By the Way

My last post certainly wasn't meant to offend anyone, and I hope it didn't. I'm just trying to point out that society needs to be more supportive of nursing mothers, so that more mothers nurse.

Also, it certainly is not necessary to show your breast while nursing in public. In fact, you can almost do it so that no one knows you're nursing. Personally, I do not nurse in public because I feel like I'll make someone uncomfortable, which of course, is part of the problem. If pictures of mothers nursing make Facebook uncomfortable enough to remove them, I'm quite sure that a real-live nursing mother is going to make someone uncomfortable. I'm also afraid that I'll get a disgusted look from someone, a look meant to make me feel like I'm doing something shameful. And, I certainly do not want to feel shame about doing what's best for my baby.

Monkey see, monkey do.

Some Thoughts I Just Can’t Keep to Myself

There’s been a minor little story in the news lately about a group of mothers, women and other supporters that have banned together on Facebook to protest the required removal of pictures from Facebook that contain any portion of the areola, including pictures of mothers breast-feeding their children. Anyone who knows me well knows that I am an ardent supporter of breastfeeding, and anytime I read something like this it really fires me up. I hope you don’t all think I’m beating a dead horse here, but I need to say some things.

First of all, breast-feeding is the absolute best thing you can do for your baby. It is the gold standard. Anything you give your infant that is not breast milk is inferior. These days, that little bit of knowledge is pretty common, and yet, many, many women in the United States choose not to breast-feed their babies. Why is this? I have a theory, and of course, I’m going to share it.

American society and our economy are consumer-driven. Formula is a consumer product that is sold, marketed, and, shamelessly advertised as an acceptable alternative to breast-milk. People will buy anything, and they think that if they are buying something for their baby, then they must be doing something good. Now, you may have noticed that every formula commercial ever made has a little disclaimer at the bottom that says, “Breast-milk is best,” or something very similar. Yes, they actually admit that breast-milk is best, but convey that if you can’t breast-feed, then formula is acceptable. I guess my definition of acceptable does not include babies that are sick more often, constipated, more likely to develop childhood diseases, more likely to be allergic, more likely to get diaper rash, and a whole host of other things that I’m leaving out. (And those are just benefits for the baby – the mother gets a whole host of them, too.)

I am well aware that a very, very small percentage of women truly cannot breast-feed their children, and for them, I feel awful. To me, not being able to nurse my baby would be devastating. However, most of the excuses that women give about not being able to breast-feed or choosing not to breast-feed are just that – excuses.

American society has told them it is okay to give their babies formula, and what I’m saying is that it is not okay. Our society needs to change some things so that women can feel more confident and empowered and make the right choice. We have to accept that a naked breast is not just a symbol for sex, but a symbol of nurture, nutrition and motherly-love. People have to stop being uncomfortable around a women that is nursing. If a nursing mother becomes a more widespread site in the public arena, then women will begin to feel as comfortable nursing their babies in front of others as they are giving them a bottle. Nursing would begin to become common place, and more and more mothers would just believe, recognize, acknowledge and accept that when you have a baby, you nurse a baby. These basic, simple changes need to occur so that we can do what’s best for our babies and for society.

Merry Christmas

Well, Christmas is winding down, and I thought I better wish everyone who still reads things a Merry one, and a Happy New Year. Our Christmas Eve party was lots of fun, and we enjoyed our first holiday season as a three human family very much. (In reality, we're a 5 member family, because I can't forget about my first and second babies, Hallie and Chance.)

JD did a great job on Christmas morning opening his gifts one at a time, and very slowly. He played with each one, toyed with the paper, tugged on the bows and tortured the dogs in between gifts. He had no idea why he was opening boxes, but it was very entertaining for Jeff and me.

My Dad headed to Vegas on Christmas Day so I'll have to be posting more often with lots of pictures. I don't know how he's going to leave the little bugger for so long, so I guess I'll have to keep him informed. You gotta love the internet.

I got Jeff an electronic drum set, which was a huge surprise for him. He's been playing it non-stop, so I'm pretty sure he likes it. He got me a locket with two tiny little pictures of JD...it's the best gift I've ever gotten.

JD got lots of toys, but our best gift this Christmas was watching him learn to walk over the holidays. He's hobbling from room to room now, after only being able to take a few steps a week ago. What a boy!

Big Boy

We got a video camera for Christmas, so I wanted to show everybody my big boy! I'm sure I'll write more about things later.

Christmastime

Let me just say that I love Christmas. I love the parties, the food, the presents, the drinks, the coziness of sitting in a warm room on a cold night with my whole family in front of a twinkling tree. I love the music and I love getting dressed up in a pretty sweater. Maybe I'm sounding a little weird now, but I remember absolutely loving the various traditions that my family had around the holidays when I was little. I guess I still love them, but now we have to start our own traditions so that JD (and any other future little Eckert babies) can cherish his holiday memories.

So, I guess we're starting with our first Christmas Eve party tomorrow night. There are lots of people coming, and hopefully, everyone has a great time and will look forward to coming to our house for many years to come. It's especially important for us to enjoy Christmas this year, because if you remember, or if you just take a look back to December of last year in this blog, you'll see that we spent the entire holiday in the hospital. Jeff was stuck inside his room last year with no appetite, and no desire for much of anything but getting his hospital stay over with. My Dad, Rich, Nicole and I ate a free Christmas dinner in the hospital cafeteria, which nice as it was, is a horrible place to be on Christmas.

Sometimes after thinking back on something bad that happened, you can sort of say to yourself, "well, it wasn't that bad..." I'm still not able to say that about last year. In fact, the more I think about it, the more horrible and real it all is, and the more I can be thankful that we made it through and that Jeff is doing great. Enough said about that.

Lately, JD has been taking 3 or 4 steps at time from one spot to another. This morning, he basically went almost the whole way across the room before falling at my feet. He was so darn proud of himself, and so adorable that I just can't stop thinking about him.

I Don't Know Why I Do This

When Jeff was first diagnosed with AML last October, I spent a lot of time scouring the internet for any information I could get my hands on. I read technical papers about transplants, GVHD, chemotherapy drugs, platelet recovery time and its connection to survival rates, and just about anything else that I thought might tell me whether or not Jeff was going make it.

In addition, I also searched and found blogs of others going through the same thing that we were. These were the hardest to read, but also the most helpful. I remember one blog in particular that I followed from October when the author received his transplant. He ended up dying right around the time Jeff received Mark's stem cells. I can remember sitting at the computer in the hospital, staring in disbelief at the screen with tears running down my cheeks, crying for someone I had never met, but whose life had touched mine so deeply.

I've recently, for reasons unknown to me, felt compelled to read more leukemia blogs, and occasionally I make a comment to let the author know that my blog is out here in cyberspace just waiting to be read. Anyway, to make a long story short, by posting on someone else's blog, I've stumbled across many more blogs and have just read the stories of a young man named Derrick and a young woman named Erica. Both of them passed away earlier this month, and in reading about their battles, I can't help but count my blessings. AML is a nasty, relentless disease and Jeff is so lucky to have come through things so well. I certainly don't want to be overly optimistic, but after all we've been through, I need a little optimism to help keep me sane.

Derrick's story started out similar to Jeff's, but unfortunately for him and his family, he didn't end up nearly as lucky. He did his induction chemo in Hershey with Dr. Claxton as his attending, and followed with a stem cell transplant (which he chose to have done at Sloan-Kettering in NYC). Derrick made it to the 100 day post-transplant mark without too many problems. Unfortunately for him, he relapsed shortly after that and his body couldn't handle any more harsh chemo. Basically, his organs stopped working properly and he never made it to a second transplant. He was 23 years old when he died.

Erica's story starts with ALL, relapses with AML, and after a slightly mis-matched stem cell transplant, her body once again succumbed to some form of the disease and too much graph vs. host. I think she was only 28 at the time of her death. Both of these young people were so full of life and incredibly beautiful, both inside and out.

Sometimes I just don't understand the unfairness of it all.

A Boy and His Dog

JD likes to head butt just about everything, and Chance is no exception. He'd also like to give Hallie a good knock on the head, but she runs as soon as she sees him coming. My beautiful little boy is a bit of a roughneck. He finds delight in diving head first off of just about anything, hitting himself in the head with a coaster, biting and wrestling with Chance, ramming his walker at top speed into the kitchen cupboards and repelling off of my bookcases. He is definitely a contrast in character...sweet, laid-back, and happy, but very, very busy, and like I said, a bit rough.

I can't believe he's almost 1! He'll be walking any day now, and it makes me sad to think how fast his first year flew by me. I guess we'll just have to get working on another baby.