As I announced on BlogHer, I will be staying home from the annual BlogHer conference while I await surgery.

This community means the world to me and I’d love for you to participate in our ‘BlogHer ’10 at Home’ fun- because I’m not the only one who will be unable to get on a plane in a few days.

*crossposted at BlogHer.com

My uterus and colon are totally awesome and you should want to GAWK at photos of them.

What? What do you mean that’s too much information? Looking at my insides is WAY COOL and rather fascinating, if I do say so myself.

Yes, I’m about to show you what I mean … so look away now if you don’t want to see the inside of my body …

Alright: So as it turns out, some of you didn’t really want to see my innards and had some issues when, after my last surgery, I shared that photo of my insides on Twitter and Facebook. Is it too much?

How about this one of one of my laparoscopic incisions?

For you … maybe. Maybe it was too much. But for me? It was just what the doctor ordered. I needed to talk about what was happening to my body. I needed to tell you everything, show you everything, have you talk back to me about it and give me that virtual “Oh honey, I’ve been there” or “don’t worry, it will be ok.”

I wasn’t really going for grossing you out. OK, maybe that was a little fun, but it wasn’t my end goal. I needed to commiserate and feel that virtual hug. Plus, I thought my internal organs were kinda cool.

I’m not the only one getting up close and personal online. Yvette showed off her six-and-a-half pound fibroid tumor to the world too. Yes. I clicked. It’s disgusting but important. She wanted us to see what had been plaguing her body. Just like I wanted you to see what had been ravaging mine.

LOOK. SEE! THIS IS WHY I HURT! THIS IS WHY I COMPLAIN! — that’s really the message I’m sending when I take shots of my IV-laden arms that make me look like a junkie or my kids making me smile in my hospital bed.

When you are scared, sick, and worried … sometimes all you can do is reach out to your friends. That’s what this whole “oversharing” thing is all about. I know some times it’s over the top, but when I posted those photos, I had messages from other women about how they were going through something similar. We traded war stories. We traded tips. It reassured me in my time of need, and I reassured them they were not alone.

It’s why I blog. It’s why I tweet. It’s why I Facebook. It’s why I am here.

The communities surrounding any given disease or diagnosis are nothing shy of essential support systems to help you through. Even if I don’t normally talk doctors and procedures (and trust me, I’d much rather be talking politics and parenting), I easily found an entire community ready to talk hysterectomy, fibroid, colitis, diverticulitis and auto-immune disorders as I struggled with what happened to my body.

Over and over again, people recommended to me sites like HysterSisters and gave me their tips for dealing with colitis and gastro issues. Over and over again people also admonished me for ruining their appetite and giving them more information about my life than they really wanted.

But I have to be honest … for the those people upset with me … too bad, get over it, or just go ahead and cut your ties with my social networks. I have another surgery coming up in a few weeks, and I NEED to talk about it. I NEED to find others like me to feel less alone. I NEED my community for that virtual hug.

I also need to overshare, because it’s the only way I know how to be real and for you to know the true me. TMI FTW.

Contributing Editor Erin Kotecki Vest also blogs at Queen of Spain blog where she’s lamenting about losing her gall bladder, part of her colon, and most likely her uterus on June 24th, 2010.

Politics & News Contributing Editor Erin Kotecki Vest

I want you to head on over to BlogHer today and leave a comment about a book that changed your life.

BlogHer and BookRenter, a company that rents textbooks to college students, have joined forces because we know that books makes a difference.

From May 3-28, together we are working to make a difference in children’s lives by generating new books for children who need them most — via the nonprofit organization First Book.

Want to help? For every answer we receive in the comments to the following question, one book will be donated…

I know you have one.

If you do, you can make a difference to a child- and it’s really, super easy.

crossposted at BlogHer.com

Fear? I eat fear for breakfast.

Nature? Beautiful and wild and beloved.

Cows? Awesome creatures that moo and wander and eat grass.

Did Erin hit her head?

No. It’s just all those scary thoughts I had about visiting the Pioneer Woman’s ranch in Oklahoma were entirely unfounded and insane. All right, maybe it’s a lot easier to handle acres upon acres of beautiful open land when you are lounging in the Lodge. Maybe “roughing it” isn’t so bad with fabulous friends to laugh and talk with. And maybe, just maybe, when a cowboy invites you to go light a hill on fire and chase a bull, you jump and squee with glee and all the fear you had leaves your head and you snag your CEO’s baseball cap and run like a child into the vast plains.

The ranch, in short, was to die for. Ree and her Marlboro Man husband were delightful hosts who live in a magical place where wild mustangs roam and cattle abound.

That’s right, while filming Putting it All Together for BlogHer, I wasn’t afraid of my surroundings. I got to chase a bull and light a hill on fire. And I didn’t have an ounce of fear or worry, despite my premonition I’d be curled up in the fetal position, in fact I wanted MORE.

My job is never dull.

Speaking of work, take a look at our finished product. I helped out with the first episode while I wasn’t running around Oklahoma with Ranch Hands. Keep in mind Putting it All Together is about you. Right now the conversation for the next episode is happening over at Susan Wagner’s Friday Play Date, so feel free to chime in.

I get to head back to Ree’s ranch with your ideas in a few weeks. The Marlboro Man has promised another ranch activity, and admittedly I’m over-excited about it. Oh who am I kidding, I CAN’T WAIT! I LOVE COWS!!!

Contributing Editor Erin Kotecki Vest also blogs at Queen of Spain Blog, where she’s trying to convince her husband to sell their Los Angeles home and move to a cattle ranch

Crossposted at BlogHer.com

Recently, I was asked on CNN what lessons politicians like John Edwards could learn from sex scandals. My answer was simple: “Keep your pants on.”

Apparently Rielle Hunter should have been given the same advice during a recent photoshoot with Mark Seliger. Call me crazy, but if you become famous due to a sex scandal with a presidential candidate … you might not want to take pantless photos for a bombshell interview, posed with your love-child’s toys. Even we mommybloggers know enough about brands to call that a boneheaded move.

Image source: GQ

As if sexy photos from someone seen as a homewrecker weren’t enough, the Dora and Barney stuffed toys leaning against her threw in that extra edge of creepy.

Hunter, the mother of Edward’s child, has reportedly told Barbara Walters she now regrets the photos,

“She was in tears when she called,” said Walters, “and said that when she saw the pictures in GQ she screamed for two hours. She said she found the photographs repulsive.”

So Walters says she asked if that was the case why did she pose for them? “She said she trusted Mark Seliger, whom she said is a brillant photographer and quote, ‘I went with the flow,’” recounted Walters.

If you haven’t seen the GQ photo spread and interview of John Edward’s baby mama, go take a peek.

I’m not buying Hunter really regrets these photos. At some point she had to take her pants off and at some point she had to let Barney fall on her leg a bit and act sexy. Sex and the 405 isn’t buying it either,

Oh, my. We’re all about the MILF here at Sex and the 405 but posing half-dressed among your kid’s toys is just a little too … ew. That’s Barney half on your lap, you know? To make matters worse, according to Barbara Walters, Hunter called her hysterically to let her know how disgusted she was about the GQ photos Mark Seliger took of her for the men’s magazine — like she was somehow not a part of the shoot or had any say in the matter. We’ll say to her now what we said to “Johnny” then: you did it, now own it!

Shannon of RightPundits is also skeptical,

Rielle Hunter allowed herself to be interviewed and photographed by GQ magazine; just exactly what John Edwards, the man she supposedly loves, didn’t need. Never mind that in the photos which you can see here, she pimped out their two year old child and allowed semi-racy pictures of herself to be taken. And surprise, surprise; she’s shocked that GQ would have the audacity to run photos of her wearing nothing but a white button up shirt. Are we really to believe that this woman is that naïve?

Bipartisanship at it’s finest — the Right and I agree the Hunter photos are in poor taste and ill-advised! Next time, just follow my advice: Keep your pants on … and maybe stay away from the children’s toys.

Contributing Editor Erin Kotecki Vest also blogs at Queen of Spain blog

Politics & News Contributing Editor Erin Kotecki Vest

There is a big discussion going on over at BlogHer right now, tackling the complex issues of race, culture, identity… things that aren’t easy to unravel.

Which happens to be going on as I pulled my daughter from her suburban ballet class…and added her to a suburban hip-hop class.

Yup. My soon-to-be five-year old is shaking it to Tina Turner and Beyonce.

But considering this discussion at BlogHer…I’m torn. My daughter is having fun, my daughter is learning dance and generally oblivious to any cultural issues that may surround what’s going on. But Mom is well aware she’s the little white girl emulating black culture. There is positive and negative here. The positive in her being exposed to it, and the negative being the dilution of that culture.

It’s not lost on me that little white girls in the suburbs are taking hip-hop, and the ramifications there of. It’s not lost on me that while acceptance and mainstream can aid in race issues, they can also harm and make things worse.

No, this isn’t step and this isn’t a pow wow…but it’s food for thought.

Given that I used to be what the kids call a *real* reporter and am now a blogger… (which I think makes me some sort of fake reporter….) I’m headed to Reno, Nevada this week to corrupt speak to Journalism students, at the Reynolds School of Journalism at the University of Nevada, Reno, about the wonders of this *new* media world.

I plan to corrupt speak to them the way I blog…in my pajama bottoms.*

Ok maybe not, but I do plan on letting them know there’s room for everyone as Journalism and reporting find their way in this crazy new world.

I’ll also be at Nevada Interactive Summit if you happen to be in the neighborhood.

The fun doesn’t stop there either…just as soon as I get home, I’ll be turning around to attend and speak at SXSWi in Austin, Texas.

I keep promising Denise I won’t start any wars as I travel around to let everyone know what BlogHer is up to…but if Texas plans on seceding….no promises. Or if Austin let’s me have too much of it’s tequila…Or if I end up outside Austin city limits and Republicans chase me with their pickup trucks and hunting rifles…or if the Texas Board of Education nutjobs show up anywhere…Texas, you annoy me. Wars will be avoided if possible.

…maybe Denise is right….

*the pj thing would make way more sense if you saw the presentation I’m giving on us upstart bloggers living in our parent’s basements….

crossposted at BlogHer.com

There I was, knee-deep in my element. Answering work e-mails, editing posts, watching whitehouse.gov‘s live stream of the Health Care Summit at Blair House. I was screaming at my screen, tweet cheering the Dems and tweet jeering the GOP … sitting in my pjs, loving life.

Then the phone rang.

Mrs. Vest this is N, the school nurse. Your son is in my office with an abnormal bloody nose, can you come right away?

The rest is kind of a blur. The kind of blur a parent gets when you get a call you don’t exactly understand but know your child needs you NOW.

My first reaction was to grab my wallet and keys and run, and then I realized I wasn’t dressed. I threw on clothes while thinking

bloody nose?

wait … why am I rushing to school for a bloody nose?

abnormal?

did she say clots?

Clothes on, I grabbed my wallet and keys, typed an incoherent message to my work colleagues (I think it said something like “school called bloody nose clots jack running”) and bolted out the door.

I called my husband on the way, said I would call when I knew more, and then maybe broke several laws driving from my street to my son’s school — which I have now deemed too far away.

I might have passed a California Highway Patrol cruiser along the way, and I might have been a)on the phone and b)driving like a bat out of hell and c)thinking “Fucking Chase Me Copper — I’ll pull into the school parking lot, and you can ticket me as I run to my kid.” I swear to you I made eye contact with the officer behind the wheel, and it was the “I’m a mom on a MISSION DO NOT MESS WITH ME IN THIS MINIVAN” look. It worked. I blew past him, and he stayed right there putzing along while the drivers around me were clearly doing the “OMG is that woman insane there is a COP RIGHT THERE” thing.

I parked at the school and then did the run/walk but don’t really run walky thing to the door thinking the entire time “calm down, she said bloody nose … but what nurse calls for a bloody nose???”

And there was my boy. Ice pack on face and blood everywhere.

He seemed OK. He was chatty as hell about his day. The nurse and teacher told me of the students finding him bleeding all over his sandwich at lunch, he didn’t say he hit his head. But there were clots and blood from both nostrils, from his mouth — it was so overwhelming.

Decisions were made and off we went to lay on the couch for the day. Thinking he had a bad bloody nose and wanting him to at least be cleaned up, it seemed sane to just bring him home.

Except a funny thing happened on the way to our house. Upon reliving his harrowing tale of bloody nose horror … my first grader’s speech began to slur.

Without even contemplating I put on my left blinker, darted across two lanes, and headed straight for the local ER. I kept talking to him. He kept drifting in and out of making sense. He was telling me now he did bump heads with someone. But his story kept changing. He was confused.

My heart racing, I drove the mile to our local hospital — it seemed like 20 — and my questions to the backseat were resulting in answers like “soffa hitta hwead.”

Left turn signal. Lane change. Park. Carry child into ER. Again the look in my eyes paid off and my quick explanation and fast signature had us back and in a bed in under five minutes. The doctor was there not two minutes later.

Eyes OK. Nose OK. CAT scan shows no bleeding. No fracture. Diagnosis = concussion.

Now here’s where I finally exhale. Not entirely, mind you. But I exhale, and I look around. Now I am actually capable of looking around.

It turns out this place is filled with people and doctors and nurses and moaning and IVs and hustle and bustle. Things you don’t see until you exhale.

Two beds down I see two Sheriff’s deputies and someone obviously in custody. Across from us, a mother and two sons. Directly to our left I hear broken English and understand enough Spanish to know a dog bit a girl and she was crying telling her mother she shouldn’t have played with the puppy without asking their neighbor first.

Then came the woman with the clipboard. Like they always do. First to my son and me. I hand over our insurance information and card, explain that I am the primary card holder, not my husband (that annoys me every damn time), and she moves to the curtain next to us.

No tengo seguro médico.

Then the next.

Nah, this gangbanger doesn’t have insurance. I bet you he doesn’t even have a real job. Hahahahaha

Then the next.

Well, I think my ex-husband might still have the boys under his insurance but he lost his job, so I’m not sure. Can I just put down his name and number?

Then to the next.

Nah, I ain’t got no insurance. I lost that when I lost my benefits, and I’m still waiting on my VA paperwork. I ain’t got no VA paperwork yet but the lady down there said she’d get it to me soon.

There we sat in the “Fast Track” area of the typical American emergency room, and I was the only one with insurance coverage.

Not an hour or two before, I was actually enjoying and cheering and jeering the political theater in Washington. I sat at my desk from 7 a.m. until the phone call I got at lunch, engrossed in every word coming out of every politician’s mouth sitting at that summit.

How they would do it. How they want to do it. Which way they should do it. Who’s right? Who’s wrong? Who’s been wronged? All the talk of costs and deficits and government control. The talking and talking and talking that from one room in D.C. seemed entirely out of place in this California ER.

But at least for me, sitting in that ER, health care in America — and the battle over reform — was very clear. There were no questions. Criminals and children were being treated, and bills would come due. And there I was, on the edge of my son’s bed, the only one with insurance. THE ONLY ONE.

I missed the remainder of the health care summit to be with my son in that emergency room. I’m glad I missed whatever discussion was had. Because I was sitting there in the middle of the answer, in the middle of an ER, in the middle of a crisis that MUST be fixed.

As the only one WITH insurance today as those beds were strewn with dog bites and rashes and knife wounds and heart attacks, and yes, concussions … as the ONLY ONE with the privilege of having the means to have an insurance company pick up part of today’s bill — I said loudly and I said clearly for those in that room with me: Shut Up, Washington.

I am not any more privileged than the girl in the bed next to me or the family across from us or that alleged criminal two beds down. This isn’t a political game. This isn’t what I earned.

This is a right that any civilized society provides its people. ALL of its people, not just those with money and not just those lucky enough to have a job in this economy. ALL of its people.

The bill is due, Blair House participants. Either you can pay in political gains and losses or we can pay in our lives, our homes, and our dignity. As the president said today before I ran out of my house in a panic, “I hope we have the courage to make some of these changes,” and then he called out everyone in that summit for not having the guts to do it.

It’s gut-check time.

Get it done. And get it done now.

Actual Progressive Summit Coverage Can Be Found:

Momocrats.com

Odd Time Signatures

The Mahablog

Think Progress

AND FOR THE OTHER SIDE:

Althouse

Pajamas Media

Pundit & Pundette

Townhall

Contributing Editor Erin Kotecki Vest also blogs at Queen of Spain Blog and is monitoring her son for the next 24-hours and hopes to NOT land back in that ER anytime soon.

Politics & News Contributing Editor Erin Kotecki Vest