Obesity, Our Epidemic.

Epidemic. Plague. Outbreak. Is this really what obesity has become in our country? According to the Journal of the American Medical Association, nearly one third of our country is obese. Why? Is it in the water? Is it some mutation that is ravaging our genetic make up? I am not discrediting individuals with legitimate medical disorders that have lead to their obesity (i.e. thyroid disorders). But in most people, obesity can be boiled down to poor diet and inactivity. But there is a light at the end of the tunnel, because our country is becoming more aware of these factors, and is doing something about it.

Fast food has become the center of most American family diets. And why not? It's quick, cheap, and tastes good. But with it's high fat, sugar, and salt content, it is something that is best reserved for rare occasions, and rightly so. In the article Fatty Foods May Cause Cocaine-like Addiction, the author Sarah Klein reports that Paul J. Kenny, Ph.D., an associate professor of molecular therapeutics at the Scripps Research Institute, in Jupiter, Florida, found that junk food has the same effect on the brain as drugs like cocaine (Klein, para 2). Kenny performed a study on three groups of rats: group one was fed normal rat pellets, group two was fed fatty human foods like cheesecake, bacon, and sausage for one hour each day, and group three was allowed to pig out on the human foods for up to twenty-three hours a day. The rats in the third group, “gradually developed a tolerance to the pleasure the food gave them and had to eat more to experience a high.” (Klein, para 5). Said high was so consuming for the third group of rats that even when the researchers put an electric shock under their feet while in presence of the unhealthy food, they still continued to binge. Add to that the findings of another study, and the result is a bit unnerving. Dr. David Ludwig, director of the obesity program at Children’s Hospital Boston surveyed 6,212 kids from all regions of the country and from many different socio-economic levels and found that almost one-third of American children ages four to nineteen eat fast food on a regular basis (Holguin, para 1). One can come to the conclusion, then, that these children are on the fast track to becoming obese. The added incentive of a toy from the latest Disney movie is not helping. But with today’s ongoing recession, coupled with the fact that health food is not as readily available or affordable (Krukowski, para 1), it is easy to see why many people rely on these cheap, quick foods.

The economy is thought to have something to do with the levels of inactivity that is leading to more obese children in our country, too. Debbye Turner of The Early Show reported that only six percent of schools in our country offer daily physical education classes (para 2). This is due to the fact that it costs approximately $500,000 just to start a physical education program (Turner, para 3). Since The National Association for Sports and Physical Education “recommends two and a half hours of physical activity a week for elementary school kids, and nearly four hours a week for middle and high schoolers,”(Turner, para 9) this lack of physical education programs for children is something that needs to be addressed. Another problem that needs addressing is the amount of television that our children are watching while being inactive, and what they are watching. Jane E. Brody of The New York Times quoted Dr. Margo G. Wootan, the nutrition policy director at the Center for Science in the Public Interest as saying, “…junk-food marketing is a major contributor to childhood obesity” (para 7). In one of the Center’s studies of 548 Boston public school students, researchers discovered that for every hour of television that a child watched, said child ate an average of 167 calories, and mostly the high-calorie, low-nutrition junk foods that are advertised for on television (Brody, para 9). Actually, another study done by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation found that of 8,854 food ads viewed, there were no ads for healthy foods, like fruits and vegetables, that were targeted towards children (Brody, para 8). So not only are children less active than they should be, but while they are being inactive they are being bombarded with advertisements for fatty, sugary foods.

Fortunately, the National Conference of State Legislators was quoted as saying that, “…efforts are underway to raise awareness and encourage healthy eating and a more active lifestyle” (NCSL, para 4). The First Lady, Michelle Obama, has started a “Let’s Move” program, designed to change the way that children play and eat (Parker-Pope, para 5). There is even a county in California that has banned promotional toys that accompany “child-size portions of cheese burgers and chicken nuggets if those meals don’t meet certain nutritional standards” (McKinley, para 1). It is my hope that these efforts will go a long way in changing the way that we as Americans think about nutrition and fitting healthy physical activity into our already active lives. Joseph Miller, MD, a preventive cardiologist with Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, put it best, “You don’t have to be a Nike man or woman. You don’t have to buy equipment, fancy shoes, or a gym membership…we encourage people to walk the dog, walk a little further in the parking lot, walk the concourses at the airport”(para 1). It is the little things that will add up to us becoming a more healthy country.

Treatment. Remedy. Restore to health. Through our countries continued efforts to increase awareness of the dangerously high rate of obesity, and individual efforts to eat better and be more active, it is my hope that our future will be a healthier one.




WORK CITED

Works Cited
Brody, Jane E. "Risks for Youths Who Eat What They Watch." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 19 Apr. 2010. Web. 5 May 2010. .
Dakss, Brian. "Obesity Up, Phys Ed Down." The Early Show. CBS Broadcasting Inc., 27 Jan. 2005. Web. 5 May 2010. .
Flegal, Katherine M., Margaret D. Carroll, Cynthia L. Ogden, and Lester R. Curtin. "Prevalence and Trends in Obesity Among US Adults, 1999-2008." The Journal of the American Medical Association 303.3 (2010). Health Reference Center Academic. Web. 5 May 2010. .
Krukowski, Rebecca A., Delia Smith West, Jean Harvey-Berino, and Elaine Prewitt. "Neighborhood Impact on Healthy Food Availability and Pricing in Food Stores.(Report)." Journal of Community Health 35.3 (2010). Health Reference Center Academic. Web. 5 May 2010. .
Lerche Davis, Jeanie. "Inactivity, Obesity Are Killing Americans." WebMD. WebMD, LLC., 5 Mar. 2004. Web. 5 May 2010. .
McKinley, Jesse. "Citing Obesity of Children, County Bans Fast-Food Toys." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 27 Apr. 2010. Web. 5 May 2010. .
"Nutrition, Physical Activity & Obesity Overview." The National Conference of State Legislatures. The National Conference of State Legislatures, 2006. Web. 5 May 2010. .
Parker-Pope, Tara. "In Obesity Epidemic, What?s One Cookie?" The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 1 Mar. 2010. Web. 5 May 2010. .

Interesting Finds...

My research so far has uncovered some information that (to me, anyway) seems to be common knowledge, and other information that literally made my jaw drop. For example, according to Jeanie Lerche Davis of Webmd, in the year 200, 17% of deaths were due to poor diet and lack of physical activity. This is only 1% less than deaths due to smoking (para 1) . How crazy is that? Additionaly, Jesse McKinley of the New York Times reported that, "the board of supervisors in Santa Clara County, south of San Francisco, voted Tuesday to ban the promotional toys that often accompany child-size portions of cheeseburgers and chicken nuggets if those meals don’t meet certain nutritional standards" (para 1). As dissapointed as I would be if I were a kid in Santa Clara County with a toy-less happy meal, I feel this is a wise choice. When I take my sisters to Mc Donalds, I have to enforce a "no toy until you are done eating" rule, so I've seen first hand just how much of an incentive the toys are. If fresh, healthy meals were accompanied by them, I am sure my sisters (and their peers)would be more inclined to eat them. Fascinating stuff, huh?

So far...

As we all well know, obesity has become an epidemic. There are millions of theories floating around about causes, and so my difficulty with this project so far has been narrowing it down to three or four concrete causes. So far, I have chosen two: inactivity and fast food. I chose these two because they have the greatest amount of support behind them from many reputable sources. For example, I have read an article in the New York times about how the more commercials that an individual takes in while watching TV(and as such, being inactive) the more likely that person is to become obese. I’ve also downloaded McDonald’s nutrition facts and ingredient lists to my flash drive, and am looking forward to sorting through them. The other two causes I am leaning towards are the link between infant formula and obesity, and the fact that food now a days is mostly corn derivatives and preservatives. But like I’ve said, there are thousands of theories out there about obesities causes, so who knows what I’ll find out there…

The Man

Is no holiday safe? Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Halloween – they all have become over run by corporations and their gimmicks. Even Oreo has come out with a Spring Time cookie, complete with green frosting that stains your entire mouth green (just ask my Grandpa). But is this such a bad thing? Take Earth Day, for instance. It is the newest of the holidays to join the ranks of the bigger ones as being an excuse to sell a product, and I have a mixed reaction about it. On one hand, companies are stretching their “earth-friendliness.” In her article At 40, Earth Day Is Now Big Business, Leslie Kaufman of the New York Times sites that, “For this year’s celebration, Bahama Umbrella is advertising a specially designed umbrella, with a drain so that water “can be stored, reused and recycled”(para 3). On the other hand, I can see the advantages of having a holiday be a reason to sell a product – awareness. Leslie states that “…many corporations say that it is often the business community that now leads the way in environmental innovation — and they want to get their customers interested” (Kaufman para 14). And who among you can disagree? It may be sad that no holiday, even hippy rooted Earth Day, is safe from “the man,” but getting people aware of our Earth’s problems is how we can eventually solve them.

I'm not stupid! Thank goodness...

When a woman is pregnant, she sometimes get what is called “pregnancy brain.” She will forget simple words and tasks, like that thing that makes the stuff in the morning (i.e. coffee maker) and to put gas in her car (happened to me twice). Its been almost seven months since I’ve had my baby, but I still have been spelling things wrong and using words in the wrong context. I had been chalking it up to recovering from my pregnancy brain, but after so long it seemed a little far fetched to do so. So I thought maybe I was just getting stupid. I mean, why else would I still be making silly mistakes when I am supposedly an intelligent individual? Then, I had an epiphany: I’m not stupid, I am just more willing to make those mistakes in the first place.

I have always been a terrible speller (I blame dyslexia) and had tendency to use words in the wrong context. But I’ve also always prided myself on my intelligence. So much so, that one sure way to piss me off was to make me feel stupid. I used to hate getting corrected, so I would get crabby. A little ridiculous, right? How could I live with being crabby every time someone told me I spelt veiw wrong (which is every time)? Well I tell you, it was exhausting. In the past I had learned to just hide it – if I wanted to use a word but did not know exactly in which context to use it, I just would not use it. I never hand wrote things, that way those squiggly red lines would underline my mistakes instead of my teacher, who would no doubt judge me. But since having Jack I am less self conscious, and therefore am willing to make errors and have people correct me. I’m not going to lie, it still irks me a tad, but I am making those blunders less and less, because I am re-learning things like “I before E except after C.” So there you have it, my epiphany: I’m not dumb after all.

Once the Ball Started Rolling...

Oh man, this was tough for me. Why? I don't know. But I asked everyone I knew before I finally came up with my topic. Literally, I was calling people. But after a weekend of topic searching, I narrowed it down to three: breastfeeding, organic gardening, and the obesity epidemic. I made the following list and decided to go with the latter choice, obesity. Note: all topics are what I consider trends, so, for example, a cause for breastfeeding coming out as a trend is the benefits to the child.


1. POSSIBLE TOPICS:

breastfeeding

organic gardening

obesity


2. CAUSES OF TOPICS:

breastfeeding
- benefits for the child
- benefits for the mother
- cost effective
- convenience

organic gardening
- better soil = better food
- recession (growing a garden is a good way to save money)

obesity epidemic
- formula fed babies tend to become obese later in life
- less sleep from stress
- large portions
- high fructose corn syrup
- processed foods
- fast food

3. AND THE WINNER IS...OBESITY.

And so went my brainstorming process. It took a while to get the ball rolling, but came easily once it did. My "causes" of the current obestiy epidemic were thanks to my mother and her reading the New York Times, but I am looking forward to delving deeper!

Brilliant

Sir Ken Robinson made many good points about how children’s creative talents are suppressed by our education systems. He wisely said that schools “mine our minds for a specific commodity.” Unfortunately, creativity is not a hot commodity as far as our schools are concerned. The story about Gillian Lynne and her teachers assuming that her inability to sit still was an illness and not a gift is proof. I also love his comment about how people grow out of creativity, rather than into it. My previous story about my sister Justice and her creative way of thinking made that comment hit home with me. I agree with Sir Robinson that it is sad that kids don’t get the chance to develop the special creative side to them; they are told that those talents will not get them work when they are adults, so they should focus instead on things that will get them a job.


I was fortunate enough to go to a middle school called The School of Technology and Arts, or SOTA. We learned science through art and math through music. We were given the chance to indulge our creative sides. I learned to love the right side of my brain, and use it not only to embrace the artist in me, but to use it to learn. I thrived during my short three years there, and was sad to have to move on to a non-charter high school. But the emphasis my teachers there put on being creative stuck with me, and I am happier for it. I use that side of me everyday: when I get dressed, when I write, when I doodle; as such, I feel like I am less bogged down by everyday hassles that can stress out some of my peers. In sum, Sir Ken Robinson, you are brilliant. (Brilliant and hilarious; I laughed out loud during the whole video.)

Tsk Tsk

The following is a summary of my “rock bottom.” I make a point not to make excuses for the choices I made because they were just that, my choices. I will tell you all like it was and is. I am not proud of what I did, but part of accepting consequences for mistakes you make is knowing that people will never think the same of you. What happened last year will follow me the rest of my life, and I won’t try to hide it, because it made me who I am today.


In November of 2007 I was hired at Macy’s of Onalaska. I only worked there for 3 months, but I stole quite a bit of money from the registers to which I was posted during that time. In April I was charged with Business Theft - Class A misdemeanor, which is one step down from a felony. Had I been charged with a felony it would have meant no financial aid, no voting, and likely no more employment. I was sentenced to a year of probation, 100 hours of community service, to pay restitution (compensation), and to attend a women’s group about criminal thinking. I managed to get a job at a bar in my home town, but apparently, had not learned my lesson. I stole money from the register for about two months, and was confronted by my boss when he noticed that things were not adding up. He made me a deal – I would continue to work for him and his wife under strict supervision, and would have a portion of my paycheck docked every week until he was compensated. I was very grateful for the chance to make things right, and was a model employee from that point on. I made the best Bloody Marys in town, too, which didn’t hurt any. In January of 2009 I got the best news I have ever and likely will ever receive- I was pregnant. Thrilled, I told everybody, including my boss. He was not quite so happy for me. He knew that that meant maternity leave at one point, which meant a break in compensation and, technically, a breach in our little contract. Consequently, I was greeted the next day at work by a county sheriff.


I was arrested on January 23rd and taken to the La Crosse County jail, where I was held without bail for revocation of probation. Someone is revoked when they fail to comply with the terms of their probation. I stole while on probation for stealing, so I was in no uncertain terms, revoked. Besides my revocation, I was charged with 3 counts of Business Theft – Class A Misdemeanor. For those of you counting at home, that makes four total on my record. My sentence given for my revocation (which was considered a separate case) was 60 days in jail. I had already sat for 45 days and was given “good time,” so I was to be released on electronic monitoring after my sentencing for my new charges. Good time, for those who don’t know, is a reduction of your sentence for good behavior when you are sitting for a non-violent crime. My court date for the new charges came, and I was sentenced to 2 years probation, 200 hours community service, counseling, and to pay restitution. The judge also made me eligible for expungement, which meant that if I complied with the terms of my probation and my probation officer okayed it, I would get the new charges cleared off my record (the old one would remain, as well as the fact that I was revoked from probation). So on March 9, 2009, I was let out (and went straight to Burger King). Then on June 4th, my “government issued jewelry,” as my dad called it, was removed.


I am still on probation today, and have undergone a proverbial “180” since my time in orange. Being pregnant and terrified that you messed things up completely will do that to a person. I laid on my narrow cot and cried most of my nights there, when all was quiet after “lights out” and I was left with just my thoughts. Everyone I knew in my life was disappointed in me, as they should be, and I was consumed by questions about my future. How was I going to support my baby? How was I every going to earn back everyone’s trust? How was I ever going to get through this? I had to take a good hard look at the path I was going down, and chose to go running in the opposite direction. I was determined to never be in this situation ever again. In county jail, there are a lot of superstitions surrounding “coming back.” If, while cleaning, the broom touched your feet, you had to spit on it or you’d come back. If you wrote your name on anything there, you’d come back. If you started a book and did not finish it before you were released, you’d come back. Needless to say, I spit on that broom, never wrote my name down, and made damn sure I finished my book. But the biggest reason I have not gone and will never go back is because I have changed fundamentally. My outlook on life is no longer a grim one, and as such my self-destructive behavior is no more.


I learned more than just my lesson in jail. Those girls in Block 4 taught me that you need to make sure you are getting what you want and/or need, and if you upset someone in the process, they get over it. I learned that even when faced with something you think you can’t handle, you get through it every time. And I know now that I am a better me.

Music, Food, and Safe Sex

This assignment was a tough one for me. I felt overwhelmed when asked, even hypothetically, what I would do to make the world a better place. Where would I even begin? There are diseases that need curing, people that need feeding, and houses that need building. So I thought a lot on it (honest, I did) and realized that I needed to rephrase the question. Making the world a better place was just too much for me to wrap my head around. Instead, I asked myself what things have made my life better. What things that I have experienced or learned would I want to share, because they improved my life in one way or another. Bam- I had it. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you my three wishes.


Magical world changing genie, my first wish is to have music programs in communities. I am a firm believer in creative outlets. They give anyone, young or old, a way to let it all out. A way to express anger, frustration, or sadness. A way to express what makes those individuals just that – individuals. I have fond memories of playing my violin or clarinet. Of singing, and learning to strum a few tunes on a guitar. Playing an instrument always just made me feel better. I could be mad at the world, play a little Vivaldi on my violin, and suddenly things were no longer as terrible as I had thought. I want that for the world. I want everyone to have a way to make things feel better. I want kids to know how great it feels to play in a band, and be a part of something beautiful. How satisfying it can be to nail a passage of music that you thought you would never get down. I wish that all the world could know music.


My second wish, oh magical one, is to have communal gardens in every community. Summers with my mother were always full of the smell of good dirt and the taste of fresh food. Delicious, healthy food. Being able to watch a seed that you plant grow into something you can eat is magic in itself. If people in communities were given land to work, to get some dirt under their nails, they would be the better for it. Neighbors helping neighbors would bring communities closer together, which has its own benefits, like lower crime rates. And people who have the opportunity to eat fresh locally grown foods would learn the benefits they bring, like tastier home cooked meals and healthier bodies. I wish that all the world could know fresh-from-the-garden food.


Now, magical world changing genie, don’t be embarrassed by my last wish, because I realize it’s a little unconventional. I wish that sexual education was taught more readily in communities. Sex is a topic that can make a well spoken and otherwise intelligent adult start to stammer, especially when their audience is their child. I am blessed with a mother who has an open mind, and who knew that the only way she could protect me from sexually transmitted diseases, teenage pregnancy, or AIDs was to talk to me about sex, and often. I grew up hearing “No drinking, no drugs, and if you have sex use two forms of barrier protection and a spermicide!” every time I left the house from the time I was thirteen. My mom knew she could never stop me from having sex, because people are sexual beings and it was bound to happen sooner or later, so she made sure that I knew my stuff. And it worked. I am not one of one third of American adults who has genital herpes. I am not one of the many young people who end up pregnant because they heard from their friends older brother that you can’t get pregnant if the girl is on top because of gravity. I wish that all the world could know how to keep themselves safe when they decide to have sex.


So magical world changing genie, I want a world filled with music, food, and safe sex. Sounds like a better world to me.

How to Eat Food

Choosing what I eat every day has become a bit of a process, since my mom dropped In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan in my lap. Since letting the information in Pollan’s wonderful book (he is a genius, in my opinion) soak in I have made a conscious effort to take the time to eat meals, read what is in the “foods” I buy, and avoid being caught up in the food fads of late.


Step one: eat meals. At a table and everything, candle light optional. These once prevalent sit-down-with- the-family meals have been lost to the ever-fast, ever-easy snack food. Besides, who has the time to cook? Our lives are packed from sun up to sun down with friends, family, school, work, and kids. This may be why one-fifth of eating done by American adults now happens in their cars! Entrées that are pre-made and need only to be nuked are what more and more people are reaching for. A package that says “to-go” on the front sells a product. Try counting how many food products you see with “to-go” labels on them next time your doing some grocery shopping if you don’t believe me! You may be asking yourself, what can one do to stop all the snacking madness? The answer is simple. Cook. Get a cook book, or crack open the one your mom got you when you moved out. Make a point to try and make something at least once a day. Trust me, cooking meals is like Pringles (only far healthier), once you start, you can’t stop.


Healthier food is food that is comprised of a few identifiable ingredients. One’s that you can both pronounce and trace it’s roots. For instance, my once favorite breakfast food of all time, Malt-o-Meal, has something in it called ferric orthophosphate. I can pronounce this one, if I read it slowly, but where does it come from? What is it made out of? I think it’s safe to assume then that whatever it is, it was made in a laboratory, so is likely a chemical. And there are dozens of these unpronounceable, unidentifiable ingredients in the food products we eat. Bread, a once simple food, can be made with flour, yeast, water, and a pinch each of salt and sugar; five ingredients. While buying bread recently, the fewest ingredients I counted in one loaf of bread was 21. In 1938 there was an rule passed by the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act that made it so if a food product only resembled a standardized food, then that product must be labeled “imitation.” The rule was repealed by the FDA in 1973, but if it were still in effect today I think we would have very little food (and defiantly no bread) in our stores that would be without said label. Alas, even without those handy labels, we can choose our food using a simple rule: If your great grandmother wouldn’t recognize it, don’t buy it.


Another food guideline, if you will, is to avoid foods with health claims. These are food products that your great grandmother surely would not recognize. Fat-free, low-carb, high-fiber, low-cholestoral, sugar-free. The hyphens have taken over. As a general rule, when one thing is removed or added to a food, another thing is removed or added. For example, a food product that has been made fat-free is full of sugar, because removing the fat also removes the flavor, and so the sugar is used to give it a better taste. A second reason to avoid these health claims is that they are normally just a fad. Take margarine. A while back it was packed with trans-fats and said to be the healthier alternative to butter. Instead, it gave people heart attacks. Consider also the low-carb fad of today. Not many people know that the once popular “healthy” diet was low-fat, high-carb. Before that, sugar was the enemy. A man who lived through and followed those health fads said that after all his years of being stingy with the maple syrup on his pancakes, he was surprised to learn that he should have been worried about the butter. Now a days, however, he would be avoiding his carbohydrate loaded short-stack all together. It just goes to show that health claims do not make a food healthy.


At risk of sounding like one of those children from Reading Rainbow, if you want to know what is really going on with the “foods” in your grocery store, stop by your local library and check out Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food today.

Labor and Delivery...Sorry Boys!

A woman screams in agony. Sweat drips from her furrowed brow as she pulls her knees to her chest and obeys the nurses order that she pushes. And there is always a complication. Is it any wonder that pregnant women have anxiety about the day they go into labor? The birthing process is always portrayed as horrible experience – long, painful, and fraught with risks. But, in reality, the women out there who have this supposedly “typical” kind of birth are few and far between. Giving birth is something that has, quite literally, been happening forever. And more often than not, it is a process that goes smoothly. My own birthing experience was not entirely smooth, but I know for sure I was not screaming my head off at any point during the 29 hour process. I take you back to approximately 14 months ago…

I was, and still am, a firm believer in giving birth naturally. Not just vaginally, but naturally. Women have been doing it in my family forever, and so to me it was, no pun intended, the natural choice. I was disappointed to find that while looking for some classes on birthing, most included a detailed “menu” of drugs that were made available to the laboring mother-to-be, and little to no techniques on preparing for a natural birth. So after a lot of online research, I found and later took a class called Hypnobirthing, which is actually a course on breathing techniques and visualization for drug-free pain management. There is no hypnotizing involved. The class, along with my mother at my side as my doula (or labor coach) prepared me for the day I would give birth to my son. Let’s jump ahead to the day I checked into the hospital…

So there I was, waddling into the E.R. at 7 am, sick of being the size of a Geo Metro, thinking THIS WAS IT! After more than 10 months of being pregnant, I was finally going to get to meet my Jack Thomas! The date was 9/24/09, and I was a full two weeks overdue. My drill-sergeant doula had me walking to try and induce my labor naturally (25 miles in 4 days), but to no avail. So now I was on my way to be induced with Pitocin. I got up to my birthing suite and was hooked up to an IV, my drugs, and a monitor to watch my baby’s vitals.

It was 12 noon before I felt a thing, and that apparently concerned my nurses. So after four hours of stubbornly refusing to comply (in true Osgood fashion), I agreed to let them break my water. Then it really started hit the fan. I for one would not call labor painful, but rather very, very uncomfortable. So uncomfortable in fact, that when any of my many wonderful nurses touched my huge stomach , I slapped their hands. After 20 some hours of contracting and slapping, I was begging for an epidural. The nurses called for an anesthesiologist, and I don’t know if it was the long day of laboring, but I swear it was Mr. Clean. So Mr. Clean prepared my epidural, and after a poke it was administered. Except I still felt everything, and for those who don’t know, an epidural is suppose to leave you numb from about the bottom of your rib cage down. After giving it a half an hour to kick in, Mr. Clean was called back to administer another one. Two minutes later, I was conked out. There’s a reason they call it labor- it’s work! I slept for five hours, and woke up to bad news. I had thick myconium(basically Jack pooped from all the stress of labor) in my fluid, and my temperature was rising. The doctor came in and told me that a cesarean section would be necessary if I did not deliver soon. After four more hours of contracting, I was told that if they did not get Jack out soon, both he and I could be in danger.

I was crushed to hear it, but the last thing I wanted was to put my baby in danger, so I reluctantly agreed to have the cesarean. I was wheeled in my bed to the operating room, where I was then asked to sit on the edge of my bed with my back hunched so that they could administer my spinal. My epidurals must of worn off at that point, because that is one part of my labor that I would describe as painful. After 20 minutes of being hunched the anesthesiologist had to call in another anesthesiologist, because apparently I am difficult to anesthetize. Once I was finally numbed up, I was strapped to the table, and a nurse who I swear looked like Dr. Grey from Grey’s Anatomy commented on the fact that Jack was still kicking. Apparently babies normally stop moving during labor, but not my Jack! All of the sudden I could not breath, so I told Dr. Grey and she said that my spinal had “crawled up.” That meant that instead of numbing only my lower body, my spinal had also numbed up my chest so I could not feel myself breathe. So I was put under general anesthesia.

The next thing I know, I was being told by a very excited new Grandmother “Wake up Atlanta! Meet your son!” I couldn’t believe it - I had a son. I still can’t believe it sometimes. It’s a whole wealth of emotion that no one can know until they experience it. I had made it. I had given birth. It was not the way I wanted it to go, and I still am disappointed that I did not get to see my son come out all gooey and hear him take his first breath. But I’ll say this - it was no scene out of a horror movie either. And there is always next time. But it’ll take me a few years to forget just how hard having a newborn is before I’m brave enough to go down that road!

My thoughts on Tinker School, having just watched Finding Nemo

“You think you can do these things but you just can’t Nemo.”
-Marlin, Finding Nemo

The notion that children are less capable than adults is an understandable one. Children are smaller, not as strong, and less experienced than us older and wiser folks. They have a lot to learn, and as such are rarely given responsibility. However, how are our children supposed to grow without these opportunities? I’m not talking about arithmetic, or grammar, or how to play an instrument; these are skills taught in school. Responsibility and independent thinking; these are skills less commonly taught, and even less commonly exercised. In order to grow into well rounded and happy individuals, children need to be respected and given the opportunity to be freely creative.

Adults have the tendency to be hypocritical towards children; they demand to be respected and trusted, but in turn do not respect and trust their young ones. For example, when my six year old sister was given a toy shopping cart for her birthday, she was insistent on assembling it herself. Her mother, assuming that a six year old could not be trusted complete such a complicated task, would not let her. The six year old responded by throwing a hissy fit, until her mom gave in and let her help. And wouldn’t you now it, that little girl was a great help, and even attached the wheels all on her lonesome. Having witnessed this exchange, I could not help but think about how my little sister was initially not given the respect and trust that she showed, in the end, she deserved. I have since been careful not to underestimate children, and to give them every chance to show me just how much they can do.

Children also astound me with what they can cook up in those little heads of theirs. When my darling sister was learning about space in her second grade class, she asked me what the atmosphere was. I told her that it was a layer of clouds that held all the air in so we could breath. She asked, “Like a big balloon?”. I was impressed (and, admittedly, a bit jealous) that she came up with a more creative analogy than I. Children have minds that positively overflow with creativity, and as such should be given every opportunity to let that creativity flow. As a creative individual, and someone who feels just plain rotten if not allowed to express myself, I understand how important this is. Creativity is the ultimate outlet for anyone. If a child is frustrated, a chance to get their creative juices flowing is all they need to put their world into perspective. A child who is able to think for himself is a more confident child, and grows up knowing that anything really is possible with a bit of elbow grease. When given the respect and trust that they deserve and every opportunity to be creative, children can prove that they are, in fact, very capable.

“Let us see what Squirt does flying solo.”
-Crush, Finding Nemo

Pretty typical, I think.

My name is Atlanta Osgood. Not Georgia, not Atlantic Ocean. Now that I've gotten that out of the way, I can tell you alittle about myself.

I was born in La Crosse, Wisconsin on July 13th, 1988 (that makes me 21). I grew up all over the area, and even lived in Hawaii for a bit while my parents were still together. But when asked what my hometown is, I answer Mindoro. For those of you who don't know where that is, it's 30 minutes north-east of La Crosse (that's how long it takes me to get there anyway, probably more like 45 minutes for anyone who's never been there).

Like I said, my parents are divorced. They have been since I was 5, and I can't even imagine them being together. That would just be really friggin' weird. My dad, since then, has had 3 other wives, and this last one has stuck. Her name is Angela and I love her, even though I don't call her mom. That would also be really friggin' weird. My mom remarried one man, and now is married (legally in Iowa!) to Amy, my other step mom, who I also do not call mom. And I love her, too. So I consider myself one lucky girl, having 3 moms and all.

Now on to siblings. Jesse Lynn is my whole sister, who is now 19 and getting married to her highschool sweetheart this June(soooo jealous). Mercedes Kristin is my half sister (same dad, mom is my dad's second wife) and is going to be 14. She lives in Sparta with her mom. Justice Julia and Olympia Marie are my youngest sisters, who are 6 and 3, respectively. They have the same dad as me, and their mom is Angie, my dads current wife. So, yeah, my dad has 5 daughters, and is living proof that men determine the sex of the baby. I love my sisters all to death, whole or half.

Now my favorite part....MY SON! I still can not believe that I have a 4 month old. His name is Jack Thomas Stanton, and he's my little round-head :). He loves to eat and poop and laugh and no matter how pissed or sad I am, he makes me smile. His newest hobby is trying to eat my face, and he makes vicious growling noises while he does it. He was 9lbs. 14oz. at birth, and has had no problem growing since, seeing as how he's 20 lbs now. So he's my monster round-head, and is the best damn thing that has ever happened to me.

Now for hobbies and all that crap...I like to knit, sew, bake and cook (my mom calls me a "domestic goddess"). I like to swim, and I'm obsessed with music. Name just about any song out there and I know at least the lyrics to the chorus. I play violin, piano, clarinet, guitar, and bass. And I sing. ALOT. Like, all the friggin' time.

So that's me in a nutshell. Pretty typical, I think.