Sometimes we forget that celebrities have real feelings and are real people under all the makeup and paparazzi flashes. Even their children often look like props in a photoshoot entitled "just like us."

But Angelina Jolie, in a stunning op-ed in the New York Times, shows us that beneath the glamour, celebrities have the same pain and anxieties that as we do. 

Jolie chose to have a double mastectomy. She carries the mutated BRCA1 gene which dramatically increases her risk of breast and ovarian cancer (though BRCA1 and 2 mutations only make up 5 to 10 per cent of breast cancers). Jolie's mother died at 56 from the disease, and only met one of her six grandchildren.

Did you know that if you got a serious sunburn before the age of 18, your chances of having a melanoma are doubled? Raise your hand if you got a serious sunburn before you were a teen. Because I sure did! My pale, freckly skin has burned to a crisp more than once. And that freaks me out.

Melanoma can be deadly. And it can be caused by sun exposure. (I admit it, before this post my knowledge of melanoma came from Izzie's experience on Grey's Anatomy.) 

I want to make sure that my kids don't raise their hands when asked the same question about sunburn. So I buy sunscreen all year round and yet, I still find myself confused at the aisle, with 483 different lotions at the drugstore. Is SPF 80 double the strength of 40? Is 15 even worth it?

Luckily, I went to a lunch sponsored by Coppertone where dermatologist Dr. Sonya Cook explained the ins and outs of SPF and sunscreen. 

The Ontario government has targeted child obesity as a problem and has set a goal of reducing childhood obesity by 20 per cent over the next five years. 

To do so, the Healthy Kids Panel outlines three key ways to get kids healthier:

I carried the folded, fraying article from the New York Times in my purse for months. Occasionally, I would find it, unfold it and read Emily Rapp's words about parenting her son Ronan.

This is a love story, and like all great love stories, it is a story of loss. Parenting, I’ve come to understand, is about loving my child today. Now. In fact, for any parent, anywhere, that’s all there is.

I have written about Emily Rapp before. But my words do not come close to touching hers. Her elegant contemplation of what it means to have a dying child, to love so completely has stayed with me long after the article disintegrated.

When I was first diagnosed with a placental abruption and put on bedrest for 8 weeks, someone (who shall remain nameless) asked me if it was the stress that did it.

As if stress could actually physically move my placenta a millimetre away from the uterine wall and make it start bleeding. Please. Blaming stress on pregnancy issues or fertility problems is blaming the victim -- and there is very little science behind it. 

Slate did a takedown of this old wives tale and explained that stress and anxiety has very little affect on pregnancy or fertility issues.

Allison Schaffer reports that a British study in 2011 looked at 14 different studies on IVF and reported that anxiety did not change outcomes: "In other words, women with more extreme levels of anxiety or depression were just as likely to get pregnant after a single cycle as women with milder levels."

What about pregnancy? Can stress and anxiety harm your unborn baby? A Danish study looked at 78,000 Dutch women and found that those with the highest self-reported stress levels gave birth a mere two days earlier than the women who reported little stress. In fact, reports Amanda Schaffer, fetuses whose mothers reported higher levels of distress tended to be more active in utero, a positive developmental sign.

So, if the next time a doctor or well-meaning relative gives you the "just relax for the baby's sake" speech. You can tell them to lay off because being told to constantly "think positive" is just a recipe for more stress, and while that won't harm the baby, it can cause heartburn. 

Were you ever told to "just relax"? Do you think anxiety affected your pregnancy?

Want more chaos? Last year, I reported that Beyoncé breastfed in public (reportedly) and how that can change the world.

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"I think," I tell my husband, "that he has THE FLU." Dun dun dun DUNN!

I then immediately come down with guilt for not schlepping my 12-year-old son to get the flu shot out of sheer laziness on my part. 

"Maybe it is just a cold," says my husband. "And who cares what it is?"

And then hit me. As long as the kids are sick but not overly sick; why should I care if it is the flu or a cold? Just because the government has released more Tamiflu; and flu season has been "nasty and deadly and normal"? This does not mean we are in a pandemic, or that I should panic, because that's the nature of influenza. (I don't do well in pandemic season, one day I will write about our SARS experience that left me scarred forever).

So, I set off to find the differences between the common cold and flu:

Two weeks ago, I walked in 10 minutes late to my spin class (sadly, that's on time for me); I went to adjust the bike seat up a few notches, but it was stuck. The force of trying to shove it up made something in my back go "ping!".

I got on to my bike and about five minutes later I knew, that was not an ordinary "ping". I left spin class feeling humiliated and in pain. I had an excruciating drive home after which I threw myself on my bed, Tylenol back pain and Advil in hand. Tears were shed.

The next day I went to physio, and after consultation with a doctor and the lovely Lindsay, it was decided that I had re-injured my disc. The same one that I injured in the great lasagna pan bike accident of the spring. But this was worse and the next few days are a blur.

So if you noticed that my blog posts were a little shorter of late and with a few more typos, you would be right.

But now that I am (almost) out of the fog and I am (almost) ready to be a glass half-full person and say there were some good lessons learned from my slipped disc.

By now you must have heard the news that the Duchess of Cambridge has fulfilled the first part of her most important duty -- she is pregnant! Sound the trumpets! Royal Bump Watch Cometh! There is a royal heir coming (and it doesn't even matter if it is a girl or boy)!

Unfortunately for her though, she is very ill with "morning sickness." So ill that she has checked into the hospital for a few days and is receiving IV fluids to keep her hydrated.

You know when someone starts a sentence with "I’m not a crazy mom...", that something crazy is about to happen.

Donna Giustizia is asking the city of Vaughan to have the oak trees next to her child's high school torn down because the acorns may pose a risk to kids who suffer nut allergies. [I'm sure there is appropriate squirrel joke to add in here.]

While 22 weeks pregnant with her second child, Californian Jamie Cottrell Thomas was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer. Waiting for treatment could have been deadly, so Jamie immediately had four rounds of chemotherapy.

While still pregnant, Jamie reached out to well-known blogger, Jill Krause, and asked for more than good wishes -- she asked her if she could help her find donated breast milk to feed her baby. She hoped the breastmilk would give her the best start possible, despite the in-utero chemotherapy.