Outraged!

So I was reading the November edition of Babytalk magazine and there is an article in there worth reading for every mother, soon to be mom, or woman for that matter! Entitled, "Don't get cheated!" the article is easy ways to fight for the maternity leave you deserve. It starts with some startling facts:

"Give birth to a baby in France and you can count on at least 16 weeks of paid leave to cuddle and bond. Have a child in Norway and you get 42 weeks at full pay. Sweden promises 390 days at 80 percent of your salary."

Seriously, we are the richest and most powerful country in the world and all Uncle Sam promises is employers have to offer 12 weeks of unpaid maternity leave and that rule only applies to companies with more that 50 employees (Family and Medical Leave Act)! I guess I never really thought about this but it really is a problem. Studies show that the more time mom can bond with baby the lower the chance that child will have emotional and psychological problems. And of course the longer the mom can breastfeed the lower the risk of all kinds of things like infections. But how can a single mom just stay at home with her baby when there is no one else supporting her financially? I have heard people criticize the moms that HAVE to go back to work after 6 weeks, and I just wonder what in the world they are supposed to do? I have been VERY fortunate to be able to stay at home with Addie and I thank God and Graham for that everyday, but I think we need to rally together to get a solution to this problem from our government. I believe there are too many people in this country that aren't even aware of this problem, I was one of them. We need to get this out there and make it one of the strong political issues. Here are a few ways the article suggests that you can do to help make the presidential candidates, congressmen, state reps, etc aware that this is a problem and we are not going to stop till something is done!

Email the presidential candidates-
Just go to momsrising.org and click on the "campaigns" link, then click on "momsvote'08: e-mail the Candidates"
They provide a sample letter you can make your own or just send.

Email your state reps-
Babytalk.com also posted a sample letter along with a list of Democratic and Republican state party websites.

I know you are all busy, but this only takes mere minutes. So please take a minute and send these emails and tell everyone you can to do the same. Together we can make a difference!