Weekend Reads: Teen Births are Down, Small Town Parenting, and Why Vitamin D Matters
Happy Weekend Readers! It’s the first week of June, a weekend that should forever be celebrated as the Dianaversary because Wonder Woman hit the theaters and has already made 186 MILLION DOLLARS at the box office. And it’s still opening weekend! We’re seeing it this afternoon! We’re very excited!!!
Teen Births are plummeting, and there’s a simple reason. Better use of birth control.
So of course the Cheeto Tinted Tyrant’s administration is planning on revising the rules in the Affordable Care Act (Obomacare) to make it easier for employers to deny coverage for birth control, threatening the free access that hundreds of thousands of women have taken advantage of since 2010.
We think of New York as a liberal pro-choice bastion, but there are still dated laws on their books that require certain non-viable pregnancies to be carried to term.
When we heard this outcome for our baby, which sounded to us like suffering, we immediately wanted to know if there was any other option. This is when our doctor first mentioned the possibility of termination. Emotionally exhausted from months of hanging on to hope, we were heartbroken. My husband and I looked at each other with tears in our eyes, knowing immediately it was the most humane possible conclusion to this pregnancy.
But then we learned that our doctor would not be able to provide this care to us because abortions are illegal in New York after 24 weeks unless the life of the pregnant person is in immediate danger. We were shocked because, as we understood it, Roe v. Wade was supposed to protect people in instances such as ours, when my life or health was at risk or if the pregnancy wasn’t viable. Our doctor just said, “not in New York.”
At the time, the politics of the issue eluded us. All we knew was that we needed care, we were unable to receive that care in our state, and that we were racing a clock.
Meanwhile, the Seventh Circuit Court of appeals ruled that the Kenosha Unified School District in Wisconsin violated the rights of a trans student, Ash Whitaker, when it refused to let him use the boys’ bathroom. This is a huge win for transgender student rights!
Steph responds to GOP Senator Ben Sasse’s rose tinted remembrance of parenting in a small town with her own experiences… in list form of course, with 10 Ways Growing Up in a Small Town Changed the Way I Parent.
In this weeks “WTF WERE YOU THINKING,” a Texas teacher has apologized for giving a sarcastic end of term award “Most Likely to Become a Terroist” to a 13 year old girl.
The Converstion looks into how childhood trauma can affect mental and physical health into adulthood, the first in a series exploring adverse childhood experiences.
What if everything you knew about disciplining kids was wrong? An old piece from Mothers Jones in the summer of 2015 that is still a good read today
Are your kids getting enough Vitamin D? It might be more important than we think.
Jimmy Kimmel explains the tenuous relationship the President has with the truth…
