Author Topic: "Pregnancy addiction" article (Read 3990 times)

PenitentWoman · « **on:** September 18, 2012, 12:44:17 PM »

This article is terribly condescending towards mothers who are open to life. It is basically saying that if a woman wants/has lots of children she may be suffering from a psychological problem.

I know that not all mothers who have lots of babies are truly open to life, and some may not be religious at all, but wanting to be pregnant and have babies (even lots of them!) is completely normal. Pregnancy is not a disease, it is a normal state for a woman to be in. I cannot believe society is so messed up that modern psychology can somehow decide the most natural part of human nature (the desire to reproduce) is somehow disordered.

The worst part is the mention of Octomom. As if her situation is comparable at all to married women having babies naturally.

I put the two most offensive paragraphs in bold.

By Martha Brockenbrough
Women's Health

Are ‘bumpaholics’ addicted to pregnancy?
Some women procreate for the same reasons people turn to booze or drugs

It's not just in your head. There really is a bumper crop of baby bumps out there, from the famously fertile, like Heidi Klum, who's flirting with her fourth set of stretch marks in five years, to the infamous Nadya "Octomom" Suleman, who earlier this year bore eight babies at once even though she already had six other kids at home that she could barely afford to take care of.
In 2007 alone, American women birthed more than 4.3 million babies — the highest number ever. More than a quarter of those were to women having their third or fourth child, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And despite the infertility freak-out the entire country seems to be currently engaged in, only a small number of these babies — perhaps 100,000 — resulted from medical interventions such as in vitro fertilization, says Jamie Grifo, M.D., Ph.D., director of the division of reproductive endocrinology at the NYU School of Medicine.

That doesn't mean that we're transforming into a nation of Duggars (the Arkansas family with 18 kids often seen announcing their latest conception on NBC's TODAY show) and Novogratzes (the New York City clan of seven kids soon to be the focus of a new Bravo reality show) — the average number of children per American family is still hovering right around two.
Still, certain mothers, like 31-year-old Meagan Francis, who is raising her flock of five in Michigan, have big broods because that's what they're used to. "I grew up in a relatively large family and always loved having lots of people around," she says. "So it's natural that I'd try to re-create that experience with my own family."

But it's not always quite so simple, psychologists say. Some women may like being pregnant a little too much, often driven to rapidly reproduce out of insecurity, a craving for attention, or feelings of abandonment by their own parents.

The High of Pregnancy

Having babies isn't addictive in the way that alcohol and narcotics can be. But bumpaholics feel compelled to procreate for many of the same reasons that substance abusers turn to booze or drugs.
"Women who are obsessed with being pregnant are literally filling an emptiness inside of them, just as alcoholics and drug addicts use substances to fill a psychological void," says Beverly Hills psychiatrist Carole Lieberman, M.D. Every one of us at some point encounters this void, adds New York family therapist Bonnie Eaker Weil, Ph.D., author of "Financial Infidelity." "You want to have a purpose in this world. You want to feel less lonely."
For some women, babies fill that gap perfectly. Infants are dependent creatures. They can give their mothers a clear identity; they can also become handy social buffers. At a party or on the playground, a woman struggling with feelings of social anxiety or self-consciousness can hide behind the adorable infant in her arms. Any pressure to be cute or charming or funny disappears — your baby has that covered. "Bumpaholics breed to blot out their feelings of insecurity," Weil says.

Boston psychiatrist and Fox News consultant Keith Ablow, M.D., says some women seem to view having more children as an alternative to addressing their own personal problems. "Bearing another child can sometimes provide a substitute for deciding on a career path, making a marriage work, or even wrestling with questions of self-worth," Ablow says.
And the baby fix can become a cycle. When an infant becomes a more independent toddler, "the mom may feel abandoned and act quickly to fill the void again with a new baby who will rely upon her and her partner and define their lives," Lieberman says.

Procreating isn't just a psychological balm; it also feeds genuine physical cravings. According to Helen Fisher, Ph.D., a professor of anthropology at Rutgers University, humans developed a set of three related brain systems that are intended to push them toward parenthood: sex drive, hunger for the romantic love of one partner, and a desire for the calmness and security of attachment.

Mother Nature prods us by making sex and its aftermath feel amazing. Oxytocin, the so-called "cuddle" hormone that promotes bonding, floods women's bodies during intercourse, pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding. "[Pregnancy] is like a love drug," Weil says. "A baby-love drug."

Then there's the constant attention you garner from others when you're bursting with child. Bumpaholic or not, it can be pretty great. Barb Pomeroy, 42, of Longmont, Colo., is a mother of six girls. She admits that she reveled in the questions and comments her pregnancies elicited from family, friends, and even complete strangers. She also loved the compliments people fed her about how good she looked when she was pregnant with her daughters. Even though she's not planning to have any more children, she misses the heightened interest and confidence pregnancy often brings. "There's this feeling of being special when you're pregnant," she says. "I feel like I become ordinary again when I'm not expecting."
It's not hard to understand why: People smile at you, throw you baby showers, buy you lots of gifts. And the rounder your belly gets, the more space you take up in the world, and the more people take notice of you. In many respects, you become impossible to ignore.

Spouses and partners dote on you, gladly delivering soup at 10 a.m. or antacids at 11 p.m. "My husband constantly rubbed and coddled me, and I ate it all up," says Liz Bustamante, a 39-year-old financial advisor from Forest Hills, N.Y., who has one child and is currently planning for the next. "And for the first time in my life, instead of feeling insecure about my body, I wanted to run around naked! I'd never felt sexier."

Magazines conduct celebrity-bump watches, and nude maternity portraits are becoming de rigueur for celebs and civilians alike. Pregnancy lets every woman be a star in her own world, and the rest of us are all too happy to shine the spotlight. A pregnant woman is exciting because the child she's carrying represents "that tie to the future," says Holly Donahue Singh, a Ph.D. candidate in anthropology at the University of Virginia who teaches a class called Anthropology and Reproduction: Fertility and the Future.

Filling a void?

The belly-rubbing high hits the pregnant woman as well as the people who surround her. The expectant mother gets an oxytocin blast and rubs her belly as a way of bonding. Admirers who rub her belly get a hormone rush, too. "As social creatures, our brains have evolved to make positive social behaviors feel good. Touch causes the release of oxytocin, and this causes the release of dopamine in reward regions of the brain," says Paul J. Zak, director of the Center for Neuroeconomics Studies at Claremont Graduate University.

Given all the psychological, physical, and social rewards associated with pregnancy, it's no surprise that so many women like it. But plenty of couples stop at one or two children, despite the fundamental drive to reproduce. This is because we can use our higher brain functions to keep those instincts in check, reminding ourselves that children cost money — about $950 a month until they're 18 — and require an extraordinary amount of time and energy.

This is precisely why the bump-loving Bustamante says she'll stop at two. Much as she loved her pregnant body and adores being a mom, she wants to allow for some financial flexibility — childcare, ballet lessons, summer camp, and college tuition add up. Having sufficient funds isn't a deal-breaker for everyone, though. Nan Mooney, a 39-year-old single mom, is living with her parents in their Seattle home because she doesn't make enough money to support herself and her son. Still, she desperately wants more kids. Her friends and family call her crazy, she says, but "I knew enough people growing up who had plenty of money who were not necessarily loved and not necessarily happy. I don't think it's an essential ingredient to raising well-adjusted children."

Figuring out the right number of kids to have is a personal decision, to be sure. And not all women with lots of children are bumpaholics. But an important question for pregnancy-craving mothers to ask themselves is why they want more children, Weil says. Are you having them because you don't want to deal with your husband? Or so you don't have to go back to work? Or because you love the attention? Nadya Suleman, for one, is blunt about the fact that she got pregnant to fulfill an emotional need. As she reportedly told one journalist, "I just longed for certain attachments with another person that I really lacked."

But psychologists say there are far better ways of making meaningful connections. In order to have a healthy relationship, married moms need to spend quality time alone with their husbands — whether it's taking a vacation without the baby or just going out to dinner together once a week and leaving the kids with a sitter. "Women who focus on their children to the exclusion of everything else inevitably face an emptiness when their kids grow up and become more independent," Weil says.

If you do find yourself feeling a void as your bundle of joy becomes a toddler, "that's a good sign that it's time to look in the mirror and figure out what's going on with you," says Ann Pleshette Murphy, author of "The Seven Stages of Motherhood: Loving Your Life Without Losing Your Mind." "Invest in yourself. Though it may never be as satisfying as what we get from taking care of our kids, it's important to feel proud of something you do outside of child-rearing so that you don't think of yourself as 'only a mom.'"

"Me time" can include big things — like going back to work or starting your own business from home — or small, daily experiences that enrich your life, such as heading to the gym or joining your girlfriends for dinner and cocktails. It's only when you have a balanced life that you can be sure the inner call for a new addition to your family should be answered.

:barf:

:cry:

Agobard · « **Reply #1 on:** September 18, 2012, 01:39:09 PM »

"Women who have early pregnancies are protected against breast cancer, but teenage pregnancy is a social disaster so it's not something we want to encourage," she said in a phone interview from Cambridge, Massachusetts.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-03-25-breast-cancer_N.htm

Cancer is a symptom of some underlining disorder, something not functioning naturally as it was made to do. What women's bodies are telling them that it is against their natural order to be half way to seamstress until having their first child. Having more than one child also helps prevent breast cancer.

When God created man and woman, there were no nunneries. So I am not trying to start a debate about nuns, for breast cancer was once known as "nun's disease".

When did women marry during biblical and medieval times? When did men marry during biblical and medieval times? What makes women ready and what makes men ready for marriage? Straying too far from this and you are entering social engineering that has gotten us into deep trouble for the past century.

Telesphorus · « **Reply #2 on:** September 18, 2012, 01:47:37 PM »

Today, if you buck what the establishment brainwashes the suburban professional class to believe about family and marriage, a person is called mentally ill.

It's the way they shame people who don't go along today, since they've tried to remove the existence of moral stigma.

What is very sad is how ostensibly Catholic people so readily, even eagerly, go along with these ideas.

Telesphorus · « **Reply #3 on:** September 18, 2012, 01:50:09 PM »

Quote

such as heading to the gym or joining your girlfriends for dinner and cocktails.

Yuck.

Cuthbert · « **Reply #4 on:** September 18, 2012, 02:24:13 PM »

Quote from: PenitentWoman

This article is terribly condescending towards mothers who are open to life. It is basically saying that if a woman wants/has lots of children she may be suffering from a psychological problem........

The idea is to define any opposition to the Judaeo-Communist order of things as a manifestation of mental derangement. If you are not a cheerful hewer of wood & drawer of water for them, then by definition you are mentally deranged. The same thing was done in the Soviet Union. In fact they seem to have adopted Soviet policy as preferred policy here. One has only to read the history of the U.S.S.R. & one will see the similarities at once.

The rural councils being set up all over the U.S. are nothing more than the soviets (soviet in Russian means council) that were set up by Lenin & Stalin. The deliberate recruitment of criminals, perverts & mental defectives to serve in the T.S.A. & now in many police forces is also something done by Stalin, he recruited such to serve in the soviet state security apparatus. They know that these people will have no qualms about carrying out criminal orders. They will enjoy their work.

Feminism itself, tho' not of course in the exact same form as it exists here, was state policy in the Soviet Union. The woman would no more be a mere chattel of her husband, now she would be absolutely equal to him in all ways, she was now free to do her bit in building the glorious socialist motherland, the soviet worker's paradise &c., &c. I must say, false tho' it was, the soviet propaganda sounds better, almost noble in a grotesque sort of way, compared to the manner in which it was promoted in this, & other western countries, which was pretty much something along the lines of "you don't need no stinking man, you can go out & become a wage-slave, have your own income, & with this wonderful income you can live an evil life to your black heart's content, do this, that & the other as much as you like, snort dope up your nose until it rots the innards of it out, with all the money you'll be making, you can just pay a plastic surgeon to make you a new one......"

Agobard · « **Reply #5 on:** September 18, 2012, 02:43:49 PM »

It got worse when it fell:

(warning this is a trailer for a docuмentary: annoying rock-n-roll music is played)

I watched the docuмentary when it was on PBS a year ago.

Hopefully life in Russia is better now?

Matthew · « **Reply #6 on:** September 18, 2012, 03:04:12 PM »

Quote

"You want to have a purpose in this world. You want to feel less lonely."

Um...YES!

Turning to drugs or alcohol because you lack purpose in this world, or because you feel lonely? Yes, that's messed up.

Feel lack of purpose or lonely, so you decide to have many children? Guess what? That's about the most REAL way you can deal with the issue. The best possible way to solve the problem. Nothing else will work actually.

There is no higher thing a layman can do -- that has an effect extending into eternity -- rather than have children.

If you're not going to dedicate your life to God in religion/the priesthood, you want to make sure your hours on earth MEAN something. Helping souls to be created, teach them to love God, etc. -- THAT is more worthwhile than all the "dinner & cocktails with girlfriends" or vacations in the world.

PenitentWoman · « **Reply #7 on:** September 18, 2012, 03:24:26 PM »

The comment about higher brain function really bothers me. You read a lot of stuff like that on secular parenting boards, usually in reference to stay-at-home motherhood. "My brain couldn't function at that low of a level all day" or to getting married young...which is for lower class people only.

I don't really understand the political reasons behind it, but at an even more basic level, isn't it just Satan pushing us further and further away from God? I mean, what a clever concept to lower the population. First we have the legality, availability, and promotion of birth control...which is a huge assault on the family. Then the new church promotes NFP as holy, which is nearly as bad. But now women who WANT to bear children are fed this idea that they are disordered because of it?? There are thousands of women who read these articles and convince themselves their instinctive and natural desire to be pregnant is wrong...at best a necessary evil.

I think even the cocktails with girlfriends has a deeper evil behind it. What do women do over martinis? Complain about their lives, husbands, responsibilities...

Yuck is right.

Sede Catholic · « **Reply #8 on:** September 19, 2012, 12:18:32 AM »

Quote from: Matthew

Quote
"You want to have a purpose in this world. You want to feel less lonely."

...

Feel lack of purpose or lonely, so you decide to have many children? Guess what? That's about the most REAL way you can deal with the issue. The best possible way to solve the problem. Nothing else will work actually.

...

If you're not going to dedicate your life to God in religion/the priesthood, you want to make sure your hours on earth MEAN something
...

Dear Matthew, that is so important.

If people are not called to become priests or monks or nuns, then to bring children into the world and bring them up as traditional Catholics, is a wonderful calling.

Loriann · « **Reply #9 on:** September 19, 2012, 08:22:56 AM »

I can see why women enjoy being pregnant--There is a euphoric feeling that I experienced during my pregnancy, plus the little miracle growing--I literally glowed. I was blessed to not have more than a handful of yuckky mornings. It is a sickness that society makes comments about people who have many children. I love seeing families fill the pew.

PS I think we Catholics sometimes make the same type of assumption about childless couples--we assume this is a lifestyle choice and in SOME it is a God choice.

The goal of the Evil one is to divide us so we conquer ourselves.

PenitentWoman · « **Reply #10 on:** September 19, 2012, 08:30:19 AM »

Quote from: Loriann

I can see why women enjoy being pregnant--There is a euphoric feeling that I experienced during my pregnancy, plus the little miracle growing--I literally glowed. I was blessed to not have more than a handful of yuckky mornings. It is a sickness that society makes comments about people who have many children. I love seeing families fill the pew.

PS I think we Catholics sometimes make the same type of assumption about childless couples--we assume this is a lifestyle choice and in SOME it is a God choice.

The goal of the Evil one is to divide us so we conquer ourselves.

Loriann, I don't make judgments about small families. I have a friend on another board who has been trying for many years. She won't use IVF because they want to follow church teaching. It is heartbreaking to read about her struggle. I always feel so guilty.

Loriann · « **Reply #11 on:** September 19, 2012, 11:14:44 AM »

Quote from: PenitentWoman

Quote from: Loriann
I can see why women enjoy being pregnant--There is a euphoric feeling that I experienced during my pregnancy, plus the little miracle growing--I literally glowed. I was blessed to not have more than a handful of yuckky mornings. It is a sickness that society makes comments about people who have many children. I love seeing families fill the pew.

PS I think we Catholics sometimes make the same type of assumption about childless couples--we assume this is a lifestyle choice and in SOME it is a God choice.

The goal of the Evil one is to divide us so we conquer ourselves.

Loriann, I don't make judgments about small families. I have a friend on another board who has been trying for many years. She won't use IVF because they want to follow church teaching. It is heartbreaking to read about her struggle. I always feel so guilty.

I had many a good cry from well-meaning and not-so-well-meaning people who told us "read a book" get hopping, quit being selfish...I was too private to say much about the issue, but our priest was always a rock, saying my backward uterus was God's doing, lol. We yielded to the will of God--figured it was his call, and 17 years later--baby. I never was sad when my friends got pregnant, though...I got to be a Godmother 12 times! I am an adopted "Auntie" to many.

PenitentWoman · « **Reply #12 on:** September 19, 2012, 01:53:27 PM »

Quote from: Loriann

I had many a good cry from well-meaning and not-so-well-meaning people who told us "read a book" get hopping, quit being selfish...I was too private to say much about the issue, but our priest was always a rock, saying my backward uterus was God's doing, lol. We yielded to the will of God--figured it was his call, and 17 years later--baby. I never was sad when my friends got pregnant, though...I got to be a Godmother 12 times! I am an adopted "Auntie" to many.

I'm glad you were finally blessed, and how wonderful to be a Godmother. I think I will get to be one soon too. :)

I pray that I get to do it all again because I didn't get to enjoy it as much as I know I would under better circuмstances. There were definitely beautiful and amazing moments, but it was always bittersweet to not to able to share them with anyone. I was too stressed to appreciate it the way I should have.

I can't believe she will be a year old next month. :cry: So close to walking too.

PenitentWoman · « **Reply #13 on:** September 19, 2012, 02:31:02 PM »

Quote from: Agobard

"Women who have early pregnancies are protected against breast cancer, but teenage pregnancy is a social disaster so it's not something we want to encourage," she said in a phone interview from Cambridge, Massachusetts.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-03-25-breast-cancer_N.htm

Cancer is a symptom of some underlining disorder, something not functioning naturally as it was made to do. What women's bodies are telling them that it is against their natural order to be half way to seamstress until having their first child. Having more than one child also helps prevent breast cancer.

When God created man and woman, there were no nunneries. So I am not trying to start a debate about nuns, for breast cancer was once known as "nun's disease".

I've read it lowers the risk of ovarian cancer too. There are other health benefits as well.

Quote

When did women marry during biblical and medieval times? When did men marry during biblical and medieval times? What makes women ready and what makes men ready for marriage? Straying too far from this and you are entering social engineering that has gotten us into deep trouble for the past century.

This discussion has come up on a few different threads here recently. It is pretty taboo to talk about.

Quote from: The article

Oxytocin, the so-called "cuddle" hormone that promotes bonding, floods women's bodies during intercourse, pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding. "[Pregnancy] is like a love drug," Weil says. "A baby-love drug."

I don't understand why this is being talked about as if it were a bad thing. Why shouldn't women have hormones that make them more feminine and motherly?

Loriann · « **Reply #14 on:** September 19, 2012, 06:39:56 PM »

Quote from: PenitentWoman

Quote from: Loriann

I had many a good cry from well-meaning and not-so-well-meaning people who told us "read a book" get hopping, quit being selfish...I was too private to say much about the issue, but our priest was always a rock, saying my backward uterus was God's doing, lol. We yielded to the will of God--figured it was his call, and 17 years later--baby. I never was sad when my friends got pregnant, though...I got to be a Godmother 12 times! I am an adopted "Auntie" to many.

I'm glad you were finally blessed, and how wonderful to be a Godmother. I think I will get to be one soon too. :)

I pray that I get to do it all again because I didn't get to enjoy it as much as I know I would under better circuмstances. There were definitely beautiful and amazing moments, but it was always bittersweet to not to able to share them with anyone. I was too stressed to appreciate it the way I should have.

I can't believe she will be a year old next month. :cry: So close to walking too.

I hardly remember the first six weeks, I was so tired and she was so hungry, lol. But the time will fly by, for sure. You will be able to share all of that with her, when she has a baby.