Baby Mama

I just got back from my hair place (or the SA-lon as hubby calls it) and I am shocked - shocked! - to report that Ashlee Simpson is pregnant. OK, well, maybe. It was US Weekly after all. Regardless, if it is true then she is yet another young, unmarried, celeb who apparently doesn't know how to use a condom and I am sick and tired of it.

For the record, I do not give damn whether or not these women, no, girls, are married or not. It's the fact that they do not have their lives together, decide to bring a child into the mix and then, by the glib way they talk about it, set an unrealistic example for young girls. Under the best circumstances, like having a supportive partner who, ideally, you live with, and being financially and emotionally secure, having a baby can seriously throw you for a loop. I was lucky enough to be in the ideal circumstance when I had each of my kids and each and every time I had days when I thought I was going to jump off a bridge. So when a teenager in Anywhere, USA is deciding whether or not to have sex and if so, whether or not to abstain until proper birth control is obtained she can relax, thanks to Jamie Lynn Spears, Jessica Alba, and, maybe, Ashlee Simpson, knowing that if she does, indeed, get pregnant, it's no big deal.

This trend feeds into my rage, in general, at the way pregnancy and motherhood are portrayed in the media. A pregnant belly is treated like an accessory and while I appreciate the subsequent increase in availability and chicness of maternity clothing, the real, stretch-marked, swollen-ankled truth about the physical demands of carrying a child are swept under the red carpet.

And after these celebs have their babies - wait, let me take a deep breath here to keep my blood pressure under control. OK, better. If I see one more fucking celebrity on the cover of a magazine with the caption "Body after baby!" I'm going to drive down to US Weekly's offices with a firearm. Let me say this for all of you who do not have children and for those of you who have had a child and weren't wearing your size 24 True Religion jeans five weeks later (I had to look up the size comparison since I know nothing about these weird, Euro-sizes) - IT IS NOT NORMAL TO BE BACK TO YOUR OLD BODY RIGHT AFTER YOU HAVE A BABY. Do you know why these women look so great? Because they have a staff. Someone else, other than them or their complaining husband, is getting up with their kid in the middle of the night so they can get a full eight hours of sleep in order to have enough energy to workout for two hours the next day while yet another person cares for their infant. After each baby, I barely had enough energy to stuff that third cookie in my mouth to give me a sugar rush to wake up and take care of my kids, never mind take a Boot Camp class. I loved, loved, loved Sarah Jessica Parker for saying during a post-baby interview that she was able to get back into shape so quickly only because she was lucky enough to have childcare which many new moms do not have.

The media, in its irresponsible praise of celeb moms does not mention the fact that the life of a celeb new mother looks so easy compared to yours because it is. They have someone to clean their homes, cook their healthy meals (or accept their Zone delivery), do their laundry, you name it, they don't have to do it. With all this extra time they can actually shower, or even brush their hair - imagine! But the most glaring oversight is the fact that these new moms return to work and their lives carry on as if they'd never had a child. And it is this that makes me the most angry. The average, young, single mother out there struggles and sacrifices. Many can barely cover the cost of the daycare that allows them to work. So when a young girls is making important decisions about her life and sees these images in the media she may think, "Hey! Jessica Alba can do it. So can I, even though I'm only sixteen, live with my parents have haven't graduated from high school."

Yeah, yeah, I know. It's the parents' responsibility to make sure their kids make the right choices and the media shouldn't be parenting our children, but for some kids that's the case. And while US Weekly and OK only care about selling magazines, celebrities should care about being role models for their audiences. For all that money we pay them by buying albums and movie tickets, so they can hire four nannies to tend to one baby, the least we can ask for is a little honesty. Even if it's only to say, "How do I look so good after my baby? A lot of money. A lot of money and Spanx."