The problem with 'bereavement' leave after pregnancy loss
Last month New Zealand broke new ground with a national policy of "Bereavement Leave" following miscarriage. This is a welcome...
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Lara Freidenfelds
- Oct 6, 2020
Pregnancy and Miscarriage on Social Media
New Metaphors to Make Miscarriages Easier to Talk About, and Easier to Bear For someone who has been trying for a pregnancy, it is...
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Lara Freidenfelds
- Sep 23, 2020
During Covid, We Need to Grieve, Find Perspective, and Seek Safe Connection and Fulfillment
I wrote this letter to the editor of my local newspaper after my community experienced a Covid outbreak from a teen party, resulting in a...
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Lara Freidenfelds
- Mar 14, 2020
Sperm Donor Siblings Speak Their Truths
In Random Families: Genetic Strangers, Sperm Donor Siblings, and the Creation of New Kin, sociologists Rosanna Hertz and Margaret Nelson...
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Lara Freidenfelds
- Jan 1, 2020
How Did We Get Here? An Interview with Lara Freidenfelds (by Shannon Withycombe)
Lara Freidenfelds’s new book, The Myth of the Perfect Pregnancy: A History of Miscarriage in America, explores the history of pregnancy...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Oct 23, 2019
In Vitro Fertilization: From Science Fiction to Reality to History
It was not that long ago that “test tube babies” only existed in science fiction. I remember my shock when, in 2007, one of my students...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Nov 22, 2018
Give Thanks for Crossing Guards
“Wait on the curb, kids. Wait until I say you can cross.” Janice, the crossing guard at Fairmount Avenue, stepped briskly into traffic,...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Nov 16, 2018
Washington Post op-ed: What Michelle Obama’s Miscarriage Teaches Us About Modern Pregnancy
“In her new book, “Becoming,” Michelle Obama reveals that she miscarried her first pregnancy, and went on to conceive her two daughters...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Sep 6, 2018
A View from Inside the Suburban Mom Movement
Before 2016, conversations at school pickup time in my affluent suburb nearly always revolved around kids’ activities and home...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Aug 23, 2018
Are Our Smart Devices Turning Us into Dumb Humans?
Are all of our “smart” devices training us to be “dumb” humans, too-often indistinguishable from mere machines? As click-through...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Dec 25, 2017
Let’s Say “Happy Holidays” and Share Hope, Joy, and Light in the Darkness
“Merry Christmas!” It was the standard December greeting in the New Jersey town where I was raised. New Jersey is diverse as a whole, but...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Nov 17, 2017
Let’s Question All Versions of the Myth of Perfect Motherhood
I would call it a “pet peeve,” but the stakes are higher: I can’t stand policy arguments based on inaccurate or misrepresented historical...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Oct 23, 2017
Pornography on the Playground
When I was 19, I had a summer job supervising a playground. It was a pretty lame job. It paid $5 an hour, and it was outside in the...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Sep 22, 2017
Face to Face with Sharrona Pearl
I recently had the pleasure of speaking with Sharrona Pearl about her new book, Face/On: Transplants and the Ethics of the Other. Below...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Jun 15, 2017
The Baby as Scientist and the Parent as Gardener: Alison Gopnik’s Inspiring Views on Childhood
One of my favorite books to recommend to new parents is The Scientist in the Crib: What Early Learning Tells Us About the Mind. In it,...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Feb 8, 2017
Referendum on a Life in the Woods
For three decades, my dad’s brothers framed houses. The three of them had a small construction business in rural Connecticut. The eldest...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Dec 23, 2016
Nurse-Midwives are With Women, Walking a Middle Path to a Safe and Rewarding Birth
In childbirth politics as in all politics, extreme viewpoints make the news, and sensible centrists are ignored. A couple of years ago,...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Oct 18, 2016
Are We Free to Be President Yet? The Legacy of Pat Schroeder and 1970s Feminism
I was born into 1970s feminism. I came into the world in 1972, the year Free to Be You and Me came out. It must have made a big...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Oct 11, 2016
Diversity Works, but Only if We Can Forgive One Another
“We are a divided nation,” Donald Trump repeats again and again. And then he makes plans to divide us still further: registration of...
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Lara Freidenfelds (Admin)
- Aug 25, 2016
Playwright Alice Eve Cohen Asks Us to Reconsider What We Think We Know about Pregnancy and Motherhoo
“What makes a mother real?” asks writer and performer Alice Eve Cohen in her newly-published play, What I Thought I Knew. In 1999, Cohen...
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