Photo: Ian Sane's photostream

So far this year, I’ve read at least have a half dozen articles about expanding less out into the world, and focusing more on specific people, places, and work that mean something to the individual writing the piece (i.e. My Focus Word For 2012 Is…, Our Responsibility as Media Channels, The Artificiality of Time).

Perhaps the most brilliant and impactful article (considering it was in the New York Times) may be the one that showed up just at the end of 2011, The Joy of Quiet. As writer Pico Iyer writes:

Has it really come to this?

In barely one generation we’ve moved from exulting in the time-saving devices that have so expanded our lives to trying to get away from them — often in order to make more time. The more ways we have to connect, the more many of us seem desperate to unplug. Like teenagers, we appear to have gone from knowing nothing about the world to knowing too much all but overnight.

The too-fast pace at which we have moved – particularly over the last two years – has led to an all too-common feeling of burnout. We have computers that stay on all day long, phones that track us wherever we go (and that we can’t put down for five minutes even when we sit across from a friend at a cafe), social media networks that demand our attention at all hours.

Being constantly tapped-in and knowing what is happening to people on the other side of the country or the globe has not necessarily improved our lives, true connections, or well-being. While movements have toppled shady governments thanks in part to being linked in, we’ve become less connected to the human beings that sit directly beside us in full technicolor.

I don’t believe the answer is to shut down the computer and pitch it out the sun roof (though at times, I definitely think might be the best protest of all). Instead, it’s time to swing the pendulum back so that it ends up somewhere in the middle.

Balance. Use it for good, for efficiency, for your message. Then leave it alone and focus on building the real-life communities that surround you.

Focus inside. Enjoy the quiet. Sit in solitude. Free yourself from the constant adrenaline rush/addiction that is breaking your body down when you are constantly reading new things on the computer or iPhone or iPad.

If 2012 is really shepherding us into a new reality, let that reality be dependent on human interaction and love, so we can learn how to be better at this job of living.

Photo: thetappingman

The emotional freedom technique, or EFT, as it is commonly called, is one of the most powerful, natural tools you can utilize to change or improve your life.

This therapy is easy to learn and is the perfect pairing with more traditional therapies for aggressive diseases like mesothelioma that is triggered from asbestos exposure, as well as a host of other physical maladies. When EFT is used in conjunction with Healing Touch & Intuitive Bodywork, its power is even further amplified.

EFT is a combination of ancient acupressure techniques used in combination with mantras. It can be used to address deep seated emotional troubles as well as physical concerns, and is appropriate for people of all ages, at any stage of their health. EFT can be learned from a trained guide or online, and once you understand the procedure it can be performed anywhere.

Process

First you choose a topic to focus on. You can use EFT to address any topic of concern, but this technique is meant to be used on just one topic at a time. Suppose you have knee pain. Focus on the feeling of pain in your knees, and rank your discomfort on a level between one and ten.

Concentrating on your knee pain, you will then tap through a pattern using specific points on your body’s meridian while repeating the words “knee pain.” At the end of the exercise, you will go through a resetting process using mental techniques, and evaluate your pain again. If its level has not decreased to a satisfactory amount, you can repeat the process again.

This can be done as many times as needed, and eventually can be done very quickly. EFT becomes more and more powerful the more often that it is performed. You will have greater power over your pain and emotional issues.

Gaining Acceptance

EFT is particularly valuable because it brings you into greater familiarity with your body. You will come to accept yourself and understand yourself much more with this therapy. Often a mesothelioma prognosis leaves us feeling as though our own body has betrayed us, and EFT can help you to heal that rift.

Healing Touch and Intuitive Bodywork complement the training you receive by practicing EFT regularly. These types of touch therapy are performed by bright practitioners who help you to bring positive, loving energy into your own body.

Not only do these therapies feel wonderfully relaxing and rejuvenating, the stimulating effects last much longer than an ordinary massage, and bring remarkable changes to the way you feel in body and spirit. These therapies used in conjunction with a traditional regime will recharge your life, and you will learn to accept and love yourself, exactly the way you are.

Photo: athalielaure

Menopause is rarely something that women look forward to. That’s probably due in large part to the fact that the media constantly reminds women how “horrible” a part of life the “change” is. Culturally, it is impressed upen women that they are no longer young or attractive to the opposite sex, and have lost their status as a “real” woman.

It’s such an unfortunate reality, as menopause is as much a part of being a woman as getting your period for the first time or giving birth to a baby.

Yes, there are physical and emotional shifts that occur with the onset of menopause. But these aren’t all negative; changes often include deeper wisdom, a better connection to your body, and appreciation for all the experiences which have led to this point in life.

But as with any change, being a part of a supportive community is a huge help when first experiencing menopause. Maybe creating a support group with friends going through the process will work for you; or if you want to be a part of a group in a more private manner, a new online menopause community may be the way you want to go. Either way, working with a doctor or other practitioner who not only understand the process, but is sympathetic in nature can also help with moving into this phase of life.

How do you know you are experiencing menopause? Well, the most common symptoms include irregular periods, hot flashes, and night sweats. There are plenty of natural ways to lessen intense physical symptoms of this process, including exercise, wild yam supplements, and decreasing sugar and alcohol.

As with any process that we can’t control, menopause teaches us lessons about ourselves physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. Just remember to be kind to yourself as you face these new lessons, and find others who are doing the same.

Photo: ale e francesco

It’s taken me a week to find the time – and the focus – to work on this post, which I actually thought from the get-go was a pretty cool idea. Tripbase introduced another round-robin of sorts (see my post about Secret Travel Spots, which they started at the end of ’09) for travel writers (a category under which I sometimes fall) to list their favorite seven links from their own blog.

My 7 Links is a retrospective, which I love; they give us a chance – or force us – to look both internally and externally when we rarely take the time to do so otherwise. For me, looking back over my blog doesn’t happen – it’s always about looking forward to the next thing, what I want to capture, and what’s on tap in the big, bad world of too-much-going-on news.

So I savored this opportunity to look through Google Analytics and read through a few posts, to remember where I was, where I am, and how many great people have contributed to making LH happen. Thank to Leigh Shulman of The Future is Red for tagging me.

Here we go with the top 7:

Most Popular Post

25 Best Quotes About Beliefs and Points-of-View

People dig it

Duh. I knew as I was writing this it would probably be one of – if not the most popular – post on the site. In fact, that’s probably why I pulled it together.

It’s not to say that we are easily pleased as a society, but rather that we all want and need inspiration more often than we all willing to admit. And hey, quotes from alternative health people almost always make you feel better about yourself and humanity. So feel free to continue passing this one around like the blankie you cuddle up on as you fall asleep.

You’re welcome.

Most Controversial Post

Tie: Response: When is a One-Night Stand Worth it for a Woman? and One Woman’s Experience With an Open Relationship: The Wife’s Response

When I had an ex-professional dominatrix respond to my article One-Night Stands: Are They Worth it for Women?, I knew we had some juiciness afoot. Though there weren’t many comments directly under the piece, the amount of emails I’ve received blew my head open. Classic.

The second piece was also a response to something another contributor had written, Love and Marriage: One Woman’s Experience With an Open Relationship. The idea of an open relationship seems unfathomable to many, and yet it continues to become a more viable option as we contend with large-scale issues of cheating and divorce. This piece may have been illuminating to some, and ridiculous to others, but it certainly got me thinking about issue of love and relationships, which I eventually took over to another platform at Confronting Love.

Most Helpful Post

Special Detox Series

Everybody wants to know about cleansing. That’s the first thing I ALWAYS GET ASKED as soon as people hear the words “holistic health educator” (probably as soon as they hear “holistic”). As with being stopped on the street because people recognize you or jetting off to different countries at a moment’s notice, people think cleansing is all romantic and good and makes you a stronger and better person than other people who, well, don’t cleanse. The reality is that cleansing is hard, is gonna drag up more than some impacted feces in your colon, and may even threaten your life. Kinda like all those airplanes and people on the street.

Thanks, Kendra Mellinger, for telling it how it really is in this detox series.

Post That Surprised Me With Its Success Most

Oh You Hipsters You

This was one of those posts that I totally stole from another site and commented on (also known as “remixing”). It was completely unoriginal, and really had nothing to do with health. It did alright at first, and then like a year later TOOK OFF for no apparent reason. Not even a late Stumble Upon thumbs up.

Really? Well, okay. I ain’t too good to take the rankings surge.

Most Beautiful Post

How To Break Up While Maintaining Integrity

I am not only super proud of this post because of what I wrote in it, but that I lived it. It was an excruciating time on many levels, but my ex and I decided we wanted to do our very best to not damage the beauty we’d tended to during our relationship.

I remember being in the cafe, crying as I wrote this piece, and receiving an email from him at the same time. It was gut-wrenching, lovely, and the most real thing I had ever experienced. And I have it forever online.

Post That Didn’t Get the Attention It Deserved

Is Time Really Speeding Up

This is one that I just wrote last week, and even as I wrote it, I knew it wouldn’t be popular. None of my sciencey ones ever are, maybe because that’s not what people expect to read on a site about health and humor, or maybe because they are just diatribes I like to go on that no one else really cares about.

But with our relation to time becoming ever more skewed, I think it’s important to ask why. And why in ways other than, “wow, why is [insert month/year here] going so fast?”

Post Of Which I Am Most Proud

Tie: I Binged Last Night and Ode to My Body

Looking up

Again with the tie. I can’t help it.

A good friend who’s only been in my life for about a year recently took her first good, long look at LH. She told me afterward that she was surprised at how much of it was about my struggles with body image, since that is not the person I portray to her or the world, today.

It took me a moment to fully realize the truth of her words. That yes, I still have my moments of not appreciating my body where it is at, or getting irritated with it for being what my ego believes is too big. But mostly, I do not carry the stuff I carried for years – a belief that I wasn’t good enough, or worthy of love, because of the way that I looked. Of course, that was always a surface explanation for a deeper issue, but it played such a powerful role that it didn’t matter.

Thanks for coming along with me on this trip down memory lane.

Ok, who are the bloggers I’m tagging?

- My blogging partner-in-crime is up first: Carlo Alcos of Vagabonderz, Confronting Love, and Matador’s Brave New Traveler.

- Ryan Hurd of Dream Studies. Not a travel blogger, unless you count traveling in your dreams. Which I do. So, he’s in (plus, he’s got a great site and is the most scientific-yet-dreamy person I know).

- Not that he’ll have time to do this since he’s traveling around the world for a year, but Daniel Baylis at The Conversationalist could easily give a great retrospective of his site based on what he’s written just the last 7 months.

- Vanessa Smith of Let Your Life Bloom. Vanessa’s put out so many good tidbits over the years, I know pulling out her top 7 will be both hard as hell and a total breeze.

- Travel writer and author extraordinaire Shelley Seale has several blogs to chose from, but I’m tagging her How To Travel For Free site since that’s something that everyone is interested in learning how to do.

Go to it, kids.

Photo: epSos.de

When I finally figured out (aka remembered) that my tiny old iPod had a clock on it, I frantically looked at the ticking digits to see how much time I had for a shower. Or a few yoga poses. Maybe even a nap.

The time was always ahead of where I thought it was.

This fact didn’t pass me by easily; I was in Belize, with no computer, no iPhone, not even a watch. Three days it took me to recall there was a clock on the only technological instrument I brought with me.

I had brought none of those radiation producers mostly as a way to disconnect. I’m on the computer all the time. Sometimes 10 hours a day. I know it’s not good for my health, but it’s my work.

I needed a break.

So, while everyone else on this press trip whipped out their phones the second we got in wifi range (which was incredibly often in this country that I assumed we’d have little access to), I sat and looked around at my surroundings at the Machacha Hill Lodge: the large green leaves on the trees that seemed to wave hello in my direction. The massive spotted beetle with his own version of tweezers attached the front of his body, wearily trudging by. The mosquitoes that tried to bite through the back of Bob’s shirt as he unknowingly looked off into space.

(The rainforest was different than I thought it would be. I always imagined the jungle to be deep foliage and rain with little horizon and no way out. Then again, maybe we didn’t go deep enough.)

But I expected these moments would lounge, maybe like they did when I was in Zambia, or even when I would walk around London for hours, exploring its inner crossways and streets that decided to change names three times over. Instead, though the balminess of Belize had me breathing a little easier and my brain slowed down to thoughts of Maya ruins and the shift of consciousness in 2012, time still seemed on overdrive. Wherever. I. Went.

Why is this happening? Is time really speeding up?

The Hypotheses/Myths

Many myths abound / Photo: The Queen's Hall

Well, if you take a little tour around the internet under the search, “time speeding up”, you will inevitably find many sites dedicated to 2012 and few linked to any sort of science – even quantum physics.

The easiest thing I could find to understand that might get some backing from the science-minded set is Suzanne Taylor’s take at TheConversation.org (even then, it includes references to the end of the Maya calendar and is a site about crop circles, so scientific people can go ahead and cringe uncontrollably now):

Imagine a ball rolling across a level surface, the distance it travels each second would be constant, apart from the effect of friction – this is a linear approach that is similar to how we perceive life. However, if the ball were dropped from the top of a tall building, in the first second it would travel thirty-two feet. But the time it would take to travel the next thirty-two feet would be less than half a second as its speed would increase exponentially because of the accelerating force of gravity.

If you were a microbe on this ball, you might therefore conclude that time is speeding up. In this case it is not time that is speeding up, it is the distance traveled that is increasing each second. In a similar way, evolution is also exponential and time is not speeding up, but the number of events occurring in each year is increasing.

Easy enough – the more we do, the more we are connected, the faster time seems to go by. There are very few people I know that haven’t uttered the phrase, “this year is going by so fast!” for well, the last three years or so. Every day, there is more to get done, with technology that keeps adding new networking tools (ahem, Google+) to news that tells us about the latest flood that occurred in the mid-West or earthquake in New Zealand to the latest bombing in Delhi.

But is it just the technological impact, or is there something deeper going on? Again, it’s hard to find “concrete” resources on this subject, one because of its new-age connotations and websites full of flashing aliens and fairies, and second because really, you can’t stick plastic in a compost mound and expect it to decompose. But here’s something at least kinda scientific: Mathematician Tony Smith explains Schumann Resonances, geomagnetic reversals, and human brain states:

Just as a tuning fork has natural frequencies for sound, the planet Earth has natural frequencies, called Schumann resonances, for electromagnetic radiation. The Human Brain also has natural frequencies for electromagnetic radiation. It turns out that the Earth’s Schumann resonances are “in tune” with the Human Brains’s Alpha States and Theta States…the fundamental frequency could be varied due to a number of things: the strength and configuration of Earth’s magnetic field, which has been weakening for the past 2,000 years; the composition and properties of the atmosphere…the solar sunspot cycle; electromagnetic storms from the sun; electromagnetic properties of the Earth, such as “earthquake lights”…thunderstorms…

What does this mean? Well, it could mean several things: another magnetic field reversal (and yes, pole shifts have occurred before), that the Earth’s frequency is changing and our bodies are struggling to keep up, which makes us feel like time is moving faster, that the increase in Schumann resonance while the Earth slows its rotation means eventually meeting at a zero point magnetic field, which means everything will stop for a moment (guess when?) and then start turning in the other direction.

There’s also British author/conspiracy theorist David Icke’s thoughts on time speeding up, and Terence McKenna’s Time Wave Theory. I’m sure there are countless variations on these ideas.

What the Point?

Time standing still / Photo: h.koppdelaney

There is plenty to worry about, what with the possibility of asteroids hitting the earth and aliens making us their love-slaves. Oh wait, that was just in several dozen A and B-list Hollywood movies.

I think that what counts right now, for each of us, is that most everything feels out of our control, including time. Our lives seem to be slipping away from us with the bigger to-do lists and the aspirations yet to be fulfilled. Decisions are being made more quickly; loss doesn’t have a chance to settle.

Too much of this impacts our body – our health – more than most of us can comprehend. Until it’s diabetes. Or a heart attack. Or cancer. That internal feeling of must-get-it-all-done-there’s-not-enough-time-in-the-day is an actual internal motion that speeds up our heart beat, increases our insulin, beats the crap out of our adrenals. It robs us of our sleep – the time to cleanse and repair – which takes away our focus while we are awake. So we use extra caffeine to get through the day, and an extra wine to come down for the night. That’s the cycle.

Yes, it felt to me, even in Belize, that time is speeding up, however much some people scream pseudoscience and hell and damnation. If it feels that way to so many people, isn’t it true – even if it’s something we can’t ‘prove’?

So I remember looking at those large green Belizean leaves and the broken body of a beetle just trying to survive. I remember doing this instead of looking at the clicking in of emails on my iPhone. And I think, ‘this time is all the time we have.’

Photo: AlicePopkorn

When Newsweek covers it in great detail, you know it’s hit mainstream.

It’s earlier than I thought, I’ll tell you the truth. I envisioned the entirety of California would have to be swallowed by the ocean, or not a single sliver of ice left in the Arctic before the “news” would call it was it is: climate changed.

Yep, folks, we are past the point of no return.

It’s no longer, “what can we do to hinder global warming?” (well, at least those who believe in it. If you read the comments underneath the Newsweek article, you will see many, many people will deny it until their death bed.) Now it has to be, “how will we prepare for a different environment?”

There will be ever more hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, ocean’s rising. Places that were hot will now be cold, and vice versa. Italy may have to step out of the grape and olive business and into growing winter greens throughout the year. Ireland may become dry. We may lose entire edges of countries to the swarming oceans.

And we are bound to see more nuclear and oil spills, birds dying en masse, and fighting for water and food.

I’ve been contemplating and reading a lot about what changes I’ll have to make in my own life (go ahead and call me an extremist. Don’t worry, I’ve been called worse). I may have to let go of the idea of traveling as a big part of my life. I may have to get really settled in my home in Black Mountain, walking to the store, and poking around this town and this town only. I may have to get a green thumb seriously fast.

Preparation is necessary on a bigger scale than most of us would like to take a look at.

And yet one of the biggest components to this shift in reality is our lack of using all of the creative scientific minds to save us. There’s plenty of know-how out there, but they’re either getting paid to maintain the status quo, or being stifled by the status quo. We have the ability to jump into a whole different way of living, where our energy needs could be fulfilled sustainably, and yet we stay where we are and hope for the best. Which is just accepting the worst.

Here’s what a recent post by Gregg Braden has to say about combining science and spirituality:

It’s based in the false assumptions of scientific thinking that suggest we’re somehow separate from the Earth, separate from one another, and that the nature that gives us life is based upon relentless struggle and survival of the strongest. Fortunately, new discoveries have revealed that each of these assumptions is absolutely false. Unfortunately, however, there is a reluctance to reflect such new discoveries in mainstream media, traditional classrooms and conventional textbooks. In other words, we’re still teaching our young people the false assumptions of an obsolete way of thinking based on struggle, competition, and war.

Don’t forget, change can happen fast. That includes good change, my friends. A study reported on Reuters in 2008 rings even more true today – 30 men who had low-risk prostate cancer and decided to go with alternative treatment instead of chemo not only lost weight and other normal health improvements from diet/exercise change and meditation. They found that after three months, the men showed changes in about 500 genes, including 48 that were turned on and 453 turned off.

Yes, the genetics that we believe are set, aren’t. We can turn on our good genes and turn off our bad ones.

Truth is, we can do the same for our Earth. But we gotta put our money (and lifestyle choices) where our mouth is. Now.

History – and the present – is telling us we won’t. Will you?

Tired of searching a ton of different books for some good health advice? Check out Anita Naik's Lazy Girl's series. / Photo: Herr Saush

There are so many great writers and personalities out there when it come to health, it’s hard to keep up with them all. But certain writers have stuck with me since my program in holistic health education, where we read all the renowned Dr.’s and Naturopaths in the alternative medicine and health field.

I happened upon Anita Naik’s The Lazy Girl’s Guide to Good Healthwhen I was working on an independent study about how living holistically doesn’t have to be so darn hard. There is so much conflicting information out there, along with a lot of extreme diets and lifestyle regimens to follow that shoot for perfection. To be human is not to be perfect. We must enjoy getting healthy as much as being healthy.

I recently found this book when I was unpacking, and decided to contact the author and see what she is up too. Many books later, she’s still telling it straight.

LH: Even before you started writing books, you were writing for Cosmo and Glamour. What got you into writing about health in the first place, and how did you start?

AN: I’ve always been interested in health and beauty and used to read magazines extensively when I was a teen. It was my plan to get into journalism and women’s lifestyle issues.

Author Anita Naik

LH: What inspired you to hit up the ‘lazy’ set when it comes to health? Did you personally connect to it, or was striving for perfection something that you saw as a barrier to health for people in your life?

AN: I had an idea for lazy guides that don’t tell you how to be lazy but find out all the hard stuff for you and condense the information you need – so lazy as in you’re too busy to read all the books so just buy this one.

LH: Do you consider your approach to health holistic? I know sometimes that word scares people, with notions of Yoga Journal models and weird green drinks dancing in their heads, but it seems like you are trying to bridge alternative approaches and those who just want to feel better?

AN: My approach is more choose what’s right for you. As in here’s the information for you to make up your mind. Personally I am not an advocate of alternative approaches but I write about them as I know they help a lot of people.

LH: How do you think health has changed in the mainstream since you first started writing the Lazy Girl’s Guides?

AN: There is a lot more mis-information on health thanks to people posting anecdotal stories on sites, and a lot more lazy journalism where writers just copy press releases about studies that haven’t been proven.

LH: You’ve published an impressive amount of health and wellness books, all with fun titles and covers. Which one is your favorite, and which one was the hardest to put together? Why?

AN: My favorite was Lazy Girl’s Guide to Beautyas I got to try all the beauty treatments, the hardest was Naughty But Nice: The No-Excuses Guide to Getting What You Wantbecause the idea kept changing as did the title and in the end I don’t think the book works very well.

LH: What projects are you currently working on?

AN: The Lazy Girl’s Guide to a Blissful Pregnancyout June 5th 2011 – I wrote it when I was pregnant with my second child last year and am promoting it now.

Life Map to Freedom

Though eating disorders are rampant in this country, especially among young women, it continues to be a rather taboo topic. If a person goes to an eating disorders facility, there tends to be still be a lot of shock and sad eyes coupled with whispers behind their back.

But fully treating eating disorders goes beyond the time in a facility. What happens when a person gets out? Sure, there are weekly meetings they can attend, and sponsors they may have, but who helps them to truly shift into everyday life and not just survive, but thrive? That’s where Kathleen Krupar and her new organization, Life Map to Freedom, come in.

Here’s the video that describes her much-needed organization:

Blissful Living

FB page
Twitter: @live_bliss

Lindsey Lustig offers fitness and nutrition classes, workshops, demos & consultations. She also constantly offers super easy health tips at her FB page, along with more in-depth videos on yoga and breathing techniques. She’s also great with kids, and has written a children’s book. The perfect source if you are looking for ways to be more healthy and connected.

The Urban Conversion

FB page
Twitter: @urbanconversion

I was recently introduced to this TV show/organization/Greening Force and am excited to be one of the professional contributors to their site (first piece coming really soon). Rodman Schley is the fiscally conservative businessman who decided to travel the country and participate “in the most ‘extreme green’ projects, to learn about how we can all make changes to save our planet.”

Now he’s got a reality show that highlights the ups and downs of being a businessman who owns 13 businesses in the Denver area while trying to green environments and reduce his carbon footprint. Preview some of their episodes at their videos page.

Holistic United

FB page
Twitter: @holisticunited

Are you a holistic practitioner who wants to connect with other practitioners around the world? Are you a non-practitioner who is looking for a holistic practitioner? Then head on over to Holistic United to create a listing, or do a search, or hell, even both.

Choose from Naturopaths, Homeopaths, Osteopathy, Chiropractic care, and Nutrition, among others. Get some cutting edge info on alternative health research at their blog. Then make sure you tell your friends about the site so that it becomes an even greater resource for people all over the world who are looking for a different approach.

International Women’s Health Coalition

FB page
Twitter: @IntlWomen

Many women throughout the world still have little to no voice when it comes to basic rights, health, and protection. That’s where the International Women’s Health Coalition comes in – fighting for the rights of women who have few others standing up for them. Here’s a quick overview of their work:

IWHC shapes international policy and builds local capacity for women’s health and human rights in Africa, Asia and Latin America. We leverage our work in these two very different, but critically linked worlds – to change thinking, redirect funding and motivate action by people and institutions that can secure rights and health for women.

Women’s rights – which are directly related to their health – is still a dire issue. Just as this post began with an eating disorders aftercare organization, a disease on one end of the spectrum closely linked to the restriction and oppression of women in the West, we end with an organization that works to give women a voice in places where they are still stifled.

What organizations would you add?

Photo: M Glasgow

The following piece was originally published at Erin Ellis Homebirth Midwife.

A midwife in North Carolina was recently charged with practicing midwifery without a license because her state does not license Certified Professional Midwives (CPMs) and other direct entry midwives.

There was some local news coverage of the arrest and the ongoing efforts of North Carlina families to legalize CPMs. One of the local news stories contained the “If I were at home, I would have died” sentiment.

When I hear statements like this I cringe on the inside. Being a midwife, I hear it a lot. Women love to talk about their birth stories, naturally. In the park, at mom’s groups, among new friends, anywhere women gather there are stories of births being told. When a mother begins telling me her story from the “I would have died at home” perspective, I nod with empathy and say mmm hmm.

It’s a bit of a double bind (midwives and doulas — you know what I am talking about). Every woman’s story is inherently valid and it is her story to tell, her journey. On the other hand, my inner advocate of truth wants to illuminate the myths and realities of the hospital birth industry. In these moments I strive to listen with deep gratitude, kindness and love.

The best I can do is to honor the mother’s feelings and experiences while side-stepping all the nuts and bolts of the “I/we would have died” argument. That can get messy; so often, it is the unnecessary interventions that cause the emergencies.

Breaking Down Beliefs

A typical hospital birth hook-up: pitocin to speed up labor, epidural medication, and an IV bag.
Photo: Erin Elllis

But since it’s coming up in the again in the media and a larger audience of women is hearing such emotionally charged statements about homebirth, it’s time to get messy.

Why do women in the US die while giving birth? No one knows for certain because our reporting methods for maternal mortality are so abysmal. We think, based on fractured US statistics and older studies, that the primary causes of death to women during birth or shortly after are thromboembolism, preeclampsia/eclampsia, hemorrhage, infection, and anesthesia deaths.

Lets look at hemorrhage because it is the most likely to occur in a homebirth setting, though the risk is extremely small when compared with hospital birth.

Here are a few reasons why. Homebirth and hospital birth are supported by two divergent models of care. The homebirth model subscribes to the philosophy of don’t fix what isn’t broken: natural processes generally work best when they are not interfered with. The medical model subscribes to the (more profitable) philosophy of action: pregnancy and birth are conditions that require fixing.

All actions and interventions have consequences. Many of the interventions in a typical hospital birth cause complications, like hemorrhage. These interventions do not happen at home.

New research demonstrates that women whose labors are altered by prolonged exposure to pitocin are more likely to hemorrhage after their birth. This is because oxytocin, our body’s own version of pitocin, helps the uterus to contract after birth and minimize blood loss. Pitocin binds to oxytocin receptor sites, and over time the body becomes desenstitized to it, preventing the uterus from contracting normally and leading to hemorrhage.

Regrettably, we’ve gotten to a point now where most births in the US are started artificially with the help of pitocin (induction) or hurried along by it (augmentation). Homebirth midwives do not use pitocin to start or speed up labor.

Immediate postpartum interventions can also lead to hemorrhage. The period just after birth is a unique and potent time biologically for the mother and baby. A natural flood of hormones connects mother and baby physically and emotionally, and helps the mother safely birth her placenta. The mother’s hormone levels will never be as high as this hour after birth; and when this flow is is disrupted the mother is more likely to bleed excessively.

Interventions during this immediate postpartum time are routine in a hospital setting: failing to give the baby to the mother immediately, assessing the baby away from the mother, pulling on the umbilical cord, changing the mother’s position to suit the care provider, diverting the mother’s attention away from the baby, clamping and cutting the umbilical cord without any good reason to do so, among others.

Honoring Biology

Midwives honor the biological importance of the hormonal bubble after birth and do not intervene unless the mother or baby needs help.

In a typical homebirth, mother and baby are undisturbed after birth.
Photo: Erin Ellis

When you hear someone say “I would have died if I had a homebirth” or “my baby would have died” please remember that these are very emotionally charged declarations. In many cases, unnecessary interventions have caused the complications that women and babies suffer from. (The CDC has estimated that half of maternal deaths are preventable).

You can’t simply cut and paste all the circumstances surrounding a given hospital birth, superimpose them on a homebirth setting, and predict the same outcome — or vice versa. The models of care are too divergent. Women can die from birth complications in any setting, and our hospital death rate from birth-related causes is indefensibly high. We know that low-risk women are as safe, if not safer, birthing at home.

The United States ranks 41st in maternal mortality among nations. That means in 40 other countries, women are less likely to die from pregnancy and birth related causes. The CDC also states that half of the reported deaths were preventable and that death rates are underreported by almost a third. On April 9th the Healthy Mothers Healthy Birth Summit will convene in Washington D.C. to examine the clinical and political issues surrounding maternal death in the United States.

Photo: decade_null

Like many other people around the US, I love listening to This American Life. Their stories offer up a slice of Americana that we rarely hear elsewhere – not to be classified as positive or negative, but encompassing of the human spirit.

Over the last two weeks, I had heard producer Nancy Updike explain that host Ira Glass was out on assignment and she would be taking over hosting duties – an unusual approach for a show where I’ve never heard anyone else start the hour with, “from WBEZ in Chicago, it’s This American Life, distributed by Public Radio International.” I knew whatever he was working on was bound to be juicy, but it wasn’t until last night that I heard the episode which has had me all over the internet this morning.

Veering off from typical TAL fare, this week’s episode is about a drug court in Glynn County, Georgia. Well, it’s more about the woman running this particular drug court, Judge Amanda Williams. Her sentences are so severe that people who forge checks for $100 or are caught with two pills of prescription drugs they don’t have a prescription for face four and five years of drug monitoring, drug classes, and sometimes “indefinite” amounts of time in jail for not following orders in the way Williams approves of.

One woman was thrown in an isolation cell for one of these “indefinite” periods of time, which originally began as an entirely too-long-for-her-crime 28 day sentence, during which time she ran out of her anti-depressants. No one was allowed to talk to her, even the guards who delivered her food, so she could do nothing except for wait. And painfully detox off her meds. And cry. Finally, she took the disposable razor given for her to shave, and does what you think she would do.

Williams believes this is the way to rehabilitate people.

The Truth about Drug Courts

Let me start off by saying I think the basic idea behind drug courts is a good one – instead of sending drug offenders to jail, put them in drug treatment programs to actually help them while they are on probation. Absolutely, sounds fantastic.

But what is going on in practice doesn’t quite seem to live up to the preach. The judges of drug courts have unyielding control over those who show up in front of their benches, sometimes taking away basic rights that we only think could happen in some developing country.

And according to the Justice Policy Institute, drug courts are instead helping to increase the number of people entering the criminal justice system. They believe tax dollars would be better spent on increasing the availability of substance abuse treatment options (um, yes please).

Some of their recommendations, according to Join Together:

• Implement “real” diversion policies and alternatives to incarceration to keep people — mostly those convicted of low-level and drug offenses — out of jail and prison.
• Focus court treatment programs on those who would have gone to prison.
• Evaluate current drug court policies and practices to avoid “cherry picking” and practices that lead to higher failure rates for certain groups, especially those with lower income or people of color.

And these recommendations outline part of the problem you’ll hear in the TAL broadcast – these people would not have otherwise gone to prison. At all. At most they would have had probation, because they committed petty crimes. But Judge Williams forces them to go into drug court or face the strongest felony penalties allowed on their crime, penalties no other judge would impose for first time offenders. Especially ones clearly not addicted to drugs.

[SPOILER ALERT]: The last story in the hour is heart-breaking. A man, who admits he was addicted to drugs and who became a model citizen in the program for 22 months, initially thanked Judge Williams for saving his life. Then, 3 months before his program was to end, he failed a drug test for meth.

He told the person testing him that the test had to be wrong, as he was clean, and they retested him. Twice. Both times, his tests turned up negative – meaning no drugs were found in his system – but the judge would only accept this first test. He was sentenced to another year and a half in drug court for a test that was clearly a fluke. After that, he did relapse, because he thought – what’s the point?

So that’s rehabilitation? [END SPOILER]

The Connection to Health

Jail for this? Seriously? / Photo: xJasonRogersx

The reason I’m even writing about this story on a health blog is because of the HUGE health ramifications of our approach to drugs in this country. The fact of the matter is, most people in this country will do some form of drug at least once, if not many times, in their lifetime. The fact of the matter is, we arbitrarily decide what is a legal drug and what is an illegal drug, while there are plenty of persuasive arguments that alcohol has caused more loss, death, and destruction that pot could ever dream of doing, and certain prescription drugs lead to silent addictions which far surpass the effects of cocaine.

The fact of the matter is, we jail people based off of these arbitrary decisions, sometimes for years, subjecting them to living in extremely harsh and sometimes animal-like conditions, profiting off of them with the big business that is our jail system. The fact of the matter is, most people in jail are poor, African-American or Latino, and male.

I could go on and on about the demoralizing implications of going to jail for drug charges on the individual, but I want to stand back and look at it from the point of a community and even our country as a whole. We are giving true addicts no way to deal with their addictions (though this was the original idea of having a drug court, and in some places, it seems to be working), and we are making criminals out of people who previously were not.

Can you imagine being forced into survival mode that is the reality of living in a prison? There is no way that doesn’t change a person, overwhelmingly in a negative way, which they bring back into society once they’ve “paid their dues.” We bring more crime into our society, more crime inflicted on each of us, that we were so worried about we jailed them in the first place. Even though they didn’t commit a crime.

Maybe by stepping back and asking why so many people are addicts in this country (many more of them running around outside of prison), why so many people are drawn into abusing drugs beyond being a teenager and wanting to rebel (plenty of teenagers get out of those years without becoming addicted even if they tried hardcore drugs more than once), and what we can do as a community (i.e. nation) to create a culture that doesn’t make so many people want to check out so much of the time, we then can begin to answer how to deal with our “drug problem.”

Certainly, Judge Amanda Williams doesn’t know how.

After you listen to this TAL’s episode, I guarantee you’ll want to do something. Here’s who you can contact.