from Sarah Whedon at Reproductive Rites, “Feminist Coming Out Day and Sacrifice” Yes, I’ve given my time, my energy, my body, my heart, my will, my planning, and my love to raising my child in the way I believed was best for her and for me. I’ve lent my resources toward that most sacred of [...]
[originally posted at my old blog on 24 February 2009] In a post entitled “What Does Coping Well Mean?,” Molly Remer of Talk Birth asks a really interesting question–the title’s question, with regard to childbirth, of course. For her, the answer is not being quiet or uniformly “relaxed” (I might say ‘appearing well-behaved’) but: listening [...]
[originally posted at my old blog on 16 August 2008] This admittedly lengthy post requires some back-story in its first few paragraphs because I’m writing in response to a conversation at a particular blog I read. But my point (once I manage to get to it …) is about a brand of nastiness that happens [...]
Welcome to First the Egg, a collection of practical information, links, and cultural criticism. This site is a feminist intervention in our rigidly-gendered culture of childbirth and parenting. It aims to provide a nonsexist space for people who want to learn, reflect, commiserate, or laugh about being pregnant, giving birth, and helping children grow up whole and happy.
Feel free to contact me with ideas or questions at
What makes a ‘good’ birth experience? Or, dude, if you were in labor for 50+ hours, where do you get off saying it was wonderful?
I think of my birthing experience as a really, really good one. So it always sort of throws me when someone reads Noah’s and my birth story or hears me talking about it and reacts as though it were something along the lines of a nightmare. A very long nightmare. A nightmare the reader/listener does not [...]