NINA FARINA

When Biology and Brain Conflict (or adventure in Birth Control land part three)

Lately I have been getting lectured about making sure John and I do not have kids until we are ready to give up our alone time. Well, John and I have discussed and we really don't plan on having kids anytime soon. I've never left the country. There are trips to be taken and money to be spent (on us) and I am really not in the proper mental state to sacrifice my wants for someone else's needs.

My brain knows that, but biology is a bitch. Biology says I should've started breeding 10 years ago and now I am in my mid-20s and childless and my hormones sometimes want to know what I've been up to. All this sex and no baby! What's wrong with me?

There have been two adventure in birth control post and this is number three. I like talking about birth control cause no one else does. So here is the latest adventure.

Last year I stopped using the pill and switched to a diaphragm (this was sometime between December and February if you wanna scan for the post). Okay, the diaphragm was like this novelty item for a few weeks but its very real drawbacks soon came into play. 1. I was using it without spermicide so we used withdrawel as well. 2. Putting it in was either quick and easy OR TOOK FOREVER!! There was no in between. You know what the list is longer, from limiting what we could do to other stop. If you want that much detail you have to email me cause I am not broadcasting that for the mildly interested world.

Anywho. The diagphragm got tossed by the wayside. It sits underneaths John's sink, unused. I forgot to bring it back for my annual.

So occasionally my body makes me dream about being pregnant. They are always very lovely dreams that scare the shit out of me when I wake up. Or I dream I have a baby and she is cute and perfect. When I wake up I actually miss her for a few minutes. But I tell her, quite literally, that she has to wait a while.

I've been hearing that most newlyweds want to wait three years after their wedding to have children, which is what John and I want. I have also read, repeatidly, that most fail at it. That biology overwhelms them, they are in a secure relationship and they start self sabotaging. It is purely a subconscious thing. They are very unaware of it.

I don't think John consciously put pins in the draw that house our condoms but it was funny to find them there. The condoms were fine (mostly all happily still in their boxes), but the condoms didn't always get used. Which may be TMI, but a form of birth control was used.

Then I got home. I was supposed to get my period Monday (last Monday). I didn't. By Wednesday I was freaking out. We should have been safer! My brain yelled at me. The panic comes like this first 1. I can't be pregnant, I don't even have a passport!! Really that is how the thought came to my head. I am not ready to give up smoking for ten months, or drinking or dancing my ass and most importantly. I want to be ALONE with John. And then I begged God...please please please I need more time alone with John. And I begged and I begged. I took a pregnancy test thursday night and the results were negative (which for me was a big positive), but I was still panicky till I got my period Saturday.

Because of this whole sucky debacle I went online to try to find a different form of birth control. I thought I was threw with hormones but Brazil, Trinidad, Tobago, Japan and the Phillipines will not be as much fun with a child in tow SO

I go to planned parenthood and I read stuff online and I decide. 1. An IUD still freaks me out. I just can't accept that adhereing plastic and copper to me is good for my body. Plus I could get heavier cramps and my cramps suck as it is. 2. The pluses and the minuses of the pill are such that I may consider going on it again.

3. And three is a whopper. Withdrawel is more effective than being on a diaphragm. NOT as effective, more effective. The caveat is that it has to be between two adults in a steady relationship. I think the reason that we are convinced that it is so awful is that people don't want kids attempting it. Although the window of error is rather large diaphragms have 6 pregnancies per year with perfect use whereas withdrawel has four pregnancies per year with perfect use. Who knew?

Hormones are still the bestest and I am trying to get myself past the IUD ickies (as that would be the easiest) but the moral of the story is;
Don't sabotage yourself, I panic a lot and withdrawel is more effective as birth control than you thought.

Be safe

Gotta love selective application MSNBC - New EPA mercury rule omits conflicting data

Music?

Today, on the way to school, I was listening to (in order) Cody Chestnutt, which made me want to hear The Roots, which made me want to hear Common which made me want to hear Nas AND THEN I realized why I have been listening to less rap (aside from it's general suckiness of late); There are very few men or women in rap today. Really, regardless of gender, they are a bunch of little boys; they want shiney things and really have no broad view. It pisses me off. So, when going through radio stations, I turn the dial and turn the dial until finally I turn it off (and yes I really did just almost quote myself).

And when I listen to music I fluctuate, for days I will listen to rock/punk/emo and then I will listen to hip hop for days and then I will listen to Latin music and then classical. I realized that I never really mix what I am listening to.

I don't understand people who really just listen to one type of music. It would be like eatting one type of food; it's fundamentalism on an even tougher level.

You know what else pisses me off; when people say Spoken Word is the daughter of Hip Hop. I am gonna have to start smacking folk. They are more like sisters, born of the same traditions. But hip hop did not birth spoken word, you only have to look like at the time lines to see that. Dumb people. They're everywhere. Especially on the radio.

I have a moving date

I will be moving to Tallahassee on Sunday May 29th. In case you wanted to know.

Dear Congress (and most of the U.S. population),

You crazy meddling idiots.--
While ya'll are staying up late at night to discuss the state of one woman;

there is still a war going on.

Just wanted to remind you.

Question

What do Martha Stewart and Lil-Kim have in common?

Answer

They are both going to (or have) spent time in jail for doing what the men in their respective games have ALWAYS gotten away with.
read here

It seems that if you have a problem the sacrificial goat of choice is a female.

recipe for a shitty spring break

take

one legal aide office with no windows (none at all)
lots of terrible divorce and child custody cases
and one phone call from your mom telling you she put your ferret to sleep today

stir and enjoy

Tally Ho Bitches

I head to Tallahassee tonight on a Delta flight that leaves at 7:50. I will be gone till Monday the 21st.

Cross your fingers that John and I find a place to move into come May.

Lately

I have been feeling like the butt of God's joke. Some wonderful things better flow my way soon. I called my mother at home to ask her how she was and she has to inform me that my ferret is dying.

I have had my ferret for 4.5 years. It is amazing that he has lasted this long since he has green slime (if you don't know it is an intestinal disease ferrets get). After talking with my mom we have decided that the best thing to do is to put him to sleep. I just don't want to put him through a whole lot of pain that he won't understand.

I have spent lots of time with him since I have had to go home so much and I am not going up there to see him one last time. The last time I saw him was beautiful. We played a lot and he was as adorable as always (I wish I had a pic).

I hope that his recent rapid weight loss is nothing, but I am trying to be logical about this. 4 years ago they told me he would live till 3. I don't want to watch them kill him. I don't want him to be in pain.

And it wouldn't hurt if God would send some good things may way. I've been smiling in the midst of all the crap going on and my face is starting to hurt as much as my heart.

Sing it with me, even if just in your head

If your happy and you know it clap your hands
*clap clap*
If your happy and you know it clap your hands
*clap clap*
If your happy and you know it and you really want to show it
if your happy and you know it clap your hands
*clap clap*

See now don't you feel just a little better, if not a lot silly
Life is beautiful and don't you forget it

"A chasing after the wind..."

Within the last week my uncle has passed away and I have also found out that a very good friend is dying (the doctors are giving him till Saturday). This entire semester has been so hard and yet, for the most part, I have remained happy. I think I just appareciate the fact that life is so short and so random. The only thing we can do is love and let those we love know we love them. Often.

Following is one of my favorite Biblical passages. Enjoy.

Ecclesiastes 9; A Common Destiny for All

¹ So I reflected on all this and concluded that the righteous and the wise and what they do are in God's hands, but no man knows whether love or hate awaits him. ² All share a common destiny-the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad, ^[a] the clean and the unclean, those who offer sacrifices and those who do not....

⁵ For the living know that they will die,
but the dead know nothing;
they have no further reward,
and even the memory of them is forgotten.
⁶ Their love, their hate
and their jealousy have long since vanished;
never again will they have a part
in anything that happens under the sun.

⁷ Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for it is now that God favors what you do. ⁸ Always be clothed in white, and always anoint your head with oil. ⁹ Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun- all your meaningless days.