Author: Sheila Quirke

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Princess Kate Giving Birth, Body Image, and Other Disasters in Celebrity Culture

I pretty much stayed out of the fray with the birth of the most recent royal.  I’m not a royalist or an Anglophile and after the death of Diana, well, my sole icon obsession is relegated to Irish Catholic political dynasties.  Can you say Kennedy or Daley?  I can, and often do.

That said, my heart kind of melted when I saw the photos popping up on my Facebook feed.  The sheer joy and utter amazement on Price William’s face as he held his newborn son.  Well, yeah, that got to me. ‘Well done,’ I thought, and wished him the best.  I mean, seriously, how could you not feel a little tug?  There is such joy and potential in a newborn.  And there was Diana’s first grandchild all perfect and untouched.

Then I saw it.  Within hours of the happiest of couples leaving the Lindo Wing with their newly swaddled bundle of joy, who also just happens to be the future Kind of England (how’s that for silver spoon?), a blog post headline remarking on Princess Kate “still” having a pregnant looking belly hit my screen.

Princess Kate Leaving Hospital

For criminy’s sake, people.

While I know this post was not meant as condemnation or intended as a slam (which is why I am not linking to it), the title alone feeds into the heinous expectations women place on themselves due to our obsession with celebrity culture and the messages the media regularly and loudly send us. And let’s not kid ourselves, ladies, as there is certainly a male contingent who hold women to these expectations as well.  Have any of you seen the husbands in the Real Housewives franchise? These dudes exist and sometimes live right next door to us.  Shivers.

A friend remarked on the same thing in a Facebook status update this morning.  Why are we needing to defend the extra few inches around Princess Kate’s middle just HOURS after she gave birth?  Here this gal just did one of the most miraculous things a body will ever do, and the chatter starts, even if it is meant to be humorous and “tongue in cheek,” as another friend suggested.

I promise you I am not humorless, but I also promise you that when we start to refer to women as “still” having a pregnant looking stomach 24 hours after giving birth, even in humor, we are treading into some pretty icky and tricky waters.  These messages stick to us as women, consciously and subconsciously and unconsciously, just as much as the peanut butter from our toddler’s fingers.  Whether we want to or not, we are receiving the message that perfection is what is demanded.  Always and in all ways.

Giving birth is not enough.   No, mam.  We need to give birth, then walk out of the hospital in our skinny jeans.  And if we don’t?  Well, what the hell is wrong with you?  Are you lazy?  Genetically doomed?  Not up to Hollywood standards?  The answers are simple:  NO, NO, and YES.  Cause most of us are not Hollywood starlets, and that’s okay.

We have the capacity to reject these messages, but only if we are aware of them.  Know what you are looking at, take the smallest of steps back and see the messages, both written and unwritten.  Step away from the US Magazine trash and Perez Hilton bash and know that they are powerful.  Very powerful. But you are powerful, too.

And if you’ve just given birth and have more of a triple layer chocolate cake top rather than a muffin top?  Well done, mama, well done.  You are amazing.

But don’t just believe me, a publicly established feminist blogger.  Take it from my new BFF Ralph, who left this message on the Facebook thread I referred to above:

I think women can be almost as hard on themselves as the media. As a man, I want to state out loud that a little shape is a wonderful thing  no matter the shape. Most of my male friends would say the same. The ones that don’t aren’t worth bothering with usually, anyway. But you guys probably know this by now.

Do you?  Do you know this by now?  I think many of us don’t, on a very real and potentially damaging level.  I speak from experience, cause I am the first to condemn myself for the extra weight I carry.  Sigh.  But I’ve done this since the 8th grade when at probably no more than 100 pounds, I was embarrassed to walk around the local pool without a towel around my middle. I just shake my head now.

Do your thing, Princess Kate.  Mother that baby, wear your polka dot dress with the elastic waist that highlights the abdomen that just birthed the future Kind of England.  Work it, girl.  Don’t listen to the chatter.  And for the rest of us?  Know that you are better than okay.  Know that you have the capacity to decipher messages, overt and covert, that try to tell us otherwise.  You work it, too.

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Guest Post: I Never Imagined I Would Be In the Same Situation As My Birth Mother

This is a guest post written by the Birth Mom who has chosen our family to adopt her baby.  We are beyond humbled.  The weight of the relationship we are embarking on, not just with a new baby, but with the mother and brother of the baby who will become part of our family, is new and heavy and promising.  Adoption is complicated, just like life.  Heartbreaking and hopeful, too.  Here are Sarah’s words:

This adoption journey is an experience like no other. Being adopted myself, I never imagined I would be in the same situation as my birth mother, having to make the same difficult decision as she did 25 years ago. When I learned I was pregnant, I wasn’t even considering adoption. It was only later, after I thought long and hard about the struggle it would be as a single mother with a four year-old and newborn, I knew what I had to do. It is painful enough that my son has had to go without, I couldn’t bear to put another child through that.

I first looked at same-sex couples, as I feel these couples are well deserving. I found an adoption agency online and received many couple profiles to look over. I hadn’t told many people at that time about my decision for adoption, so I decided to tell my Facebook friends and family. I got an overwhelming amount of support and love that I hadn’t expected. One of my friends had seen a video and adoption page of a couple from Chicago. I had no idea, just by looking at them, that we were meant to be. I went to their adoption website and watched their video. They seemed like really down-to-earth people. I liked that they had a four year old son, so that the baby would have an older brother to protect him and play with him. I was touched and heartbroken that they had a daughter who died of cancer four years ago.  Although very different situations, I at least knew they had an idea what the grief would be like for me when I am to be separated from my unborn son.

The couples I talked to before [them] had no other children and it seemed to me they were interested in the novelty of adopting a baby, but I feared once the “cuteness” wore off and the child grew, they wouldn’t be in it wholeheartedly. I also was very fearful of the other couples I talked to that they said they wanted an open adoption, but would end up shutting me out. One couple said they would “do what is in the child’s best interest” like an open relationship would only work if the child wanted it. Well, how is the child capable of determining that when they are a baby and throughout childhood? I felt that unfortunately, many adoptive couples out there misrepresent themselves in order to have the adoption go through. They tell you what you want to hear or use vague terms in order to adopt your baby.

I never for a moment felt that [S. and J.] were misrepresenting themselves. They were very open and honest when we talked, and when talking for the first time, I felt as though we had known each other for years and were just catching up. The type of relationship we want for this baby is very open. They want my four year-old and I to be an extended family. I realize that every adoption is different and the level of openness varies. Our unique situation could be viewed as unconventional, but I know first-hand that it is confusing and painful for an adopted child not to have a relationship with their birth mother. No matter how wonderful the adoptive couple are and how well they parent and provide for the child, there will always be a void in the child’s life if they don’t know their birth mother.

Modern family, adoption style. This photo was taken just a couple of hours into our first visit.
Modern family, adoption style. This photo was taken just a couple of hours into our first visit.

I don’t want my son to feel that he was unwanted or that I don’t love him. I also want him to understand I don’t love his brother any more than I do him. I love my boys equally. I recognize that tomorrow is never promised to us. I lost my birth mother well before her time. We never had the opportunity to really get to know one another. I don’t know anything about her childhood or teenage years and when we were together she didn’t open up about a lot of things. I know that is due partly because of how adoption was viewed in the past, as a dirty shameful secret. Something you did because you were irresponsible and without morals. I know her parents made her feel that way, because my aunt and uncle who adopted me told me my grandparents wanted nothing to do with me. They wouldn’t even hold me when I was a baby. That is extraordinarily painful for me to think certain people viewed me as unwanted and discarded. Something to be shameful of.

I am so thankful my unborn son will never have to feel that way. I know my birth mother wasn’t ashamed of me, but ashamed of herself. It is a goddamned tragedy that society could ever make birth mothers feel that way.

Our plan is to visit at least once a year. I would get photos and updates, and if I get a computer with a webcam, we could Skype as well. I am already writing a journal for my son to read when he comes of age explaining why I chose adoption. It has helped me to handle my emotions as well. It is very hard for me to explain to my son why his baby brother won’t be with us. I still am having trouble figuring out how best to explain it. He will be going through his own grief and sadness over the loss of his brother. Of course, it isn’t a true loss, as we will have contact throughout the child’s life, but it will be painful and difficult nonetheless.

I have several more weeks until the baby’s due date. I am trying to prepare for the emotional whirlwind it will be when the baby is born and we are separated. I don’t believe there is any way to truly prepare for the heartache that is sure to come. I don’t want to fall apart. I can’t fall apart because I have my son to care for. I just hope to survive it without it destroying me. I’ve got to find strength from within.

You see?  Adoption is heartbreaking and hopeful all at once.  My husband and I extend continued gratitude and are amazed at Sarah’s strength, openness, expressiveness, and awareness.  We choose hope for all of us.  

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If a Birthday Happens and No One Is There to Blow Out the Candles, Do You Still Celebrate?

So this is the question I ask myself every July.  And I’m not the only grieving parent that struggles with this question.  Many of us do.  July 20 is a hard day for me and my family.  I know this because as it gets closer I am prone to tears that come and go like an unexpected summer storm.

Grief sucks and it sucks the most for me on July 20 and October 19 — my daughter’s birthday and death anniversary, respectively.  An analogy I use often is that the volume is turned up on life during those days leading up to and following.  I am more raw, more emotional, more sensitive, more aware, more open, more closed, more everything.

The first year, MAN, it packed a punch.  I didn’t realize how hard it would be. Since then, I have learned to make room for it.  Feel the feelings, just like Donna did.  She was a master of feeling her feelings without letting those feelings overtake her.  I have learned much from her.  As a family, we’ve also learned that it helps to pull close during Donna’s birthday.  Don’t commit to anything, as we won’t want to be there.  Maybe that will change, but for now it is what it is.

That first birthday without Donna was the acorn revelation birthday.  In a nutshell, pun absolutely intended, two of Donna’s closest playmates offered us envelopes of acorns on her birthday.  What are the chances of that happening?  And what did the acorns mean?  Well, Mr. Google gave me all the information I needed to know, know, that those acorns might have been collected by her playmates, but Donna sent them.

Acorns are the symbol of strength, power, potential, protection, immortality, and difficult labors being rewarded.  I was completely certain, in the moments after opening those two envelopes of acorns, that Donna was reaching out to us on such a difficult day.  She was reminding us of her presence, her continued presence in our lives.  “Mighty oaks from little acorns grow,” is a hard to attribute, but ancient quote that has become very important and comforting to me in the years since.

DGT_BlueRed

So much of the work our charity, Donna’s Good Things, does is to help other little kids in need.  I see it as a mission to help fulfill Donna’s potential that she will never fulfill herself.  Donna was our acorn and it is our honor and reward and task to nurture that acorn into a mighty oak.  That is why so much of what we do is help other charities, like St. Baldrick’s (just shy of $170K! raised in Donna’s name) and Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago at their annual Run for Gus, raising funds for the pediatric brain tumor program.

Helping others helps us.

Tomorrow, Donna’s would be/should be 8th birthday, we will be together as a family.  We try to do things that Donna enjoyed.  The zoo, a bookstore or library, Noodles & Co. for macaroni-and-cheese.  Ha!  As wise and amazing as Donna was, she was still four when she died.  Her joys and pleasures were simple ones.

Another thing that has helped us has been to ask our online friends and family members to post photos of themselves wearing black, Donna’s favorite color.  It is hard to understand or describe why seeing dozens and dozens and dozens of photos of folks we know and folks we don’t know honoring and remembering our girl is so helpful.  Such a simple gesture, really, but damn does it give us what we need on such a difficult day.  You can post them here.

It reminds us that yes, Donna was here, she made an impact, she continues to make an impact, she lived before she died, she loved noodles and cheddarwurst and the color black and dancing and reading and her baby brother.  Donna lived.

Finally, if you are so inclined, we invite you to support our Team Dancing Donna in next week’s Run for Gus, a 5K run or 1 mile walk where all donations go to Donna’s hospital to support the care and research of pediatric brain tumor patients.  We wear tutus as we run or walk along Chicago’s beautiful lakefront.  Please consider an $8 donation in honor of Donna’s 8th birthday.  Or, better yet, consider joining our team.  We have lots and lots of tutus to pass around!  You can donate your $8 tribute donation here.  

So back to the question in the title of this post, “If a birthday happens and no one is there to blow out the candles, do you still celebrate?”  Well, I am still working on that one.  I know there will be cake, a little one just for the three of us.  And if we won’t be celebrating, per se, we will certainly be remembering, honoring, and marveling at the beautiful Donna, and how lucky we were and are to have her in our family.

And if you don’t know Donna, well, you should!  Here is Donna in a nutshell:

Hug your kids, folks, and treat them extra special today, and give them a kiss from Donna just because.  She would like that.  Thank you.