Over a bowl of chili at lunch, I scanned the Des Moines Register. An article about a girls' high school bowling championship caught my eye. Bowling is now a sanctioned sport for women in 80 Iowa high schools, the 10th such sport for women. When I started teaching in Iowa in l975, track was the only women’s sport and then only because Title IX forced high schools to offer girls athletic opportunities.

That same year, Tom answered a knock at our apartment door one night and there stood several high school boys holding a huge trophy. Schools didn’t sanction bowling at that time so these kids asked Tom, who was Booster Club president, to make a personal donation so they could attend the state bowling league championship. He was their sole sponsor, so their arrival to present him with the state bowling trophy was a surprise.

Bowling is good exercise, it’s fun and helps people understand teamwork and the ups and downs of competition, which is a part of our everyday lives as adults.

In the article, Lincoln High School girls spoke about the fun of competing in the state championship and their pride in the recognition they’ve received. These women are learning a life-time sport, something they can do with a date, a spouse or life-partner; something they can do with their children someday, or a great way to enjoy a night out with friends.

The assistant director of the Girls Athletic Union says that this sport reaches 40% of students who are not involved in their schools in any other way. That’s the best part. Team sports are one more alternative to premature sexual activity, one more esteem-building activity. We’ve come a long way.

Opportunities

Diana Rodrigez grins at her dad who sits next to her when a sentence she has cut from another document magically appears on the computer monitor before her. The Computers for Youth teacher switches between English and Spanish to accommodate the diverse parent-child population gathered at Leonardo da Vinci Middle School in Corona, Queens, New York on a Saturday morning for a first lesson in technology.

Another dad in the front of the room yawns. He’s just gotten off work and would normally be home asleep, but he has to attend the class in order for his son to take home the free, refurbished computer offered to families by this program that puts parents together with their children to learn some basic word processing skills.

The director of the program, Kavita Gilchrist, says that many of the 700 6th graders at this school will attend one of the Saturday morning classes with a parent so they can access the computers, even though the program can no longer offer Internet access.

In front of Diana a boy can’t get the hang of the double-click. He tries again and again, his third finger awkwardly getting in the way. I am reminded not to assume that all 6th graders in this country have mastered the double-click or the right-click.

I have to listen carefully to understand a teacher talking in another room to a group of Spanish-speaking families about the importance of parents monitoring what children are accessing on the computers. In Spanish, he explains My Space and Facebook and tells parents that these 6th graders are too young to have an account.

In most cases these families will be unable to afford to hook up to the Internet, but the software downloaded already into the computers will allow children and parents to access language skills and math skills that already are boosting test scores for the children in this low-income neighborhood, according to Principal Lisa.

What does this have to do with reducing unintended pregnancy among women 18-30? When you give girls opportunity, you nurture dreams of extended education and job opportunities. You offer them choices about when, how often and even if to have children.

It’s the joy of opportunity I saw on the face of Diana Rodrigez, and I saw that joy mirrored in the face of her father, who had made a sacrifice to be there and make sure his daughter had that opportunity.

Gloria

Fifty-eight years ago, a 23-year old women gave up her job as a secretary and entered a home for unwed mothers in Pittsburgh. On December 13, she gave birth to my husband, then left him behind in the orphanage in care of the Catholic nuns. Four months later he was adopted by Bud and Dolly Vilsack. The way they described it to him, they chose him as they might a holiday turkey—the plumpest baby—and took him home to join his older sister Alice.

When I met my husband as a college freshman 40 years ago, he told me he was adopted. Maybe because we were 17 when we met, we always assumed that his birth mother was our age when she discovered she was pregnant in l950. Sometimes we imagined where she might be and assumed she had born other children, but Tom was never curious enough to go looking for her. He was satisfied with his Pittsburgh family. Despite his father’s financial woes and his mother’s alcoholism, he always knew he was loved. His dad died in our senior year of college and his mother died just before our first son was born in l977. His sister died suddenly a few years later. None of them lived long enough to know him as the Governor of Iowa or as a candidate for president.

It was during a campaign announcement tour that we stopped in Pittsburgh in November 2006. A few weeks after his name and picture appeared on the news he received a letter from the nuns who had cared for him before his adoption. They said they had information he might want about the circumstances of his birth. They couldn’t reveal the name of his birth mother because she had never given them permission to do that, but they would give him any other information they had.

His political advisors suggested he could find out himself or read it in the newspaper one morning. The letter arrived near his birthday. His birth mother took the assumed name Gloria when she entered the home for unwed mothers. She was 23 and a secretary. She was the oldest of 5 children in a Catholic family with an Irish surname. His mother didn’t leave the home right away after his birth. Considering our assumptions, this news was shocking.

Did she think about keeping him, Tom wondered? Marriage must not have been an option. Could her family afford to help support them? Did they consider their oldest daughter a bad influence on the other children? Could she afford to raise him on her own? We’ll never know. If she’s still living she is now 82 years old.

Coincidentally, finding Gloria coincided with a new job for me as executive director of The Iowa Initiative to Reduce Unintended Pregnancies, an organization dedicated to creating a national model for how states and the federal government can invest in pregnancy prevention among adult women 18-30. When I held a press conference in January to announce the goals of the organization and my association with it, I mentioned Gloria’s story, and said that she would motivate me every day as I travel the state educating people about the high rate of unintended pregnancy among adult women, which most voters and decision makers know little about.

Rather flippantly, a reporter said to me afterward, “Well, your husband turned out all right, didn’t he?” “Yes,” I said, “he did; but how did she turn out?” It was l950. She had to quit her job and enter a home for unwed mothers. She had to give up her financial security. Did she further her education? Did she marry; have other children? Is she surrounded by a covey of grandchildren who love her? How was her life changed by the decisions she made? We won’t know.

But I do believe, knowing my husband and what he’s accomplished, that Gloria must have been an intelligent woman with a great deal of potential. I do believe that all of us have the opportunity to give women a chance to reach their potential by assuring that they have the information they need and the access they need to the newest birth control methods, so they can control their own fertility and plan their futures.

This holiday season, I honor all the Glorias whose lives were changed by their unintended pregnancies, and I honor the difficult choices they made.

What Do You Talk About With Your Hairstylist?

My hairdresser says that when she was in school to become a stylist she was taught that clients are more apt to share personal information with the person who cuts, colors and styles their hair, because people respond to the human touch. Because barbers and hairstylists actually touch us, we tend to trust that person and reveal more about ourselves. Asking hairstylists and barbers to share healthcare information didn't start with birth control, however. Other studies have proved that barbers and hairstylists have helped to spread info about diabetes and cardio-vascular disease.

Our researcher Mary Losch at the University of Northern Iowa's Center for Social and Behavioral Research will be keeping data about this project so we can determine if using hairstylists to inform l8-30 year olds about long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARC) works. Our website provides a comprehensive list of all contraceptives so that people who know little about the new technology will have an overveiw of each method.

“…To go far, go together.”

Recently I stood listening to Al Gore speak to Harvard students about global warming and climate control. He began his speech by saying that overpopulation had contributed to the problems we are now experiencing. The solution, he said, started with educating girls, empowering women, giving them the chance to control their own fertility and giving them opportunity. When women have opportunity, they limit the number of children they have. On a day focused on “green” issues, it was good to hear the vice president reference the empowerment of women.

Later he said something else I think speaks to the coalition we are building in Iowa as we reduce the number of unintended pregnancies among 18-30 year olds and create a model for states and the federal government.

The vice president quoted an African proverb which says “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

For me personally, the Iowa Initiative has been gratifying work. My most productive professional work has happened as a result of grassroots coalition building.

With a new president-elect, we are at a turning point in our country’s future. A change in leadership at the national level will influence our ability to create a positive climate in Iowa.

I’m excited to see how, here in Iowa, just how far we can go, together!

Please, Have a Conversation...

Most Iowans I talk with are surprised to learn that we are 48th in the country in terms of access to family planning and birth control. I was surprised, too. In Mt. Pleasant I lived three blocks from the Southeast Iowa Planned Parenthood clinic, so I thought everyone else in Iowa had access.

The Iowa Department of Public Health contracts with Iowa Rural Health Clinic Providers to deliver primary care, including reproductive services. Women on Medicaid can get reproductive health services at these rural health clinics in counties where there is no family planning clinic. I have come to realize that access is more complicated than that.

In cities like Des Moines or Davenport a woman might not have access if she has no car and the local bus doesn’t stop near a clinic. Recently the Visiting Nurses of Des Moines opened a family planning clinic at Park Fair Mall Shopping Center, right next to the Fareway grocery and the Walgreens pharmacy on the local bus line.

In fact, they advertise in the Des Moines buses. The ads are important because if women don’t know about the three new kinds of long-acting reversible contraceptives, then they aren’t really accessible.

If a woman lives in Lyon County or Taylor County and there are no family planning clinics within 30 miles, then access is a problem, because most women work, sometimes on shifts that make it inconvenient to access birth control and reproductive health services on a regular basis.

Because of Iowa Initiative grants, existing clinics are opening satellites. A few weeks ago Northeast Iowa Community Action opened clinics in Postville, Fayette and New Hampton. Next week we’ll be opening Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa clinics in Creston and Ft. Dodge.
Access also includes access to information. We created the first comprehensive map of family planning/birth control clinics in the state, so that anyone visiting our website may click on the town where they live and get contact information. In some cases they can make an appointment online. The Initiative also created a comprehensive chart of all hormonal and non-hormonal birth control options now available in most clinics across Iowa. It's also been translated to Spanish, because language can be a barrier to access.

When I was newly married, I was making $7,000 a year as a teacher in small town upstate New York. I had health insurance, but it didn’t cover birth control. I couldn’t afford to be pregnant those first three years of marriage, because I was supporting us while my husband finished law school. The nearest family planning clinic was 30 miles away, but that’s where I had access to low-cost birth control pills and a yearly check up. If a woman has no health insurance or has health insurance that doesn’t cover birth control, access is a problem.

Today the Pill can cost between $30-50 a month. College students and many women working minimum-wage jobs, simply can’t afford this expense. Iowa Initiative grants make long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARC) available at no-cost or low cost at every family planning clinic on our map. So far the best advertising for new clinics and LARC in Iowa is word-of mouth: roommates sharing information; daughters telling their moms; health care professionals counseling clients.

Please have a conversation with someone else about what you learn here.

U.S. 29th in Infant Mortality?

On Sunday, October 18, a New York Times editorial called “shameful” how poorly the United States compares with other industrialized countries in its infant mortality rate. The Times reports that in l960 we were 12th and now we’re 29th. The editorial says it’s difficult to pinpoint the causes because infant mortality is linked with health and economic status of the mother, her race or ethnicity, access to quality medical care as well as obesity and drug use.

While we’re overhauling the health care system maybe we could take a look at where we can integrate age-appropriate sexuality education from kindergarten through college.

If we can help women learn to prepare their bodies for pregnancy, educate them about contraceptive methods that will allow them to plan their pregnancies and space them with enough time to recover, we can reduce the mortality rate.

The Guttmacher Institute numbers show that the mortality rate goes up when women have babies too close together for their bodies to heal and strengthen. At the family level, the school level, the community level, in faith-based organizations and among elected decision makers, we must make women’s reproductive healthcare a higher priority than polarizing ideologies.