Reviews tagging 'Pregnancy'

Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive by Stephanie Land

8 reviews

greatexpectations77's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

5.0

God was this good and impactful. Just a really clear look at how poverty looks in this godforsaken country, and how you can't "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" if the system is set up to make sure that you can't move forward. And Ms. Land didn't even have systemic racism working against her! Just. incredible and so important.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Car accident, Classism, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Medical content, Medical trauma, Abandonment, Eating disorder, Domestic abuse, Grief, Bullying, Excrement, Fatphobia, and Misogyny

Minor: Abortion, Toxic friendship, Suicide, Alcohol, Panic attacks/disorders, and Pregnancy

frmeden's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Car accident

Minor: Medical content, Panic attacks/disorders, and Pregnancy

cakearson's review

challenging emotional hopeful medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Car accident, Domestic abuse, and Emotional abuse

Moderate: Pregnancy, Abandonment, Toxic relationship, and Gaslighting

Minor: Addiction, Classism, and Alcohol

mysterymom40's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative reflective sad medium-paced

2.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Car accident

Moderate: Emotional abuse, Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Classism, Toxic relationship, and Pregnancy

Minor: Gaslighting

charley0796's review against another edition

emotional hopeful reflective sad fast-paced

4.0

I devoured this book in 24 hours. I have wanted to read this book since watching the Netflix series. Being a therapist who often sees survivors of Domestic Violence I really liked how the series explored the honest realities of fleeing DV, custody battles and I also loved the stories of her houses as she battled to make a better life for her family.
The book is similar but different, both highlight the battles of the system, the hoops that have to be jumped through. In differences - one it starts when she moves to transitional housing, so you do not see the initial abuse or difficulties navigating the system. Second, it highlights the hoops she has to jump through and the cycle of poverty she can’t break free from that I had never considered before.  As a third difference, it’s more raw, not romanticised or dramatised - Stephanie makes a lot of really valid and understandable decisions. She moves in with a boyfriend who turns out to exploit her financially, cycles of abuse that are actually really common in abuse even with support and education around breaking the cycle. She then is determined to stay single and manage on her own, using men just for keeping off the loneliness, something I know one single parent with very similar circumstances is doing at the moment. Choosing to go on holiday rather than moving home, this I can also understand, after what had been years with no break and living on a shoestring it makes sense that she bought items for herself. I appreciate her including this - she could have hidden it! It’s different to what I think I might do, but I’ve never been in her shoes. I’ve read lots of reviews, especially on goodreads, criticising her as a ‘whiny, privileged woman’ and people being shocked that at 28 she had no savings or career. She described working in a tourist town, where jobs centred around this - thus there are few jobs you can make a career out of. In addition, it sounds like her upbringing was pretty unsupportive and also in poverty - meaning career planning may not have been instilled on her (the tv show really exemplified this) as does the fact they lived in a trailer initially. She was on birth control - naturally a conversation about pregnancy hadn’t happened with her partner as they weren’t planning on staying together, she was heading to college to make a career for her future. I can totally understand the decision not to abort, even though her life wasn’t stable and she didn’t have things together at her age. Some people are late bloomers and it takes time to work out that college/uni is a good idea and worth it for you. Something that must be hard when your mum is the only person with a degree that she knows of and everyone else seems to have struggled with pay check to pay check living and the financial crash. 

I’d love to read more books of a similar style, most autobiographies I’ve read have focused on the pain and suffering with no commentaries on the social systems and how it relates to their situation. Most detailing abuse from childhood and not starting in adulthood, so the writing style seemed much more reflective than venting. 

I look forward to reading some of the review suggestions 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Car accident and Medical content

Moderate: Domestic abuse and Pregnancy

basicbookstagrammer's review

informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Classism, Physical abuse, Pregnancy, Sexism, Car accident, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, and Medical content

mandi4886's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

5.0

So good!!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Car accident, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Alcohol, Blood, Cursing, Gaslighting, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, and Sexism

Minor: Abandonment, Abortion, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Child abuse, Death, Drug use, Excrement, Misogyny, Pregnancy, Violence, and Vomit

chronicallyplotting's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

5.0

An amazingly written memoir highlighting the struggles of poverty, single parenting and surviving with little to no support. Praise to Stephanie on making it and her willingness to work hard to overcome. It is hard to see beauty while in a storm.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Car accident, Domestic abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, and Pregnancy