Nicole Kidman has new baby

In a surprise to the world, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban revealed that they have welcomed the arrival of their new daughter, Faith Margaret through a surrogate in the US. While surrogacy is a fairly standard procedure among couples in the US and abroad, Kidman and Urban have sparked controversy by referring to their surrogate by the technical term, 'gestational carrier'.

"It all sounds like terms from a lawyer-drafted contract -- ghastly," one person tweeted.

That Kidman and Urban most likely paid the surrogate is also the source of debate. While the couple say that they went to the US for the surrogacy because they can fly under the radar more easily as a celebrity couple, it is well known that surrogacy for payment over basic costs is illegal in Australia.

I would guess that Nicole Kidman using the technical term because it helps her to distance herself and her new baby from the birth mother: She clearly wants to be known as the 'mother', whereas the surrogate is just the womb.

Nicole Kidman: what baby?

Brave be the woman who wears white jeans two weeks following childbirth.

Source: http://dlisted.com/node/27280

Nicole Kidman: with baby, no bump

Nicole Kidman, one week postbaby. Word is she has most (or all?) of the weight she gained during the pregnancy. Was spotted at the gym the day before she delivered too!

Source: http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/2008/07/18/2008-07-18_nicole_kidman_loses_baby_bump_in_record_.html

Nothing says 'I love you' like a big, fat diamond

Looks like Nicole Kidman is getting a 'push' present, you know, the new, very consumerist version of a very old American ritual in which women get gifts for giving birth.

Except, Nic is getting a $73,000 Cartier Trinity band which is apparently 'very symbolic'.

Is there a pair of diamond earrings waiting in the wings for an extra long labour?



Source: http://www.sofeminine.co.uk/w/star/n433100/news/Keith-Urban-s-labour-ring.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/06/fashion/06push.html

Nicole Kidman for Vogue

Well, here it is..the long awaited Nicole Kidman pregnancy cover for the July edition of American Vogue. I wonder when she took the photo because she does not look very pregnant!

Here is a tidbit from the interview:

“When I first saw the baby on the ultrasound, I started crying. I didn’t think I’d get to experience that in my lifetime. I like the unpredictable nature of it. To feel life growing with you is something very, very special, and I’m going to embrace that completely. I don’t believe in flittering around the edges of things. You’re either going to walk through life and experience it fully or you’re going to be a voyeur. And I’m not a voyeur.”

You can read the full article here:
http://www.style.com/vogue/feature/061708/page2.html



Source: http://justjared.buzznet.com/2008/06/17/nicole-kidman-vogue-july-2008/

Another pregnant cover

More rumours abound.. Nicole Kidman set to appear on the cover of Vogue preggers in July?

Source: http://blogs.fashionweekdaily.com/?p=4326

Another belly on parade...

*Yawn* News is that Nicole Kidman has already posed nude and pregnant and will appear on some magazine cover. Shot by Patrick Demarchelier, the most famous fashion photographer in the world. Im not sure what annoys me more; the fact that Nicole Kidman is posing nude or the fact that her face doesn't move when she smiles? Either way, get a new hobby ladies, nude and pregnant is so 5 minutes ago.

I didn't think this day would come, but it has. I'm over naked and pregnant. I don't get my nerdy researcher thrill anymore to find magazine covers littered with preggos, dreaming up all of the articles I can write. Naked and preggo is a very bizarre cultural phenomenon because for the most part, as much as we think we care about how celebs look when they're pregnant (in terms of how fat or thin they look), the truth is that the term 'baby bump' that has taken over our pop culture is about the 'baby' and not about the woman. Naked and preggo mag covers were groundbreaking because they were meant to put the woman back into increasingly medicalised images of pregnancy (hello foetus!) but the truth is they just reinforce all of the crappy cultural norms that we see in mainstream fashion photography; women need to be smooth and 'thin' in order to be beautiful naked. Now surely you're thinking how on earth can a pregnant woman be thin? Well, just look around. Most celebs are 'thin' and pregnant, no extra skin anywhere.

So I'm over naked and pregnant. Bring back the dowdy pinafores with weird ruffles and oversized bows. Or photos of preggo celebs with clothes on. At least they made for more interesting photos and a little something was left to the imagination. Sometimes I think that the reason all of these celebs want to pose naked and pregnant is not because they are 'celebrating' their fabulous birthing bodies. Rather, they are just proving to the world that they aren't 'fat' and they are still hot.

It's Friday in Melbourne. I'm tired. Perhaps I'll re-evaluate this post when I've slept for more than 4 hours.

Source: http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/story/0,23663,23740914-7485,00.html

Nicole Kidman and her invisible bump

I try not to judge..but Nicole Kidman is supposedly 6 months pregnant and the latest photo of her from last night at the Country Music Awards is a bit of a worry...perhaps it's a phantom pregnancy? She has no bump!

Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/showbiz/showbiznews.html?in_article_id=559755&in_page_id=1773













Source: http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/news/celebrity/251623/nicole-kidman-s-mini-baby-bump.html

Bumps on display: Jamie Lynn and Nicole Kidman

I have this theory (supported by evidence) that the ways in which pregnant women feel about their 'bumps'/pregnant bodies is directly linked to whether the pregnancy was 'wanted'/'planned' or not.

Two very interesting examples of the above just fell in my lap(top).

1) Nicole Kidman: extremely outwardly excited to be pregnant and is happy to 'show off' her growing belly at every opportunity, an 'older' mother who has said numerous times that she has been trying to get pregnant for years

2) Jamie Lynn Spears: hidden from public view since her pregnancy announcement, wearing baggy clothes, avoiding having her photograph taken. According to new reports (and this is very sad), Jamie Lynn is having severe body image issues and has taken to wrapping Ace bandages around her stomach to hide her 'bump'. No longer is she just the 'cute teen', she's a pregnant teenager.

This is very interesting and evidences my theory very nicely. Both women are 5 months pregnant (although have to say Nicole does look extremely small for 5 months!). Nicole has described her pregnancy as very much wanted and in the works for many years. Jamie Lynn is 16, and whilst no one will ever know if the pregnancy was 'wanted', I think most of us would guess that, for all intents and purposes, this pregnancy was not 'planned' or at least part of her life plans at such a young age.

Whereas Nicole is proud to show off her changing body, Jamie Lynn understandably looks as though she is in denial of her situation. I noticed very similar situations in my own research. For younger women who had 'surprise' pregnancies, it often took them a very long time to come to terms with being pregnant. They often told me they didn't 'feel' pregnant until they were much bigger in size and also had a chance to bond with the baby more. For 'older' women who had been trying to fall pregnant for ages, they were ready to push out their bellies and tell the world they were pregnant from the moment they found out.

Sources: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23283835/

http://www.catwalkqueen.tv/2008/02/yay_or_nay_nico_3.html

http://www.celebrity-gossip.net/celebrities/hollywood/jamie-lynn-spears-growing-baby-bump-203331/

A little bump in the road.

I never thought I would say this.

I feel saturated. Fully and utterly saturated. As of this week, it feels like pregnancy and birth are the only things left for the media to talk about. Whereas I used to get a little rush reading about the latest pregnant celeb, seeing the snaps of her belly in a tight maternity top or delighting in stories about weight gain, for some reason this week, pregnancy in the news is no longer exciting. From someone who lives and breathes pregnancy (without actually being pregnant), this is a very bizarre turn of events.

I've been trying to work out why celeb pregnancy hasn't been doing it for me lately. Is it just the latest crop of preggos that I find to be utterly boring? Is it possible that I have read too many tabloids for one lifetime? Then it occurred to me. Pregnancy is now a career booster for celebrities and the birth of a child is treated like an 'event' rather than a private family affair. More than 400 articles are devoted to the 'birth' of Christina Aguilera's son whom she had by elective caesarean (which is not mentioned anywhere). For someone who claimed she did not want to have the media involved in her pregnancy by sheepishly failing to 'announce' that she was knocked up, that she and her husband sent decided to send out a press release just undermines the 'privacy' she was supposedly trying to achieve. Why would she do that? Because pregnancy and motherhood are clearly boons to the careers of celebrity women and it would be a mistake not to cash in on the tabloid baby showers.

Now that all of these celebs are pregnant (I hesitate to even give a complete list it has grown so spectacularly in the last few months), pregnancy is an PR exercise. No one is willing to say how they really feel and every pregnant celebrity, it seems, feels the need to pay lip service to 'good' motherhood. I swear if I read if one more celeb using the words 'wonderful' or 'amazing' to describe her pregnancy, I think I will hurl. When Halle Berry recently said she wished she could be pregnant 'forever', it was like nails grinding on a chalkboard. Nicole Kidman is 'thrilled' to be pregnant along with the rest of the world as the 600th rumour about her non-existent baby bump has finally come true and no doubt, motherhood at 40 will eclipse all of her independent achievements to date.

I'm just over it. What happened to the frank pregnant confessions of both elation and utter disgruntlement? I'm so sick of celebrity women going on about how great and easy pregnancy is and lapping up the adulation for daring to be naked and pregnant on a magazine cover when only last week it was decided that British mother Louise Manning is set to win up to £200,000
because she was harassed so profoundly at work. Forced to resign when she revealed she was pregnant, Manning's boss sent a memo stating:

"Louise’s pregnancy has quite naturally had an adverse effect on her ability, motivation and dedication."

Mothering is not easy and for many companies, pregnancy is the WORST career move a woman could ever make.

This is the world we live in. It's not all designer prams and expensive birthing suites. Average women, it seems, have to quite literally fight for their 'right' to have a career during pregnancy. Surely the birth of a child is a major life achievement for any woman but quite often it comes at the expense of her ability to achieve a work/life balance. The celebrities who rave about how easy pregnancy is completely undermine the everyday realities that most women face trying to juggle a family with a career or even in staying at home without the luxury of a nanny or a chef.

Source: http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/families/article3176474.ece

Mothers over 40

If you recall, in October, I wrote about 'Statistics That Piss Me Off'. In particular, it was statement about fertility, that well, pissed me off:

"Fertility Society of Australia spokeswoman Anne Clark warned that the decision to defer motherhood could have serious implications for national population growth: "This is not good news, because fertility levels change for women in their mid-30s and for men after 40, so you are going to have a lot of people pushing it to have more than two children."

In case you have been living in a hole, Nicole Kidman is pregnant. She will actually give birth when she is 41. Whereas the Australian media has been all about flogging mothers over 35 for being selfish and risking their health for no reason, in the last two days, almost every story about 'older' mothers is praiseworthy. For example:

NSW Midwives Association, Hannah Dahlen, said yesterday women should not be deterred.
"Older mothers are more likely to be educated and financially secure, more settled in themselves and more prepared to make the sacrifices required to be a mother," she said. "They are better able to negotiate care for their child, their children often do better in school, and it has also been shown in some studies that women who have babies in their 40s live longer."

Apparently, because Nicole Kidman 'looks' fit and healthy and wants a child so badly, apparently she is immune to any of the 'risks' associated with pregnancy over 40.

Sources: http://www.smh.com.au/news/health/the-risks--and-rewards--when-motherhood-begins-at-40/2008/01/08/1199554655649.html

Nicole Kidman: miscarriage or miscommunication?

Everyone is talking about Nicole Kidman's recent interview with Vanity Fair magazine where she apparently 'bares all' about Keith Urban and the miscarriage she had when she was married to Tom Cruise. As all of the gossip websites are onto the story and publishing tidbits of the interview, Us Magazine published the headline:

Nicole Kidman: I Miscarried Tom’s Baby'

This makes me so insanely angry. As usual, blame the woman. First of all, Nicole Kidman never says in the interview 'I miscarried Tom's baby'. This headline makes it seem as though Nicole's body was inadequate to carry a pregnancy to term. Nicole is the source of blame as if she had the power to control whether she would miscarry or not. Furthermore, why is the fetal death referred to as 'Tom's baby'? Was Tom pregnant? Since when is it 'his'? Just because he was the 'father', why wouldn't the headline say that she miscarried her own baby?

None of us have any idea how Nicole Kidman felt about this pregnancy. Did she think of it as a 'fetus' or a 'baby'? We don't even know at what stage in the pregnancy she miscarried but the use of the word 'baby' makes it seem as though she and Tom lost a 'child'. In fact, Us says:

"In a revealing interview in the October issue of Vanity Fair, Nicole Kidman admits that she and Tom Cruise lost a baby early into their marriage."

I think this is really misleading and unnecessarily sensationalistic. It's great that Nicole feels secure enough to talk about her experience openly but it is unfortunate that emotive language has to be attached to her miscarriage and even more so, this article basically suggests that she failed in her reproductive duties as a woman because she was unable to carry a pregnancy to term.

Source: http://www.usmagazine.com/nicole_kidman_2