I heart Joel McHale. And 'The Soup'. The End.

Trust Joel McHale to give us his take - and eerie prediction - on the whole Kardashian debacle:

Communication Shutdown - a global social network shutdown day. Starts at midnight.

So, maybe you've read my piece published on The Punch website on Friday, on why I am supporting the Communication Shutdown day starting in less than an hour.

Here is my piece, below.

I love my kids - as we all do - more than life itself. My decision to be open about what's been happening in our lives was not made without much thought over many weeks.

To take a line from the extraordinary movie about an extraordinary woman, Temple Grandin, my son is "different, not less."

Communication shutdown to promote understanding. (As published on The Punch, Friday 29 October, 2010).

I have always been a great communicator. Sometimes excessively so. My first report card – in kindy - said “Josie talks too much.” I am known to like a good chat. I even studied ‘Communications’ at uni and my job demands constant interaction with people. Social networking sites were made for me: Facebook and Twitter are my daily friends. So when I heard about a ‘Communication Shutdown’ day on November 1 – a chance for silence online for 24 hours – I was intrigued. I read about the cause and then – well, I was completely in. You see, the special day is designed to raise awareness for autism. And as my son was recently diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, I knew it was not only a chance to support a cause I believe in, it was the opportunity for me to tell the world what’s happening with my son – it would only benefit us both by demystifying what autism is and widening my support network.

My son Rafael is a twin. He and his sister Estella will celebrate their third birthday this December. But I knew something was up before he turned two. He said ‘mamma’ plenty before he was one, and then, he just stopped talking. His sister was doing all the usual chatty stuff, but Rafael - not interested. When I got the diagnosis for Rafael, I cried. My tears were all about the fear of the unknown and the thoughts I had surrounding his future – would he go to a ‘normal’ school, would he be bullied – and overwhelmingly, the sadness tapped into my intense guilt. This was mother guilt, amplified by ten. Ever since the twins were just newborns, I have always worked from home, timing my work around naptimes. In awake times, we play, paint, Plasticine, read, run, try to break stuff (them, not me) and yes, sometimes I will answer emails, finish a story, and whack on a Brainy Baby DVD or Hi-5 to help calm and entertain the rambunctious twosome. As soon as I got the diagnosis, I wasted no time in blaming myself. Perhaps I hadn’t spent enough time with him, I thought. This self reproach consumed me, in the midst of my daily work and marriage and life. Deep in my heart, I knew this was untrue: we have structured playtimes and outdoor play and random, spontaneous play. We’ve been going to playgroups since before they were two and my husband has always been heavily involved in parenting and fun interaction.

I didn’t cry for long; it was off to a special, weekly playgroup held by the amazingly dedicated people at Learning Links, weekly speech therapy, a dedicated teacher at daycare, local council ‘speechie’ fortnightly sessions, and continuing the reading and playtime in earnest. Rafael was – and is – making incredible progress. Me, not so much.

To continue reading, go here:

http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/communication-shutdown-to-promote-understanding/

And to support the Communication Shutdown, go here: https://communicationshutdown.org/

It's really easy. Simply donate as little as $5 (which goes towards helping kids with autism in your country) by going here: https://communicationshutdown.org/?view=donate-form

Once you're up (takes one minute to do), your Facebook and Twitter pages will automatically give status updates about the special day. It's actually really fun to relinquish control for 24 hours. Don't worry - if you feel you can't quite live without your social networking pages for one day, you can still 'cheat' and sneak a peek, and no-one will know. The important thing is to show support. With one child being diagnosed with autism globally every 15 seconds (I know, astounding), someone you know may well be affected by autism.

David Jones, Kristy Fraser-Kirk, and the whole juggernaut.

I am a huge fan of The Punch, and this latest piece from Tory Maguire, deputy editor at The Punch, is a thought-provoking read. It speaks of the timing and sensationalism surrounding the sexual harrassment case of Kristy Fraser-Kirk and former David Jones boss Mark McInnes. The most eyebrow raising part for me was reading that Kristy's team has set up a website which directs you to all statements made by her camp.This is one slick machine. Have a read, see what you think, and comment away:

Fraser-Kirk’s confronting a monster of her own creation

Kristy Fraser-Kirk, the young woman who launched a $37 million law suit against David Jones and its former CEO Mark McInnes, is feeling the strain.

Yesterday her barrister Rachel Francois told the Federal Court Fraser-Kirk has developed an adjustment disorder and the “media intrusion” into her life since news of her case broke was partly to blame.

The point was raised during arguments over whether the names of potential witnesses in the mega sexual-harassment case should be made public, with Fraser-Kirk’s team saying it wanted to protect other women from suffering the same intrusions as the former DJ’s marketing staffer.
There’s no doubting the media interest in the case has been intense. It’s the business story with everything - a venerable brand, a red-hot chief executive, and that $37 million, a figure so staggering it could only have been arrived at with the intention of causing maximum attention and damage.

It’s worth looking back to early August when Fraser-Kirk first announced she was lodging a statement of claim against the DJs board and McInnes, who had been punted from the retailer the previous month after she complained of him behaving inappropriately towards her at a work function.

It was the day before the David Jones Spring Summer 2010 fashion launch and the next day’s frock fest was overshadowed by the massive law suit.

The timing was no accident.

You can read the rest of the article here:

http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/fraser-kirks-confronting-a-monster-of-her-own-creation/?referrer=email&source=Punch_nl&emcmp=Punch&emchn=Newsletter&emlist=Member

Photo credit: Brad Hunter

Oprah is coming to Australia.... in case you haven't heard! Part two on this $ bonanza

This piece by Paul Colgan from The Punch is a cracker.

The captioning of the Oprah audience pics is my fave part.

This pic above is captioned as "Janice, Margie and June" from Tourism Australia accounts. Clearly losing it. Love.

And here is his piece:

A thank-you note to Oprah from Tourism Australia

Dearest Oprah, can we start by saying: ohmygod ohmygod ohmyGOD.

We can’t thank you enough for getting us out of the little marketing pickle we have found ourselves in ever since the Lara Bingle Where-the-Bloody-Hell-Are-You business (yes, what were we thinking?). For your enjoyment we have enclosed some photos from inside our marketing department from the moment we heard the news that you have decided to shoot your first ever overseas show in Sydney. As you can see, there was quite the excitement.A few more pictures follow. We will of course have a full itinerary ready by the time you arrive but now that we’re locked in there are a few preliminary things you might want to think about that we’ve listed below.

Continue reading here:
http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/tourism-australias-letter-to-oprah-winfrey/

Burning holy books... sin or stupidity?

So, here's a change of pace.

That QLD lawyer guy - the one who filmed himself smoking the Koran and the Bible as if a joint - is causing all sorts today.

Whatever you think of Christianity or Islam, I think it's completely disrespectful to burn what many people hold sacred. Hey, Alex Stewart? Not hilarious.

Yeah, I get it, I get it, he's trying to make a point. According to Stewart, he says they're just books, and if people are getting so upset over a book then they're taking life way too seriously, and people should just "get over" the burning of books like the Bible or the Koran.

"I guess that's the point with all this crap," he said.

"It's just a f---ing book. Who cares? It's your beliefs that matter. Quite frankly, if you are going to get upset about a book, you're taking life way too seriously."

Except it isn't just a book. Just like a marriage cerificate isn't 'just a piece of paper'. It means significant things to people, mate.

Now, people who know me know that I have a fantastic sense of humour, the blacker and weirder and cruder the antics, the better. But this... well, this is just dumb.

Paul Colgan is managing editor of http://www.thepunch.com.au/ and as you will see from this piece, an excellent writer.

In answer to Stewart, he says: "To the contrary, I would suggest that if you are fanatical enough about your belief system to rip up someone else’s and smoke it, then you are the person who is taking things too seriously."

Here is an excerpt of his piece, entitled: "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of total stupidity."

When pastor Terry Jones called off his epically dumb plan to mark the anniversary of the September 11 attacks by burning a bunch of Korans, for a brief period it looked like western civilisation valued people with something between their ears. But then along comes Alex Stewart – an Australian, no less – to confirm democracies provide shelter for the hopelessly stupid.

It was on behalf of people with a brain everywhere that the US President went on television to plead against the pastor’s plan to burn holy books. He succeeded in stopping the Jones protest but then along comes Stewart on YouTube, ripping out pages from the Bible and the Koran and smoking them in a festival of smugness cloaked in a mantle of enlightenment.

Score one for the Taliban and the view that the West is intellectually bankrupt.

To continue reading (and I highly recommend you do), click this:
http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-total-stupidity/

DING, DING: ROUND TWO

My heart did a little flip when I was on http://www.thepunch.com.au/ just now. I randomly came across a blog post written in reply to my blog post for The Punch on choosing the gender of your baby. In the first few paragraphs, this writer mentions my name. A lot. And I thought, that's it - I am getting dissed (I can't think of a better word than that right now, although I do know I sound all silly faux-ghetto).

Turns out, the writer - Tim Cannon from the Australian Family Association - didn't personally attack me (which was a nice change from some nasty peeps on my original blog post), but he did disagree with me. Which is fine.

But he is not that woman in the news who has three boys and wants a girl - and is willing to pay for it. Hang on, he doesn't even have kids yet. He purports to understand the drive for gender selection. Exhibit A:

"Sex-selection is just the next step in parents being picky about what kind of child they’d be willing to love. By specifying which sex they’d like, parents turn their children into items on a bucket list."

What kind of child, you say? How many types are there, Tim? Let me answer: boy or girl. Boy and girl. Two boys, five girls. Six girls, no boys. Are we talking about choosing their personality? Eye colour? Whether they have learning difficulties? No, Tim. That, my friend, is the surprise package you and many people insist is being tampered with. That remains intact, left up to chance, the universe, genes, karma, God - take your pick. No, we are talking about... hang on, I'll let someone who has actually gone through the gender selection process speak:

"Tim, what are you talking about? Sex selection does nothing but alter random chance. It doesn’t change a child, or the fact that a baby is to be born, it only changes the fact that the baby will be a certain sex. Is this a problem? As a couple who have already used this technology legally overseas, (and I don’t class my husband and I as selfish by any means), I cannot understand how you came to this conclusion. FYI, as our sex selection doctor put it “the cost of the procedure will self regulate the balance and no overbalance would take place”. Only people who can afford the expense will do it and people who are more educated about the process will choose to have more children if they know what they are getting. So Tim, before you choose to call this procedure selfish, please write an article actually explaining the processes involved before the final stage of choosing a child's sex, and I would be very surprised if you still called this process selfish. Do not judge others on a final decision, until you understand the journey involved."

That's all I am saying people.

That comment was published on The Punch by a woman called JA, in response to Tim's blog. I replied to her comment.

Here is what I said:

"Thanks for writing this piece, Tim - I am all for expressing one's opinion.
But even more thanks to JA. Hello again, JA. You were one of the few people who gave a real-life account on why she underwent this procedure on my original blog. Yes, I am Josie, the author of the piece Tim refers to.

I was at pains to explain in some of my comments on my blog post that unless I was in that woman's shoes (the woman who sparked the entire debate), I had no right to judge.

We can harp on all we want about it being selfish, and China, and playing God, but do you think she cares? We are not her; we are not the ones who cannot let go of that burning desire. It is HER life, not ours.

As you so wisely point out JA (you are, after all, the only one on this post who has actually gone through the procedure and know what it involves, and actually explain what lead you to do it) not everyone will take up this option to choose the gender of their child.

I will say again - I did not choose the gender of my twins. I didn't even choose to have twins. I did not know the gender of my twins until I delivered them. Were we thrilled? What do you think? But I also get a little embarrassed when people fuss too much about "hitting the jackpot". I was thrilled to even be pregnant - anything else was a bonus.

Would I choose the gender of my next baby? No. Quite simply, I don't desire to choose. And I think we are done, too. Oh, and I couldn't afford it anyway. But I support women like you, JA who want to use what medical science provides us. Remember folks, it is a choice. Why should you dictate what JA does with her life? It is none of your business. Or mine. I like to stand up for people's causes even when they are clearly not my own. But I don’t particularly enjoy being whipped for it on my post (not here, but on my original post… oh yes). But hey, you get that in blog-world. By the way, I am also being supportive to a friend who is having very serious fertility issues. You reckon she might want to choose? Yeah, I am thinking not. See, context. I get it. Perspective. I have it. Each person’s life choices are different. And you do not know the journey they took to get there. How about learning to respect what people choose instead of judging. Trust me, it’s very liberating."

Tim also adds more thoughts in his blog:

"Unfortunately modern reproductive technology is feeding an attitude which is totally at odds with the selflessness good parenting demands. Already we exercise obsessive control over the “how” and the “when” of conception and childbirth through contraception, IVF and abortion. We’ll have a child when it suits us, thank you very much."

Oh, okay. So let's scrap contraception and go back to having loads of kids we can't afford. And definitely yes, let's also ditch IVF... because, you know, giving hope to women who have fertility issues absolutely reeks of, what is it called, Tim? "Obsessive control." And abortion? Not even gonna touch that one.


Ah yes, opinions. Everyone's got one.

As published on The Punch, 21 July, 2010 - choosing the sex of your baby

Call me a bit of an idealistic Charlotte from Sex & The City, but if I have experienced something amazing, I want the world to experience it too.

So now I am a mum, I’d love the whole world to experience the joy of motherhood, particularly the women who are having difficulty falling pregnant. That’s why I am so supportive of IVF. Strangers (even friends who have dared not ask for fear it’s too private) assume I had my twins via IVF. I did not. And I would be willing to shout it from the rooftops if I had.

I have seen people close to me finally get their wish to be a parent thanks to this miraculous medical procedure. A few of the beautiful mums in my twin prenatal class had their multiples thanks to IVF and I know just how eternally grateful they are that the procedure exists.

So when a woman announced recently (curious that she broke such a deeply private story herself; otherwise, how else would we have known about it?) that after having three sons she was ‘desperate’ for a girl and was willing to turn to the medical world for help, I understood. I found myself quietly nodding in agreement. As a mother of twins - a boy and a girl - that secret lifelong desire to have one of each was fulfilled the day we were blessed with a ‘pigeon pair’. Suddenly, nothing was missing any more. It was a total fluke, of course (and I must admit to cringing when people say we were so ‘clever’) but I couldn’t have planned it better if I tried. These are not the words of a smug mum. No, these are words of utter relief. Utter relief we could even have kids after trying for a year.

I had the twins at 35 (three weeks shy of 36) and I knew that if I’d had one baby, we’d have to start to whole conception process again before our baby turned one or two if we were to beat both our biological clocks. We’d always discussed having two kids and we knew time wasn’t on our side. So, having two at once – be it a boy and girl, or two of each – allayed the imaginary deadline in our heads.

So, back to the woman desperate for a daughter. By that evening the story broke, I found myself shouting at the telly. Why? Because this woman – who was flying to a Bangkok clinic and spending $15,000 to undertake a gender selection procedure illegal in Australia – was the latest victim in the courtroom of public opinion. News polls indicated that the majority disagreed with her decision. Some reader’s comments on news pages were particularly awful, with such words as ‘ungrateful’ and ‘greedy’ being used to describe this woman.

Sorry, I disagree.

Some people have said she is “playing God” by choosing the sex. Again, I disagree. Wasn’t that the same argument wheeled out when IVF was introduced decades ago? Would you deny a woman the opportunity to experience the joy of having a baby because she had challenges with fertility, because she couldn’t do it ‘naturally’? So why does using a medical advancement like this one rile people up so much?

It’d be so very easy from the fortunate position I sit in to say, no, you should just be happy you even have children. Some people can’t. Yes, I understand that argument too. Boy, do I get it. On a recent Practical Parenting blog I wrote titled Ten Things I Hate About Motherhood, one mother who’d had multiple rounds of IVF, many miscarriages, and was now rendered infertile told me in no uncertain terms that I was ungrateful to hate anything about motherhood and she’d give anything to have poo smeared on her carpet (you’d have to read the blog for that comment to make any sense).

Make no mistake. This should not be a forum for arguing fertility versus infertility. Everyone gets we are lucky to even conceive, even carry, even give birth to a live, healthy human being. If I had the choice of having four girls or no children? That’s not even a question for me; the answer is an obvious one. Would I have loved my twins any less if I had two girls or two boys? Are you serious?

And does any mum resent her three spirited girls, or her five rambunctious boys? Ask them and see. While you’re at it, ask them if they feel guilty for desperately hoping they got the opposite gender to what they already had when they went for their sonogram or in the delivery room. Perhaps that’s why this topic is often deemed so shameful, so hush-hush. The kind of conversation you only have with your mother, sister or best friend.

My own best friend had this exact conversation with me. She had a boy first, then three girls, then desperately wanted a boy for baby number five.

To balance up the family and so her eldest could have a brother, she said.

Can’t you have sex in particular positions or times of the month for this to happen, I asked? And aren’t there certain foods which make having a particular gender more likely? Check out that oracle called the internet to prove just how popular this topic is. There are plenty of sites giving advice to women wanting a particular gender. One I found even says results are 100% guaranteed and offers all your money back. (My bestie had a boy, by the way).

The woman at the centre of this debate was at pains to explain she wouldn’t swap her three boys for the world.

“At this point I would do anything to have a daughter,” she said. “It is an ethical thing we have weighed up. It hasn’t been a decision taken lightly but it is one we feel we have reached and we are happy with. I wouldn’t trade my sons for a million daughters - this is not about my sons. It is about me and my husband wanting a daughter. For me, it is about the desire to have a daughter being such a strong desire in me that I can’t seem to shake it.”

Many have branded her selfish, and I wonder, would it be more selfish for her to continue to try for a girl and end up with more children than she can afford to provide for until she gets her girl?

People often ask me, “If you’d had two boys or two girls, would you go again?” I always say, “I don’t know,” because I really don’t. Would my desire to have that ‘missing’ boy or girl diminish because we’d already reached our magic number? Again, I don’t know.

But I don’t believe it is my business to interfere with a woman’s decision to have the daughter she so desperately wants.

What do you think?

As published on The Punch, 14 July, 2010.



The 'right' way to give birth

Okay, so this is a delicate topic. How a woman ‘should’ give birth is such an emotion-charged issue because it’s something a woman has imagined since the moment she found out where babies come from.

If I am brutally honest, there are two camps of women here: one group of very vocal women who are yet to give birth, who are probably pregnant and have a very detailed birth plan (right down to scented candles and essentials oils). The other (far more realistic) group of women are the ones who know that a birth plan gets shot to shit when it’s crunch time.

And by crunch time, I mean that pivotal moment when you scream, “Please get this baby out of my body immediately, or I will kill someone.” (Not that I said this. In fact, I am surprised that for someone who likes profanities, I didn’t call my husband any names or tell him it was ‘his fault’. And whatever else Hollywood makes you believe is ‘normal’ during an intense delivery).

The first I’d heard of a birth plan was when I was pregnant. I’d always (naïvely) assumed the doctor would be the one making that decision. Turns out, I wasn’t so naïve after all. More on that later.

The issue on ‘how to give birth’ hit the news again a few days ago when it was reported that Dannii Minogue’s carefully scripted birth plan, the one she’d written on scented, embossed paper (I don’t know if this is true… but you can’t imagine ‘the plan’ on a yellow Post-It, right?) which included a home birth, was promptly turfed and she was ‘rushed to hospital’, undergoing an emergency caesarean instead.

Now. Let’s be clear, here. The very fact you are pregnant is a miracle in itself (something you only really appreciate when you start wanting a family). Then, the joy of having healthy babies is one surpassed by nothing else in life (again, only relevant if having kids is something important in your world). So how to give birth should be a no-brainer. Everyone wants the same end result: a healthy baby and a healthy mother. Because we have options to go natural (vaginal birth, no drugs), natural but with drugs (epidural, gas, etc), caesarean, or a home birth means that women not only have myriad choices, it also makes choosing one that much harder. The key here is to acknowledge that often the choice is taken out of your hands.

Have you seen the movie Knocked Up, when Katherine Heigl’s character is giving birth? No, not that scene when the baby’s head is crowning. Before that, when she’s in the throes of excruciating pain and demands an epidural. Trouble is, it’s too far along in the delivery for it to be administered and she has to push ahead (ahem) sans drugs. The funny-but-not-funny part is that she had a well-scripted birth plan, even kicking off the process with a relaxing bath. But as anyone who has given birth will tell you, when you get to the business end of birth, there is nothing Zen-like about it.

I have spoken with lots of women who have given birth, both for my parenting magazine stories and in conversation with my friends (when we are brave enough – and bevvied enough - to go there) and anecdotally what I have found is that women who have undergone an emergency caesarean feel a bit ripped off. As you would. For most women, the pinnacle of childbirth is going the natural route. For the truly heroic, the zenith is pushing out that child without drugs of any sort. But no-one’s plan is: push like a maniac for hours, then go under the knife anyway, and feel that all your efforts were for ‘nothing’. In reality, these women are champions; they should take a bloody bow. The truth is they brought a healthy child into the world; how they did it is no measure of how ‘womanly’ they are.

There are of course women who go the elective caesarean route; unfairly dubbed the ‘too posh to push’ brigade, these are the women who don’t want a caesarean as the last resort; it’s their first choice.

According to the 2005 National Perinatal Statistics Unit Mothers and Babies Report 30.3 per cent of Australian women gave birth by caesarean section compared with 19.5 per cent in 1995.

When I interview Dr Andrew Pesce on the topic – he is an obstetrician and gynaecologist as well as the Australian Medical Association President, plus Chairman for both the National Association of Specialist Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and the National Pregnancy Counselling Expert Advisory Committee – he said that the rise in caesarean births could be attributed to the fact that obstetricians are more likely to recommend a c-section because of the procedure’s improved safety. He also attributes it to more women believing a c-section is a more ‘desirable’ procedure over a vaginal birth. And then there is the litigation factor.

“When obstetricians are sued for a poor outcome, it is almost always for not having performed a caesarean section.”

He also cites a move away from more difficult forceps deliveries as well as a rise in older and obese women giving birth, pointing towards a c-section as a safer option for them.

Accompanying the story on the mini-Minogue birth were figures from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists which indicated that up to half of all first-time mothers attempting a home birth had to be transferred to hospital due to complications.

While I completely respect a woman’s choice to have a natural, non-interventionist birth, there are options available which reduce the risks associated with giving birth at home - birthing centres led by midwives attached to hospitals are an excellent solution.

As for me? Well, my birthing choices were extremely limited because I was carrying twins. My obstetrician was actually the aforementioned, wonderfully fantastic Dr Pesce (most women are ‘in love’ with their obstetricians. Ask them). He told me I had to have an epidural (there is likely to be manual manipulation prior to the delivery of twin number two) but he wanted me to give a ‘natural’ birth a red hot go. In the end, the pain relief made it possible for me to concentrate on pushing and deliver two healthy babies, 18 minutes apart. Hands down, the most empowering thing I have ever done in my life.

The key? Be very open to things not going to plan on your baby’s birth day. In fact, expect it.