Welcome to your last year of binary dates

Yes, I'm totally embracing my nerdhood in this post. Not exactly "New Year's Resolution" worthy as I've been embracing my nerdhood in various ways for a while (years, if not decades - depending on your perspective and what parts of me you've come to know). One "New Year's Resolution" I'm making is to try to post here more often (this is being posted on my blog, which cross-posts to my Facebook profile, for those of you confused since I am very active on Facebook).

Last Veteran's Day (November 11, for you ingrates who don't bother to spare a thought about those brave folks who defend your liberties on one of the few days set aside for them in our American calendar) it occurred to me that Veteran's Day 2011 will be a very cool date to write out (11/11/11)... it then occurred to me that this past Vet's Day (11/11/10) was the last binary day of 2010 (when all days in the short form of the date are either 1s or 0s). Then the thoughts just totally did a pile-on and I realized that 2011 is likely the last year I'll be able to write dates in a binary format a few times for the rest of my life as I don't really expect to see the year 2100 (possible, but living to be 123 seems rather unlikely. I would turn 124 at the end of 2100).

So all this pondering made me feel like I should do something to more than just say "huh, that's somewhat cool and interesting" every time I notice that the date is binary this year. I've decided that I will take a moment to send wishes of pure contentment to those who see things in a more binary way than I typically do (you could say I'm a bit more hexadecimal than binary I guess... see, the nerdiness just keeps on coming aren't you glad you continued reading???). Not just people I disagree with or don't particularly like (yes, I'm giving YOU a hairy eyeball, Speaker Boehner), but also friends of mine with mental health conditions that can seem rather binary at times (bipolar comes to mind immediately, and there are some aspects of OCD that can be kinda binary too). So if that happens to fit you, if there's something binary about a label applied to you (even if you don't feel at all binary yourself!), I hope you'll feel a little psychic hug from me whenever you write the date and it's all 1s and 0s.... and also if you look at a digital clock on one of those days and notice that IT is only displaying 1s and/or 0s ("or" being appropriate in this case since some folks have digital military clocks that actually display 00:00 once every 24 hours) - maybe consider noticing that the clock is displaying that way on a binary day could feel like a friendly little psychic kiss on the forehead AND hug from me since it's an extra special little quirk of a moment.

So why am I wishing contentment instead of happiness? There is reason for this distinction. I think our society is actually a bit messed up in its seeing the "pursuit of happiness" as a be-all-end-all thing... Happiness is nebulous, undefinable, and fleeting. As a species, anything that seems for a a moment to make us "happy" we seem all too quick to habituate to and be taking for granted in the blink of an eye. Happiness has become a commodity to be sold, almost as much as in the episode of Doctor Who during David Tennant's tenure when he took Martha Jones to New(to the Nth) New York and street vendors were trying to sell him "Happy Happy". Happiness has become linked to that which is disposable in our society - we are a culture of Happy Meals and the associated Made in China plastic crap. I wouldn't consider it a blessing to wish happiness like that on someone, particularly someone who already has an abundance of everything that SHOULD, theoretically, bring happiness - wealth above 90% of other individuals in the world, alleged freedom and equality under the law, and at least one person who gives a crap about their continued existence (me).

For those who have so much, I wish contentment. I wish them, for moments on a regularly occurring basis, to see all that they've got going for them and be content with it instead of constantly trying to acquire more and better and living in a constant state of low-level fear of losing any of what they have. I wish for them to realize how even a small portion of what they have could sustain those less fortunate - here in the U.S. and abroad - for a significant amount of time. I wish for them to take a moment to calculate what percentage of the necessary monthly expenses their pleasure discretionary expense of the moment might cover for a family less fortunate (for reference, the average monthly rent around my home is about $600 for a 2 bedroom unit with bathroom, kitchen, living, and dining rooms. Heating bills in the winter can run between $50 and $200 per month to keep such a home at 68 degrees while occupied, depending on how often someone is home and how well insulated the place is and how old its windows are, so someone who finds themselves confined to the house due to poor health in a poorly insulated place with old windows is really financially screwed unless they can qualify and obtain financial assistance... guess what? That's kinda us, only we don't qualify because my husband makes "too much" money while I'm home with the kids - "too much" in this case being a few hundred dollars a month above our recurring expenses [mortgage, payment for the family van & vehicle insurance, utilities, student loans, food, etc - not luxuries]).

Even with all this, I am content. Even with my physical disabilities that make that van a necessity not a luxury (without it, I would barely be able to leave the house, I can't physically get in and out of the 1991 Honda Civic my husband uses as a commuter car). Yes, there are other things and adventures I'd to have, pleasurable activities I'd like to do that I am prevented from doing because of lack of resources (financial, health, stamina, etc), but my ability to experience the pristine moments real happiness that flit through my life on a regular basis as I hobble from one splashy puddle to another of contentment is not in any way inhibited. Even when I do it in a mobility scooter on days (too frequent recently) when my legs aren't being cooperative.

That recognition, of how good we all really have it, is what I wish for everyone else.

May you be so blessed... and pass it on. Happy New Year.

History of artificial baby feeding

This topic seems to come up with unnerving frequency among the lactivist community, and there is a lot of misinformation going out about how long artificial baby feeding has been going on - most people think it's a post-WWII societal issue, hand-in-hand with the increase in births occurring in hospitals. Yes, it increased then and breastfeeding rates dropped, but we also have better statistics across social classes in the 20th century. Furthering the misperception that breastfeeding was the way ALL babies were fed prior to the 20th century keeps us from looking at this important factor in infant and maternal mortality rates of our foremothers. Only the wealthy could generally afford a true full-time wet nurse (to the detriment of that woman's own nursling, supposing she hadn't already weaned her baby, since it doesn't seem common to allow the wet nurse to bring her own infant along on the job and tandem nurse the two), though informal cross-nursing (nursing mothers sharing the "duty" of feeding their infants so that one could go do something else for a while) has been going on most likely since before we evolved into humans (it's a common primate practice when there are 2 or more lactating females available to care for the infants).

Lack of breastfeeding, especially in the first few days, is detrimental to the mother in many ways - the act of IMMEDIATELY breastfeeding after birth encourages uterine contractions that help prevent hemorrhage, helps shrink the uterus quickly, encourages the ongoing release of hormones to facilitate bonding, relieve pain and promote rest via continued release of ocytocin, and on and on. There are "traditional" societies even today that discourage women from feeding their newborns their colostrum, believing it to be worthless until the "real milk" comes in, and proscribe waiting 5 days before feeding the infant from the breast, substituting various alternatives (many of which contain honey) to keep the baby hydrated instead. This was (and still is) common practice in parts of India. What effect does this have on infant mortality? Maternal hemorrhage? Successful initiation of breastfeeding, when the baby has been allowed to feed from a non-breast for the first 5 days? Doesn't take much to figure out the effect on all these rates might be, especially now when "modern alternatives" are so widely available and socially acceptable. But when women hand off their babies to be fed other than at their own breasts from birth, they increase both the infant and maternal rates of early postpartum complications. And when new mothers aren't supported in their efforts and struggles to nurse their newborns, they're set up for depression over their supposed "failure" - a failure that is more due to our society than anything to do with the mother. Pushing women to not nurse openly and publicly places further barriers to the natural learning of how to accomplish the task in those first early days, as much as lack of availability of profession lactation consultants (not that both groups don't sometimes give misguided or downright wrong advice - it happens, but I believe it's less likely than misinformation coming from anyone without firsthand experience at nursing, regardless of gender).

Before the 20th century we can just make presumptions based mostly upon bodies in cemeteries/mummies/etc about how many babies died at which ages in which social classes (death records are not nearly as common for anyone below upper middle class prior to the industrial revolution, especially outside of urban centers). Not the best data collection method by any stretch of the imagination. Some of these early deaths do include clues as to infant feeding method (ancients tended to bury feeding containers with the infants that weren't breastfed). There are surviving medical advice documents from ancient times that talk about when infants should be weaned, how often they should be fed, etc. So it's not just modern morons encouraging mothers to put their babies on feeding schedules, to watch the clock instead of the baby. They have a long, sordid history of giving this shoddy advice - surprising that it's mostly from males who were probably not even nearby when their own children were being nursed.

Artificial infant feeding is much MUCH older than 50 years. The Sears catalog from 1897 contained at least 8 different brands of artificial baby milk. There are infant feeding artifacts left over from the ancient Greeks. Wet nursing wasn't the only way a baby would survive, but it definitely gave the kid a better chance of survival (in the Victorian era only 20% of infants made it to their 2nd birthday, one wonders how many of those deaths were due to not being breastfed combined with other factors of Victorian life). These are facts that I've researched in the past when people have tried to tell me how dangerous childbearing is because our ancestors DIED in childbirth. I point out that sanitation has never been as good as it is now and a great many of the "ancestors" who were well off enough to get their statistics recorded (not mine, I'm of peasant stock!) were handing off their babies to be fed elsewhere so they could get pregnant again ASAP (and deplete their bodies' nutrient supplies, not letting their uterus have a rest, etc etc etc - the risks of frequent, rapid-fire childbearing are well known to anyone who has dealt with breeding any species of mammal). Of course, young mothers did die, for various reasons (not all associated directly with childbirth) and other ways of feeding their infant if no other lactating woman was nearby had to be devised. Our ancient ancestors were ingenious, just as we are. The infant found in the group of bodies called the Cherchen Mummies has an artificial infant feeder buried with it, the baby has been dead for 3,000 years. The family is presumed to be nomads (they have Caucasian features though they died in China) and it's postulated that the mother died before the infant did.

Here are some online references:
early infant feeders - http://www.babybottle-museum.co.uk/the%20early%20feeders.htm
Ted Greiner's Breastfeeding History - http://www.geocities.com/HotSprings/Spa/3156/history.htm (hate using Geocities references but it's the version available online)
An article about Cherchen mummies - http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20060828/ai_n1669651


Oops.. I think my sociology degree is showing ;) Darnit I want to go to graduate school already! *sigh* Kids first, academia later.