Post Partum Depression

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   This is unnatural and too much to do. if they have  small children,Women are exhausted and they get very little rest/sleep. -Najamsahar
You know Dr. Northrup talks allot about the system of things.  She doesn't reffer to our system as patriarchical because she believes men are victims of this system too, but explains that every one is affected by this sick psychology.  In'sha'Allah I've loaned all of the books I own written by her to other Muslim mothers but when I get them back I want to look up what she called the system.
It is this sick psychology that causes people to think and function abnormally or naturally. I personally believe that consumerism, capitalism, coporate America, and immaturity contaminate the hearts and minds of so many women world wide.  It's a shame that our economic situation feels the need to compete, minimize or destroy families.  Why can't this be inclusive? Why do they have to be at odds?

I feel that feminism for all its worth, has turned a card on the women themselves. I do not know for sure what the ideals of feminism were, but surely the pictures of worked out and washed out women are no models of gender equity.-Najamsahar

 I whole heartedly agree with you there.  I read some where that that the movement was started by two Catholic nuns not just Betty Friedan.  Like the Civil Rights movement, I believe they were trying to abolish the seperate but equal standard that harmed the well being of women and children.  Many women were being hospitalized due to severe clinical depression because they couldn't tolerate the marriages and communities they lived in.  If you read feminist literature many mothers with small children committed suicide so women experiencing depression during child bear years is really not a new thing, it's just that the male dominated medical profession has now chosen to accept it as a valid problem.
What I found particularly disheartening is that Muslim women in Europe and the North America's have assimilated so much that they have abosorbed the pathologies of North American peoples. This isn't to say that Muslim countries don't have the same problems or challenges on the contrary they most likely do.  Instead of holding the male scholarship and leadership accountable for the preservation of Muslim motherhood, and Muslim women's rights, there is a certian disgust, and apathy I notice about many well educated Muslima toward sharia and their status.  Why people choose to focus on whack scholars acting like mad scientists is beyond me but never the less they do.
When I read the works of Imam Malik and Imam Shafi'i, women and mothers were clearly honored. Our only two obligations are to guard our husbands property and fufill intimacy aspects of marriage.  Yet some see the last obligation as marital rape, even though women are just as demanding regarding intimacy as men.  Muslim women aren't required to be a super woman so why in the heck trade that in for slavery?
I believe that men should particpate in parenting, child care, and house work, but Islam already has taken care of that? So the truth is, it comes down to the character, integrity, and maturity of the two people involved.  The best thing you can give your children is a good marriage. The truth is most Muslim and non Muslim women are in unhealthy marriages, that they chose to be get into and remain in.  Women never want to talk about this aspect because it's more comforterable to play the victim and blame the man. If your spouse isn't honoring sharia law or the marital agreement you made, that is a MAJOR character and integrity issue. They are violating sharia law by lying, defrauding, and dishonoring their agreements or oaths.  The Prophet pbh tolerated that crap from Ibn Ubay who committed treason at the Siege of Madina almost costing every one their life. He sws only tolerated so much of that from non-Muslim before pre-emptive self defense. The non-Muslim tribes had violated every single treaty and oath they ever took and had the guts to tell the Prophet sws that it was null in void from day one. That was the last straw for the Prophet sws.  Many Muslim spouses display that same sick characteristic of lying, defrauding, and negating their agreements.  So Muslim women but more so it is the children who end up suffering.  I realize no one is perfect but there it is totally unacceptable to lie, defraud, and not follow through on what you decide. Thats also a big maturity issue as well.  I understand certian situations but if you are in a Western Nation there is no excuse for why you are in a poor marriage you brought it on yourself.
I do believe Western women are waking up because many are choosing to sequence their life or stay home peroid.  But many professionally educated women end up suffering from depression, and end up divorced only to see they are back where they started from. Why? Everything for them has to be totally equal and perfect all of the time. I'm not talking about major stuff but little stuff.  I just finished reading a book about a White middle class family where the mom elected to stay home and quit her journalist job. She has a house keeper, a nanny, and a stable situation. Yet if her husband didn't dry one dish and she had to dry it, than that was opression.  If her husband slept in ten minutes than that was opression.  It's attitudes like that , that are self defeating and abusive.  It's a shame we are taught to hate woman hood, motherhood, and marriage.
Salaam