Modern Inconveniences.

My last post was triumphant.  I think all that effort to have things hang together facilitated the quick undoing that followed in the past couple of weeks.

Josh brought home a nasty stomach bug which quickly jumped to me.  Poor Elena would shuffle silently to my side as I vomited, and then flush the toilet for me when I had finished.  "Mommy sick," was something she told me for a few days after my recovery.  Thankfully she was spared--I don't think I could have handled cleaning up after myself and her at the same time.

Then our credit card got jacked.  I'm grateful but kind of amazed at how credit card companies take you at your word when reporting fraudulent charges.  "Not us," I say.  Gone!  Of course, I haven't the guts to apply that to our legit charges, but still--how often to people take advantage of that?  We're still waiting on our new cards, which stinks because now I just feel like each purchase I make is a waste of potential rewards.

And then Elena got her thumb caught in the door at school.  I think her teacher used the word "courtesy call" three times that day to describe the notification she gave me of the incident which included, "she can move it" as a sign that all was good.  Not really what I would consider a courtesy call, but it was nice to know, or at least think, that the thumb was okay.  In reality, it is--despite the fracture that goes through her growth plate.  We paid our $35 copay at the ortho hand appointment today to hear in 5 minutes that she's got a great prognosis since the area around the growth plate heals well.  Good thing, since she ripped off the splint in the car on the way home from the ER last Saturday after singing Where is Thumbkin? and waving her blue coband thumb about.

And then our swamp cooler busted.  Steph and Steve's a/c unit had broken the weekend before, so they had holed up at The Vortex (the affectionate and appropriate name for Josh's parents' house).  Thankfully we only spent a night in our hot house (in the morning Elena woke up and promptly asked, "Where pjs go?" when she discovered she was wearing only a diaper) before the Kolnackis were able to head back home and we could take their place.  So tomorrow they come to fix things.... hopefully.  The swamp usually works well until about now when the humidity rises with monsoon season--it's about now each year that Josh and I consider investing the ~$6,000 in having a/c put in as well.  And then those two months pass and we forget about how uncomfortable July and August are in our house until the following year.

So that has been our series of obnoxious events over the past two weeks.  Needless to say, I'm pooped.  Judging by Elena's bedtime of 7:20 tonight, I'd say she is too.

I started on our Maternal Child Health service on Wednesday.  This change in routine is typically energizing for me, since I get a ton of time to spend with mom/baby pairs educating them and myself about breastfeeding and lactation.  We've had a delivery each yesterday and today--todays was sticky, and I was thankful that our patient had made it to the hospital and that we had obstetric back up to help get baby out.  I am helping a med student devise a reading elective for the month her baby is due--one of her classmates said in recognition, "OH!  The breastfeeding elective?" which I thought was kind of funny since right now it's very free form.  The classmate expressed interest in "doing the elective" as well--encouraging that there is interest, but I am still amused that my relatively new found passion keeps giving me opportunities to spread the breastfeeding love.

Anyway, in my preparations for this student's elective, I read The Surgeon General's Call to Action to Support Breastfeeding, just released this year.  I skimmed the 90 page PDF, searching for a few statistics I had heard at a recent conference.  Read this--it blew my mind:

"A more recent study that used costs adjusted to 2007 dollars and evaluated costs associated with additional illnesses and diseases (sudden infant death syndrome, hospitalization for lower respiratory tract infection in infancy, atopic dermatitis, childhood leukemia, childhood obesity, childhood asthma, and type 1 diabetes mellitus) found that if 90 percent of U.S. families followed guidelines to breastfeed exclusively for six months, the United States would save $13 billion annually from reduced direct medical and indirect costs and the cost of premature death. If 80 percent of U.S. families complied, $10.5 billion per year would be saved."


13 billion!  That's on par with shoring up some of the tax loopholes that the government is batting about.  


Anyway, back to the baby we delivered today.  My guess is that the majority of the bajillion of kids this woman has were born at home in Africa, like many of our African refugees.  They are quick to learn what studies have shown (and probably necessitated lots of money to prove): that increased intrapartum surveillance increases C-section rates.  So they tend to wait until the last minute to come to the hospital (if at all) before baby comes.  I am SO happy this patient came to the hospital--I shudder to think about the outcome if she hadn't.  I think this case is one of many that has led to Healthy People 2020 including the following objectives, specifically the last one:





I'm very happy that people are paying attention to the benefits of breastfeeding on our children, and our nation's future health.  I thought today of writing to Michelle Obama and asking her to extend her campaign against childhood obesity to include publicly supporting the WHO, AAFP, and AAP guidelines for breastfeeding.  If a successful, stylish, respected black woman stands in support for breastfeeding, maybe women (specifically young black women!) would listen.  


It's a good thing our swamp cooler is getting fixed tomorrow--I've got to get writing.