I was disturbed to receive in my email the below article, apparently from the John Tesh Radio Show. I have included what I received by email in italics and my response:
John Tesh Radio Show - October 4th, 2009
What Drives "Bumpaholics" to Keep Having Babies?
You always hear people saying that pregnant women have a “glow” about them. It’s true - most expectant mothers enjoy being pregnant. However, some women may like it a little too much.
Experts say these women are driven to rapidly reproduce out of insecurity, a craving for attention, or feelings of abandonment. Here are the details, courtesy of USA Today.
They’ve been deemed “Bumpaholics” – because of their bellies, and they’re cropping up more and more. According to the CDC, American women gave birth to more than 4.3 million babies in 2007— the highest number ever. More than a quarter of those women were having their 3rd or 4th child.
While many simply want big broods because that’s how they grew up, experts say that some women feel driven to be constantly pregnant. Dr. Carole Lieberman is a psychiatrist in Beverly Hills. She says that bumpaholics feel compelled to procreate for the same reasons that substance abusers turn to booze or drugs - to fill a void inside of them. Only in a bumpaholic’s case - it’s literal. Once they give birth, their infants depend on them, which helps give mothers a clear identity.
Babies also become handy social buffers. At a party or on the playground, a woman struggling
with feelings of anxiety or self-consciousness can hide behind her child. Any pressure to be cute or charming or funny disappears — the baby has that covered. As family therapist Bonnie Eaker Weil puts it, “Bumpaholics breed to blot out their feelings of insecurity.”
Then of course there’s the hormone rush. An expectant mother gets a feel-good oxytocin blast as she rubs her belly – it’s a way of bonding. Some women can’t get enough of this. As you can imagine, psychologists say this “bumpaholic” behavior is harmful to a woman’s emotional health.
That's because eventually, her body won’t physically be able have babies anymore. She’ll inevitably face an emptiness when her kids grow up and leave home - one she won’t be able to fill with another baby. Weil says it’s vital for parents to realize that the only time to bring another baby into the family is when you already have a balanced life, not in an effort to try to create one.
Mr. Tesh is correct in his facts, but incorrect in the conclusions he and his quoted psychobabble psychiatrists draw. Of course it’s true that pregnant women have a glow about them and that expectant mothers generally enjoy being pregnant, but I don’t think that they do it out of insecurity. God has instilled in us the desire, even the need, to have children. This is not a bad thing. It is not a hormone-induced psychosis that should be recognized for the delusion it is and avoided. How is it possible to like pregnancy and children too much!?
Why is it okay to, “want big broods because that’s how they grew up”, but not good that, “women feel driven to be constantly pregnant?” Furthermore, the term “brood” is here used in a derogatory way, as if we are animals reproducing as quickly as possible. It would be just as bad as if Tesh stated we were having litters.
Let’s get it straight. They are children, a precious addition to our families, not our broods.
One part of the article I tend to agree with. Dr. Lieberman is correct that we have children, “to fill a void inside….”, but that void is not caused by some aberrant psychological need as it is with addicted people. The void is caused by God’s plan for us to be open to life and specifically to have children. There is nothing wrong or addictive with a desire that follows God’s plan.
Dr. Lieberman goes on to imply that because the babies depend on the mothers and give the mothers a clear identity, it is somehow wrong. The author expects the reader to take this at face value, but it is an incorrect assumption.
Everything we do in life identifies us. For instance, when we take a job, we become associated with that job. When a person joins the military, they become a soldier, sailor, airman, etc. When someone joins a city police force, they become a policeman. Well, in the same way, when a woman becomes pregnant, they become a mother. There is nothing wrong with that association nor is there anything wrong with wanting to be associated with motherhood anymore than there is something wrong with someone with patriotic attitudes wanting to be associated with the military. Quite the contrary, motherhood is a difficult, good and noble occupation to take on and one worthy of respect and honor every bit as much as a soldier’s is.
Babies are not social buffers, but social enablers. When a mother sits at a playground and watches her children play with other children, she is not hiding behind her children, she is protecting them. She is not cowering behind them but standing in front of them, between them and the dangers of the world. If she also finds support and friendship with the other mothers who are doing the same thing, it is no different from soldiers forming close bonds with their compatriots. It should also be kept in mind that these women did not make the decision to have children, consciously or sub consciously, to make acquaintances. The friendship bonds that mothers make in the course of their motherhood are incidental to their role as mother.
The author goes on to explain that the mother gets a hormone overdose when she is pregnant and that this is harmful to the mother’s emotional health. It’s true that God has created our bodies in such a way that pregnancy is desirable and enjoyable, but that’s His way of encouraging us to follow his plan of life. It is not a psychosis to be avoided, but a way of life to be embraced.
I have been told that parents who have spent 20+ years rearing children go through a period of disappointment when their children finally leave the nest, but I think it is not the emptiness that can only be filled with another baby that the Dr. Weil of the article implies. My children are 9 and 6 years old right now, so It’s possible that I don’t know what I’m talking about, but I think there will not be an unfillable void in my wife’s life when they leave.
I think that sadness only follows from regret and we will not regret the time and effort we put in to our sons’ educations and upbringing. I think we will be proud that our sons are taking their first steps into the world as men and I think we will not be sad for a loss.
They will not be lost to us, but will be with us for visits, telephone calls, letters. They will not be with us in the same way as they were before, but that will have been going on for a long time as we will have watched them develop from infants to men. I cannot see us as the deranged, heartsick people who are so desperate to fill the void that we would have a child for no other reason than to fulfill our own selfish desires. Parenting is an act of love and sacrifice, not selfishness.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Hi this is your cousin Darbi. While I get what you are saying, I also get the point that Tesh is trying to make (albeit taking it to the extreme while he does so). He is talking about women such as OctoMom, who might I add is clearly dilusion and seemingly obsessed with having children. Most people that have large families are doing it for the right reasons. However, I have to question anyone's sanity that has 8,10,12, or even 20 some odd children and then gets a reality show. It would seem to me that what was supposed to be taken as a blessing and gift has been degraded and used for personal benefit. These people are sick. Its not the children that Tesh is attacking. They can't help being born. It is the parents. You have to bear in mind that Tesh is speaking about a small group of individuals, not every person who ever had a child.
Darbi,
Thanks for the comment. Though I agree that people who have 20+ kids are unusual, that doesn't mean they are insane (though a few might be). Also, Mr. Tesh's comments and the comments of the psychiatrists he quotes do not distinguish between the small percentage of nuts and all mothers. His comments are blanket and degrading to all mothers. Thus, my diatribe.
Steve.
That's interesting...I agree with you that there's probably not a lot of merit to the idea that women get pregnant because of some sort of psychological aberration. Cases like that are known to occur (such as the Octomom that Darbi mentions, arguably), but they're few and far between.
Having a family is a very natural, very human thing to do. I am not a particularly religious person, so I personally wouldn't describe it as God's plan, but still I agree with the gist of what you're saying. There's nothing unnatural about it.
My issue, though, is that just because there's nothing unnatural about reproduction doesn't mean it's economically or ecologically responsible for everyone to have as many kids as they want, all the time, always, and I think this is probably the point Tesh is getting at even though I don't really agree with his methods or conclusions.
For instance, it is a well-known and verifiable sociological statistic that the United States contains about one twentieth of the world's people but consumes about one fourth of the world's resources. One consequence of that is that a child born to and raised by an American family will cost quite a bit more in terms of dollars and in terms of raw, natural resources than a child in Africa, South America, or even in Australia or Europe.
Where that ultimately leads is this: if people all over the world want to be fruitful and multiply, they have to do so with the knowledge that, for very physical and immutable reasons, all of these new children will be subject to a cap in their standard of living.
So while people should feel able to have families unhindered, and should not feel that there is anything psychologically wrong with doing so, they should also have a little enough foresight and world-wisdom to understand that, in doing so on a massive scale, they are placing ever greater strain on the resources available to each new child. It's the old concept of the Malthusian Hammer, and even though our technology has taken us a long way, I'm afraid it still applies. It may take a village to raise a child, but it takes a planet full of diminishing resources to support it, especially if that child is born in the US of today.
Great article! Thanks.
-Curtis
Post a Comment