I'm an atheist Jew and my husband is a lapsed Catholic (with a tendency towards agnosticism). We don't go to either church or synagogue, but I celebrate Yom Kippur, Channukah and Passover, and we both celebrate Christmas (he's really cute about it, one year he got me a present for every night of Chanukkah).

Hee, I love talking genetics! Although I was wrong about one thing. It wasn't Denmark or finland. It was Iceland. There was actually a large genetics project done there where everyone in the country had their genome screened.

Those numbers are from 1987, and reflect women who have abortions past 16 weeks. Which means we can't know how many of those abortions were still within the second trimester, and how many were third trimester. And the number one reason cited was not recognizing they were pregnant:

Oh, my aunt's first child was born with that condition. She survived for 2 hours after birth. It was devastating for my aunt, and she was afraid to have more children (she did have 3 healthy pregnancies later). I don't think at the time this was as detectable (sometime around 1984 I think) but if it had been I…

With genetic mouse models we do a lot of brother-sister mating to create inbred strains so that all the mice of a particular strain are supposed to be genetically identical (in theory, in reality there are scattered somatic mutations hanging around in all individuals). Then when you throw in a specific mutation and…

I never said it's all genetic, but a LOT of research has been done to show that there is a genetic component. I never said we shouldn't examine environmental components, but it sounded like you were saying it's all environmental. It's clear to most geneticists that there is a mixture of both, but it is usually…

And if you search "Autism genetic" you get 3257 articles. And I've never seen anyone who argued for an environmental contribution who denied the genetic contribution.

My understanding is that the TDaP is a new thing. When I was younger, you had to get the tetnus booster every 10 years, but it didn't include Pertussis. But they began recognizing that Pertussis did wear off, so now it's a combined shot.

My friends who had this first kid on thanksgiving also had this rule. And honestly, it was good for me. I couldn't remember when, if ever, I has gotten a Whooping Cough booster, so now I feel better that I am more protected.

My husband is a photographer, and he shot a wedding for a couple where the woman was, I think, 6 months pregnant. She was worried about how she would look in photos, so my husband did his best to photograph her really well. She looked beautiful regardless, but I think a good photographer can do wonders. (Looking at…

I understand, I think there's this underlying current of trying to find the right way to do things. I read your comment as being "this worked for me, so this is the right way" instead of reading it as "this worked for me."

I am an empowered woman who LOVED princesses and wanted to be a princess until I was probably about 12 or so. I also loved math and reading and wanted to be a writer, actress, and teacher (all at the same time). And now I'm nearing the end of grad school, so to have a PhD in human genetics, pursuing a career towards…

my lips are zipped, but I may have to steal that recipe.

We do use the Hormel canned stuff, and I imagine we eat our entire days allotment of sodium in that meal, but it tastes sooo good, and we only eat it once in awhile.

I enjoy both. I like Annies, but sometimes I really want my neon orange mac and cheese.

They don't tend to explain holidays to me too much, but they do seem flabbergasted by some of my experiences. Like that I have friends who aren't Jewish. Because they live, play and go to school only with other Jews, so they've barely ever met non-Jews before.

Sort of tangential to your situation, but it reminded me of when my Ultra-orthodox cousins visited my grandmother the same time I did. Since we were in Florida I wore shorts and tank tops, but since they are so religious, the girls all had to wear the long sleeved shirts and skirts. And they had been taught that All…

Yeah, she used to send me birthday cards to Sara and I always sent a thank you that I signed Sarah.

Sarah is super common, but it's 50/50 whether a person spells it Sara or Sarah.

See I actually lost a lot of respect for the college republicans that year because they admitted that they didn't adhere to Schlafly's beliefs but brought her in to cause controversy, and that just pissed me off.