Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Post-natal Perfection


I was thinking about Post-Natal Depression today. I am a major candidate for it and sometimes feel stirrings of said depression. It's interesting to me the rise of depression in our society. Compared to days gone by, we have everything a person could ask for. We are fed and clothed, and have amazing conveniences. We live longer and are taller and stronger. Yet we are more depressed than ever before. I think it is because we are in a state to desire perfection...in everything. We will tolerate no mistakes to be made. There are people who have made a living off of other people's mistakes, you'll find them constantly in court battling for cash because they slipped on a recently mopped stair...Gynecologists are being forced out of business because they are constantly getting sued for mistakes. For hundreds of years mothers and babies have died in the birthing process. Modern medicine has made it seem a safe process...but, thanks to Eve, it is not safe. In days gone by mothers were grateful to have a baby, the longer it lived the more amazing. We expect our babies to be born without pain, in perfect condition. We expect a special oil to take away our stretch marks and special pills to take away our fat.
I myself have fallen pray to this need for perfection. I get depressed at the size my belly still is and that I can't breast feed. I get depressed about my son's disease that made his first 2 weeks very near every mother's worst nightmare. (I say very near because, as with all mothers the worst nightmare is to watch your child slowly fade unto death.) I feel like our time with him in the beginning was stolen. I had to wash my hands before I could even enter the room he was in. He was cut out of me, and I was pretty much stoned out of my head for the only time we had "before" the disease. I expected a regular delivery with a healthy baby who would come home with me, and people would be so happy that "It's a BOY!" and I would feed him from myself. I suppose in many ways I needed it to be perfect.
So, I guess I don't really wonder too much why so many women are stricken down with such a paralyzing mental plague. We demand perfection and will take no less.

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