Advocating for the best is not an attack.

I saw a post on a favorite blog of mine, "The Mom: Informed" about how advocacy, or even activism, is not a personal attack. I loved it. If my internet weren't so crappy right now, I'd link it, because it really is that good. It reminded me so much of my day to day life.

When our kids are little, it's the land of many decisions. Literally, the moment you find out you're pregnant, you have to choose what type of care you want. Do you want an obstetrician, a nurse midwife, or a direct-entry midwife? Once you choose your care provider, if you chose a nurse-midwife, you have to figure out if you want a hospital birth or a birth center birth. If you chose a direct-entry midwife, you have to figure out if you want her to assist you in a birth center (if she has a birth center, as mine did) or at home. As you progress throughout the pregnancy, there are so many more questions. Do you want ultrasounds? Do the risks outweigh the benefits for you, or the other way around? Do you want prenatal testing of any sort?

Then you plan for the baby's arrival. You figure out what kind of birth you feel most confident with. What interventions are ok, and what ones are absolute deal breakers? Will you have pain medication, or is it mind over matter for you? Under what circumstances would you accept a transfer to hospital, if you're not birthing there already? Are you going to breastfeed or formula feed? Do you want the baby to get a Vitamin K shot? What about eye ointment? If it's a boy, will you circumcise him? Then there's the matter of naming! You need something that sounds equally good on the playground and in the board room.

After the baby is born, the decisions only keep piling on. Will cracked nipples make you waver on your steadfast promise to breastfeed? Will the diaper laundry pile up so much you reach for the Huggies that well meaning friends and relatives gave you even though you assured them you would only ever use cloth? Will months of no sleep tempt you to let the baby "cry it out"? Do you believe in schedule feeding, or do you keep it on demand?

The constant decision making really ends after the first few years. After that, you've pretty much just got to decide what school you want to send Jr to, and what's acceptable to pack in a lunch. By Kindergarten, nobody cares if you breastfed or not, and the only time your vaccination schedule even comes up in conversation is when the smiley fake-sweet school nurse informs you that Little Susie is "missing" some shots. (Kiss my exemption form, needle pusher!) That heroic homebirth you made happen against the odds? Your record breaking milk supply? The fact that you kept her rear-facing until the age of 3? None of it will mean a hill of beans by the time your kid learns to read. Time goes on, and focus shifts. (That's not to say that stuff isn't important. It is. It's just, by the time you reach school age, it's pretty clear that what's done is done.)

However, parents who are just in the beginning stages of their parenting journey don't know this yet. They only see the here and now. They're confused, pretty sure they're doing it wrong in one way or another, and having to make decisions they never even knew existed until now, and with relatively little help in many cases. I understand. I was SINGLE when I went through this the first time! I was also really young, and I knew NOTHING about most any of this stuff. I was confused. I know how it feels to be in the middle of that, where you're just doing the best you can, and it seems like the world is against you a lot of days. I'll never forget when I ran into my (royal bitch of an) 8th grade science teacher in the mall when Erin was about 5 months old. I was sitting on a bench, feeding her a bottle (See, I flunked at breastfeeding once upon a time, too.) and this woman literally gave me the third degree for bottle feeding. I know what it's like to feel judged even when you're doing your best.

Even so, this is no reason to withhold facts. Knowledge isn't worth a thing if we sit on it and keep it for ourselves. Advocating for best practice is always a good idea, because that's how change happens. You know, these days, every baby has a carseat. That wasn't the case a generation ago. People got the word out that carseats are the way to go, and change happened. Even laws changed to reflect that it's the right thing to do to use carseats. The same goes for a lot of other stuff. A generation ago, breastfeeding rates were at an all time low. They're still not very good, but they're coming up, because people are getting the word out that human milk is the appropriate food for human babies. Circumcision rates are falling below 50% throughout much of the country, Medicaid has stopped paying for it in 16 states, and a lot of private insurances have stopped covering it. This is because people have gotten the word out that it's a really bad idea. Change happens because people tell each other about best practice, new studies, and how things are done around the world.

Advocacy for best practice is not a personal attack, though, and as hard as it is for those in the throes of new parenthood to do, they REALLY need to stop taking things so personally when they were intended generally. If I say, for example, "Circumcision removes 20,000 nerve endings, and 500 babies worldwide die of complications from circumcision every year." that does not translate, "You circumcised your son, and for that, you are a horrible monster." It is hopefully a bid to convince you to research and maybe keep the next one whole. If I say, "Breastmilk is the appropriate food for human babies, and has many health advantages compared to formula." or "I notice a major difference in my breastfed baby compared to my formula babies." that does NOT translate, "You are sentencing your child to a life of shit for feeding them formula. You are a horrible parent." STOP taking things so personally. Talking about what is best is not condemnation of whatever it is you are doing, as it pertains to you. There will be some practices that we all do that are not the best. I'm eating a cookie right now, in fact, and I could probably find about 1000 studies that say I really shouldn't eat a cookie. I'm still eating it, though, and that's ok. I don't take those studies personally, however, I do acknowledge them by sticking to ONE cookie instead of eating ten like I'd like to right now.

I know everything I know because somebody was unafraid to tell me. I first researched circumcision when I was pregnant with Erin. I had just assumed, like many people, that it's just what was done with baby boys, and that was that. Then one day, my aunt asked me if I planned on circumcising the baby if it was a boy. I said I didn't really know anything on the subject, and she told me to research it very thoroughly, because it is not at all necessary to do it. I was interested, and read up on it a lot. I quickly came to the conclusion that it was not only unnecessary, but barbaric and cruel, and that no baby of mine would ever go through that. If she hadn't spoken up, for fear of my reaction, I would still know nothing on the subject. Similarly, my resolve to breastfeed is strong because of the facts I have learned when people gave me studies and news articles to read, or brought this topic up in conversation. On vaccines, it's the same. I had no idea it was an option to give only some, until someone told me it was, and I used that as a jumping off point for my own research on the subject. It applies also to carseats. I thought forward facing at a year and 20 pounds was the thing to do until Orren was about 6 months old, and I saw a crash test video that an activist friend sent me. Orren is still rear-facing, and 500% safer in the car, because that person was unafraid to tell me the truth.

Everyone who advocates for things knows that not everyone will be receptive to the message. That's a given, and we all accept that some will always do things their own way, even if every study in the world finds that way to be less than the best. It is what it is. The important thing, though, is to realize that when people are getting facts out, it's not an attack. It's the spread of knowledge, and that is an inherently good thing. We weren't born knowing all this stuff. Somebody told us something that sparked our interest, and we did research to learn more. That's what we're trying to do, spark your interest, so that you do your own research and become knowledgeable on topics relevant to parents or parents to be. I suppose my view of it is slightly more objective because I have one foot in the early stages of parenting (with Orren and Chai), and one foot in the school age world where nobody cares about any of this stuff, because what's done is done. It doesn't seem so personal to me because I see how temporary it is that this stuff is even relevant to discuss. Just take my word for its temporary nature, though, and realize that when someone tells you to tighten up your baby's carseat straps, or tells you where to find breastfeeding support after your baby's born, or asks you if you will keep your newborn son whole, this is not an attack on you. It is advocacy for best practice, and being knowledgeable is generally considered a good thing.

Get some.... knowledge.

Look up these great sites for more information on relevant topics:

www.cirp.org (Circumcision)
www.thewholenetwork.org (Circumcision)
www.kellymom.com (Breastfeeding)
www.birthwithoutfear.blogspot.com (Birth)
www.mamabirth.blogspot.com (Birth)
www.drmomma.org (all of the above, plus vaccines, positive discipline, and more)
www.mothering.com (all of the above, plus vaccines, positive discipline, and more)
www.car-seat.org (Carseat safety)