A Feminist Paradox

I am a "breeder" or whatever the current epitet is for a person who has children. I'm crazy about my kids and I can't imagine life without them. Does that mean that I have anything against people who choose not to have children? Absolutely not! I think being "pro-choice" and a feminist means that you support another woman's decision, even if that means she chooses NOT to have children. Besides, what business is it of mine if a woman does not want to have children? NONE.

One thing I find really really strange is that even in Feminist Paradise Sweden, it still really does seems culturally unacceptable not to want to have children. (Of course not being able to have children is a completely different thing). This is a country where contraception is free and easy to access. Likewise, if a woman chooses to terminate an unwanted pregnancy, there are no hoops of fire or elaborate ruses to muddle her choice. Women in this country are in full-control of their bodies and reproductive choices.

So why, then, in a nation where women receive enviable equality in society and birth control/family planning is free and accessible is it so heinous to not want children? Maybe it's because I live in a small city in the forest? Perhaps one will find more childfree-by-choice people in the cities? I don't know.

In any case, to be perfectly honest, I generally prefer the company of my childless friends to that of my Sanctomommy acquaintances. More on these crazy people soon. To be continued...

  

A Life of Sound Bites & Press Releases

Do you think you actually know me from reading this blog or reading my status updates on Facebook?

It's weird when somebody I don't know all that well IRL (in real life) will tell me how they "know EVERYTHING" about me. That is a really strange thing to say to somebody.

Facebook, blogs and social media in general are forms of performance art, I think. These media may reveal essential basics and ideas (for me at least) but they don't represent the whole picture of a person. There are definitely some people who wear their hearts on their sleeve (err, on their wall as it were) but I am not one of those people. You'll get a general idea of who I am, what my life is like and my thoughts, but you'll never get the whole picture unless we spend time together in person. I have no problem revealing certain more intimate truths about my life. But these are the sorts of things I have no problem talking about openly in person. My FB privacy functions have a series of lists that control which posts/images can be seen by which of my friends. I hope that you are doing the same. Having a modicum of privacy is essential even in today's Tell-All world.

I never claim to know anybody based on what they write in social media forums. It's a very calculated image. It is a presentation. It's an avatar.

Don't forget - I still charge a shit-ton of money if you want me to do your public relations. I spent nearly a decade writing for advertising in both public relations and copy in New York City.  You don't net the high fees if you don't know how to spin an image or cultivate the flow of information.

What I do worry about is the time and space that is growing between myself and the friends/family whom I am separated from by distance and time difference. I don't want these close friends (i.e. the people who do actually know me) to start mistaking my social media avatar/persona for actual me (or likewise, theirs for them).

Thank goodness for chat functions, private messages, text messages and Skype. Frequent interactions in real time seem to bridge the gap.

What Could Have Been - Thinking about Bolivia

If we hadn't moved to the Forest of Fika, I am fairly certain that we would not have remained Stateside.

We had definitely reached a breaking point as a family (and me, personally) for living in that country. We needed to move on and explore what other parts of the world had to offer us. S. and I are both interested in other cultures and had been researching real possibilities for working/living outside the USA.

There was a work opportunity for me to be the director of library cataloging (technical services) at a phenomenal and unique research foundation in La Paz, Bolivia. This is a private collection maintained by the family of one of La Paz' most noted and scholarly individuals. It is a tremendous and special collection with so many rare books, photographs and ephemera that, once cataloged properly, will no doubt draw the attention and interest of many international scholars. It would have been a wonderful professional opportunity. Alas, logistics (i.e. the cost and red tape of attaining a long-term residential visa for me, a US Citizen in Evo Morales' not-too-fond-of-America Bolivia) would have proved too difficult. Besides, my husband doesn't speak Spanish and would have had a hard time finding work there. I also cannot imagine that being pregnant with twins at 12,000 feet above (3500 meters) sea level would have passed with the same ease that it did here.

Still, Bolivia remains firmly implanted in the lining of my heart. I really like it there. The nature is supernaturally beautiful, the culture is richly textured and the people are some of the kindest and warmest people on the planet.

It's not an easy country to live in. It's pretty much the diametric opposite of Sweden's orderliness. I would describe it as Libertarian Paradise with developing-nation Socialist tendencies. It's hard to explain unless you have visited and experienced it. I feel a wild and irrational ove for Bolivia. My sentiments towards that country remind me of Post-Island Jack's on the TV show Lost (yes, crazy Jack with beard who screamed "WE HAVE TO GO BAAAAAACK!").

I definitely want to return to Bolivia someday. It's a long and costly flight from Sweden. With 3 young children, it's not the sort of trip that you can spontaneously go on. That said, I WANT TO GO BAAAAAAACK!

Surreal sunset in La Paz

Los Yungas - where the twins were made 

One Year Requiem

It was hardly my intention to live in the Forest of Fika.

I'm a big city kind of person. I grew up 40 minutes from New York City and at 18, I moved to Manhattan to start NYU. For the better part of 15 years, I lived in the 5 boroughs (well 3 of the 5 anyway) with shorter stints in London (1 year) and La Paz, Bolivia (5 months). We moved to the dark forests of fika in late July 2011. That ball started rolling at this time last year.

I never wanted to live here. I never wanted to have 3 kids. Stuff happens. Destiny hands you funny cards sometimes.

A year ago, my dear darling Grandmother died at age 89 after a long battle with chronic heart issues. My grandma was much more like a second mother to me than a regular grandma. She lived with my parents in my childhood home and raised me while my parents were working. We were extremely close. I never wanted to be far from her.

Prior to this day last year, my husband and I had been debating two issues and we were locked in a stasis. I wanted to have another child. He wanted to move back to Sweden. He said that he would not add to our family unless we moved to Sweden. I would not move to Sweden until my grandmother was no longer living. I couldn't bear to be permanently far away from her. When she died, I okayed the move to Sweden. When I agreed to move to Sweden, my husband agreed to add to our family.

S. had a job offer here in his hometown. In the same internet cafe in Sucre, Bolivia that I learned of my grandma's passing, he signed and emailed a PDF job contract to the firm in the dark forests of fika. A few weeks later, whilst on vacation in Los Yungas(a lush jungle 3 hours down the mountain from La Paz) the twins were conceived, though I obviously didn't know at the time that we'd created 2 rather than 1.

After Bolivia, we spent 10 day at my parents' house in New Jersey, then flew to Galway, Ireland for a working vacation and eventually made our way to the Forest of Fika. On July 31, I finally realized that a certain monthly visitor had never arrived. The deal was sealed: We had moved to Sweden and I was pregnant.

Some nights like tonight, I look out my window at the silent and empty rain-slicked streets and I think how the hell did I end up here? Will I ever live in a city again? I look at my sleeping 1 month old twins and I think of how different their early lives will be from their older brother who was born in New York and has lived in La Paz.

The Earth moved for me a year ago and my life will never be the same.

Real Housewives of Kronoberg Län

I guess I'm a Real Housewife of Kronoberg Län. Ha ha. Well, it's true. I am a stay-at-home-mom for the foreseeable future (or, well, let's see - I'm 4 weeks into a 960 shared parental leave). To be fair, until August, my husband is a stay-at-home-dad too. So, I guess we're like Simon and Alex McCord from the Real Housewives of New York. OMG that makes me laugh! I need an expensive leopard print mumu to swan around in.

In the USA, the issue of Stay-at-home (the term "housewife" is antiquated, though the concept obviously isn't) vs. Working Moms is such a heated issue. It is seriously divided with a lot of shade-throwing on both sides. I've been on both sides of the fence - I've stayed at home with my kids, I've worked full-time and I've worked part-time/freelance.

The nastiness that arises from the American debate really seems to be an issue of jealousy, of haves and have-nots. Come to think of it, jealousy and looky-loo-ism (or comparing your lifestyle/belongings) seem to cause  many of the not-so-nice feelings in the USA, especially when it comes to motherhood.

If you stay at home, you are seen as spoiled and "taken care of" by your partner. You are a "kept woman" and backwards on feminism. You might be accused of being a "helicopter mom" or "sanctomommy" who is so gung-ho about motherhood that she can't spend a nanosecond away from her offspring. Supposedly you don't "have to" work.

If you work full-time out of the home, you are considered by some to be a cold-hearted careerist. There are always nasty whisperings "Well why did she have kids anyway if she was just going to throw them into daycare???"

From my distance now, I can see that all of this meanness and jealousy really comes from a general lack of support for both women and mothers in the USA. It's also a backhanded way of controlling women's bodies and choices. Like, if you're only getting max 3 months paid leave (most of my friends get less nowadays, it seems), childcare costs are extraordinarily high,  health insurance policies are tightening, Human Resources/work policies favor men and the economy still effing sucks, well of course back-biting is going to happen. It's the fucking Hunger Games for women in that country it seems, sometimes. Seriously.

I generally notice that the mean-girl stuff is not very prevalent in Sweden as a whole. I even tried watching Svenska Hollywoodfruar (Swedish Hollywood Wives - a reality show on TV about wealthy Swedish women who live in Los Angeles) and I stopped watching it because they were so darned nice! They were nice to one another, to their children, husbands and in general. No drama. I think Swedish society really supports feminism. Feminism isn't just about aesthetics or "being angry." In fact the feminists here are not angry at all - their voices are being heard. Feminism is about society supporting women and women supporting other women.

So, no, I'm not working now. But it's not because I'm lazy or spoiled or "kept." I'm just taking the allotted time (and yes, fire-breathers - it is a long time) off to care for my children. I will eventually go back to work. Most women in Sweden do work. I don't have the percentage, but it's much, much higher than in the USA. And fathers here do absolutely take paid leave too to care for their kids. The onus isn't just on the mother for childcare and housework. This helps too.


Did you know that even in Viking times that women were allowed to own land and get divorced? This country has a long history of supporting women. Not just encouraging them to talk shit about one another and flip tables shouting "Prostitution Whore!"  during televised dinners. Yeah Teresa from RHNJ, you made my home state proud right there. :)

I'm back after an M. Night Shyamalan Life twist

I disappeared shortly after I started this blog. The reason? I found out that I was having not one, but two babies. Twins. Yes. F*%k!!! I found this out at my mid-pregnancy ultrasound, so it was a real shocker. Compared to my singleton pregnancy, I had scant morning sickness or any of the other tell-tale signs that I was pregnant with more than one child. 

In Sweden, they do not have ultrasounds earlier than 18 weeks unless there is a problem. And as this was a very normal and easy pregnancy, I had no reason to get an extra check up. 

These twins were not "pre-meditated" meaning that I'd not undergone any fertility treatments to conceive them. That's one reason this was such a shocker - except that my grandma on my mom's side was a twin (and there a few sets of naturally-conceived twins and 1 set of triplets on that line) I had no reason to believe that I was a candidate for multiples. I am under 35 years old and have been completely textbook normal in terms of regular women's health. So when we saw the two large healthy twins (a boy and a girl) on the ultrasound, I had a few choice exclamations (shouted in English not in Swedish) and then burst into panicked tears. 

I spent the next 5 months in a curled up ball of tension completely dreading being a mom to multiples plus a toddler. I didn't really feel very communicative. Some people really really want large families. I was one of the women who was very much set on having only 2 children, maximum. 

Twin ultrasound pix

Now that they are here, I adore them. Not that we don't have moments of total hell. 

All I can say is THANK GOD WE LIVE IN SWEDEN. 

Why? 

Let's see:

-The pre-natal care I received was truly terrific. It was the most pro-woman-centered care I've ever seen. All female OBs and midwives (women pregnant with singles only see midwives through their pregnancy but since I was a twin pregnancy, I saw an OB-GYN regularly). 

It's weird here - you call your doctor by her first name. If you did that in the USA, you'd probably not be welcome at the practice. Swedes don't like to pull status rank. 

-My feelings and preferences were taken into account during the entire pregnancy. It was extremely respectful care. Your wishes are taken seriously here (within reason of course- I'm not a doctor or a midwife). We also hired a doula who was wonderful too. Kim's presence soothed me even though I was very, very scared about giving birth to twins and in a language that is not my native tongue. 

-Breastfeeding is encouraged and there is no baby nursery. Rooming in is practiced here (my daughter had jaundice and had to go under the lights, but the nurses always brought her to me to nurse). Even without the nursery, the midwives and baby nurses are super-helpful and wonderful. I felt spoiled by their attention, kindness and care. 

- Fathers/partners automatically get 2 weeks off from work (paid of course) following the birth. S. got 4 weeks on account of having twins. 

-Families with one child automatically get 480 days of paid shared parental leave. With twins, we get double that. I thought that it was just an extra 180 days, but now according to the Tax agency, it's 480 for each child. Holy Hell! 

-When this long period of time is over, the twins and my older son can attend high-quality dagis (daycare/preschool) for an extremely low-cost (next to free). If we'd had the twins in the USA, we'd have had to pay at least $1000 USD for each of them to attend daycare, if there were any openings (as we lived in NYC, daycares have long wait-lists) Or we'd have had to hire a nanny or two plus put our older son in at least part-time preschool just for the social/educational factor. 

-In general, Swedes respect and value personal privacy, which I like a lot. I hated getting unsolicited advice and nosy questions from strangers when I was pregnant with my older son in the USA.  I don't think it's a stranger's business on how I want to give birth or whether I want/have to work after my child is born or my parenting "style". I do things in a way that is instinctive, comfortable and acceptable to my family and I respect that other parents do too. Swedish society as a whole feels a lot more privacy-oriented about that sort of thing.

- I've encountered zero "competimommies" who insist of milestone "mompetition" one up-manship. I remember once when my older son was 6 months old, a lady in Brooklyn accosted me on the swings one day - "What does your son DO?" she asked? He was 6 months old so um, not much. So I answered "Do you mean for a living? Like, is he a fork-lift operator or a librarian?" She got very agitated at my answer. I can be an asshole, but it was an asshole question. 

-I can breastfeed my babies in public and don't feel weird here. Nobody has acted strangely or accused me of indecent exposure (happens all the time to nursing moms in the USA). Nobody leers. It's just fine. 

- Most public bathrooms are clean here (there are also more of them). Many public bathrooms have a clean changing table too. 

I'm really happy that we live in Sweden with our suddenly large family. Although I miss my family and friends in the USA terribly, I wouldn't have it any other way.