Gabrielle Gassin

A mother’s musings on life

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  • Looking For Something

    It’s becoming clear to me as I travel through life that a sense of satisfaction is transient for many of us. Framed in myriad ways by thousands who have come before, is the concept that we are all on a similar expedition; we are all Looking For Something.

    Sometimes the desire to satisfy this at times, seemingly unquenchable thirst is entirely what drives a person: to set and complete daily habits, to work every day towards Goals. But what if you, the hunter, are in the forest with all the right gear…but you don’t know what your target is? There’s a recurrent feeling pervading our thirtysomething-year-old psyche: this notion that we are standing blindfolded, bodies clothed yes, but our fumbling hands are anxious, feeling around for something stable to calm a mind that is naked of fulfilment.

    The search for meaning is perpetual; for when one thing fills us up and even spills over the edge of the cup, contentment is rife and satisfaction abundant. But slowly, it seems as if the cup has a sad little leak. With it, the bounty of meaningful joy seeps out, the question begins to niggle and eventually the voyage begins again. But hope isn’t lost, for the desire to go Looking For Something with Purpose will bring Purpose to the seeker, and hopefully too, those who follow in her wake.

  • Bare feet | a prompt

    Barefoot bliss is a state of being experienced only by some of our kind. As we all know, us humans walked the earth barefoot for millennia and were content to do so, before the invention of shoes. Nowadays, shoes play an absolutely pivotal role in several areas of society. Not only is footwear there to provide the feet with a barrier of safety from the nastiness of city pavement, it also enforces stereotypes of class, providing yet another system of segregating those who are essentially born equal.

    Removing shoes from a scenario altogether conveys one of two messages: either your shoe-clothing is embarrassingly out of shape for the environment you’re entering, or you are rediscovering a lost connection with Mother Earth. The latter, when being observed by a shoed onlooker, would be accompanied by an assessment of clothing, hair and jewelry as to judge whether the “hippy” archetype fits the build. Generally this image is accepted.

    Age is also a strong determinant of characterising a shoe-less person. The younger the culprit is, the more accepting we seem to be. Many parents encourage children to go without shoes: perhaps attempting to keep aflame that primitive desire we have as humans not to shod our feet in man-made materials like plastic and rubber. Children are closer to what we innately are; the biases and rules of culture are yet to infiltrate untainted minds – so this might feasibly explain such behaviour.

    If one is exposed to a grown person, in public, wearing daily attire but without shoes, a silent and scathing critique would at first ensue, followed by a realisation that this person might actually be in grave danger – perhaps he or she removed their shoes to flee. No offer of help would follow this inaudible verdict, however, despite the self-made justification. Why else would a person be barefoot in public?

    What a strange and interesting thing we have created by designing and producing covering for our feet.

  • Birds (in your head and on your screen) | a prompt

    If you’re in the realm of disposable income that allows you to spend in excess of three hundred dollars on a little piece of technology to assist in your meditation practice, you’d want to hear the birds that sing when you hit the bliss brain wave.

    The ‘Muse‘ headset application plays the lovely sound of gentle, chirping birds, when your brain remains in a state of calm for long periods of time. It’s quite nice to use, really, and one feels a sense of real achievement when there are multiple birds listed on the review and tracking screen.

    But this isn’t a sales pitch. The question potentially more fitting for those serious meditators – is this the sort of device that would be used by a Tibetan Monk? Trust our generation of humans to take an age old practice and modernise it by convincing people they should wear a special little headband to meditate, and then check over a fun little series of graphs and charts to see what progress was made. Our consumerism-driven society is alive and well in 2021, that’s for sure.

    I’m informed that evidently, the name of this little game is ‘bio feedback’. For correcting and practicing the art of meditation, receive real-time feedback about how your brain is dancing whilst you sit still and breathe. Well, why not, I suppose. If you do have the sort of aforementioned cash to throw around on this little treasure, you’ve probably also got a lot of noise in your brain that a bit of assistance and good natured nudging could help to dislodge. Good natured, because you can choose either the beach or the rainforest to listen to during your practice. The thing monitors when your brain goes haywire: (did I lock the front door? Is that the baby crying? Is there enough bread for breakfast?) and plays increasingly stormy weather in order to jolt you back into the ether. Once you’re calm for an extended period, the birds start – and then theres no going back.

    A luxurious purchase, for sure. Excessive, some might even say. But worth it? That’s for you to decide. Meanwhile, I’m going to borrow my husband’s to see what all the fuss is about.

  • A Noisy Fanny Speaks for Herself

     

    So, you’re pregnant. Or maybe you’ve already had three babies, each one exiting through your vagina. Perhaps you’ve c-sectioned two little ones, and reading this might cause you to intake some air, loudly. No matter which of these categories you fit into or not, we need to talk about a secret little topic which has been overlooked at mum’s group. Not even mention of your pelvic floor rehabilitation exercises gives this topic room to air…it’s the inconspicuous yet illustrious fanny fart. 

    The medical term for this unwelcome occurrence is vaginal flatulence, and studies quote that a highly variable number of women experience it. Hmm…it’s the topic flying under the radar, despite the fact that as much as 69% of us are well acquainted with it. Many women hear their vaginas contributing in random situations: For some of us a little air escapes during our morning yoga class and we’re scared to attempt a three-legged downward dog ever again. Others become wary of simply moving from sitting to standing at a coffee date, for fear of setting free what sounds remarkably like an actual fart and being judged by one and all. 

    Technically, a chattering vulva occurs when the integrity of vaginal wall tissue has been compromised – usually after a superstar feat such as the vaginal birth of a baby or two. The valve-like structure at the entrance to the vagina allows air to freely venture in while the woman is at rest, which seems fine, right? But here’s the catch. That same gateway closes with movement, trapping air inside the vaginal canal. With activity, the abdominal and pelvic pressures increase, and air is expelled through the closed entryway, much like air escaping through a musical wind instrument. Voilà! Your vagina now not only produces babies, it is also an in-built French horn which toots whenever it feels the need. 

    Obstetrics and Gynaecology Fellow at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney Doctor Sarika Gupta states that interestingly, younger women of reproductive age and slimmer women are more susceptible to a noisy giney because pelvic floor muscle strength is lower in this group overall. This is likely due to the youngsters believing they have a “ good pelvic floor” and not routinely engaging in pelvic floor strengthening exercises, particularly after childbirth. As if the thought of a human leaving the womb via a teeny tiny hole wasn’t enough to handle, this such action is the very provoking factor to a chatty fanny. In childbirth, 75% of women undergo perineal tissue damage, which usually requires getting stitched back up to keep everything in. And then, the pelvic floor exercises need to become habitual in order to repair the ruins and keep the varting on the low-low. 

    Worrying about keeping our insides inside is another fear inducing concept that we’ve all thought about before birthing a little person. Women who give birth to a big baby, have an instrumental delivery or shoot out multiples are at higher risk of developing a prolapse – where part or all of the vagina heads downtown. Those who experience this have a lot more work to do on the recovery side of things, and some even need surgery to replace everything properly. Unfortunately, ladies in one or more of these situations are more likely to experience vaginal wind, as the tissues in that area are weakened with such an injury. Sheesh! 

    All of this goes hand in hand with pelvic floor function and is all too familiar to pregnant mum of two, Emma Muskett. After two uncomplicated natural births, her vaginal back wall has prolapsed, and the fanny farts are real. For Emma, they are most obvious during everyday movement – so much so that she has employed some little tricks to try and evade awkward situations where friends and strangers might think she’s passing wind. “I try and do a movement, kind of like rock in my chair before getting up, to maybe get it out before standing. This sometimes works!” Kudos to Emma, she hasn’t let the queefing impact her quality of life. She still goes out despite its prominent occurrence in her everyday routines. She remains vigilant, however, to use these little techniques to keep the flatulence at bay. 

    Not every woman has the confidence that Emma has, however. Doctor Gupta says that actually, most studies indicate that vaginal flatulence causes considerable distress that leads to a severe decrease in quality of life. But again, almost all of us are ignoring the presence of it. The limited data available suggests that the majority of women do not seek medical help for flatulence alone, due to embarrassment or shame. That’s one huge reason there isn’t a whole lot of chit chat about it! Here we are, experiencing a loss of our libido, with the thought of a fart-sound making itself known at exactly the wrong moment, while others in the Queef-Club are reporting social isolation due to the insecurities associated with emitting wind in public. So, what can we do about it? 

    Targeted physiotherapy is most often the first line of management for tackling vaginal wind. This sort of physio improves the integrity of the muscles and tissues of the pelvic floor, which then translates into narrowing of the entrance, thus preventing that valve from forming and limiting air from being trapped. Bam! Failing this, ladies, we also have the option of placing an object in the vagina such as a tampon or pessary, like a little piece of hidden treasure. This would fill up the vault space and prevent air from entering and getting trapped. Our in-built wind instrument would sing no more. 

    Thank goodness there are ways and means we can tackle this problem. And the first step? Let’s talk about it. We don’t have to continue doing yoga in our living rooms forever, girls! It might take some courage to address, but the upside will be downward dogs and shoulder stands with our vaginas remaining forever silent, and the confidence to leave the house for normal tasks restored. Nobody should be afraid of bending down in the supermarket aisle. And the best thing about it: you can begin right now. In and up, ladies! 

    ——-

    An altered version of this feature article was published on Essential Baby, here

    References: 

    Jeffery S, Franco A & Fynes M. Vaginal wind—the cube pessary as a solution? International Journal of Urogynaecology, 2007 

    Neels H et al. Vaginal wind: a literature review. European Journal of Obstetrics & Gynaecology and Reproductive Biology, 2017 

    Krissi H, Medina C & Stanton S. Vaginal wind—a new pelvic symptom. International Journal of Urogynaecology, 2013 

    Hsu S. Vaginal wind—a treatment option. International Journal of Urogynaecology, 2007 

    Contributors: Doctor Sarika Gupta, Obstetrics and Gynaecology Fellow at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, MBBS, MIPH, MRANZCOG, PhD (Usyd) Illustrations by Sarika Gupta 

    Case Study: Emma Muskett

    Others: Emma Grant and Brit Jollife and Women’s Health Specialist Samantha Craddock 

    http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/pregnancy/pregnancy-health/vaginal-wind-the-embarrassing-condition-no-one-wants-to-talk-about-20210429-h1vjd0

  • undone | a poem

    I’ve lost my way.

    There’s been too much thinking going on.

    I’ve been misled; believing that planning to write would get me writing.

    “Planning” has kept me away from the pen, the keypad, the notebook. Because a plan begins with an idea, and an idea could come from anywhere.

    But thinking too hard has interrupted my natural flow, and now I’m stuck with nothing.

  • outside the binary.

    Recently, a man was at the park with his two kids and dog. After a brief chat, he commented to his kids that he liked my son’s hair (the top knot). For some reason this urge to explain his hair style has overcome me lately; perhaps there is something inside my brain that believes that the explanation warrants the style: somehow making it acceptable for a little boy to A.have long hair and B.wear it tied up. I pursued this path with my clarification, and followed it with something akin to: everybody assumes he is a girl, though he really does have quite a boyish face.

    This man in the park with his two kids and dog then said to me, “I know what you mean. This is my son” with a flourish of his left hand he gestured the child next to him. My eyes darted to the child I had already seen and chatted with and then back to the father. I thought this man was having a laugh, playing some sort of sick joke with the little girl next to him. He was delighting in the protagonist role in some sort of weird “let’s freak out the mums at the park” satire. To express that I didn’t know what to say would be false because I didn’t even get so far as to consider a response. All that I actually managed to sputter was, “really?” Even the boy nodded in my direction.

    The child in question looked every bit the stereotype of a grade 3 girl. He had long, blonde hair swept to one side in a low ponytail. He was wearing a pair of earrings in the lower lobe, identical to his sister: little dangling stars. The sky blue school uniform shirt was the same as his sister, and he was wearing navy tights with tiny sparkles all over them. He had a lovely face, freckles and deep dimples highlighting the smile of an innocent child.

    At that moment, I thought I was a fairly unassuming person. I thought that my education, my career choices and the “seeing the world” I’ve done had played a part in shaping my understanding of the world. I realised though, very quickly and shockingly, that in fact the society we live in has simply shaped my perception of gender in the way that it wants me to comprehend. Girl equals this, this and this and boy equals the opposite. This notion is embedded in fixed patterns that we expose our children to from the moment of conception onward and is perpetuated by most people. It’s the whole “pink is for girls, blue is for boys,” put simply.

    Prior to this occurrence at the park, I listened to a podcast which warped my present understanding of what gender is. I thought that there were two genders: male and female, and I was surprised to hear that Science disagrees. Not every body fits into the binary; with the biological makeup of the body (sex) aligning with the social expectations associated with it (gender). For as long as history has determined, our society has set the rules for the gender binary. It is both prescriptive and proscriptive, meaning those individuals who develop two X chromosomes are expected to fit into the category of “woman” by identifying, acting and developing the body of a “woman” and those with X and Y chromosomes do the same with expectations to act in line with masculine stereotypes.

    There is another classification that occurs naturally for a person, for which our society has long ignored or tried to change. Known in circles today as intersex, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights defines this “category” as:

    “Intersex is an umbrella term used to describe a wide range of innate bodily variations of sex characteristics.
    Intersex people are born with physical sex characteristics (such as sexual anatomy, reproductive organs, hormonal patterns and/or chromosomal patterns) that do not fit typical definitions for male or female bodies.”

    The podcast, “My Body, My Podcast” hosted by Elizabeth Banks is beyond informative and eye opening. She interviews Pidgeon Pagonis – intersex activist, writer and artist, who themselves experienced a confusing childhood, within which their truth was concealed by medical professionals in order to try and squeeze them into a predetermined category: one of the gender binaries. My mind was blown; I really had no idea firstly about the traits of an intersex person, nor the struggles endured by someone navigating an unconventional life in a conventional society.

    Over recent years, representation of people who fall outside of the gender binary has grown in the public sphere. The LGBTQ+ community is alive and well, and with a growing general presence and flourishing confidence in the media, people like me are challenged to question the internal biases we’ve been raised to believe are the status quo. And so we should. I can only envisage the heartache and challenge of daily life when you feel that you’re one thing but you’re being told you’re another, and the question of who you really are is constant and unanswered. The way our rule makers attempt to bring order to what could be a chaotic world is through creating distinctions between girls and boys. But these lines of distinction enforce inner turmoil for those who cannot adhere to them, and that just isn’t just.

    About three weeks ago, my four year old boy asked me two questions. The first one, seeming to have come simply from a pondering and curious mind was: “what happens when a girl and a girl love each other?” My response was this. “When a girl and a girl love each other, they can live together if they want to, they can get married if they want to, and (with the help of science) they can make a baby if they want to.” Locking eyes with my husband, the question was whether this answer was okay. My son’s second question was: “what happens when a boy and a boy love each other?” and I acknowledged the query in a similar way, recognising that if two boys want to have a baby, they need the help of a female body. I didn’t go into further detail, though I’m certainly not afraid to do so.

    It seems that recently, my exposure to the topic of gender binaries and all the very many subcategories which fall inside, outside and all around, has increased. I am happy to feel somewhat disarmed by this, because my reaction means that I’m open to learning. My mind is not glued into position and reluctant to modify ideals. My kids are going to grow up knowing everything there is to know, so that if the time ever came that either of them was in a position where their own identity was compromised, or even that of a friend…they would know that it’s safe to ask, it’s safe to express, and being who you want to be is acceptable without judgement.

    I am glad that the situation at the park made me feel awkward and wrong. It’s not okay to make an assumption about a person’s sex or gender thus place them in a category that doesn’t fit with their choices. My reaction should not have been so stark, and I see now that I need to actively shift the stereotypes which line the seams of my mind, so that future encounters might be tended to differently. Diversity is intriguing, and intrigue is a magical thing.

  • difficult people | a prompt

    It can take some serious strength of character to handle a difficult person with compassion, but what can sometimes happen if it’s done well is the total subversion of a tentatively terrible situation. Recognition of The Ego in oneself and then the ability to quieten it must first occur, so that you don’t feel the rush to get back at the person giving you grief. Then, you can depart with satisfaction that you didn’t also lose your shit.

    The other day, I attempted to reason with and assist a man (who was being VERY difficult) to help him realise, politely, that he was in the wrong. He had been stationary whilst I began a three point reverse park into a ‘parents with prams’ car space. This elderly man went just a little short of psycho with the assumption that I was a thief, robbing him of his car spot on this Tuesday morning. I ceased moving, blocked three or four cars from passing and buzzed my window down.

    Irately, he claimed that the car spot, clearly indicated among a row of signs with a human figure and a stroller, was his. I calmly replied that no, sir, have a look. I gestured to the signs and informed him that these spots were for parents with children in tow. “I”M AN INVALID!!!” he screamed at me, syllabic emphasis made obvious with his British accent, spittle surely raining down his window panel and steering wheel. I signalled to the five or six empty disabled spots further along. Apparently, these weren’t suitable.

    Composure retained, I replied again. I told him that he could have the spot despite not being entitled to it and I followed that cordially with the words, “just because you’re an ‘invalid’ doesn’t mean you have to be an arsehole!” I pressed the button to close my window and drove serenely away, releasing the flow of traffic which had been impeded by this comical car park episode.

    In front of my four year old, I was content with my dealings of this difficult, self righteous specimen. I allowed him his victory but hopefully stung his stinking attitude with a taste of virtuous honesty. Despite having a strong sense of compassion and empathy, I won’t be walked over for no good reason, nor will I teach my son to bow down to acrimony. When you’re right, you’re right and when you’re wrong, you’re wrong. Knowing both sides is fundamental to developing into a “good” person and living a happy life.

    I hope that gentlemen’s cup of tea burnt his wretched tongue.

  • self talk | a prompt

    The bridge to happiness and contentment in life can depend almost entirely on the colour of language that forms in one part of the brain and is received in another.

    Self Talk is the modern name for the little jabber jabber chattering on your shoulder, dictating your every move, reviewing your decisions past and present and sometimes playing the role that represents a relative of Lucifer – the one you don’t get along with.

    Many of us listen with resolution to this voice, allowing the words to infiltrate and activate our existence, no matter the flavour. Few of us realise that in fact, the fragrance of the word tones emitted and accepted are defined by our very own consciousness.

    It can be hard goddamn work to tell yourself one thing when your cells are working in unison to spread fake news about another. It turns out though, that the catalogue of words which filters through the back of our eyes and decorates the daily mood weather, can have an impressive impact on how we actually show up to our day. Self talk can inflict a sense of elation if you want it to, or it can bring you smack down into the crevasse of a chronic depressive…if you want it to.

    Knowing this, the choice to make really shouldn’t be a difficult one. So let’s just cut the bull shit and get it done. Positive self talk that is going to progress our lives is what we all need. Give power to yourself.

    It matters not how strait the gate,
          How charged with punishments the scroll,
    I am the master of my fate,
          I am the captain of my soul.

    -William Ernest Henley