Maternally Challenged

Giving Up The Addiction

A couple of years ago, I had a book contract that went sour. I still don't know exactly why. My editor was a highly respected name in the publishing world and I was thrilled to be working with her. Trouble began, though, when I turned in my first three or four chapters. I knew they could use improvement--what first draft couldn't?--but I was not prepared for the terse and scathing e-mail I got, something along the lines of "Well, this is frankly disappointing." That was it. No critique, nothing about what needed work, no guidance. This happened three or four times over the course of the next 18 months, which rank as the most excruciating in my career. I'd been a professional writer for more than 20 years and things had gone wrong, but nothing like this. I was baffled, distraught, utterly demoralized. On one particularly bad day, I actually crawled under my desk and sobbed. Eventually, things got so bad that my agent negotiated an end to the contract--which the editor's publishing house agreed to, on one condition: I had to repay my six-figure advance.

When my agent told me this, I had to check to make sure my ears were screwed on properly. I had to repay them, when I had tried in every conceivable way to fulfill my end of things, had asked repeatedly what I was doing wrong, had begged for guidance, and my editor had barely answered my e-mails? I couldn't believe it. I called the Author's Guild.

"It sucks," their lawyer said. "You're right and they're wrong. But if I were you, I'd pay up. Believe me, I've heard worse. And they've got a battalion full of high-priced legal talent. What have you got?"

I took a deep breath, and I took his advice. (The book, incidentally, is The Ghost in the House: Motherhood, Raising Children and Struggling with Depression. Another publisher, HarperCollins, bought it; since then it's sold two foreign rights, is now in paperback and has done quite well.) But I was writing checks to that editor's publishing house for a long, long time. 

Fast forward to last week. A non-profit group I've been a member of for some time sent out a mass e-mail about a book contract just signed by one of the group's former officers. The e-mail said that the book would be based in part on things that had been said by members in online discussions over the past several years, and it expressed the sincere hope that we would all continue to contribute our thoughts and experiences. There was a clearly implied hope that someday lots of us would buy the book.  The amount of the advance was not disclosed. But in the usual course of things that money goes straight to the author, minus a percentage to his or her agent to be "earned out" against future royalties, if any (and there usually aren't, unless the book hits the best-seller list).

The only reason this is interesting at all is that a couple of years ago, two members of the group (I was one) were barred from even discussing two topics they had written about--topics which were highly relevant to many members. One of the people who made this rule was the person who last week announced her own book contract. And the reason we--this other member and I--were given was that we had written books of our own, the mere mention of which, we were told, would be abusing our membership for personal enrichment by, you know....selling books. When people expressed an interest in the topics anyway, the group's leaders actually shut down the e-mail loop temporarily.

So. Two incidents--one pretty important in my life, one fairly minor. Both times, I was treated unfairly. Both times, I went ballistic. The first time, I had no recourse; I just had to take it. The second time I spent, I am embarrassed to say, an unbelievable amount of energy trying to reason with the folks in charge. And when reason did not prevail, I yelled and screamed (both online and in person). I wrote angry e-mails. I talked my husband's ear off. All in all, I did a credible imitation of Yosemite Sam in a full-force swivet. I got utterly fixated on the fact that these folks just did not understand, and I couldn't get away from the idea that it was my job, personally, to make them understand.

And both times, the Universe said: So?

And I said (condensing madly here, because actually this process took a couple of years): But I'm right and they're wrong! I'm right, I'm right, I'm right! And I'm being penalized and it's just not fair!

And the Universe said, Okay, but what's your point?

That one was easy. The point was being RIGHT, goddammit. And being right was a kind of high. Self-righteousness is the spiritual form of crack, and just as hard a habit to break. You give up your self-righteousness, and then turn around and realize that you're self-righteous about giving up your self-righteousness. Giving it up, really giving it up, is like a little death. Well, not "like"--it is a kind of death. Because you're killing off that kindergartener in yourself that's jumping up and down screaming about fairness.

The way I arrived at this conclusion was that after awhile, this posture of Being Right became a kind of psychic black hole: it swallowed up tons of energy and gave nothing back. I was very, very slow on the uptake here, but one day I was thinking about how that editor had shafted me when a new thought occurred: "I bet she doesn't remember your name." And the same thing last week: that e-mail got me all riled up again about this incident several years ago, and I fired off several rounds of e-mail before my frontal lobe came back online. And then I remembered how much time I'd spent online a couple of years earlier, how I had bored my husband to utter stupor with every itsy-bitsy detail.

And then I remembered something else--an incident that had happened just before I left the Washington Post, when I'd done a story about some financial hanky panky at a major animal welfare group. This was a non-profit that got donations from hundreds of thousands of little old ladies around the world, who dug into their Social Security checks or whatever and gave $5 here, $10 there...and the leaders of this group were living in what could only be called palatial splendor. The percentage of income that went to executive salaries in this organization was way up there. I asked one of those guys living in one of those palatial homes about some deal where he had padded his salary in the guise of some real estate deal. I remember that he made a little expression of distaste, as if I'd just belched or something, and he picked a piece of nonexistent lint off the leg of his extremely expensive suit. I got mad then, too. I wrote my story, and maybe some little old ladies out there stopped sending in their money--I don't know--but I do know that this man in his expensive suit went right on enjoying his palatial lifestyle as if I had never existed. Maybe I gave him an afternoon of heartburn, but that was about as much as I accomplished.

And then, finally, I got the point: It is not my job to fix anybody but me. I have a friend who says that our job is to send our energy outward--to create, explore, connect--and that anything which obstructs that process is inherently wrong. That sounds right to me. And so what was wrong here, truly wrong, was not what these people had done to me (or to the little old ladies of the world), but what I'd done to myself--how these events had lured me into an addiction of sorts, one which took a whole lot of energy and turned it inward.

And so now, by saying this, I hope that I have turned that around.

First the Socks, Then the Shoes....

The back door bangs open.

"Mom, is it supposed to rain today?" 

"I don't know."

"Are we supposed to have any bad weather any time today?"

"I don't know."

"Because the wind's picking up out there and it kind of scares me and Katharine, but we really want to play outside."

"Well, go outside and play until it starts to rain, and if that happens, then come inside."

"Okay! Thanks, Mom!"

The Moms' Disease

It's called Postpartum Depression, or PPD for those of us (too much) in the know. I've done a fair amount of research on this subject, both in the professional sense and in the Reality Bites sense. PPD is a subtype of depression which is not to be confused with the "baby blues," which virtually every new mother has for a few days or so. PPD is to the "baby blues" what a tsunami is to an ocean breaker. It makes you want to die, and this in spite of the fact that you have a new life to nurture and cherish. That's one of the worst things about it, in fact--that it happens at a time in your life when there is so much cause for joy. And that is also why so many women suffer it in silence, white-knuckle their way through the first year or so of motherhood: they are ashamed to be feeling so shitty when everyone expects them to be happy. Shame on top of depression is a lethal mix.

Here are just a few quotes from some of the women I interviewed for my book, The Ghost in the House (HarperCollins, 2006), who talked about this subject:

“I was afraid of her and ashamed of myself. I used to watch [my baby] sleeping and wonder with pride at how beautiful and perfect she looked. Then I would cry because I felt so sorry for her for her having such a screwup for a mother.”

“I lost me. I never knew me. And if I had a gun in the house, there wouldn’t be a me.”

Depression is a disease of recurrence; once those toxic neural pathways in the brain are ignited, they catch fire much easier the next time, and the time after that. That means any woman suffering from PPD is at risk of being on her way to a lifetime struggle with a disease that is the leading cause of disability in the world, according to the World Health Organization. And PPD, like maternal depression in general, is a disease that has a unique ability to spread the damage to the next generation. Research by Sherryl Goodman of Emory University, who co-authored the survey on which much of my book was based, has found that women who suffer from depression, especially women who suffer from depression during pregnancy, are more likely to have babies who are fussy, hard to soothe, colicky. The result, when the baby is born, is a vicious spiral: an unhappy baby who unknowingly creates more anguish for an unhappy mom, who then has trouble caring for this unhappy baby, who...That's what happened to this mom:

“My daughter cried for 8 weeks constantly. Finally, I was crying too. She barely slept. I barely slept…Finally, I stopped my life. I spent the entire morning deciding if I should give her up for adoption. It was that bad.”

Older cultures were a lot smarter about PPD than we are, and some still are. Some cultures routinely seclude a new mother for 40 days following delivery, a time in which she has nothing to do but rest, recuperate and care for her baby. Even in Elizabethan times, this was the case. Today, our "enlightened culture" ships new moms out of the hospital in 48 hours or less (even those who had C-sections); mothers who work for small employers (50 employees or fewer) are entitled to zero maternity leave. Zero. Is it surprising that doctors in this country aren't particularly attuned to this problem, and miss the diagnosis even when it's staring them in the face?

Here's a quote from a mother who is a physician, who suffered from PPD after the birth of her own daughter:

"The mother has to be pretty bad before someone picks it (PPD) up. In my experience, the physicians weren’t asking—the pediatrician, the obstetrician, the specialist. I didn’t see my internist, but I doubt she would have asked either—it’s not something we are trained to ask about.”

Today is Blog Day for the MOTHERS Act (S. 1375 ), otherwise known as The Moms Opportunity to Access Help, Education, Research and Support for Postpartum Depression Act, or MOTHERS Act. This proposed legislation, sponsored by Senators Menendez and Durbin, would ensure that new mothers and their families are educated about postpartum depression, screened for symptoms and provided with essential services. In addition, it would authorize money to be awarded as federal grants to researchers who are exploring the causes, diagnoses and treatments for PPD.

I end with one last quote--this one from an older mother who raised all her kids while struggling with depression, at immense cost to her and them.

"Depression is the parent with the most power."

Think about that for a minute. And then, when you're done, call or e-mail your senator. 

I Am So Not Worthy

It is now 8:13 p.m. East Coast time, and it was approximately 2:45 p.m. when I picked up my six-year old at school. Two hours after that, her 10-year-old sister came in. In that five and a half hour period, I have learned that:

I "never" play with my six-year-old.

I have a heart made of ice because instead of playing with her I chose to talk to the computer repairman. This proves I don't love her.

I am negligent. I did not make sure that my six-year-old had boots for Boot Day tomorrow. And they said it was going to be Boot Day ON THE ANNOUNCEMENTS, which if I had been there in her classroom with pencil and paper taking notes, I would have KNOWN.

I have no fashion sense. The outfit I laid out for tomorrow to the six-year-old was rejected with thinly disguised horror. "Uh......" (sharp intake of breath) "...no."

I am incompetent. The 10-year-old comes home, looks for bread to make a sandwich and is outraged. "You haven't gone to the store YET?" Similarly, I have not yet gone to the craft store to purchase items she needs for her Halloween costume. And she has been waiting a whole DAY. For God's sake, what have I been DOING all those hours she is in school?

(Sigh.)

My problem is I just ignore this stuff, or pretend to ignore it, or just say "give me a break" without explaining to any of my offspring that the world does not, in fact, revolve around them, until eventually I become aware of the fact that I feel like pounding my fist into a wall. Which is what I could do at this moment.

That's it. No insights, no great thoughts. Just a rant. And I'm done.

Why We Still Need the Mainstream Media

As a former card-carrying member of the Mainstream Media, or the Liberalmediaelite--whatever you want to call it--I've been as dismayed as anybody about its performance in recent years, most notably its near-total lack of skepticism about the buildup to the war in Iraq. But.

A story in the Washington Post today by Dana Priest and Anne Hull is a flawless example of why the mainstream media still plays a vital role, even in the age of the Internet, citizen journalism and blogs. The story is about a returning veteran of that war and his wife, who live in West Virginia, and their travails in trying to get even minimally adequate health care for his severe case of post-traumatic stress disorder. (An aside: just in case there's anybody out there who thinks this is a "new" illness suffered mainly by a generation of wimps, I could tell you someday about my daughter's former nanny, now in her mid-80s, who lost her first husband in World War II--not because of combat, but because he lost his mind upon his return and died in somewhat murky circumstances while a patient at an Army hospital. He'd served in the Pacific with the U.S. Navy's Seabees, and drove a bulldozer. Among his duties were digging mass graves. Need I say more?)

Anyway. I will not editorialize here about the disgrace that is our so-called system of health care for military personnel, because lots of people who know more about it will do that. Let's just talk about what it took to present this extremely well-done piece of journalism to the American public--and, most important, to the inside-the-Beltway public. (Are you reading, Mr. President?) That I know something about, having worked at the newspaper in question for seven years, albeit about 11 years ago.

There are two bylines on thisi story, plus that of a photographer, the incredible Michel du Cille. Let's just say that, speaking extremely conservatively, each one of these persons makes, oh, $80,000 a year. Eighty Gs times three is $240,000. Divide that by 52 and you get a weekly salary cost of $4,615 a week.

A story like this is incredibly labor intensive. The reporters would have spent a lot of time just hanging out with the couple in their West Virginia home, observing their lives, learning the cadences of their speech, getting a small peek into the landscape of their marriage. This isn't being nosy; it's making sure that the people you are writing about are, in fact, the real deal--i.e. really disabled by the war and weighed down by its consequences, and not dragging around the baggage of a prior drinking problem, for instance. Not dealing with creditors and worrying about getting their utilities turned off because they are spendthrifts, or have a gambling problem, as opposed to just plain not having enough money to live on because our government is so disgracefully stingy with its veterans. This level of intrusiveness is necessary not just in order to avoid getting misled yourself, but in order to present a true picture of the situation to your readers.

Reporting a story like this also involves talking to neighbors and employers and former employers, perhaps, as well as a few relatives and friends, because you never know who will be the person who will give you that vital slice of insight that helps you see some person or some fact in the story in a new way. It means checking out the Wal-Mart where the wife worked. It means sorting out the meaning of various psychiatric medications, so you can write knowledgeably about what Zoloft is for and why a person might be taking, say, Klonopin. Or Seroquel. And it means becoming familiar enough with some very arcane VA regulations that you can write with authority about what the veteran qualifies for and what he doesn't qualify for, and why.

The photographer has a job to do, too, and the additional problem of being a fly on the wall in a very small house with tons--well, okay, half a ton--of camera equipment while attempting to take photographs that honestly depict the people in question. Which don't look staged, or boring, or simply noninformative, but which are arresting and candid and technically flawless. I wish I could say more about how this is done, but the truth is photography is like magic to me. All I know is a good photographer can vault a so-so story onto the front page; a not-so-good photographer can stink up even the best writing.

Anyway. If I said you could do all that reporting in a month, I'd be lying, but just for argument's sake, let's say it takes a month. And then there's the writing and editing process. Just to be extremely conservative again, we'll say that takes two weeks. (Anybody who has ever worked in a newsroom, and at the Washington Post newsroom in particular, will be guffawing right now.) But let's just say that altogether, you could put this pile of information together in six weeks. Six times $4,615 is $27,690. And we're not even talking about the people in the Post's research department, who probably put in quite a few hours on this, or the cost of the equipment it took to produce all those words and pictures. For simplicity's sake, let's just round things off and say that this was a story that, at the barest minimum of minimums, would take $30,000 to create.

I don't know about you, but I don't know too many people out there in blog-land who have that kind of money just lying around to put into one story. In fact, there are alarmingly few newspapers left these days who would do it. There are, though, a few publishers left in this country who see newspapers as more than just another profit center, who are not dealing with intense shareholder pressure to maximize returns, and who are willing to shell out the big bucks to produce quality journalism. You can count them on the fingers of one hand these days, but Donald Graham is one of them. And no, I'm not letting the Post off the hook here, because it has a great deal to answer for in its coverage of the lead-up to the war in Iraq. It's a deeply flawed institution. But, as this story shows, it's also still a great one.

The democratization of the media is a great thing and I'm glad I've lived to see it; in the long run, I think it will be a much-needed corrective for the arrogance of the traditional mainstream media and its disconnect from ordinary people. But just as all the local dance studios in the world cannot replace the American Ballet Theater, neither can the resources of the Internet, at least as it is presently configured, replace the role played by giant old-media institutions like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post. Somehow or the other, they've got to survive, or we are going to be in a kind of trouble that makes our problems now look small.

In the Shadow of the Moon

"We made it." That's what everybody said--people from France and Sierra Leone and China and Kansas and even our enemies, the Russians. Yeah, the Americans did it, but everybody felt it. "We." It was maybe the last time the world was ever so united.

My husband, the NASA physicist, made me see In the Shadow of the Moon today, a documentary about the 24 men who have actually been to the moon. They're old now--it's a shock to see those weathered faces--but they have a lot to say. I wouldn't have gone on my own, probably, but I'm glad he talked me into it. It was amazing. And it made me remember.

Apollo 8 was the first spacecraft to actually get to the moon. It made it there on Dec. 24, 1968, a date that sticks in my mind because it was the day I woke up. I'd been hit by a car a week earlier, getting off a school bus on the last day of school before Christmas vacation. The car was going about 50 mph, I'm told, and I was nearly killed. Christmas Eve, a week later, was my first coherent memory after the accident. I was 13 years old, and all by myself in the hospital (except for Margaret Walker, bless her soul, a lady from our church who came to sit with me). It was the year of the Hong Kong flu epidemic and everybody else in my family was at home--not at death's door, exactly, but within sight of it. The only part of me that was not in bandages was my right eye, and through this eye I watched those blurry images on a black-and-white TV somebody had hooked up and put on my bedside table. The astronauts were going behind the moon, out of radio contact with the Earth, which nobody had ever done before; if something happened back there, we would never hear from them again. It was a fearful and thrilling moment. They read from the Book of Genesis that night, and I remember them wishing us all a Merry Christmas--all of us "on the good earth." I thought: wow. 

The moon rocks were cool, but history is largely a story of unintended consequences, and the unintended consequence of the Apollo missions was the birth of the environmental movement. Rachel Carson had warned us about DDT back in 1962 in Silent Spring, but it was actually seeing this luminous planet of ours floating in the blackness of the cosmos which seemed to trigger a slow recognition (still dawning, sadly, in the Bush administration) of what a fragile thing any kind of life is, how improbable its existence, what a narrow margin we occupy in an inhospitable universe. And of course that unforgettable image--"Earthrise" --taken on a later Apollo mission, probably the most famous photograph ever made, helped us see what the astronauts saw.

The Apollo missions seemed to take place in a cultural bubble: outside, the world was going straight to hell, race riots were erupting in major cities, we were firebombing Vietnam and Laos. Now, looking back, that turmoil seems...well, not unimportant, but somehow diminished. What was really important then? It wasn't politics; it was that adventure we were on, that thing that had the whole world looking up. I felt a shiver of goosebumps when those Saturn V rockets fired up and the rocket took off with the words "United States of America" on the outside. I feel it still.

My God, a country that can do that--a mongrel nation made up of political refugees and adventurers and human chattel and social rejects from all over--a nation like that can do anything. Anything. The only difference between then and now is that back then, we believed it.