I’m so glad your little guy/gal is doing well! But it sucks so much that you have to worry about costs as well as health.

Same! I had a condition that made it harder to feel the baby so every couple of weeks I wound up in emergency. They would monitor me for hours and send me on my way and it didn’t cost a cent (except, yes, my taxes- but this is the kind of thing taxes should go to).

Ugh, my brother does stuff like this all the time. Before I had kids, my mom would tell me when complained that I’d do it too when I had kids. Well, guess what? It’s been 3 months since bubs was of and NOPE! unless you are my child’s dr, I will not make you hear that crap. 

My local primary school (sadly in a low vaccination rate area) has had to shit several times due to various epidemics. The govt recently changed the law so that you have to be vaccinated to go to school. A whole bunch of people complained that it violated a child’s right to learn. As a teacher, though, my first…

I think a lot of people forget the ongoing effects of this disease. My parents grew up before the vaccine and both have serious diseases caused by measles scarring- my dad is down to 50% lung function despite never smoking and my mom almost went blind because she had scarring on her retinas. Both of these issues only…

Parents are the worst!

I’m not from the USA but in my country the coroners also are not medically trained- they’re judges who get appointed by an impartial (ish) board. But still, they usually get the pathologists to decide the cause of death and then address the areas around the death. 

Well, yeah! Being a teacher is hard! It can also be rewarding and fun, but it’s super tough. There aren’t enough hours in the day, there are stupid bureaucratic issues that take up way too much time, a staggering amount of people who don’t teach try to tell you how to do your job. You literally always have to be the…

I used work in that area and it was standard to have vague categories of death: falls, head injury, suffocation etc and you would put multiple types of death into those categories (eg aneurysms and car crashes with head impact into the same category). It didn’t always give enough context but I guess worked ok.

There’s a thing called ‘Christmas in July’ which is mostly an advertising thing although some do the traditional Christmas dinner then (my family often mean to but usually forget). Plus the queen’s birthday long weekend in June (not her actual birthday and not a real holiday).

Um, Christmas is very much a food centered holiday! At least in Britain and Australia. It’s all about turkey, gravy, roast veggies, pudding, custard etc. and here because it’s summer we have prawns and oysters and ham and salads! Despite it being routinely 30 odd degrees centigrade (I think 90ish Fahrenheit)we insist…

There is another recording where they rhyme it with ‘haggard’

Always relevant:

Same. I have a newborn right now but immediately before she was conceived I had an early miscarriage (on Christmas Day just to really add to the experience). Not many know and because I wouldn’t have my beautiful baby if I hadn’t had the miscarriage, those who do know expect me to be neutral or even glad about it. But…

People don’t seem to realise how bad the effects can be.

Not mine, but my parents’ friends. They met about forty years ago when she was a bridesmaid at his wedding. They hit it off, But he had literally just gotten married that day so they both shrugged it off. A year goes by, first marriage goes to shit and they run into each other in the street.

Currently 9 months pregnant but carrying smallish (5ft 10, so I guess there’s extra room). In busy places I put my hand on my bump mostly to bring attention to it so people don’t just walk right into it/ elbow it. But yep, I don’t walk around fondling it- and would get a sharp kick to the ribs if I did

I’ve spent time in Japan by myself- safest I’ve ever felt! Went walking around even at night by myself, never bothered by strangers and despite not speaking a word of Japanese, found it easy to get by.

synchronized swimming

Eh, as far as I’m concerned, the movies are not canon