I was actually going to post this as a response to a comment left on Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters, but then I decided it was too off topic and I would have been responding not the post itself, which was wonderful, but to one of the comments left for it.
I’m bothered by the response of an anonymous reader who said to Melissa,
I understand that infertility is where you have chosen to focus much of your considerable energy and that, no doubt, is for the good. And I agree that issues that infertiles face, particularly the judgements from others …read more

Many thanks to Elaine Vigneault for pulling together an alphabetical list of the bloggers for choice today. Look at all these cool women! I love a good reason to explore new blogs and there are definitely some names here that are unfamiliar to me. Now I need some tea, a nice blanket and a few hours.
You ladies rock. So happy to be in your company.

Just remember to keep them. (aye, there’s the rub.)
You know I’m not the only one here at the B5 Media Science and Health channel revisiting my resolutions, right? Heck no. This is a family affair. Many, many thanks to Kendra from Diabetes Notes and A Hearty Life for compiling these great Resolution-themed posts. FYI – our topics may be serious, but that doesn’t mean we always are.
From Kendra:
Jul at Veggie Chic made her resolutions list… a very daring one around my house, haha… Try at least one new recipe a month.
Laura has proclaimed her ‘healthyness’, if that is even a …read more

You already know that there is a legion of blogs that discuss fertility, infertility, and various (sometimes unconventional) paths towards creating a family. While we share a common theme, each blogger brings to the table his or her (sometimes his and her) unique circumstances and perspectives.
If you are looking to learn more about personal experiences with assisted reproduction techniques, adoption, surrogacy, in vitro fertilization, third party reproduction, pregnancy or living with infertility, I can’t think of a better cheat sheet than Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters’ Creme de la Creme of 2007.
Each year, Melissa invites bloggers to nominate their …read more

In a way winter is the real spring, the time when the inner thing happens, the resurge of nature.
-Edna O’Brien
I love that line. And it feels so true. D*mn if all my friends aren’t pregnant.
Ok, I am exaggerating. Not all my friends (as my friends reading this blog breathe a sigh of relief. Phew! I thought she knew something I didn’t) but it sure feels like it. This is absolutely cause for celebration, particularly since lots of these soon-to-be mommies are fellow IF bloggers. So, hurray! Take a dance around the evergreen and toast your non-alcoholic eggnog.
But please …read more

There’s nothing I hate more than returning gifts.
Last year, I tried to do almost all of my holiday shopping online, which was a tremendous success, until things didn’t fit and I had to shell out for shipping to get it right. This year, I am going to try to embrace the idea of the evergreen as a symbol of fertility, enhance awareness around infertility, and find gifts that I know won’t be returned. Here are ten “gifts” that you can give yourself and others that hopefully meet those three goals:

Donate to Resolve, the National Infertility Association.
Share Resolve’s Holiday Survival …read more

My colleague Kristina Chew at Autism Vox also encountered an ad campaign this week that she feels sets society backwards in the name of “awareness.” The NYU Child Center’s “Ransom Notes” public awareness campaign could do real and immediate harm to how autistic children are perceived and treated in America. Kristina writes:
How we talk about autism—how we talk about autistic persons—directly impacts on how the public, how people, think about autism, and how they perceive and act towards autistic persons. Implying that an autistic child is like a child who has been kidnapped—-is a child who has been kidnapped—recalls older …read more

When I first started blogging and connecting with other women (and men) trying to conceive online, I felt a little lost. Like they were speaking a language I kinda sort of got the gist of, but didn’t quite understand. Like when all the cool kids started talking jibberish or pig latin in grade school and it took me a few days to get it. (don’t sit there like you don’t know what I’m talking about).
I would read blogs and think, just what is a BFP and why does it make people joyous? What does it mean to POAS and why …read more

It seems that I was not the only one to take offense to the Globe and Mail’s article and particularly it’s title, “Baby-desperate moms share every detail online.” And that was before readers started to add their two cents and sage advice to “just adopt.”
Here’s what I said about the article. Pamela Jeanne takes it a step further and adds her comments to the mix along with a suggestion for a more appropriate title.
Kudos to her and to all of the allegedly “baby-desperate moms” for voicing their displeasure with the focus of the article and clarifying some misconceptions from the …read more

One of the opening speakers at last week’s Pennsylvania Governor’s Conference for Women was Indra K. Nooyi, the chairman and chief executive officer of PepsiCo. As a mother of two and arguably one of the most successful female executives in the world, Indra spoke to the challenges of motherhood and trying to maintain the “continuity of motherhood” while still actively contributing to the workforce:
We need women in the workforce, yet, children need their mothers at home…in a way, the very existence of the dilemma is a mark of progress.
I suppose, but the more and more I listened to Indra …read more