Jody Allard

Jody Allard

Bio

Jody Allard is a former techie turned freelance writer living in Seattle. Her online work has appeared on Time, xoJane, and Offbeat Home, among others. She writes primarily about food, family, mothering, and life with a chronic illness. 

Jody Allard Articles

I Was Born Without A Hand And Don't Want A 3D Prosthetic

I was born without fingers on my right hand. No one knows why, even now, 36 years later. It just happened, as these things sometimes do.

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You Are Enough: How Justice Kennedy's Idealization of Marriage Failed Single Parents

No one enters into marriage and becomes whole; there is no magical superpower that's granted alongside the marriage license. Marriage is simply two imperfect people who choose to come together in an imperfect union. That union can be remarkable and powerful, but it can also be dysfunctional and excruciating. Sometimes, it's even abusive.

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New People Rating App Is Literally The Worst Idea Ever

In case you thought that the Internet couldn't sink any lower, the creators of a new app are about to prove you wrong.

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election 2016

Presidential Candidates, Give Us Gun Control and REAL Mental Health Care ASAP

Contrary to what Donald Trump wants you to believe, mental illness doesn't give people easy access to the deadly weapons they use to commit mass murders. Likewise, despite what Bernie Sanders claims, high rates of gun ownership is linked to higher rates of gun violence and implementing sweeping gun control policies would make our country safer.

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When Healthy Isn't An Option: How I Learned To Love My Chronically Ill Body

I lost 100 pounds, and I kept most of it off. But I am not healthy, and I never will be.

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People Are Losing Their Minds Over A Reality TV Star's Dates With Her Son

ICYMI, "Sixteen and Pregnant" star's Nikkole Paulun's Facebook post about her monthly date nights with her six-year-old son is going viral –– and people are losing their shit over it for entirely the wrong reasons.

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Baltimore Mother Who Beat Protesting Son Is A Child Abuser, Not "Mother of the Year"

You don't get to beat someone simply because you have a feeling. And that is true whether you are a mother or a cop.

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Planned Parenthood (photo credit: Women's eNews)

Why We Should Thank Planned Parenthood, Not Defund It

". . . it is illegal to sell fetal tissue, but it is perfectly legal to receive compensation for the time and expense involved in collecting, preparing, storing, and transporting tissue for research purposes. This is well-established in the rules and regulations surrounding organ and tissue donation. Similar regulations also make it illegal to sell children, but legal to compensate parents for medical care and expenses incurred during an adoption."

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Mom Whose Infant Died On His First Day Of Daycare Asks "Why?"

Amber Scorah's son Karl was three months old when she dropped him off at his first day of daycare. When she returned two and a half hours later to breastfeed him on her lunch break, he was dead.

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Image via Sesame Street

Why It Matters That Sesame Street's First Muppet With Autism Is A Girl

It took five years for my daughter to be diagnosed with autism. There were dozens of red flags, beginning from the time she was about 10 months old, but her pediatrician always told me that she was fine. "She made eye contact with me," she reassured me. "She can't be on the spectrum." Besides, most children with autism, she reminded me, are boys.

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