by Heather Plett | Nov 11, 2007 | women
More than 60 percent of young women in high school express dissatisfaction with their bodies.
In college, it’s 80 percent.
The obsession with weight starts early – 42 percent of girls in first to third grade express a desire to be thinner.
According to published research, 15 percent of women would sacrifice more than five years of their life to obtain the weight they desire. (REALLY? Yikes!)
There are at least eight million sufferers of life-threatening anorexia nervosa (reported in girls as young as eight years old), bulimia, and other associated eating disorders in America; 90 percent of these are women.
Since 1992, elective cosmetic procedures have risen a dramatic 198 percent.
Between 1990 and 1999 the number of facelifts in the US increased sixfold.
The diet industry has grown to a $40-billion-a-year business.
Popular women’s magazines contain 10 times more diet-promoting articles and advertisements than comparable men’s magazines. One out of every 3.8 advertisements sends some sort of message encouraging women to acquire a body that is “barely there”.
Somebody PLEASE tell me how we’re supposed to raise healthy daughters in this culture?!!?
(Information source: “Eve’s Revenge: Women and a Spirituality of the Body”)
by Heather Plett | Nov 7, 2007 | birth, Creativity
There have not been alot of words making their way onto my blog lately. The reasons are both simple and complicated. The simple reason is that I’m still crazy busy these days. Most of the busy-ness is work-related, but there have been other things. Like facilitating another leadership workshop, making Halloween costumes, dealing with indoor soccer schedules, and then all those other things that show up unexpectedly. Throw in a little business travel, and I’m just about maxed out.
The complicated reasons aren’t so easy to explain. Maybe one of these days I’ll come on here and explain a little more about what’s going on, but for now let’s just say it’s a bit of a personal spiritual journey, combined with the birthing of a new creative “baby”.
This figurative birthing process has made me reminisce about my literal birthing experiences – the three that resulted in my beautiful daughters, and the one that resulted in my beautiful, though lifeless, son. The memory that’s been with me today is that of my coming into motherhood experience.
Nikki had a really difficult entry into this world. I still find myself – nearly a dozen years later – getting a little emotional when I remember the intensity, pain, frustration, worry, seamingly endless agony, and yet ultimate joy of that experience (and a whole lot of emotions in between). It started out with me being induced because a fetal assessment showed (rather incorrectly) that she was a little on the small side and that my fluids were getting low (a week after she was due). Inducement led to hours of waiting for something to happen, followed by nearly 36 hours of labour (there’s the “endless” part), three hours of heavy duty pushing, followed by an urgent call to the only obstetrician in the city who could do the necessary procedure to to deliver her without a c-section, lots of tearing and stitches, and then finding out that she had to be rushed away from me to be treated with antibiotics because there was a risk of infection.
When she was finally born, after all those hours of pushing, I had gone almost completely (though thankfully temporarily) blind. It turns out the agony of pushing for that long can mess up the muscles around your eyes so badly your vision gets messed up. They put my baby on my chest, but I had to rely on Marcel’s description of her and the touch of my fingers to know anything about how she looked.
Not long afterwards, she was whisked away, and because it was late and we all needed rest, I was returned to my room and Marcel and my mom left the hospital.
The memory that has been clinging to me today has been not so much about the delivery but about what happened later that night. I awoke in the middle of the night and was suddenly filled with the most intense body-aching loneliness I had ever felt. My family had gone, and the baby that had moved in my womb for the last nine months was way down the hall behind nursery room glass. I’d given birth to her, gone through nearly unbearable pain to introduce her to the world, but I didn’t even know what she looked like.
My eyesight had returned and I knew I HAD to see her. I knew it with the deepest longing imaginable. But I was in so much pain, I couldn’t even figure out how to shuffle my body up in the bed in order to reach the call button to get the nurse.
But there is little that can get in the way of a mother who needs to see her child. I struggled for what seemed like an eternity, but I somehow managed to get my body up off the bed and down the hall. The nurses looked up in amazement as I passed them and entered the nursery. I’m sure there was a rather desparate look in my bloodshot eyes.
I found my baby. And I wept at her loveliness. She looked so tiny and vulnerable, hooked up to all kinds of wires and hoses, lying nearly naked in an incubator. Truly, she was not a beautiful baby – after what she went through to get into the world, it’s hardly surprising – but she was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.
I reached out and touched her skin and knew that I had fallen completely and irreversibly in love.
I’m not sure why this is on my mind today, but I’m sure it has something to do with this creative birthing process. Some of it is painful, and it’s possible that what comes of it may never “live”, but at this point, I have to believe it will be beautiful.
by Heather Plett | Nov 1, 2007 | Uncategorized
Because life seems to be overwhelming me a bit these days, and because Maddie had a wee tiny (yeah right!) meltdown when it was time to dress up for Halloween, I didn’t manage to take any pictures last night. Instead, I “stole” one from my sister, so I can at least show off the cuteness of the two monkey cousins. (And this is your opportunity to ooh and aah about the monkey costume I made for Nikki. Don’t look too closely at the ears, though.)
by Heather Plett | Oct 30, 2007 | Uncategorized
When I got home from work today, the girls came running toward me.
Julie: “Mom – come see the brownies I made!” Sure enough, a fresh pan of delectable brownies greeted me in the kitchen. Just because she felt like it. I think I’ll keep her.
Maddie: “Mom – come see the playhouse I made!” In the basement – in the big empty space that’s still awaiting floor finishing from the renovation-project-that’s-sucking-the-life-out-of-me was an imaginative play-world, complete with a princess who was attending her first day of school, assorted stuffed animals who were in the playroom at daycare, a computer made of a discarded box, and several other rooms that all had unique purposes. I think I’ll keep her.
Later tonight, Nikki was telling me what songs she’d uploaded onto her new iPod. “This Crowded House song is on there because it reminds me of Grandpa.” That seemed a little odd, since I can’t ever imagine my dad listening to Crowded House. “It was on the radio when we were on our way to the farm when we’d found out that Grandpa died. I’ll always remember that.” I think I’ll keep her.
by Heather Plett | Oct 25, 2007 | women
Yesterday, I attended a “Gender in International Development” workshop where I heard stories of how, in times of crisis such as the tsunami that rocked the world, women are often doubly vulnerable. Not only do they lose their homes, families, and often their sources of income, but they fall victim to sexual predators, slave traders, etc. On top of that, they have to deal with aid organizations that are often paternalistic and exclusionary.
A few days before, I read the article about how, in the sports world, wife abuse is tolerated more than animal abuse.
A few weeks before that, I read Infidel, the story of Ayaan Hirsi Ali who grew up in a paternalistic, abusive, violent culture where abuse of women is not only tolerated, it’s expected. She is now speaking out against the discrimination of women in the Muslim world, and consequently she can no longer go anywhere without armed protection.
Around the same time, I heard of a local Christian church that has decided to take a step backwards and move away from allowing women to lead. I also heard stories of how frighteningly prevalent wife abuse is among Christian pastors. Some of the perpetrators feel their faith justifies their actions.
A month before that, I heard Ato G’s story about some of the young girls we met in Ethiopia who have since died from female genital mutilation.
Today, I feel a deep sadness for all the women who lack freedom, security, hope, and peace – simply because they are women. I feel especially sad that far too frequently religion plays a role in propagating and/or justifying the abuse.
We still have a long way to go.
