MODERN WOMEN’S CHOICES: CARE, OVERCARE, UNDERCARE or JUST UNINFORMED?
There have been a variety of responses to last month’s article School Shooters: By-Product of an Emotionally, Spiritually Bankrupt Nation so much so that it was important to respond to both the men and women who emailed and called me. One article cannot convey all of the changes that need to be addressed in our supremely patriarchal culture with regards to violence, women or children.
For the FEMALE respondents: To begin on a positive note, I have been blessed, really blessed, to befriend MANY families who for generations instinctively knew how to value, respect and cherish their unborn and birthed children from all races, religions and socioeconomic backgrounds. It is from these few select families that I take heart, have hope and continue to pray that humanity wakes up in time! In addition, the younger generations of woman are awakening to all of the below comments and issues, not only having discussions but also passionately rebellious and action oriented in assisting women from around the world to value, respect, honor, cherish, love themselves, each other and their children. A revolution has begun to return women to the status, of equality (although men keep trying to surpass us with test tube babies) in this, our human experience. For that, I am VERY hopeful and happy! One day, the ‘spirit’ will return in the eyes of all babies, infants and toddlers.
SEPARATION MIND, BODY, EMOTION, SPIRIT
There is great concern for the child in the womb. For years I have been lecturing on the inhumanity imposed on the unborn and newly born child. The very fact that mothers have lost the instinct to ‘feel’ the fertilized egg in the womb within days of fertilization is incomprehensible. I had a client who was 5 MONTHS with child before she ever suspected she was pregnant! Indigenous women ‘know’ right after impregnation. That modern women need external implements, products and results is a testament to the separation of mind, body, emotion and spirit. With that, how can any pregnant mother take care of the growing infant when she is disconnected from herself?
SELF-SABOTAGE
Many women, products of the spiritual, emotional emptiness, are mistresses of self-sabotage imbibing in too much alcohol (approximately 4.6 million (about one-third) are women), drugs (prescription and illicit statistics vary); participating in unhealthy, abusive relationships (33 million or 1.5 per year); indulging in fatty, sugar-filled and highly salted foods becoming obese and a health risk; AND (my highly charged pet peeve) abortions. (This is the subject of an extensive article soon to be published). Briefly, abortions render them sterile, with ripped wombs, guilt ridden emotions, broken spirits and as years progress, physical maladies vaginally and otherwise like endometriosis or breast cancer (symptoms which very few in the professions choose to discuss in any meaningful way). Is it any wonder that pharmaceutical birth control, legalized abortion, infertility issues, high infant mortality and high birth defects all resurfaced during the same time period?
C-SECTION
There was an article published in Journal of the American Medical Association more than a decade ago that has been marginalized by media and professionals. In the uterus, a child develops twice the number of neurons it needs to sustain a healthy life. When the child moves through the birth canal naturally (without forceps assistance), HALF of those neurons are destroyed leaving the child with manageable numbers. Nature’s plan is always perfect. HOWEVER, when a child is birthed by C-section, those neurons remain leaving the child overstimulated, oversensitive to external stimuli (such as autistic, ADD, sensitive to light, sound, noises, allergies, etc.). The number of C sections has multiplied over the last twenty years having begun as procedures to minimize health risks for moms and evolving into convenience factors for physicians (and parents).
The rate of cesarean section in the U.S. (and in many other developed nations)has been criticized by the World Health Organization (WHO), which suggests that the C-section rate should not rise above 15%. In the US in 2009, Cesareans accounted for 32.9% of all deliveries, up from 20.7% in 1996. Additionally, induced labor more than doubles the likelihood of a C-section. In my opinion, over-medicalization is responsible for the high rate of induction and C-section in the U.S. leading to the high rate of increased maternal mortality and the number of physical issues mothers have when the acupuncture meridian lines are severed during the process.
EPIDURALS
The normal hormones during aN unmedicated birth bond a newborn to their mother and imprint on the newborn the information about which species they are part of, with the benefit of reducing intra-species violence. So at birth, a baby learns to recognize their own “kind”. It may be the roots of kindness.
CIRCUMCISION
Then, there is circumcision for both boys (Western cultures) and girls (in middle-Eastern and African cultures):
BOYS
• About 117 boys die each year in the United States as a result of their circumcision, most from infections or blood loss.
• The current U.S. circumcision rate is steadily declining. In 2009 it was 54.5%, and in 2010 it was 32%. That’s a huge drop from 56% in 2006 and 65% in 2002.
• Most physicians do not have their sons circumcised. Why not, if circumcision is medically advisable? Since most have performed the surgery as part of their training, they are the ones who should know more about its consequences than anyone else.
• Physicians are biased toward circumcision. Circumcised doctors are 5 times more likely to recommend circumcision to patients.
• Contrary to frequent claims, infants do feel pain as intensely as adults, and very possibly even more.
• Circumcision regularly removes a shocking 3/4 of the penis’ sensitivity through the removal of the ridged band, foreskin “lips,” and most often the entire frenulum.
• Anesthesia is used in only 45% of circumcisions; the type of anesthetic varies. The most effective method does not eliminate all pain, and the most common type used, a topical creme, does almost nothing to reduce it. In fact, a major clinical test of the various types of anesthetics, on actual infants, was halted for humane reasons because of the intense pain.
• As adults, men circumcised in infancy are almost 5 times more likely to be diagnosed with erectile dysfunction (ED).
• Circumcised men and boys are 60% more likely to suffer from alexithymia, a psychological trait disorder which causes difficulty in identifying and expressing one’s emotions, which can lead to difficulties in sustaining relationships.
• The complication rate for circumcision varies from 3—6 percent to as high as 55 percent.
• Meatal stenosis (narrowing of the urinary opening) is found in 20% of circumcised boys. The average male will have more health problems from being circumcised than from being left alone.
• Circumcision has never been proven to be effective in either reducing or treating cervical cancer, penile cancer, urinary tract infections, or sexually transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS.
• Not one medical association in America, or anywhere else in the world, recommends infant circumcision; some even recommend against it. At no time in its 75 years has the American Academy of Pediatrics ever recommended infant circumcision
GIRLS
This practice came to light recently in the US when immigrants were pleading with physicians to continue the religious practice from their country of origin. Female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) is a traditional practice with severe health consequences for girls and women. It occurs mainly in countries along a belt stretching from Senegal in West Africa to Somalia in East Africa and to Yemen in the Middle East, but it is also practiced in some parts of South-East Asia and immigrant communities in the US and Europe. The procedure is generally carried out on girls between the ages of 4 and 14; it is also done to infants, women who are about to be married and, sometimes, to women who are pregnant with their first child or who have just given birth. It is often performed by traditional practitioners, including midwives and barbers, without anesthesia, using scissors, razor blades or broken glass. It is estimated that more than 130 million girls and women alive today have undergone mutilation.
The World Health Organization (WHO) groups FGM/C into four types:
1. Excision of the prepuce [the fold of skin surrounding the clitoris], with or without excision
of part or the entire clitoris.
2. Excision of the clitoris with partial or total excision of the labia minora [the smaller inner
folds of the vulva].
3. Excision of part or all of the external genitalia and stitching or narrowing of the vaginal opening (infibulation).
4. Unclassified, which includes pricking, piercing or incising of the clitoris and/or labia; stretching of the clitoris and/or labia; cauterization by burning of the clitoris and surrounding tissue; scraping of tissue surrounding the opening of the vagina (angurya cuts) or cutting of the vagina (gishiri cuts); introduction of corrosive substances or herbs into the vagina to cause bleeding or to tighten or narrow the vagina; and any other procedure that can be included in the definition of female genital mutilation.
There is no medical evidence that supports the practice. It is more likely to result in serious complications that would lead to urine retention, hemorrhaging, menstrual complications, infertility, loss of sexual pleasure, infection, severe pain and mental illness.
OVERCARING MOTHERS
To MALE respondents: Among my clients, several men were affected by both my article and the actual shootings at Sandy Hook. One man said, “I can understand how someone can shoot their mother”. As much as 50% of males (and probably more) are parented by mothers with partners, husbands and mates who are absent for one reason or another- divorce, constant travel, job hours, abandonment. In addition, many women, both married and single, go back to work immediately after the birth of their infant. These issues, as well as others ( like separating the children from mother at birth), combine to add to the lack of bonding and subliminal guilt many mothers feel about abandoning their babies due to political, societal, moral, cultural and financial pressures. Rather than developing the social, emotional and coping skills that are transferred and modeled during the preverbal stages of life by family and close friends, children are left to strangers who have no vested emotional, psychological or spiritual interest in the child….and paid minimum wage for their services.
As the years progress, that pang of guilt and lack of bonding magnifies for mother (and father). She attempts to fill the void by becoming overindulgent in material ‘stuff’, by attending every sports event, hovering, clinging and/or heaping her emptiness negatively on her child (the child is not good enough, smart enough, strong enough, etc.). These are all symptoms of OVERCARE. If mother had nurtured strong roots of love, safety and security in the child in the beginning stages of life, letting go during puberty would be a natural, gradual progression and the teen angst might be less violent and antisocial. But when the early stages of development have been thwarted as the child grows into tween years and puberty, aggressive and extreme behavior, alienation, isolation, especially for boys, adds salt to mother’s guilty wounds. Her many attempts to fill the gaps from infancy with superficial offerings, have undesired effects. Perhaps, the Sandy Hook shooter, whose mother was working during his infancy, attempted to assuage her guilt from her son’s anti-social behavior by home schooling him and spending more time with him. By the tween years, it is too late to compensate for the stages missed in infancy.
If speech is not introduced at the right time, children do not communicate. If a child does not crawl before walking, a child’s brain may be malformed. Stages missed are missed opportunities for the natural progression and development of the psyche, physiology, spirit and brain. To retrieve those stages missed during or after puberty takes enormous time, effort and energy.
The Early Childhood Longitudinal Study conducted by the National Center for Educational Statistics found that Hispanic children develop better social skills than their counterparts due to the cultural family structure. Human kind has devolved when children are ripped away from the safety and security of mother and the home, to be handled, raised and educated by ‘the state, Big Brother or strangers’ who are not invested in the child’s welfare for the future. When culture and society realizes the mistake it has been perpetrating since the early 1950’s and encourages mother’s to stay home and nurse their children (or not have them if they choose careers) or have societal structures where extended families are involved in the child’s early development instead of sending them to day cares and out of the home, then we will begin to see a decline in violence and childhood psychological disorders which lead to dysfunctional adult behaviors.
All in all, the abuse to babies – prenatal, natal, infant as well as during the formative years – combined with that of women, seems to be unlimited among all cultures on this planet. HOWEVER, I am, hopeful that this is the age, time and era when women will again unite, break the chains of being marginalized and honor, respect, encourage, communicate and engage in a revolution that emulates motherhood, womanhood and childhood to its rightful place superseding materialism, the almighty dollar, antiquated religious/political doctrine and law, and all other factors that devalue and desensitize the human experience.
Daria M. Brezinski, PhD is a member of and writes for the Association for Humanistic Psychology, Association for Drugless Practitioners, and the American Holistic Medical Association. www.DocDaria.com daria@docdarb.com
REFERENCES
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2012/03/28/cesarean-sections-in-the-u-s-the-trouble-with-assembling-evidence-from-data/
http://www.ncadv.org/files/DomesticViolenceFactSheet(National).pdf
http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/fasd/data.html
http://circumcisiondecisionmaker.com/circumcision-facts/overview/
http://www.unicef.org/publications/files/FGM-C_final_10_October.pdf
http://www.gentlebirth.org/archives/bbepirsk.html
WHO, UNICEF and UNFPA, Female Genital Mutilation:A joint WHO/UNICEF/UNFPA statement, World Health Organization, Geneva, 1997, pp. 1–2.
Ontario Human Rights Commission, Policy on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), Ontario Human Rights Commission, Toronto, Revised 22 November 2000, pg 7
Hosken, Fran P., The Hosken Report: Genital and Sexual Mutilation of Females, 4th Edition, Women’s International Network News, Lexington, Massachusetts (USA), 1994, p. 334.
World Health Organization, ‘Female Genital Mutilation’, Fact Sheet No. 241 (June 2000). Accessed on the Web at http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs241/en/ (21 Oct. 2005).