises and suggestions. I have noticed a small difference. I jerk a little less. I hurt myself less by thwacking my hand on things. I stumble less. I have not fallen down in a month. It's a start to a long journey. I'm so grateful that I know I can change. And I'm still learning about myself. Thank you so much.

Crossposted to Silicon Valley Moms Blog

Wow I got an award

Thanks Susan Ettinger! Susan of the Family Room gave me a Thinking Blogger award for my post on Silicon Valley Moms blog called Mommy Wars miss the point I link it because the comments are interesting.

Mini-vain and ashamed

This is my dream car. Only available in Japan. The Toyota Estima minivan which first came out in 2001 and has been redesigned this year. I'm not ashamed to say it. I am ashamed of how I got here.

When I was pregnant with our first child, we bought a Passat. My husband tried to get me to buy a minivan, but I categorically refused. I had this "eww!" reaction. It's funny, because I'm not really a car person. I want quality and reliability. Stylishness and image are not really on my list. Or so I thought.

My previous car was a Honda Civic hatchback. When I used to work in middle management at an Internet company, the people that worked for me used to rib me about my car. I occasionally thought "maybe I should get a more 'managerial car'." but I never did. I count on my Civic to always work. It fits five people and tons of stuff. The only thing that makes it less kid friendly than the Passat is it has just two doors. So you have to push down the seats to get at the kids. Plus the doors are pretty heavy.

But somehow a minivan symbolized something awful to me back then. I've always wanted to be a mom. But moms in minivans are a shamed group.

After child #2 , it became clear that the Passat was in fact antisocial, and very environmentally unfriendly. With today's car seats, it fits just our family of four...and a very skinny person who can squeeze between two car seats. So far we only know two people that can fit. But not another car seat. We don't want another child of our own. However as child #1 heads off to kindergarten this fall, we do want another child in our car, so we can carpool. So later this year, we'll buy a minivan, a Toyota Sienna

I feel ashamed of the incredible waste. My Civic is 11 years old, and my husband still drives it to work everyday. But we'll give up our Passat after just six years. I know some folks buy a new car every two years, but the Civic is the first car I bought new and only the second I've ever owned.

I really wish the hybrid minivan was here already, so at least I could say that I was holding out for a hybrid minivan.

A hybrid SUV is pretty environmentally unfriendly too. They're actually lower MPG than say a Prius and hold as many people, though I do admit they hold more gear.

But even so the environmental costs of buying a new car usually far outweigh keeping your old one. I feel ashamed that I listened to marketing and media instead of the common sense of my husband.

I share my shame with you in the hopes that someone reading this will learn from me as an example of what not to do.

But I'm also annoyed that every car maker under the sun is coming out with hybrid SUVs, but no minvans. Come on automakers. Surely, there's just as big if not bigger untapped market of environmentally conscious minivan mamas? Or is it just a weird artifact of the Bay Area and everyone else in the US is so minishamed that they'd rather buy an SUV?

Mommy Swine

A article entitled "Pearls before Breakfast" is bound to depict someone as swine. In this case, the swine are the people who didn't stop to listen to Joshua Bell busking in a Washington DC subway. The nauseatingly pretentious tone is supposed to show that people don't recognize beauty. The writer Gene asks, "Do you have time for beauty? Shouldn't you? What's the moral mathematics of the moment?"

No offense to Mr. Bell, who is a genius violinist.  And yes he certainly sounded better than the average busker. However the acoustics were awful. Gene disagrees and says "The acoustics proved surprisingly kind." I agree with him that "[the subway layout] caught the sound and bounced it back round and resonant." To me, it bounced the sound around and around like a bad reverb. The notes ran over one another.

The acoustics of music matters to me as well the player and the instrument. If that makes me swine, so be it. 

Also to answer his question, "Do I have time for beauty?" Yes, I have a lot more time than I used to being a SAHM and less. I'm no longer corporate swine. Though I do have to rush sometimes to get my son to his various appointments and my daughter to preschool, but otherwise yes, I have time to linger dawdle when I walk from point A to point B.wander over to where my kids want to go. I have no choice. I herd swine walk with young children.

My kids aged 4 and 2 both make our walk to the library, a multi-sensory journey. They notice and comment on every flower, pebbles, the beehives.  Every difference is noted and stared at, even once a dead rat. Okay, the dead rat was really gross.  On my own, I wouldn't have looked at it so closely as I did with my daughter who was both repulsed and fascinated by its squashed dessication. And it did have a kind of stark beauty.

My children have no idea what "moral mathematics of the moment" means. And I don't know if faced with Joshua Bell in a confined space, we would have hurried on -- "Too loud!" my son might have exclaimed. Or if the video distorted the experience, and we would have found Joshua's playing beautiful even in the subway. If so, we'd have stopped and I'd have had time to notice, "Hey that's Joshua Bell!" disguised both musically and physically.

Either way, as moms, I think most of us recognize there is no standard of beauty we all can agree on. My swine son finds his toy trains a constant source of joy and beauty, as well as his dayglo orange pants. My swine daughter loves her garish sparkly shoes decorated with Disney princesses.

Ironically one of my daughter's favorite games is to address me as "Mommy [insert name of animal here]."  I must respond with "Daughter [animal].  So calling her "daughter swine" would be great to her.

I think they're the most beautiful fascinating children in the world. I pity the mom who doesn't find constant joy and beauty in their own children in between bouts of finding them utter pains.  Even with all his medical issues and multiple delays, I'd still choose my son, quickly won over by his sweet cry of "Mummy!" and the way he laughs and laughs until he's totally breathless.

But no, I personally don't find all children are beautiful.  As an ideal, yes, and certainly I tend to find most children cute. Yet though it may be unPC, I think a few children are just plain ugly and a few more are constantly annoying. And I honestly and sincerely hope that their parents think otherwise.   

I also hope that if Joshua Bell's mom was in the subway, she found her son's performance utterly entrancing.

Crossposted to Silicon Valley Moms Blog

Outsource your mom work

One of the many ironies of my life is that I decided I could "only handle two kids". Then nature had the last laugh and gave me a kid who's so much work. His list of medical needs, therapy appointments and developmental exercises take up hours a day. And that doesn't include the fact that he's not walking at almost two and has various other delays, so we have all the typical baby stuff too.

He's also the happiest person I know. I laugh with him every single day. I find myself drowning in cliches. But he really is like the super sweet smiley cancer child you see on tv, bravely enduring chemo and other noxious procedures. At least as long he gets his own way.

But while he makes it all worthwhile, it doesn't reduce the sheer amount of work. I dunno how I and my husband do it. I dunno how any parents do it, except one thing at a time. Sometimes when I think of the sum total of what my son needs and what my daughter needs and what I can do, I start to panic, and feel totally bad and inadequate. In fact in many ways I have battled and overcome these need to do it all and be the perfect mom at the same time as my son has battled his medical issues. It helps a lot that my son is so sweet about his illness. But like my son, I have these little relapse and setbacks.

But the biggest lessons I've learned is outsourcing. Yeah a Silicon Valley term. This is Silicon Valley Moms blog. Before my son I totally underestimated the value of outsourcing. One of the best things a friend did for me in the midst of one of my son's medical crises was to say "Thida, you REALLY need a break." and take me out.

But before my son, I'd get stuck on guilt. Sure I'd take time off. But in my heart, I believed moms must do every aspect of motherhood, and never take any time off or I was a BAD MOM. Well okay if I had work, I could do a little less, but not really. I had to be there for everything, do everything.

I still encounter this attitude all the time. I see moms who are totally stressed and overwhelmed to the point where they no longer enjoy their own children. When I suggest they might want to take some time off, other moms chime in like I'm crazy for suggesting it. In my experience, the more work your children are, the more necessary breaks are. When I come back from a break, I come back refreshed and I appreciate my children ten times more. My children also appreciate me for about five minutes, then they go back to taking me for granted again.

Sometimes outsourcing means hiring someone, but outsourcing can also mean old-fashioned swapping with other moms and babysitting from grandparents. I do have a nanny because like I said before, my son is just too much work, and we can afford it. I also swap child care of my daughter with a couple other moms.

According to my mom, a wise Burmese woman, this "need to do it all" is a)Western thing since most women outside the West don't raise their children in houses as a couple, but rather in an extended family and b) a phenomenon of the past century. In the past, even in the West, people lived in extended families. People other than moms help raised children. Everyone acknowledges single parents have a tough job, yet somehow the two-parent family is supposed to be sufficient. With all my son's needs, I need more help than just my husband can provide.

Perhaps some moms never need a break, but that doesn't negate the fact that others do. Nor does it mean that the parents who need breaks love their children any less. This is not a question of love, but of parents' capacity to give and children's demands. Some children are more demanding than others. Some parents have more energy than others.

Mom work is very undervalued and not paid at all, but it can be very hard. Let's help each other. I rally you all to outsource mom work! Moms who have more energy and/or less demanding kids, if you see a mom that's stressed and overwhelmed, tell her it's okay to take breaks. If you live close enough, offer to exchange babysitting. Moms who are stressed and overwhelmed, please ask for help, so you can enjoy your kids again. You'll be a better mom if you do.

Crossposted to Silicon Valley moms blog

We're not color blind unless we can't see colors

Just as I think it's silly to deny that the men and women are biologically different, I think it's silly to deny there are races, or whatever you want to call, specific genetic characteristics that tend to cluster together. There are slight differences in biology beyond gradiences in skin color. However we're far more than our biology. I think the main ways race actually denote any differences of importance is in medicine. Even in anthropology and archaelogy, people are discovering that people are more interbred than previously thought. Like gender, race is mostly huge layers of cultural constructs layered on top of a thin layer of biology. So please don't tell me you're color blind unless you can't actually see certain colors, or I'll laugh at you.

These babies all look slightly different in terms of body shape, hair type, not just skin color.


Though people fail to recognise that many multi-racial people break their standard filters for determining race. Transgendered or intersexed people break people's filters for determining gender, but that's another discussion. And especially if you're a doctor, you had better ask someone's race rather than just assume you know, because it should affect how you treat them medically.

So I don't see anything wrong with identifying someone by race or ethnicity anymore than I see something wrong with identifying someone as a man or a woman. It's usually easier to tell someone's sex, than someone's ethnicity and you might be wrong more often, but it is an identifying attribute. However I do see something wrong with using race as the sole identifier to describe someone. I'm not the Anglo Burmese woman. There are others like me.

And then of course there's the problem that once you've identified someone as belonging to a particular race or ethnicity, what you do with that information. Small children like Special K don't understand race and ethnicity, but the construct is embedded in our culture and after a certain age, it becomes part of one's way of thinking like gender. Special K already understands gender. And unless you're somehow incapable of absorbing cultural norms, I just don't believe that people don't assign people to some category of race or ethnicity. Categorizing is what humans do. How we make sense of the world.

I would argue that a person who says "I'm color blind" actually assigns everyone to the category of white. People who are rude, or uneducated, or somehow don't fit zie's notion of whatever white means are then downgraded to whatever ethnicity they actually are. That way zie is free to comfortably keep zie's stereotypes about race or ethnicity, because these people fit the stereotype anyway.

Blog against racism week

It's Blog against Racism week. Details are here.

I'm a disabled Anglo Burmese woman of above average height. I'm married to a Chinese American man of average height.

The worst way I experience racism is when I've been mistaken for Hispanic and get treated badly. Along with this assumption is frequently the assumption I can't speak English, and the person speaks to me in loud patronizing slow tones or tries really bad Spanish. However as soon as I open my mouth and my slight Queen's English accent comes out, the person realises I'm not in fact Hispanic. That may be part of the reason I retained a little accent, but if so it was unconscious.

The main way I experience racism is white Americans often assume I'm white, because I have relatively pale skin (not white but a little lighter than most East Asians) and I'm tall. Sometimes African Americans do also. That unconscious assumption that everyone is white dovetailed with my childhood discomfort with my own race. There's much about my Burmese heritage I don't understand and most Americans have never even of heard of Myanmar. I used to feel bad about this, that I wasn't Burmese enough. My brother and sister are both several shades darker than me, darker than most East Asians, unmistakably a non-white shade. Then I realised that beyond this set of folks, other people knew I was multi-racial. They might not get the Burmese part, but they knew I wasn't white.

And I'm afraid when people do know something about Burma, their characterization of my mother's people invariably grates. They describe them as happy or loving life or backwards, terms you'd use to describe children. Yet before college I didn't identify as a person of color.

But I also see that it's hard to recognize the privileges one has. I went to a womyn's music festival and yes woman was spelled with a 'y'. At a concert, some women of color were dancing in front of some white women in wheelchairs. The women in wheelchairs asked the women of color to move, because they couldn't see. The wheelchair seating was limited to a specific area. The women of color called them racist and oppressing them. Finally a woman in a wheelchair managed to get a guard who escorted the women of color to another area. Later one of the women of color complained to me about their "ill-treatment". She was totally shocked when I not only took the women in wheelchairs side, but that in fact she was being incredibly ableist not to see how far from being oppressed she was abusing her able-bodied privilege to oppress others.

But in many ways my self-image has changed a lot. I feel a lot more comfortable identifying as half Burmese. I can see more clearly the culture my mother passed on to me. And in some ways right now I'm the ideal Burmese woman.

Yet this has not changed people's assumptions. Most people who know me say my daughter looks a lot like me. However she has straight black classic Asian hair. My hair is a couple shades lighter than black and wavy. Once I was asked if my daughter was adopted! Others would ask the question "Where does your daughter come from?" and look surprised when I said "From me". Now that my son has been born and he has dark brown hair, I rarely get asked if my children are my birth children. Ironically other than hair color and skin color, he looks a lot like C.

Earlier in my life, I would feel offended or worried that people think my children don't belong to me. Now I think it's funny and reflects their own silly assumptions. I accept my role as someone who can pass as both white and ablebodied not because I am either or get to bask in privilege, but because people fail to notice the obvious due to their own blinders. At some point, another family member shows up (besides C), or I have to eat, and the gig is up. I get tired of speaking up sometimes and I haven't had much energy to do it lately, but I do still speak up instead of remaining silent. That's the best I can do right now.

But actually I do think I have a tremendous amount of racial privilege that Americans don't talk about much. I profit every day from other races in the Third World including my mother's native country. The US spends billions of dollars arming oppressive regimes who kill and rape people. Billions of children starve while my country and other rich nations do very little. The Gates foundation leads the fight against basic African diseases. I think it's shameful it has taken so long and it takes a software engineer to wake up the Western world. The equivalent masskiller European diseases were wiped out or controlled in the beginning of the previous century or earlier. I buy goods made by people who will never have access to the infrastructure, education or goods and services that I do simply because of where they were born. I know I contribute to the problem by not paying careful attention to where I buy things and that my government's own policies contribute massively to the problem. And most of the time I don't give it a second thought. I take it for granted my numerous privileges like running water, a tv, and basic sanitation. Only sometimes do I remember shocking things like if Little T had been born in Myanmar, he would not have survived.