Katherine Stone over at Postpartum Progress writes an interesting post in response to the Vanity Fair article by Todd Purdum suggesting that former Vice President candidate Govern Sarah Palin was experiencing postpartum depression during the Presidential campaign. She is right to question the pundits and politicians that are so quick to throw out postpartum depression as the reason behind aberrant behavior.
To get to her post, click here. I've excerpted a few paragraphs below:
Purdum, as per usual when it comes to the media, shows very little understanding of postpartum depression. PPD is not a joke. It is NOT about being able to get along with others, even though of course anger and irritability can come into play. It's NOT about being an independent woman, or being disagreeable, or being emotional.
Women with postpartum depression are so affected by their illness that it impacts their ability to function on a daily basis. If Gov. Palin had been having difficulty sleeping and eating, wondering why she had ever become a mother, withdrawing from family and friends, crying nonstop, feeling absolutely miserable and disconnected from herself, wondering how on earth she could get through the next five minutes and even possibly considering suicide, then perhaps she did indeed have postpartum depression. I have seen NO evidence of that. Indeed, it would surprise me that any new mother in the serious throes of postpartum depression would be able to fly all over the country gladhanding and making public speeches and smiling so damn much all day long.
Even more interesting to me is that Purdum shows no concern for Palin, should she in fact have been suffering from postpartum depression, and it doesn't seem anyone else quoted in the article was concerned for her health and safety either. Does he understand how serious postpartum depression is?
I might actually have been able to shrug this article off to media ignorance about perinatal mood and anxiety disorders, were it not for continued references throughout the article to mental illness. Purdum uses words, either his own or those of whom he chose to quote for this article, to describe Gov. Palin like "erratic" and "whack job."
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Erratic does not equal postpartum depression. Erratic doesn't necessarily equal mental illness. Almost all of us are erratic at one time or another in our lives.
"Almost all of us are erratic at one time or another in our lives."
But the article, and this post, isn't about "almost all of us at one time or another in our lives." It's about a candidate for vice president of the U.S. It's apples and oranges to compare the erratic behavior of regular folks with that of someone like Palin who thinks she is qualified and able for such a high office.
I read the entire article, and while no Palin fan, I thought it was a clear, one-sided attack and it is sad to see it here.
On the other hand, the author of Beyond Blue uses the term "whack job" herself and therefore cannot comment if others do.
The author is quoting from other people. These other people are commenting on their observations of Palin during the campaign. They observed things they thought was negative. So why does this make the article reporting it an "attack"?????
when someone asks you to ponder some situation they are mentally ill. such as the religious cult Mormons. the bible was wrong to say they translated names. so is the book of Mormon there was no language 2000 years ago that had the symbols to produce any of the names of the bible or book of mormon. your name never changes. there was no item of each that was available during those time periods. the camel is fron austraila. The donkey from New mexico the were shipped to the middle east in 1583. English with 26 letters is only since 1630. how was the bible translated in 1610 or 1622 before the letters were available to do so. see missing letter J part one. all religions are cults (common used latterday term salvery) why can't we get an education and get along with each other? thank you John Cunningham johncunningham1956@netzero.com
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