A Mother's Balancing Act

Becoming Aware: World MS Day 2011

And now for a word from Simply C...

My modus operandi recently has been, quite frankly, a bit “a day late and a dollar short". My post today is no exception. In addition to being Towel Day, Geek Pride Day, National Tap Dance Day, and National Missing Children’s Day, Wednesday, May 25th was also the 2nd Annual World MS Day.

This year’s worldwide, Multiple Sclerosis (“MS”) awareness-raising event highlighted the issue of MS and Employment.  As a full-time employed SWF in her early 40’s and living with MS, this topic is of significant interest and concern to me, as it is to nearly every person with MS and a member of the work force. At the World MS Day website, you can provide support by signing the petition and adding your voice to the many who want to bring awareness to employers and policy makers and help to keep those with MS working for as long as possible.

For my awareness-raising effort, I’ll share my introduction to MS.

After abruptly losing vision in my left eye, I was diagnosed with MS three months after my 40th birthday. Hardly a warm welcome into the wonderful world of Forty-Something that I’d heard and read so much about. My diagnosis was a shock. At the time, I had not the slightest clue what MS was and I didn’t know anyone with the disease. That all changed in the Fall of my 40th year. I quickly learned that MS is an auto-immune disease that affects the central nervous system (the brain, optic nerves and spinal cord), particularly the myelin sheath that protects the nerve fibers.  MS affects at least twice as many women than men. Generally, people are diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 40, but sometimes diagnoses are made in individuals much younger than 20 and even in some who are much older than 50. Worldwide, it is believed that over two million people are affected by MS. Symptoms range from numbness to vision loss.  Extreme fatigue to walking difficulties. Depression to bladder dysfunction.  MS symptoms, their severity, and their effects vary greatly from person to person. Currently, there is no cure for MS. MS is every day and you don't always know what it might bring each day. One certainty of MS exists: uncertainty.

By no means is it lost on me that in the vast catalog of human diseases, deadly and debilitating, MS is far from the worst. But, to remain frank, MS has been frustrating, annoying, exhausting, expensive, sometimes depressing, and, well, truly a pain in the… well, right now, my right forearm. MS has been an eye-opener.  Every now and then, it's a plan wrecker. My biggest complaint is that it's an energy robber. In some respects, it's a game changer. It's absolutely a tolerance tester! On a positive note, MS has also been an opportunity maker.  I bet every person with MS would tell you it's a will challenger. (That’s a good thing!) I continue to be deeply moved each time MS reveals my support ralliers. Indeed, MS has been a love and friendship reminder.

The National MS Society uploaded this video to You Tube. Although it is over four years old, I think it educates and delivers a message that’s right on point: despite the challenges, we must keep moving forward. Join the Movement.

Additional information about MS and World MS Day is available at the National MS Society's website. (www.nationalmssociety.org)

I can't remedy being a few days late, but we all can help with the many research dollars short. If interested in providing financial support, the National MS Society encourages you to "Think globally and act locally" by texting MSAWARE to 20222 to donate $5 to the National MS Society. For the Facebook savvy, if you go to Pure Protein's Facebook page and "Like" them, they will donate $1 to the National MS Society. The goal is to raise $200,000.

Until May 2012, we’ll keep on keeping on and, with each World MS Day and awareness rising, who knows... Along this journey that I hope to freely move for many, many years, one day soon I may become a cured MS sufferer. Together, we continue moving forward and remaining grateful. I thank you for your willingness to become aware. 

 Simply... C

PostSecret Art Project

    Have you seen this project? I am kind of blown away by it. I found out about PostSecret through my parent connection newsletter from my daughter's college.

The creator thought it would be cool for people to have an anonymous way to share their secrets (fears, hopes, dreams, etc.). So, what you do is send in a postcard (handmade or original ones seem to take preference when getting published) with your "secret" written on the blank side. Or, you can even submit your secret via Twitter http://twitter.com/secretarchive . It's turned into quite the domino effect, with philanthropic events (promoting suicide prevention and the like) happening all over the country and in British Columbia. The project appears to have been going on since January of 2005 and is now drawing to its close, so hurry if you want to "enter" your secret!

Here's a link:

http://www.postsecret.com/

Happy Surfing (and/or posting of your own secrets)!

Balanced Babe (Molly Wendland)

Dude, It's a Car, Not a Recycling Bin!

The picture really says it all here. And I thought I let my car get a little messy now and then. I mean I've heard of hoarders, but this is over the top. I parked next to this car at the library last night...the newspapers were all still in their plastic wrappers. The one on top, riding shotgun in the front seat, was from October 20th, 2010...gotta stay up to date on your current events, you know. There were about 50 hardback books in the backseat, as well, and the car was nearly full.

Wow...white trash living at its finest!

Balanced Babe - Molly Wendland

Beyaz...a lot of B.S.?

Have you seen the ads for Beyaz birth control? This campaign is wrong on so many levels...truly, my first reaction was one of irony/humor. Did the gurus in Bayer's mammoth marketing department honestly not realize that the name sounds like they are saying "B.S" over and over? Seriously?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdSmXKRqFHM 

(Note: Apparently this link is no longer functional in the normal sense, but if you copy and paste it into a new browser, it does work...it really is worth it...talk about an inane commercial.) 

But on a much deeper level, the women in this ad are portrayed as if they are a pack of materialistic Stepford wives on a mission to find their next shopping conquest. Will it be:

• A trip to Paris
• A new dream house
• A graduate degree
• A dream guy (um, yeah...)

All while they coyly wave off the cute little stork carrying a wrapped up bundle of "un-joy".

The commercial is demeaning to women and the committed relationships that we cultivate. Shame on Bayer for promoting their product via this shallow, showy advertising.

Balanced Babe (Molly Wendland)

 

O'Donnell's Gaff Won't Be Her Last

Republican candidate Christine O'Donnell's 1st Amendment gaff at a debate against Senate Democratic oponent Chris Coons before Widener University Law School students earlier this week was absolutely staggering. I normally don't use this blog as any kind of a political platform, but this one blew me away. No matter what your beliefs are, isn't it a little scary that this woman took the GOP nomination in her Delaware Senate district so handily?

On several instances within the debate, O'Donnell challenged Coons on the validity of the constitutional separation of church and state, laughing each time she questioned him. She apparently either:

• Didn't know that there was an amendment that protected religion from being tampered with by the federal government
• OR
• Disagrees with the separation of church and state as it stands now

There were numerous times when you could hear the audience gasp and murmur after she did this. While I might understand a candidate not knowing what the 14th, 16th or 17th Amendments are (though her Tea Party is advocating abolishing them, so you'd think she'd be up on those, as well...), come on! The 1st Amendment? It's pretty cut and dried, folks...

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

 

Bullying - Celebrities Speak Out

Bullying is certainly in the news this week. Good Morning America ran a story this morning, interviewing one of my favorite actors from Modern Family, Jesse Tyler Ferguson. He said that his situation got so bad in junior high that he had to change schools in 8th grade. They aired a quote from Tim Gunn (Project Runway), who said that he had such angst as a young gay male at 17, that he tried to commit suicide.

A public service announcement about the gravity of this issue will be aired sometime later this week or early next. I have seen comments where people have asked why there is the sudden outcry only now, when a string of homosexual young men have committed suicide. From what I understand, this particular demographic is particularly at risk over all other teens (even lesbian teens) due to pressures and bullying that seem to be worse for them than their other teen peers.

Every home, every public school, every college must be a safe place for our sons and daughters to be.

Balanced Babe - Molly Wendland

 

Children's Healthcare - Coverage Not There Yet

I was overjoyed to see my good friend and co-leader in Girl Scouts, Mary Thompson, quoted in the NY Times article on Wednesday this week about pending mandatory healthcare coverage for kids with pre-existing conditions. In the article and on Facebook, Mary had still expressed some reservations regarding the dotting of the i's and the crossing of the t's on this whole thing. Well, it appears that her concerns were well founded.

Humana has told her that the new law pertaining to covering children with pre-existing conditions pertains only to children 10 and under. Since Mary's two children with pre-existing conditions are both over the age of 10, apparently, they still don't have to be covered until 2014. Well, gee, isn't that convenient for Humana - and all of the other big, fat insurance agencies? Where are these families supposed to turn for assistance?

Mary's husband owns his own business and therefore, the family is among the 14 million Americans who get their insurance on the individual market rather than via an employer. Two of the Thompson's three children have lived without insurance coverage pretty much their entire lives. No insurance. This is unfathomable to me. Working families, contributing members of the community, a mom who gives back more than just about anyone I know, in fact...and an insurance industry who can choose not to cover their children because they have significant medical needs (one with Attention Deficit Disorder and one who was born with spina bifida and later also diagnosed with very mild autism).

This is sick. I have to admit that on a daily basis, I sit back and tell myself that it makes me uncomfortable to "get involved" or "speak out". We live in an area of the country and even the metropolitan area where it is unpopular to believe in what President Obama is trying to do with the Healthcare Act. But no matter what you believe...whether you believe in what the President is doing or not, isn't it time to work together to insure the 72,000 uninsured children currently affected? And shouldn't we do what we can to help the 50.7 million people who are now uninsured in all? This number rose by 10% in 2009 alone.

What can we do to speak out, raise our voices and help people like the Thompsons get coverage now? These are children without healthcare coverage? Are you OK with that? And for those of you who say, "Hey, I pay my taxes, pull my weight, etc." and go with that argument, so do the Thompsons!

What say you, America?

Balanced Babe (Molly Wendland)

Vanity Tag - Or Message from God?

To the lady yelling at someone on her phone in morning rush hour yesterday, while simultaneously cutting me off in traffic...

Your vanity tag reads:

JZUSLVU

I'd rather not even get into the grammar/syntax (Jesus is not plural...ahem).

But yes, I might agree that Jesus loves ME.

I'm just not so sure about you.

Balanced Babe (Molly Wendland)

Blind Couple's Baby Returned to Them

Have you been following this story? I am so incensed by it that my stomach is turning. A blind couple from the Kansas City area has been waiting almost two months to bring their baby home. That's right. The state of Missouri denied them their right as parents to take their child home with them from the hospital. They had done all of the right things in preparing for little Mikaela's birth:

• The room was ready
• Newborn clothes hung in the closet
• Their hearts were full of love for their newborn

Just like any other parent, they'd had 9 months to prepare. They were ready. Or so they thought.

As mother Erika Johnson struggled to breastfeed the newborn in the hospital, a lactation nurse wrote the following words on her chart:

"The child is without proper custody, support or care due to both of parents being blind and they do not have specialized training to assist them."

Those words ultimately helped deem the new parents, both 24, as unfit to raise the child on their own. Not only that, the Missouri Department of Social Services would not allow the couple to take Mikaela home from the hospital. Adding insult to injury, when told of this the next day, Johnson and father Blake Sinnett were no longer allowed to hold the baby - only touch her arm and leg. Are you kidding me? They were treated as criminals! They had done nothing wrong. And so their nightmare began. For 57 days.

• 57 days
• 57 days of not changing a diaper

• 57 days of not wearing the newborn clothes hanging in the closet

• 57 days of not getting up in the middle of the night to her cries
• 57 days of not bonding with your newborn
• 57 days

How do you put a value on that? You and I both know that there is no way to do that. But I certainly hope that there's a crackerjack attorney out there who will do just that. I hope that attorney puts a nice fat financial value to it. That's what I hope. That way, maybe Mikaela's parents will be able to afford some assistance because having said all of these things, they're probably going to need it. Sighted or not, parenting is one tough business. I'm sure a little help would be in order. Note I said "help".

That's what social services agencies are designed to do. Help.

Instead, MDSS swooped in and took a healthy, bouncing baby girl away from two responsible new parents. Sighted? No. Numerous blind advocacy agencies have come to the couple's aid in the last two months (thank goodness), so I don't think they will lack for help.

But don't you think the MDSS could have offered help instead of taking the baby away?

Shame on them.

Swoop in on the bad guys. You know. The ones doing the beating and the neglecting.

And help the good guys.

Let's get it right.

Balanced Babe (Molly Wendland)

VP Joe Drops the F Bomb

So, President Obama was all set to sign the new healthcare bill into legislation yesterday, right?

Leave it to his trusty sidekick, Joe Biden, to steal a little bit of his thunder by dropping the F bomb just after introducing him. That's right. The Vice President cordially introduced the President, and then while shaking his hand, exclaimed, "This is a big F#@*ing deal." Apparently, he thought he was off tape. Um, yeah...

Ah, the picture of decorum, our Joe. Biden's Blooper's are getting as good as Bush's were...well, maybe not. He'll have to work on his strategery...

Here's the live clip, heard on national television: