Celebrity envy

Tori Spelling has revealed that she looked to Jessica Alba for inspiration to lose the weight after the birth of her second child, Stella.

She says, "I would look at pictures of myself and compare them to Jessica Alba, who had her baby two days before me. I'd see photos of her two months after and go, 'Look at her!'"

She adds, "The best way to lose weight is to make it a family affair. It has changed my life. It's easier now because I'm not as focused on it. Take your time. If you get obsessed, you'll miss out on great moments with your children.”

Source: http://tinyurl.com/5kn3oz

Saggy boobs? Don't blame breastfeeding

Some of you will pleased to know, a study has just been published in Aesthetic Surgery Journal that debunks the very widely held perception that breastfeeding causes saggy boobs. Well, it doesn't. The authors argue that greater age, higher BMI, greater number of pregnancies, larger pre-pregnancy bra cup size and history of smoking were significant risk factors in the development of sagging breasts.

Considering complaints of saggy breasts are one of the most common reasons for undergoing plastic surgery post-birth, it looks like women will have to blame their saggy boobs on something other than childbearing.

And yes, I did take that photo in Thailand. In fact, I probably know a little bit too much about breast implants as a result.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/5m9br3

Fertility police

As if the entire process to undergo IVF wasn't hard enough already, according to new legislation in Victoria, women seeking IVF will have to undergo CRIMINAL CHECKS in order to receive treatment. On top of the already long process of medical examinations and screening women have to undergo to receive treatment, the new bill would 'would deny people access to treatment if a conviction for sexual, serious violent offence had been recorded or if the person had a child protection order made against them.'

I thought it was particularly horrible when lesbians were being denied IVF without medical documentation of infertility. Now, all Australian women are going to be subject to what amounts to a criminal background check when they are already feeling pretty vulnerable. What is really astounding is that Australians with a criminal record are procreating willy nilly and no one seems to care because they can do it 'naturally'.

The Victorian police have no business or right to interfere with Australian wombs.

Source: http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24562002-2862,00.html

Jenna Jameson: baby bump

Oh yeah. Remember I mentioned that porn queen Jenna Jameson is pregnant? In the spirit of Minnie Driver and the informal baby/preggo photo, Jameson has posted her preggo belly on her MySpace page.

Source: www.myspace.com/jennajameson

Closing a chapter

Yeah. I'm freaking out a little bit. As of today, I've done the final copy edit on my PhD thesis. As you all know, pregnancy, baby bumps and body image have consumed my life for the last three years and three months. I'm clearing out my office as I type and I'm actually feeling a little bit sad that I won't have this monster of a project to work on anymore. Don't get me wrong: at various points during the writing of this beast, I have wondered whether I could actually get through it. Now, it's over (well, not until Friday, officially).

I've spent the past week writing about my Thailand surgery trip as a distraction and I'm still reeling from the surgery that I watched. I sort of can't believe I was there and that the whole trip even happened. After spending time with the surgeons and hanging out with some of the women having surgery, I have to say, the whole pregnant celebrity thing really seems insignificant compared to what average women are dealing with everyday.

I'm really eager for suggestions for future posts. Celebrity pregnancy is a little ho-hum at the moment. In fact, I would really like to go back to when I first started this blog and readers sent in their personal stories about pregnancy and body image.

Anyway, this is a bit of a hodge podge. Feeling very out of sorts!

Why is birth painful?

I came across an interesting article in Salon suggesting that the pain of childbirth basically serves no purpose and is merely a hangover from evolution. Some anthropologists have argued that labour pain served as a means of letting women know that they should seek assistance, ultimately, as a mechanism to lower rates of infant and maternal mortality. If women received help, they were less likely to bleed to death. The strongest evidence seems to be that all cultures have traditional birth attendants which suggests that assistance during birth was considered to be critical.

The question remains, it seems, as to whether labour pain has lived out its usefulness for women. As the author of the article suggests, this theory is problematic for natural childbirth advocates because this evolutionary perspective implicitly argues that birth is dangerous and not 'natural'.

I'm not sure I agree with this argument in general. After all, babies heads have become substantially larger over time and a woman's pelvis has pretty much stayed the same. In a nutshell, it seems pretty clear to me why giving birth would hurt.

Source: http://open.salon.com/content.php?cid=31854

Talking about miscarriage

IM BACK...to reality, that is. I said goodbye to sun, sand and surgery yesterday and will be blogging as per usual from now on.

Great article today in the New York Times about the persistent silence around the experience of miscarriage and is a nice antidote to John McCain's dismissive statement about women's 'health':
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/21/health/views/21case.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

A British group of women is discussing their experiences of miscarriage and insensitive doctors on Mumsnet: www.mumsnet.com

Read more about it here: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article4964678.ece