• home
  • contact
  • hire
    • blog
    • freelance
    • media kit
    • portfolio
    • resumé

lo-wren

muse. mom. maven.

  • Editorial
    • all
    • featured
  • Parenting
    • humor
    • breastfeeding
    • miscarriage
      • experience
      • healing|support
  • freelance
    • portfolio
    • resumé
  • natural living
    • cloth diapering
      • general topics
      • accessories
      • prefolds
      • fitteds
      • pockets
      • ai2s
      • aios
      • wool
      • trainers
    • ideas
    • products
    • recipes
    • events
  • blog series
    • featured WAHMs
    • guest posts
    • what we’re reading
    • sun protection
    • SIDS awareness

Your Birthing/Parenting Choices Are None of My Business!

2013/09 By Lauren B. Stevens 1 Comment

Someone recently posted this article on Facebook, The Unnatural Mom, and it was the final push for me to write this post.  Why do people care so much about what other people think about their birthing & child-rearing practices?
I read the article and immediately thought about the woman who stood up, during the Birth Without Fear session at MommyCon Philly, and asked how she should respond to people who remarked about the fact that she (egads!) had an induced labor/birth with (oh, no!) an epidural.  I turned to a friend next to me and said, “Why does she care?  It’s none of their business.”  It makes me sad that “mommy wars” even [exist] revolve around whether you birthed your child: at home. from your vagina. unmedicated.  Who the heck cares, as long as both mom and baby are healthy?
I started my family at an older age, and the majority of my girlfriends had their children when they/we were in our twenties.  Not once did I ever ask them if they had delivered ‘naturally’ (read: vaginally), or if they had gotten epidurals — I was more concerned about how both she and the baby were feeling, and got lost in all of that sweet, new baby squishiness.  I did, however, begin asking those questions ten years later when I was pregnant, and realized that I did have options when it came to my pregnancy and childbirth.
I made the decision to cloth diaper before ever getting pregnant…which left me plenty of time to research cloth diapering…which led me to TONS of information about natural parenting and natural childbirth.  Through my research, I realized that I did, indeed, have choices regarding my prenatal care; I didn’t have to see a surgeon for my checkups and I didn’t have to birth in a hospital — what!?  The more research my husband and I did, the more our decision became clear.  But guess what?  Due to a defect, my uterus was unable to allow my baby to be anything other than breach from 5 months pregnant on.  There was no room.  I didn’t have the birth I had “planned,” but life never goes as “planned” anyway.  My son was born healthy, I was healthy, and the sun rose to see another day.
I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t upset that my birth wasn’t natural, unmedicated and outside of a hospital.  But I got over it and I didn’t care what anyone else thought because…who the heck really cares how a baby gets here anyway?  Guess what else?  We had our son circumcised, and we sleep soundly at night with our decision (how could they!?).  In fact, my husband and I were probably more traumatized than our son will ever be.  You know what else?  We give our son immunizations (they’re poisoning him!).  Yup, I said it.  And you know what?  I don’t care what anyone else thinks about it because: he is no one’s child but ours.  Whether you vaccinate your child or not is of no concern to me (my kid’s covered).
So, if you want a term for ‘how’ we parent or our parenting philosophy, I would say that we practice “natural parenting” or “attachment parenting,” en vogue terms for: you got it – parenting.  By strict definition, we do neither.  I babywear but have never coslept.  Yup, our son has been sleeping in his crib, in another room, from the ripe old age of 2 weeks.  I never thought twice about getting out of bed and going into his room every 1 1/2 hours to feed him the first 6 months of his life (and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t feel abandoned or that his needs aren’t being met).  Oh, yeah, I breastfeed too (and [gasp!] STILL nurse him at 14 1/2 months old), but again, that’s my decision.  If I was unable to breastfeed, I’d likely need to feed my baby formula (breast milk banks are expensive), but thankfully, we never had to ‘cross that bridge’.  Yup, we let him “cry it out” when we (le gasp!) did sleep training.  You know how long he “cried-it-out” for?  A max of 7 minutes…and then he fell soundly asleep on his own.  I made all of his ‘baby’ food because I wanted to and I had the time to do it, but baby-led weaning didn’t work for us until after a few weeks of purees (failed at ‘natural parenting’ there too).
I could go on and on, and some people might find it shocking, but you know what?  We really don’t care because our parenting decisions are of no one else’s concern.  Our son is not neglected, starved for food or affection, nor will he ever question our love for him.  Our job is to keep him safe, healthy, happy and to raise him to be a moral and ethical human being (and gentleman).  How we go about that is our business, and outsiders’ opinions won’t change our decisions.  So, before you even begin to wonder what other people may think about how you birth(ed)/feed/care for you child(ren), stop and remind yourself that you don’t give a ____.Read other bloggers’ posts about this topic:

Suzi from Cloth Diaper Addicts: Your Birth Plan Is None of My Business
Bert from First Time Mom: Motherhood – Confusing Passion for Judgement?

Sharing is Caring! Please share to keep the conversation going:

  • Email
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • More
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Google

Filed Under: all, Editorial, ideas, Natural Living Tagged With: attachment parenting, baby led weaning, babywearing, breastfeeding, cloth diapering, mommy wars, natural parenting, sleep training

Our MommyCon Philly Experience

2013/08 By Lauren B. Stevens 4 Comments

The other weekend my family had the opportunity to attend MommyCon in Philadelphia.  I was eagerly awaiting this event, and had purchased our tickets last April (when we were still living in the area).  Despite moving 2 hours away, I was determined to make it — a natural parenting convention with lots of speaker on breastfeeding, babywearing, cloth diapering and lots of natural parenting vendors — yes, please!
We arrived at the venue about an hour or so after the start time and were immediately overwhelmed.  The check-in desk was a small desk, crammed with people, in a tiny area in the main lobby (I feel bad for the guests trying to check in/out or generally make their way in/out of the building).  The cramped quarters were to be a precursor to the rest of the day.  We made our way to the second floor where the convention was taking place.
Excited kiddo at the beginning of the day

I wish that I had photos to share of the vendors & surrounding rooms, but there was literally no way for me to take photos, as the area was unbelievably overcrowded.  Unfortunately, I suffer from anxiety in crowds and in tight quarters, so I was unable to really move about the hallways and the area where the vendors were located.  I ended-up spending the majority of my time in the main speaker room (which is what I was there for anyway), to avoid pushing through crowds.  The only way to be able to ‘shop’ the vendors there would have been to go while discussions were taking place, but then you would end up missing the speaker.
Crowded areas aside, it was great to see some of the people behind the blogs that I’ve followed since my days anticipating getting pregnant:
January, from Birth Without Fear

Above is January, the mama behind Birth Without Fear.  She inspires (and cheerleads) women to seek out the birth that they want, no matter the obstacles.

Jessica from The Leaky Boob

Jessica, from one of my favorite blogs and Facebook pages, The Leaky Boob, talked about normalizing breastfeeding and breastfeeding support.
Unfortunately, I have no photos from my favorite, and most educational session — Car Seat Safety with Alyssa from The Mommy Dialogues.  Of all of the sessions, the car seat safety was the most beneficial for us, already having 13 months of parenting under our belts.  We use Britax seats, and just assumed that weight was the gauge for D outgrowing his seats…but found out that D’s height will most likely be what outgrows the seat way before the weight limit!
Baby Guy NYC
Baby Guy NYC led the gear talk & giveaway.  It was the end of the day, with lots of babies in full-on meltdown mode (my little man included), and Jamie made things quick and breezy, giving a couple of great tidbits about each piece of baby gear that was given away (and there was a lot of great gear given away – I just have NO luck!).
End of the convention, people anxiously waited to hear if they had won in the 5pm prize re-draw
In summary, as the mother of a 13 month old and active in the natural parenting community, there was not a great deal of information in the sessions that was new or overly beneficial for me.  For seasoned parents, this convention is a good opportunity to network with like-minded parents.  My suggestion, for future MommyCons, would be to add sessions for experienced parents, maybe on holistic/natural healing/remedies, parenting with patience, etc.  For expecting parents who don’t do a lot of research beforehand, this convention is great and will inundate you with information!  In the absence of accessible brick-and-mortar cloth diaper stores, you are able to check out each of the types of cloth diapers on the market and try out babywearing with carriers that aren’t crotch-danglers.  
Pooped kiddo after a long day! D was a champ – he cut 2 new teeth that weekend!

I am really glad that there was such an astounding turnout for MommyCon in Philadelphia, it just wasn’t a large enough venue to be comfortable for my family.  The fact that there is this much interest in a convention centered on natural parenting makes me hopeful, and I will enjoy watching the convention grow in leaps and bounds!  My final thought?  I have never seen so many babies being worn or boobies being proffered in one place…and it made me smile.

Sharing is Caring! Please share to keep the conversation going:

  • Email
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • More
  • Tumblr
  • Reddit
  • Google

Filed Under: events, Natural Living Tagged With: attachment parenting, babywearing, breastfeeding, cloth diapering, mommycon, natural parenting, parenting conference

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Google+
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter

categories

Lauren B. Stevens is a former publishing rep-turned-writer, whose work can be found on ChildVantage, The Huffington Post, Scary Mommy and Care.com, among many other websites. When she's not chasing her precocious preschooler, Lauren pens hilarious and heartwarming stories about her life as a mother, ghostwrites blogs for businesses, and sometimes even finds the time to write a bit of creative non-fiction.
Look for Lauren's published essays in the books listed below:

i’m in these books!

  • SMITHCoverWidget.jpg
  • MMCoverWidget.jpg
  • 3534480-01Motherhood250-1.jpg
  • chicken-soup.jpg
  • SINSA-Cover-Image.jpg
  • PTB6.jpg
  • PTB7.jpg

popular this week…

  • All Prefolds Are NOT Created Equal
  • 5 Ways to Repurpose Cloth Diapers
  • Best Cloth Diapers for Boys
  • Emergency Preparedness with the HybridLight Solar Lantern

recent posts

  • 4 Things You Can Get to Ensure Car Safety for Your Kids (Without Breaking the Bank)
  • Cyber Security 101: 5 Tips for Keeping Your Kids Safe Online
  • 11 Activities To Tire Your Kids And Have Them Begging for Bedtime
  • Chicken Soup for the Soul: Military Families
  • Maximizing Marketplace Savings with Groupon and eBay

Stirrup Queen’s List of Blogs

Stirrup Queen's List of Blogs

archives

Pinterest Favorites

 photo 12UniqueGifts_zps5a66546f.jpg" alt="12-UNIQUE-GIFT-IDEAS" />
 photo 4ReasonstoUseMenstrualCupjpg_zpsb15ca7ba.jpg
 photo StopBreastfeeding_zps6df818b5.jpg
budget-cloth-diapering
 photo MiscarriageBabyLossjpg_zps3a6a4ab8.jpg
 photo PrefoldPinterest_zps43c4cd6e.jpg

Copyright © 2021

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.