…And God blessed the seventh day and declared it holy—having ceased on it from all the work of creation that God had done. And then, on the eighth day, God created an obstetrician and gynecologist.
Photo credit Ralphs Fotos
From advertisements, scare stories, witness statements, reviews, science we are told to trust, studies and research backed by professionals, every part of your body, every day of your life, has been monetized by Big Company.
Circa 2021, my husband and I sought a fertility specialist to help us conceive. For the highest chance of success, the doctor recommended his most expensive option, but with a catch: no refund if it wasn’t successful. “A single IVF cycle—defined as ovarian stimulation, egg retrieval and embryo transfer—can range from $15,000 to $30,000, depending on the center and the patient’s individual medication needs” (Conrad, How much does IVF cost? 2024).
Keeping our options open, we sought to adopt.
“There are fewer things more important than ensuring that every child is a part of a loving, nurturing, safe, forever family. Adoption is not just an important thing, but THE important thing,” says adoption.org in their article, “Is Adoption Important?” (2018). But if adoption is the most important thing, why does Adopt US Kids say adoption costs can range up to $40,000?
Herald 2024, anno Domini. Pregnancy test says positive. Health professionals say it’s impossible to birth a baby without the intervention of modern medicine, proving their point with scare stories of Baby, Momma, or both dying during labor. So we’re referred to an obstetrician and gynecologist (OBGYN) and every step of the next nine months is mapped out on a neat schedule: testing for amniocentesis, cordocentesis, chorionic villus sampling, fetal stress test, electronic fetal monitoring, anemia screening, asymptomatic bacteriuria, UTI, or other infection screening, gestational diabetes mellitus screening, hepatitis B screening, HIV Screening, RH incompatibility screening, syphilis screening, estimate gestational age, evaluate fetal growth, a biophysical evaluation for fetal well-being, evaluate a suspected ectopic pregnancy, confirm heart activity, evaluate maternal pelvic masses or uterine abnormalities, evaluate suspected hydatidiform mole, evaluate the fetus’s condition in late registrants for prenatal care, and any screenings as recommended by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Women are told not to have home births (which are either low cost or free) and health care experts and brainwashed family and friends convince them with scare stories that a hospital is the only way, exactly as if God created an OBGYN on the eighth day and women have been attended to at birth for the last 200,000 years by a medical professional.
Total cost of pregnancy and birth? $18,800.
So where’s the line? Obviously, no one disputes that modern medical care HAS saved lives who may have died under the same circumstances before the 1900’s. But how do you distinguish between what is helpful and what is monetary?
Everything in life is on a straight line. The left of this line is the measurement for too little, and the far right of the line is too much. The middle represents both in balance. Vendors, marketers, and businesses drive that far-right line hard, and harder still, pushing and pushing until what you want, what you need, is no longer in balance, because they’ve convinced you that you need $$$ to keep quality of life…and you pay it because science says to trust them.
This monetization starts even before Baby is born. As soon as Baby is born, another business swoops in and insists Baby’s quality of care must come in the form of a checklist of over 50 items. “Among all the to-dos on your plate when prepping for baby’s arrival, shopping for baby essentials is likely high on your list. After all, you’re going to want all your gear the minute your little one makes their big arrival…Keep reading for a complete list of things you need for a new baby” (Kashtan, Baby checklist: 64 baby essentials 2024).
Total cost of Baby after birth? $17,000.
Makes one wonder how 200,000 years of humans before us could possibly have survived without a diaper pail. (For fun, research how much money diaper companies are making off of you. Funny, because you can potty train your newborn as early as week 1. Look up how African tribes potty train. They don’t have diapers).
This monetization embeds itself into your traditions and the current social fashions. Baby grows and is now eight years old and following beauty advice from #Sephorakids and getting Mom to spend $1,400 a year to stave off wrinkles and other human skin “problems” until she’s an adult and beyond. Sephora has monetized your face, but Colgate has monetized your teeth.
Ask: what cleans your teeth, the toothbrush or the paste?
Neither, according to archaeological digs of prehistoric graves where human skulls were exhumed and their teeth were analyzed.
“Dental hygiene is flourishing, with a multi-million dollar economy behind it. We have straighter teeth, whiter teeth, more beautiful, shimmery teeth. But it turns out that we actually have less healthy teeth than our ancestors. In fact, archaeologists say that prehistoric humans had much better teeth than we do today…to restore the balance…cut the carbs and eat more like a caveman” (Magazine, Prehistoric humans had better teeth than we do 2013).
Total yearly cost of dental care in the U.S.? $136 billion.
Endless shampoo and conditioner companies have monetized your hair.
Piece by piece you are being trafficked and monetized day by day, year by year.
Let’s next run to the company that has monetized your feet. Big Shoe Company, backed by professionals and lots of research, has convinced you to buy the latest shoe with more cushion and more arch support. “They usually add to their proclamation some form of external validation, like, ‘I’ve seen one of the best podiatrists in the world and he agrees that I need orthotics.’ Oh? Your podiatrist agrees that you need to give him or her an additional $300-1,000? What a shock,” says Sashen in his online blog called, “Yes, You Can Wear Barefoot Shoes With Flat Feet or High Arches. Here’s Why,” as part of his message to the world to abandon Big Shoe Company’s monetization on your feet.
I was 27 when I stood up and pain lanced through both feet. I limped around the rest of the workday. It was a job where I walked around a lot, so I thought my feet had finally reached their limit. I bought extra cushion shoe inserts and blessed myself cured. Only, the shoe inserts did nothing.
I bought a pair of shoes that were very comfortable and wore them to work. My feet still hurt. I put shoe inserts inside those shoes as well. My feet still hurt. I had reached a point where I could not stand for five minutes without my feet hurting, or walk barefoot across my kitchen floor without the feeling of razor blades in both feet. I went to a foot doctor to find out why my feet always, always hurt. Except, the doctor didn’t discuss why my feet hurt. He prescribed me medication to mask the pain and sent me home because treating my ailment was more lucrative than telling me I needed to stop wearing shoes which would have fixed my foot pain. Frustrated, I did my research and switched to barefoot shoes, and now my feet don’t hurt.
“Even though shoe companies [a $133 billion industry] spend millions of dollars on technology and design development, the shoes they produce and sell are doing a major disservice to human feet. From cushioning to heel-toe drops, stiff soles to narrow toe boxes, nearly every aspect of a modern shoe has a negative impact on foot movement. It leads to an epidemic of dysfunctional, weak, and malfunctioning feet. And most of us aren’t even aware this is happening!” (Kuizinas, How shoes impact foot health – a podiatrist’s insights 2024).
Monetization of your pet: creating a subtle belief that your pet is your child and so the same amount of money should be spent on their care: vaccines, heartworm disease prevention, testing for heartworm, treatment for diabetes, depression, anxiety, all other human ailments they’ve convinced you your pet also has, and how about those pet massages?
Total cost of yearly pet care? “According to Money, the lifetime cost of a canine companion generally comes to around $15,000 — and that’s pretty conservative compared to our research” (Roberts, The true cost of owning a dog in 2023 2023).
Businesses haven’t just monetarily trafficked your body parts, they’ve monetized life events, too.
Weddings — the glorious union between a man and a wife — has been cornered on the market, giving the undeniable truth that the love between the new couple hinges entirely on how big and expensive the wedding, how big and expensive the wedding rings, and if your wedding is any less, divorce is certain in your future.
Total cost of a wedding to make sure you last till death do you part? $33,000. But no price is too high for true love, right?
Birth, life, and someone has even monetized your death.
Total cost of a funeral? $10,000. Because any less and you may just not make it to Heaven if you don’t arrive in a $5,000 coffin you will never see.
Why don’t we garden anymore? Because Big Business told us to buy from them. Why don’t we make our own soaps? Because Big Business told us to buy from them.
Pay attention to other areas where you have been monetized: it’s everywhere and everything. Remember when there was a shortage of baby food and people were crying “How am I supposed to feed my baby?” (Fresh fruits and vegetables blended and smoothed is how you feed your baby). There’s a toilet paper shortage. How am I supposed to wipe? (A spray bottle and old rags).
God created us in his image. Did he engineer the human body so poorly that we come out of the womb pre-broken and we now must rely on OBGYNs to ascertain our birth while beauty, dental, and shoe companies assist in our comfort of living, and expensive funerals to make sure the gates of Heaven swing open for us?
Are we born with broken feet so we have to rely on shoe companies to give us shoes to fix this predisposed engineering flaw? Must we rely on chair companies to rescue our backs because straight out of the womb our spines can’t hold us upright on our own power? And the pillow? Thank goodness a mortal dove in and rescued our pre-broken necks! If it weren’t for mortal intervention, humanity would have died away because we wouldn’t have been able to walk, sit, or sleep, right?
The argument could very well be made that, as a society, we’ve been engineered to progress and advance so we no longer have to live as cavemen.
You are right.
What’s the point of our ancestors struggling to get us here if we can’t enjoy the payoff from their labors? Recall earlier when I said everything in life is on a line:
Balance
Too little <———————>Too much
You can put anything on that line. Love. Hate. Food. Water. Money. Work. Home. Too little love is damaging (abandonment). Too much love is also damaging (stalkers, jealous rages). I had to rush a guy to the hospital because he nearly drowned himself to death by drinking too much water. But then, you’ll die if you don’t have enough water, too.
Balance.
One weekend I went camping. My specific goal for this camping trip was to be as natural as possible, to return to that natural man. The natural man is what I consider to be the first Adam — the first human on earth and having access to literally only the things nature can provide. And for this trip, I asked myself, “What does the natural man have or not have? A tent, for one. For another, natural man does not have any aired-up or foam sleep pad. Of course, I could have gone camping completely naked and afraid to be exactly like the natural man, but I did want to enjoy my time and I did still want to be alive come morning.
My campsite was not one designated by any park. Nothing was preestablished and I couldn’t point in the direction to the nearest bathroom (I didn’t bring toilet paper. I figured it out), and I didn’t bring any foam pad. No. I slept straight on the ground.
I woke the next morning and my back did not hurt. That’s significant because my back hurt at home when I slept on my bed. It’s a nice bed. Still new. One recommended by scientists and professionals and cost me $2000. But that morning, sleeping on the ground? I felt so much better sleeping on the ground than I did on my highly recommended bed. Of course, I had some inconveniences, such as my fingernails were filled with dirt, I cut my palm open with my knife while shaving a branch into a spear in case I was beset by wolves, and I just thought, and I’m thinking back to my ancestors — humanity’s first ancestors living on this earth…they had nothing we had. They had to kill an animal to get the skin to make clothes, they had to hunt and gather, build shelters with sticks, and they had to struggle making sure they attained fresh water and what if they were injured? They didn’t have first aid or an OBGYN standing by to attend their birth. They really had to struggle.
They had to fight to survive every day making sure animals didn’t eat them, making sure they didn’t eat the wrong animal and die, and all these survival things, and I thought to myself, maybe I am supposed to be privileged living in a house, having a bed, sitting in nice chairs, going to the grocery store, being protected, and all these modern conveniences because my ancestors earned it for me. They likely did not expect that having reached this point, I would revert to struggling just like they did.
And then I look at myself, and other people in general living today with me, and I thought: are we supposed to enjoy these modern conveniences having been earned to us by our ancestors?
The answer I feel?
“Not at the expense of your overall health (mental, physical, spiritual) and the chance of you having a quality life. Following anyone blindly is just stupid, without doing some research, it makes it much easier for people to take advantage of your ignorance” (Elizabeth, 2024).
We, as humanity, were never meant to have become soft. I used to have back pain because my back muscles were weak and soft. I wasn’t using them. My whole life I’ve been sitting in chairs that give me back support so I didn’t have to use my back muscles to support myself upright. If you don’t use a muscle, you lose it. Same with shoes and how these cushy shoes with arch supports have weakened the muscles in our feet and now our feet muscles are weak and soft and that is why we have foot pain because Big Business monetized your body for their gain, not yours.
Again the question: Have I earned this privilege to live in modern society with beds and chairs, grocery stores, and OBGYNs?
So long as it is balanced.
Big Business has monetized you out of balance, and this has triggered your anxiety and depression. But of course, you have anxiety and depression. Every day, every minute you are swamped by Big Business ads saying, “Buy this!” “Cure this for only $$$!” Or the scare tactics, “You would protect your baby at all costs, right? So you better come in and get this vaccine just to make sure your baby doesn’t die.” “The economy is going to crash! Invest in gold now.” Not only ads but look at all the daily disruptors and distractions Big Businesses have driven you to because they monetized your every body part, your every life event, your every inch of space:
- job
- rent
- car
- insurance
- groceries
- taxes
- news
- social media
- friendships
- traffic
- FOMO
- cellphones
- bills
- deadlines
- poor sleep
- medical
- fashion
- politics
- sales ads everywhere and in your face
- school
- relationships
- good advice
- bad advice
- TV
- trends
Our caveman brains were not designed for all this sensory overload, so our brains start releasing the stress chemical cortisol as a warning that it’s all too much, too much to live with every day. A side effect of this? Anxiety and depression. All because Big Business wanted to make a buck. Makes one tempted to live in a 3rd world country. I hear anxiety and depression are 1st world problems.
Open yourself to be more self-aware. Look at all the ways Big Business has stripped away your natural man and backs themselves with scientists and professionals to convince you to trust their research. Have you noticed? Have you noticed how you’ve disconnected from your instincts? Doctors tell you not to diagnose yourselves, to pay them $$$ so their expensive schooling can diagnose and cure you. Mental health? Here’s $$$ medication. Need to lose weight? Spend $$$ on an injection instead of going for a run.
I’m not advocating we never go to the doctor. Doctors save lives and give us better quality of life. I’m only advocating to be more self-aware and to understand the difference between getting the care you need and forgoing the care that only has monetary value for someone other than you.
We…all of us…are made in God’s image. He did not engineer us so poorly that we are born broken, having to rely on Big Business to save what God messed up. Return to that natural man. Pull back and find that healthy balance on that line. Become self-aware. Pay attention to, and strengthen, your instincts. Your body knows how to heal itself if you listen to what it’s saying. Can you fix your back pain by sleeping on the floor? By sitting on a chair without a backrest? Fix your foot, ankle, knee, hip, and lower back pain by going barefoot and learning to run the way God engineered us to?
Don’t take my word for it. Experiment for yourself. Stop listening to Big Business, and do your own research. Understand and insist on your own balanced line. And refuse to be monetized and trafficked. Refuse, for anyone, to take advantage of your ignorance.
References
Conrad, M. (2024, September 30). How much does IVF cost?. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/health/womens-health/how-much-does-ivf-cost/
Jordan, L. (2018). Is adoption important?. Adoption.org. https://adoption.org/is-adoption-important
Kashtan, P. (2024, November 27). Baby checklist: 64 baby essentials. Baby Checklist: 64 Baby Essentials. https://www.thebump.com/a/checklist-baby-essentials
Magazine, S. (2013, February 25). Prehistoric humans had better teeth than we do. Smithsonian.com. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/prehistoric-humans-had-better-teeth-than-we-do-26567282/
Sashen, C. (2024, February 1). Are barefoot shoes good for flat feet or high arch? yes!. Xero Shoes. https://xeroshoes.com/running/flat-feet-high-arches-barefoot/
Kuizinas, A. (2024, April 24). How shoes impact foot health – a podiatrist’s insights. Xero Shoes. https://xeroshoes.com/foot-health/shoes-impact-foot-health/
Roberts, B. (2023, September 12). The true cost of owning a dog in 2023. DogVills. https://dogvills.com/the-true-cost-of-owning-a-dog-in-2023/
Elizabeth Steen-Larsen (2024). Direct interview quote
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