Mother's Day Fog

I woke up with a terrible headache and lots of congestion this morning, so I really didn't get to post the Mother's Day post I wanted. I switched allergy medication a few days ago because I was prescribed a new medication to help my metabolism (before going the Lap Band route, which I would now if my husband wasn't slated for surgery). The Claritin D and Phentermine were just to dangerous a combination, so my doctor switch me to a nasal spray along with Singular. Unfortunately, two things happened: My insurance company covers no weight loss medication and the new allergy medication didn't work very well. (I plan a post on this whole health/weight thing this week because its gotten up my nose and parked there)

The cure for my allergies? Sleeping from 10 am to 4 pm, then taking a dose of Clartin D along with pain medicine. I came back to my half written blog post which left only so I could shower and think it through. I also hoped the steam would loosen up my congestion. The shower did more harm than good, so I laid down after to get a handle on the pain (I'd already medicated with benadryl and ibuprofen, so more medication wasn't an option).

I haven't had such huge issues with allergies since I was 15 years old. At that age, I lost almost an entire year to headaches and fatigue. As an infant, my allergies were so bad that I had to live in a sterile environment-- I was one step from being a baby in a bubble. My poor mother, who had designed a nursery and hand-made curtains and blankets, picked carpet and furniture had to have it torn out so that I could live. Even her breast milk made my little body attack itself uncontrollably.

As far as mothers go, my mom made some pretty amazing mom sacrifices to give me life. My childhood was filled with sickly moments because my body could not handle the world it lived in. And to some degree, it still can't. While I don't remember this time, I can imagine the hardships I created for my mother, a foreigner, with three other school-aged children and a young marriage.

Not exactly a mom's dream, but mom's muddle through, very often with little support from other mothers (her's had passed and her mother-in-law was a thousand miles away).I appreciate all my mom did for me and gave up for me being that I was no easy child.

Anywho, that all brings me to this:

I watched a show on OWN last night after my people went to bed. The show was called No Woman, No Cry and it was a documentary about women, mothers in particular and their lack of... well, women's health services. I learned that too many women die in child-birth each year. I learned those deaths are often seen as inconsequential. I thought of the war on women happening in our own political machine, seeing how the extreme right would love us to adopt this draconian view of the pre-pegnant, pregnant and womb having humans on this Earth. The stories were compelling, scary and yet amazing.

The woman with the courage and strength to tell these stories is Christi Turlington. She's started an organiaztion called Every Mother Counts.

While we are reading about women, I think every woman ought to read this article: HERE.

For Mother's Day, let's honor our girl parts that give us the amazing ability to choose motherhood in our journey as humans, instead of being humans to be owned because we have vaginas and wombs.