Hieronymo's mad againe.

1) NOTHING sets my blood boiling like people who state in passing that emergency contraceptives and IUDs are abortifaceants. Medically, biologically, a pregnancy is defined as beginning when a fertilized egg has attached to the uterine lining. If you're going to disagree with the medical community's working definition, the burden is on you to explain why. And if your explanation is "fertilized eggs have souls" my next question will be whether you think all women of reproductive age should have their menstrual cycles monitored, to be sure that all fertilized eggs have the absolute best chance of implanting, because that seems like the next reasonable step to me. Followed by causing women to take pregnancy tests daily, so we can monitor and investigate extremely early miscarriages. Because otherwise, I'm not so sure that you're serious about sticking up for fertilized eggs. 2) I'm officially off my maintenance meds. Took the last pill Sunday (Feb 12) Accor...

(Every time I log into Facebook, one of my friends has posted something infuriating. I need my blood pressure down, and I need to not engage in pointless flame wars. So I'm going to say quite a bit here, both today and probably later) A few weeks ago, a blog post on the right to decide when and how to start a family caught my eye. This is something my husband and I are pretty serious about. Between two doctoral programs, the assortment of jobs we juggle between the two of us (I think we might be down to just two jobs each now. Maybe), and a newly diagnosed autoimmune disorder, now is not the time to get pregnant. (When you have a whacked-out immune system that likes to attack your own tissues, there's a definite possibility it will recognize a fetus as foreign and just try to get rid of it). If you walked through our house, you'd find my pack of birth control pills in the kitchen, condoms in the nightstand by our bed, and emergency contraception in a drawer in the bathr...

I'm starting my third year in grad school, and this has prompted a number of reflections, about things both serious and frivolous. Things are different now, and one of the fastest ways to know things are different is to look in the mirror or open my closet door. I was a biology major in college, and school and work were my life. My standard uniform was a beaten up pair of jeans and a grey t-shirt, or a green button-down with sulfuric acid holes from TA-ing chem lab. I also didn't shower all that much (because, if showers take ten minutes, and you go a week without showering, you've just saved yourself an hour, and those hours add up.). It's also fair to say that especially my last two years, I was carrying a pretty big chip on my shoulder, and the yuck probably resulted in fewer verbal "screw you"s being dealt out. My first job after graduation was interning in a molecular tox lab. So I added showers into my routine and phased out the cruddiest of the jean...

In the last few days of break, I've been wrapping up some of the leftover odds and ends from our wedding. I've blogged about it before , and not terribly long ago, our wedding was featured on my favorite wedding blog. It's interesting to me...that in all the note-writing,photo-album building,and smiling acceptance of congratulations,there are only certain reactions that are acceptable. When you talk about weddings,it's acceptable to lightly dance over the stress of planning,but to suggest that anything was difficult or unpleasant about your wedding? Well, that makes you a bridezilla , unless your wedding included some you-tube worthy disaster, in which case you're allowed to tell the story to a room full of people simultaneously laughing and cringing. To say "my wedding was really hard,and I don't think I'd do it again" isn't allowed. That's considered the height of selfishness. I find this even more intriguing after reading a recent col...

I'm sure it's not just Crohn's disease...most of the things I'm itemizing are probably things most people with a chronic disease have felt. In all fairness, it's only been four months since I've been diagnosed ("only"? It seems like a lifetime some days)and maybe some of these things will change or become easier, but I can't see that now. And some of the things you can't put a price tag on are the hardest. 1)I have less time with my husband. Because he's been picking up odd jobs to pay for my meds, I see less of him. And he's more tired when I do see him. 2)I'm never going to feel pretty again. Seriously, I spend three times as long as I used to getting ready in the morning, just to feel normal. It's not just how I feel-I was going through some photos my husband took from a recent day trip to Charleston and I look...colorless, dull...like a dead fish really. "Like butter spread out over too much toast" as our fri...

Six years ago today... It was a few days after I'd arrived at my parent's home from college. I carried with me a purple sticky note with Scott's phone number. I missed him, needed to talk to him, sensed that he needed to talk to me. But I had responsibilities- family and picking up my job at the wretched grocery store around the corner. I sold cigarettes and beer, was yelled at by customers and ignored by my managers, my breaks were skipped and I worked late. Things were tense at home, to say the least. I found myself teary in the bathroom, a razorblade digging into my skin, searching for rest and quiet. Blood flowed, and with it a measure of calm as I cleaned it away and rejoined my hectic family. I tumbled into bed that night exhausted, certain that I was alone and failing at everything. Scott showed up in my dreams that night, and we talked. I don't remember much about that dream...just that we talked, I laughed, I cried, I tried to hold onto him and he faded awa...

I am Anglican, and proud to put my roots down into this tradition. It is the branch of the Church where I belong, the heritage that shaped my thoughts and imagination before I knew its name. There are few things more precious to me than those things that are central Anglicanism- Worship focused on meeting Christ in the Eucharist, the via media , a willingness to admit that not all pious beliefs (e.g the Ascension of Mary) are necessary for salvation, and a resistance to splintering over theological nuances. There are few things that hurt me more than watching Anglicans rage against each other. It is excruciating to me that I can't even use the term "Worldwide Anglican Communion" anymore because so many of us AREN'T in Communion with each other....that we have begun to split hairs in determining who we are willing to break bread with, that we have started attacking each other. I'm not sure where *I* fit in this dizzying landscape; I have friends who are a part of...

It's finals week, and I've just uploaded my second-to-last paper. I've spent the majority of my days just writing the past couple weeks and it hit me.... If some ambassador from the future had told ten-year-old me that "One day, when you grow up, you're still going to be in school. You're going to get paid to go to school, and you'll get to study whatever you want. You'll spend most of your time reading and writing about things you choose yourself and think are important" I probably would have thought this was a pretty great deal. And it is...at least the part of the time when you're not completely malnourished (since you haven't had time to make it to the grocery store) exhausted (since you have bizarre nightmares every time you sleep) and crazy (due to the malnourishment, exhaustion, and stress). I don't even know what to say about this semester. It's been hard. Starting a marriage, starting a a doctorate, and starting life ...

...you start forgetting that for a lot of people, it's not personal. Or, at least I do. I catch glimpses of the Republican primary candidates campaigning on repealing health care reform and I wonder "Why do they hate sick people so much?" I see the occasional facebook post bashing "Obamacare" and screaming about being penalized by "having to pay for someone else's life choices" or all the rhetoric about "personal responsibility." And then there's the conversations about drug companies- the "we want to encourage innovation" business. It's become really hard not to be hurt by it. I've started wondering why this country hates sick people so much. Or, really, why it hates sick poor people. And why, since the US hates sick poor people so much, why it doesn't make it easier for poor people to have a medical home and access preventive services so they'll be less likely to get sick. I suppose just by making th...

In his homily today, the bishop said "Evangelism is one hungry man telling another where to find bread." This basic statement triggered a series of flashbacks to my Baptist church evangelism days (which merit their own post. Gosh,there are a lot of things I'm not proud of. But it made me wonder...what if churches(and other Christian organizations) went through the same steps and procedures outlined for public health interventions? I have a lot of ideas about how this might work, and I want to take some time to bounce some of them off a priest-friend of mine who is actively planting churches. But the main point: in public health,our goal is to make communities places where it easy to be healthy. What if, in Christianity, we aimed to make churches places where it is easy to love Jesus? I don't mean haphazard trying, I mean systematically following an established process. *Disclaimer*: Chaos reigns in plenty of public health ventures too- often due to having insuffic...

The alternative to breaking noses: a blog post about STUPID things people say (or publish!) about inflammatory bowel disease. Counter to typical practice, I'm not citing these,because I don't think it's good manners to point fingers. 1)You might be gluten intolerant. Do you want to SEE the photos of the ulcers in my colon? It's pretty disgusting. I get that food allergies are a big deal for many people, including some with IBD. I'm not one of them. Oh, and food sensitivities generally don't need surgery, or steroids, or immunosuppressants or.... 2)Often, if Crohn's patients are not hungry, it's better for them not to eat, because it gives the intestine time to heal. (In all fairness, I understand this one a bit better). I weigh 115 lbs on a good day. I'm always hovering right around the low cutoff point for normal BMI. If I don't get some sort of nourishment,particularly protein, my body is not going to be able to maintain normal function...

Falling back on youtube videos, since I can't think clearly at the moment. These both have something to do with my Belize work (which I seem to have committed the next four years of my life to. Pretty excited about that.) and something else to do with feelings about living in the U.S. at the present moment. That is all.

Perhaps someday gratitude might become forgiveness. My alma mater broke my heart over and over again during the four years I was there.On a bad day I might contemplate whether or not this was an abusive relationship, though most of the time I know that's an exaggeration. That place left me questioning my sanity and certain that I was failing horrendously at being a Christian, a student, and a woman (and I will never come near their ideal of that mystical intersection of scholarship, femininity and faith). But I've been digging through reports lately ( this one , for example). And I'm remembering that Christian college I resent so much has sent spring break mission teams to Belize. I don't remember what those teams did, and I'm fairly certain I don't actually know anyone who took those trips. But I'm hopeful they did something good. And it's possible that someone, somewhere, who works(worked?) for that institution or graduated from there loves Beliz...

I don't want this corner of the internet to be solely about my disease. But there's something safe about this little monologue, and it seems to be worthwhile to try to package my thoughts into a conversation, one-sided as it is. Honestly, I don't want to admit that Crohn's disease is a big deal or that it changes my life. Enter Episcopalian Mom Former Boss telling me that "Denial is not just a river in Egypt." She's right- and she wouldn't be that blunt if she didn't love me. I have a chronic disorder that can be downright dangerous if not managed properly (my new favorite potential complication: sometimes in Crohn's patients, ulcers can burrow into blood vessels in their colon and cause hemorhages), and it's not going away. But at the same time...I don't think she's right. People with Crohn's disease have a life expectancy close to that of the general population. I'm fortunate to have one of the milder forms of Crohn'...

It's one of those days when I'm tossing thoughts around like darts at a target, wondering if the connections (commonalities?) I see in them are real. And today it's this odd sense of things happening at the wrong time. The right things, sometimes the right things done the wrong way, but just the oddness in the timing. Part of my thoughts are around this conversation : http://rachelheldevans.com/ask-a-gay-christian-response . It's remarkable how many of my facebook friends (from widely varying convictions and backgrounds!) have posted it. And it's a great conversation, and I think Justin and Rachel (and/or whoever is moderating her blog) have done an amazing job with it. But why now? Where was the grace at Bishop Robinson's ordination? Where was the willingness to listen and dialogue then? I'll out myself here- I'm a clergy kid, and I will ALWAYS side on giving grace and respect to pastors/shepherds/priests/overseers/ term of your choice. There are ...

Which is still rather abnormal to us. I got married in July, started my doctorate in August, and was diagnosed with Crohn's disease in September. That's a lot of new beginnnings, I guess. And really, there's just something beautifully ironic about being diagnosed with a chronic disease that is aggravated by stress and causes fatigue at the start of a demanding doctoral program. Well done universe! I'm adjusting....or not, depending on the day. First bit of  good news in a while came yesterday- the contrast CT I had to undergo Tuesday (when I learned to NEVER go in for unfamiliar medical procedures alone- ugh) came back clean, which means the disease is just in my colon (Crohn's colitis) .  It's hard to know what this means moving forward. In the words of one person I've talked to this week "We never manage to balance. Life is always a juggling act, and we have all these balls - our career, our relationship with our partner, our kids, everything. An...

A recently tenured young professor at my university (not in the school of public health, but in a closely related area) was stabbed to death by her boyfriend this week. News reports indicate that she had confided to her friends that she was "worried" about him. In this state (or perhaps county, I'm not quite sure of the level of the regulation), you cannot get a restraining order unless there's been a previous incident...well, it's easy to see that sometimes, like in this case, you can be killed in that first incident. This state constantly ranks in the top 10 for most  murders of women. What will it take for this to change? It's a widespread, heartbreaking problem. I have ached as my former students have told me about the violence and abuse they've experienced from their former partners. These young women inspire me in so many ways- as African-American women, as single parents, in having the courage to leave violent relationships and fight for their edu...

it's a little scary. What started out as a normal visit at student health turned into a referral to a gastroenterologist, and perhaps a cardiologist, depending on how the nurse practitioner feels at my next followup visit. 3 appointments later, and all I know is that no one knows what's wrong with me. It's been a week of tests, and there are more to come. That first visit at student health I weighed in at under 110 lbs, for the first time since 8th or 9th grade. I've been sick for a long time, and it's probably been a month since I've slept through the night. I want to be well, but the simple approach of "rest, and let my body fight off whatever this is" is obviously not going to work.  And, y'know, when a doctor says that what I thought was just me aggravating a high school injury looks like rheumatoid arthritis to him, well, that's scary too. Particularly when he follows that statement up with a barrage of tests he wants run, including one th...

This is my momentary pity party.  I'm presently facing a rather unpleasant health challenge which has culminated in: two trips to student health this week, a round of antibiotics, 4 separate bloodwork orders (3 trips to the lab), and a trip to a specialist, who tentatively scheduled me for a colonoscopy next week (about 20 years early). I'm exhausted. I have 100s of pages to read, writing assignments to complete, and students to find service learning placements for.  It feels completely unfair to get hit with this at the start of a demanding program, when I need to be building momentum and making progress (and getting things out of the way before the semester becomes completely unmanageable). If you know me in real life- please keep this bit of information to yourself. I've shared it with exactly: 2 classmates/colleagues, 1 friend, and 1 family member (in addition to my husband). I'm trying to not turn into "the sick girl," especially when new doctoral stude...

In January of 2009 I moved here and enrolled in an MPH program, in Health Promotion, Education and Behavior. I didn't really have a clue what I was doing, except that I had to do something, and it had something to do with this. I was scared, unfunded, gutsy, terrified. Social science wasn't an easy transition. It's fascinating, and I love it now, and I think "heath decisionmaking" will ultimately be the one overarching theme through my body of work. But at the beginning....I would have told you there was no objective way to measure things like that, and people who thought they could describe/influence those processes were crazy and arrogant. I vaguely remember saying that "qualitative research" was an oxymoron - that qualitative work was the necessary, preliminary work people did as a precursor to real research, which is controlled and experimental. When I started, I didn't know what would happen, how long I'd stay, what degree I'd get (MPH, ...