Skeptopia

Ok.

I’m NOT pregnant. I took a test yesterday and there was only one little pink line, so I know FOR SURE that I am NOT pregnant. The oven is empty; there is no bun.

It is important to establish that so people don’t feel left out of the loop.

However, I am married.

First comes love, then comes marriage, then….well, you know, the hubby’s all ready for that proverbial baby carriage.

I, however, am not ready. Nope. Not really ready at all.

But I’ve started thinking about it.

I still look at babies, especially toddlers as really short, stupid people, or hairless but maladroit monkeys. I can’t hold a conversation with one, therefore, I’m not entirely sure what I’m supposed to be getting out of the exchange. But there are days when I look at those cute little critters with their big eyes and their total fascination with the world and I think, “Man, I want one that looks like me!” or “It’s so small, I NEED ONE!” or “BABY! WANT! NOW!”

However, I don’t think I’m ready. For starters, I haven’t done any research.

So, I go to Amazon and I start looking at pregnancy books. What To Expect When Your Expecting. The Mayo Clinic Guide to a Healthy Pregnancy. Ok, cool, but a little dry. Further down the list: Spiritual Midwifery, HypnoBirthing, The Baby Name Wizard: A Magical Method for Finding the Perfect Name for Your Baby and worst of all Belly Laughs: The Naked Truth about Pregnancy and Childbirth by Jenny McCarthy. Not to mention all kinds of “methods” and “truth about the…” pseudoscience and for some reason, about a million prenatal diet and fitness books.

So, when I see a title like The Thinking Woman’s Guide to a Better Birth I get excited. It looks great, it sounds great. But I’ve been tricked before. What pseudoscience is lurking behind that beautiful cover and flattering title?  It’s telling me that I’m a “Thinking Woman”, something I’m sure all mothers want to be. And who doesn’t want to bring a child into the world under better conditions? But “Better” by whose definition? I can’t help wondering if it’s full of fear-mongering misinformation and twisted figures.  It proposes to help you make informed decisions about birthing methods and practices, but is there an agenda? The author is herself a promoter of Lamaze, which, according to my relatively skeptical mother is complete bunk. But who am I to believe, my mother or this supposed expert?

I know I have the skills to properly weigh the evidence and do my own research, but it’s hard to know where to start. Where to find any actual studies on whether or not natural birth is any better for a baby or mother? How do I wade through the agendas and ideologies and find the right books for me?

So, this is what’s going on in my head lately. This whole thing has opened up a skeptical can of worms and I am having a hard time finding a good list of EVIDENCE BASED pregnancy, chilbirth and parenting books that don’t cherry pick or depend on meta-analysis.

If you know a good place to start, let me know. I need at least an Associates Degree in in Pregnancy before I’ll feel even remotely ready.

The time came and went for a comprehensive guide to my TAM6 experience, so now, I will talk about what I learned and what I gained, five months on.

I think I summarised my feelings about the convention in my previous post but five months on, I no longer feel as…well…ranty.

TAM6 kind of turned me off from the whole “skeptical movement” for a while.  Offering another set of answers is not the best way to steer people away from nonsense. Instead, trying to promote the skills that lead people to skepticism in the first place is possibly more effective.

But that’s my husband’s rant.

TAM6 made me realise that what TAM gives to me is a sense of belonging. I have a strong emotional attachment to the skeptical community and the sense of family it brings. It’s like church camp used to be.  At TAM5 I was excited about the idea of rubbing elbows with famous people. At TAM6 I just wanted to have a good time. I met some famous people but I felt less like a fan, and more like a colleague. I realised that the celebrities aren’t as interesting as some of the less famous people who do interesting work. And more interesting than them? The people who are, like me, fans of skepticism who make skepticism part of their daily lives. I enjoyed TAM, but in the following months I’ve moved away from skepticism as a major part of my life. (However, recently I’ve found a reason to resurrect it.)

So yeah. Not a detailed thought provoking post, but a post. At long last.