Hook-up culture. OMG.

OMG.

I always thought I was fairly "hip" as far as parents go. I used to be a sex ed teacher, and J and I talk fairly freely about sexual topics. He seems open to asking me questions about sex. It really hasn't been a problem.

But...OMG.

Do you know what "hooking up" means? How about "hook-up culture"?

I was at a workshop last night with a group of other parents, and the speaker informed us that the norm nowadays - the NORM! - is to have sex first and THEN to talk to the person afterwards and maybe decide to have a relationship of some kind. But maybe not. The thing to do is to have sex. "Hook up." Period.

That's the norm!

OMG.

She gave us some historical background. In the 1950s, you were supposed to stay a virgin until you were married (for women, at least, that was expected). Dating was something you did to get to know someone in preparation for marriage. During the '60s and with the rise of the sexual revolution, the feminist movement, and availability of effective birth control, there was more uncommitted sex, "casual sex." But now, she said, "hooking up" has become the norm.

And today: sex first, talk later. WHAT?!?!?!

What about relationship? What about communication? What about love?

None of that, for this generation. It's just sex.

OMG.

This is from an article I just read on the American Psychology Association website called Sexual hookup culture:

It is an unprecedented time in the history of human sexuality. In the United States, the age when people first marry and reproduce has been pushed back dramatically, while at the same time the age of puberty has dropped, resulting in an era in which young adults are physiologically able to reproduce but not psychologically or socially ready to "settle down" and begin a family (Bogle, 2007; Garcia & Reiber, 2008).

These developmental shifts, research suggests, are some of the factors driving the increase in sexual "hookups," or uncommitted sexual encounters, part of a popular cultural change that has infiltrated the lives of emerging adults throughout the Western world.

Hookups are becoming more engrained in popular culture, reflecting both evolved sexual predilections and changing social and sexual scripts. Hook-up activities may include a wide range of sexual behaviors, such as kissing, oral sex and penetrative intercourse. However, these encounters often transpire without any promise of — or desire for — a more traditional romantic relationship.

OMG.

I'm going to hide under a rock now. And I'm building a box to hide my son in until he is 30.

Getting older ain't for sissies

I picked up a copy of More Magazine the other day – a magazine “for women of style and substance” – mainly because it was staring me in the face while I was waiting to check out at CVS, and also because I’m considering submitting an essay to this magazine. From what I read, More targets women ages 30 and up.

Once I started flipping through More, however, I became completely engrossed in the ads – much more so than the actual articles. Of course, there were the usual ads for makeup, jewelry, clothing, and diet products. But there also were other ads that I wasn’t expecting.

 Here is a list of the ads in a recent issue of More. I am not making this up.

• Age defying makeup and hair products 
• Night treatment for skin 
• Hair regrowth treatment 
• Prescription medication to help with painful intercourse (2 ads: 1 for a pill, and 1 for a cream) 
• Lubricant for sex 
• Overactive bladder relief 
• Fiber for constipation relief 
• Natural progesterone supplement to reduce the symptoms of aging 
• And a brand new product, liners that you wear in-between your buttocks for accidental bowel leakage (ABL) 

So what do you think? According to More Magazine’s advertisers, women 30 and over are dealing with dry and wrinkly skin that needs defying, hair that needs re-growing, intercourse that needs lubrication, bladders that are overactive, and bowels that leak, as well as bowels that do the opposite, and jewelry to cheer us up while we wither in our old age.

And this isn’t even AARP magazine.

Ladies, we are screwed.

Mammograms in photos

With all the mammography controversy these past few days, I've been noticing a number of stock photos that are just... well, take a look yourself. These are all via iStockphoto.com.

Hello, welcome! Glad to have you here! But I think you forgot to take off your shirt and put on your lovely gown!

Great, you put on your gown! And glad to see how happy you are! But now we really do have to take off the gown to do your mammogram.

Okay, you can just take one arm out of the sleeve, and we'll try it that way.

Good try! A tube top AND a come-hither look. But really, you have to take it off to get the mammogram done.

Yes, that's more like it. Shirt completely off. Nice jeans and belt!

Yes I just need to give you a hug so I can get you in the machine....

Just relax....Oops, I think you took everything off by mistake!

This is what getting a mammogram REALLY looks like. If they showed it like this in photos, no one would do it.

Earlier isn't necessarily better

Well, everyone’s up in arms again about mammography and whether it is effective or not. Today’s culprit is an article in the British Medical Journal that analyzed a large Canadian study and found that mammography led to no reduction in mortality from breast cancer. Some are vehemently arguing that this study is flawed. But, this study builds on other studies that have had similar findings. I’m not ready to dismiss it yet.

Even though it goes against the common refrain, when it comes to breast cancer, early detection doesn’t necessarily mean better outcomes.

I know, for years we’ve been told: “Get a mammogram, catch it early, get treated, and you’ll be fine." But that is not always the case.

The reality is that some breast cancers are very aggressive, and even if they are discovered early and treated, will eventually metastasize and lead to death.

Other breast cancers are not aggressive, and will not spread and cause harm, even if left untreated or if they are treated later on. And some breast cancers may even go away on their own.

The problem is, right now we don’t know how to determine if a particular breast cancer is going to be aggressive or non-aggressive. We have clues, but we don’t know for sure. So we have to treat every breast cancer as if it’s the aggressive kind.

That is what leads to overtreatment.

Another problem is that, for an individual, this information is not helpful. If your doctor finds a tumor in your breast, what woman is going to say: okay, I’ll wait a while and see if it’s an aggressive or non-aggressive tumor? That kind of decision could cost a woman her life. On the other hand, submitting to unnecessary treatment can cause all kinds of side effects and medical issues that might be completely, well, unnecessary.

Here’s another way of looking at the issue of whether “catching it early” is really important. Let’s say there are two women, Jennifer and Sandra. Jennifer finds out about her breast cancer from a mammogram when she is 50. She is treated with surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy, and does well for a while. However, in spite of all the treatment, her cancer metastasizes when she is 55, and she dies at age 57. So you could say that after her cancer was discovered, Jennifer survived for 7 years.

Sandra finds out about her breast cancer when she is 55, when it is Stage IV and has already metastasized. Sandra dies at age 57. So you could say Sandra only survived 2 years after diagnosis. Both women die at the same age from a similar cancer, but Jennifer’s tumor was discovered earlier and treated, although this treatment didn’t extend her life.

This is called lead time bias. The National Cancer Institute puts it this way: “This increase in survival time makes it seem as though screened patients are living longer when that may not be happening... It could be that the only reason the survival time appears to be longer is that the date of diagnosis is earlier for the screened patients. But the screened patients may die at the same time they would have without the screening test.“  

So where does this leave us? Well, Dr. Deanna Attai, a breast surgeon in Burbank, CA had this to say on her Facebook page: “We need better tools - currently mammograms are a bit "one size fits none.” She continues: “Hopefully studies like these will promote more research. We need to identify who will actually benefit from mammography, and we predict which patients do not need screening. We are definitely moving towards more personalized care - we're just not there yet.”

Some links:
Too Many Mammograms
Overdiagnosis and Overtreatment of Breast Cancer

The Accounting

I am counting up the tally

Of the past few weeks

Three deaths

Three women

Three moms

All too young

Two of cancer

They each had some time

To get used to the idea

Of life without them in it

One in a car accident

There was no "getting used to it"

It happened in an instant

What about my little family of three?

What would happen if I wasn't here?

Who would clean the dust?

Who would cook the food?

Who would hold it all together?

My family can last for a week alone, but how would they do if it was forever?

Three women have died

Two cancers, one accident

Three men are now widowers

Five children no longer have mothers

Numbers don’t really help

Except to get it straight in my mind

It really happened

Numbers don’t lie, after all

Lost

An Orthodox Jewish teenager is currently missing in an affluent suburb of Boston. There has been a community-wide social media blitz, and every time I open Facebook I see a disturbing number of re-posts about this event. Part of the reason for the high publicity level is that the boy is the son of a local newspaper columnist, so perhaps the father's fame has added to the high level of community awareness.

I feel like we are being left in the dark about a number of points: did this young man have a recent fight with his family? was he upset about something? was he depressed? did he have other mental health issues? was something going on with a girl that he liked? with friends? was he suicidal?

It is not unheard of that someone "runs away" for a while, although probably much less likely in the Orthodox community in Boston. Could this young man have caught a bus or train to another city? Could he be staying with a friend, hiding out? It has been extremely cold here, so I'm sure his family is frantic that he is outside, which would not be a good thing. 

The whole thing leaves me feeling unsettled. Why would a 16 year old just suddenly disappear? Didn't he have anyone he could talk to about whatever it is that is bothering him? Why was his only option to run away?

Recently, two young women from nearby suburban towns went missing, and then both were found dead by suicide. 

Time will tell, but this story is making me uneasy.

At the Massachusetts Conference for Women

I've been hearing about the Massachusetts Conference for Women for several years, but I was always working and couldn't (or wouldn't make the time to) attend. This year I decided to take the plunge.

The conference was held at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center, which is absolutely enormous (if you click here you'll see it looks like a spaceship!). You walk first into a giant lobby of sorts, and then you go down stairs into an even more enormous room which is where they had their exhibitors. It was a strange mix of career based organizations (schools, training), health care organizations and services, and vendors of every kind (windows, kitchens, clothing, beauty items, gift items, shoes, etc.). I found it to be a bit confusing and overwhelming.

You walk from the exhibition hall into another huge room which was filled with approximately 1,000 round tables (I did the math, 10,000/10 per table). That is where they had the keynote addresses, and lunch. The speakers were quite far away but there were many giant screens so everyone could see clearly. And the sound was great.

These were the positives:

• 10,000 women! Just kind of amazing, the sheer number of women at the conference (I saw a very few men - very few. And they looked uncomfortable.) And a huge range of women: young (high school age) to older, all kinds of cultures, all kinds of styles of clothing. Lots of pregnant women, and quite a few in very high heels (not sure why, not very practical for walking around!).

• Very inspiring, nationally known speakers, in no particular order:







Blake Mycoskie

1. Blake Mycoskie of TOMS, who is an excellent speaker, a very low key guy. The basic story is this: while traveling in Argentina, Mycoskie realized that many children there were so poor that they didn't have shoes, and this literally prevented them from going to school.  He was inspired to create a for-profit company that would use part of its profits to fund giving out much-needed shoes.  You can read more about him here and more about the impact of giving shoes to children here.


2. A songwriter from South Carolina, Emily Lynch, wrote a very beautiful and touching song about the Boston Marathon bombings called "Heart of this City." She wrote it in response to one of the marathon bomber's tweets that said "there ain't no love in the heart of the city." Here is a version of it. She did a very simple acoustic version at the conference, and I liked it better than this one, but you'll get the idea.


3. Susan Cain, author of the book Quiet, who talks about introverts in an extroverted world. She was an excellent speaker and talked a lot about research to back up her ideas. However, after hearing her talk, I realized that being in a place with 10,000 women didn't appeal to my introverted side.Whoops!


4. Linda Cliatt-Wayman is an educator who took over a troubled high school in Philadelphia and turned it around so the students could learn. Education is key to how these kids can get out of the cycle of poverty and violence, and it's very important to them. Cliatt-Wayman is a person of great faith, and she feels she is called to this work. It was very inspiring to hear her speak.


5. 

   Kerry Washington & Robin Roberts

   Robin Roberts, the news anchor, and Kerry Washington, the actor, both were unable to physically be there but attended via live hook-up. They were both very real, really connected with the audience. They spoke about the power of women, and the importance of the community of women in their lives. Really impressive. Their presentation was facilitated by Tory Johnson, who was great at asking interesting questions.


6. Laura Munson, a writer and speaker, whose talk was entitled "Getting what you want by getting out of your own way" (you can listen to the podcast here). One great take-away I got from her talk was the idea of instead of saying "I want..." you should say "I create...".  For example, instead of "I want a new job" you say "I create a new job." It gives you more power over your situation. I like it!


7. Mary Beth Monihan is a VP at Boston Scientific and is probably not a national figure, but I heard her talk at the "Power Stage" and I found her to be very down to earth and helpful. Some of her key points: 
• What are you really uniquely good at? Ask people you know (friends, family). You might be surprised at what you find out.
• What are your gaps?
• What kind of choices are you going to make? Consider that you work for appx. 45 years. One choice is not going to derail you, so it's okay to take some chances.
• When thinking about networking - help them first, before asking for something.
• Her talk was hosted by Mel Robbins who is a dynamo, and I picked up her book Stop Saying You're Fine: The no-bs guide to getting what you want. Quite interesting.  

The negatives:

• 10,000 women. Networking? Too random. Needed a better way to meet people in one's field or with similar interests/ages/stages. They should work on this.


• The exhibition was too confusing - too many different things mixed together.


• The workshop sessions were too large (one I attended was in a cavernous, dark room - not ideal). Even though they were smaller than the keynote presentations, they were still huge.


• Too much emphasis on the corporate sponsors. It started to feel like the whole conference was a huge advertisement after a while. There were 1,600 women attending from State Street alone, which was a big sponsor of the conference. 

Takeaways

One of the biggest takeaways for me was how important education is to kids, and how we take for granted things like having shoes to wear to school, and having schools that are safe and relatively non-violent.  As my son complains about having to go to school, I wish he would realize how lucky he really is. Gives one pause.

Another takeaway for me is simply the power of confidence. So many of these women just exude confidence. They will not take no for an answer. I feel like I'm probably being too nice in my professional life, and that being a little more kick-a&& might be the way to go. I think.

I've also been thinking about how a lot of these very successful folks just seem to focus on ONE THING. Susan Cain focuses solely on introverts.  Blake Mycoskie on giving shoes to poor children. Do you have to just have one focus, one message? Is simplicity the way to go? Just a thought.

I still am chewing on this experience, and hopefully I will have some more insights as time goes on. Stay tuned...