3 posts tagged “birthing”

Well I'm 21 weeks along now. getting fat and uncomfortable. but I should know better than to claim that at a mere 5 months! if I'm uncomfortable now, I will be miserable by 8 months!

this baby kicks more at 5 months than the other two. it will be quiet... so very quiet for hours. and I will actually think "wow that baby is quite right now". and then it hits 9pm and kaboom! I'm being kicked every bit as hard as when I was 8 months along with my others.

Sean calls the baby "the twins". not b/c I'm having twins, but b/c it freaks me out. having twins isn't a bad thing, surely. but it's just too much of a good thing I think heh. I would love any amount of babies i get, but it's my sincere wish to only have 1 at a time. I told Sean if I had two, one is going to be completely his. heh. he can mother that one, b/c mothering one newborn at a time is hard enough work! ;)

I'm finally off of most of my meds but I still take dandelion root everyday. I tried weaning off but my stomach was NOT happy. I have reflux as all sorts of other nasty symptoms. ick. so back on that I went. but that's ok. it's really the unisom that bothers me. I mean it is a sleeping medicine, so it has that pesky side effects of making you sleeping. 3 times a day? and then I have the personality of a cardboard box, really. but now I just take it like every other night or so. this is the longest I've ever been on meds. I was off by 15 weeks with both of the other two.

it's hard for me to realize this baby will actually be born. with Eli and Eva everything was exciting and new and "wow I'm going to have a baby". but this time I'm busy with mothering the two I have that I tend to think of pregnancy as some kinda permanent condition, often not thinking I only have 4-ish months left until I'm a mother of 3. 3! now this is no biggie for someone who is already a mother of 3... but it's my first time, so excuse me while I adjust to it a bit.  am I excited? yes! am I looking fwd to meeting this new one? yep! am I totally loving every single second of being a mom of two until this ne one comes? certainly am! I remember after havign Eva I realized i should have enjoyed being a mother of 1 while it was that way... but i was so excited about the new one coming it's all I could think of. now? I'm just taking it day by day.

my mom got the baby a ton of clothes from the thrift store. some brand new! boys and girls clothing b/c I don't know what I'm having. total score! I've been working on washing them and setting them aside. this baby wont have a nursery, atleast not at first, just a cradle and crib in our bedroom. and probably a dresser. so i don't have much set up there! I need a carseat, and dresser, and a few other things. ok actually a lot of things. I need a swing too (one baby gadget I don't want to live without!), a baby carrier (ergo, perhaps?) cloth diapers (probably prefolds and fuzzi bunz), spit up rags (cheapo gerber prefolds work well), crib for our room, more baby clothing, baby bunting/light coat/swaddling wrap, etc etc etc. is it wrong to have a baby shower with your 3rd child? tacky? well I'm hoping someone out there doesn't think so! b/c it's been 4.5 years since my last and we don't have a thing left from that except a 4.5 yr old girl =P

ok this is the part where i get a little panicky realizing i have a lot to do and aquire before this baby comes. lol. but luckily I don't have to worry about anything hospital related. no registrations or packing a duffle bag, or OB appointments. nope none of that. because we're having this one at home. ahhh what relief! takes a lot of your mind. worrying about making it to the hospital in time. and frankly riding in the car when you're contracting every 3 minutes is a nightmare! I'm looking fwd to labouring and birthing at home. no annoying nurses to hook me up to stupid monitors that go "PING". (sorry- that was a monty python reference there...) no IVs. no person telling me I'm labouring incorrectly (as if there is such a thing!) and nobody to bother me. love it! my eyes were opened when I started attending hospital births and homebirths. the difference!! the baby comes out so calm and attentive at home. healthy looking. like they just are like "hey mom and day. nice to meet ya". no one to poke them with a hep vax in their first hour of life. (I mean freaking, really... how is an hr old newborn going to contract Hep B!?) and no one to threaten you with cesareans when you "take too long". really? too long? how about I'll tell you when it's been too long and we'll take it from there? sheesh!

ok call me a little cynical. (or a lot). but I am so done with hospitals. would I go if something were medically wrong? sure I would! but pregnany and birthing are not medical conditions. and they aren't even illnesses. ;)  Believe it or not, I'm pretty well educated on it. working as a doula, childbirth educator and instructer of a birthing circle for several years - I've managed to learn a thing or two about pregnancy, birth, and post partum periods. but you know what's help me learn the most valuable stuff? just being a human being. female. yep. just realizing God created me a woman and He's pretty smart. knowing that God is in control of every single life. the author of every book. that knowledge  - as simple as it sounds - has more value to it then any degree I could put behind my name. go figure! that little simplistic knowledge could save us all lots of money and worry. 

***disclaimer, I have nothing against people choosing hospital births! to each their own!! I stand behind anyone's educated decision. but my educated decisions is not a hospital. I've tried it twice and didn't like it either time. it got a fair shake from me. for what it's worth I also don't like the state of Ohio, but if you wanna live there, be my guest! more power to ya =P

****secondary disclaimer. if you're thinking "but don't you know babies die at home!?" or "that is a very dangerous idea..." or  "I knew a lady and her baby turned our brain dead b/c she was born at home..." or  any other such thing. please, before you comment or jump to that conclusion take into consideration three things:

This is one of the sickest things I have ever seen.

this is real apparently... and really i can believe it. someone out there is patting themselves on the back thinking "what an efficient product I have made!"

if there is one thing in life what isn't about efficiency, it's motherhood.

motherhood has little to do with meeting the expectations of others. It has little to do with pleasing the current whims and stances of the medical field...  Mothering is about knowing our children. knowing them as people. loving them... understanding there every process. knowing their limits, boundaries, abilities, set backs, loves and dislikes.  and that starts in pregnancy. NOT when the kid is born, or at 3 months, 5 yrs or 16. it starts the moment that little life is inside you.

"what?", you may be thinking, "does this have to do with this outrageous birthing product?"

well what it has to do with it is this - it's just another encouragement, and expectation that a mother doesn't know enough to birth her own child. she doesn't know her body, and her child... and that a doctor and "medical personal" need to be in charge of this. and that whatever the mother has to do to make it "easier" on the birthing professionals, she must do... even in her most vulnerable and exhausting moment, she is asked to hold her legs back with a rubber peice so the doctor cn more easily deliver the baby. (btw, I've yet to see anyone who isn't the mother who is giving birth "deliver" a baby!)

it's starts with pregnancy, first you're told how to eat, how sleep, when to be checked, when to be induced. countless restrictions and demands are put upon a woman with the line added "we only want what's best for the baby". [[[ I'll not even go into how incredibly annoyed I am by that statement, as if anyone could possibly desire what was best for her baby more than a mother!? that is her entire purpose as a mother!! to protect and nourish her child! just you try stealing a baby out of a mother's hands and you will be met with the most vicious of  sites you've ever witnessed. in a mother is put the instinct to protect her young]]]  you're sent for test after test, pinched, poked, prodded and examined by people you hardly know. stripped bare of your clothing and your modestly you lay before a stranger hoping for their approval of how you've been taking care of yourself and your child.

I would just like to at this time, point out that a mother, in fact HIRES a doctor/ob/midwife/doula/other birth professional. SHE is in control.... not the people she hires. let's think for second about this... if I hired a nanny, would I hand over to her the responsibility of setting the rules for my child? informing me of how to care for, discipline and feed my own child? ... and if I hired a house cleaner, would I hand over to her the rights of my home? let her sleep in my bed and wear my clothes?

I think NOT!

why then when we go to an OB, do we as women, feel we must sign over our rights to those who know better? some may argue, "but this is what OBs went to school for!"....  but I argue that, OBs go to school to learn how to be OBs. not to learn how to be mothers!

I would never encourage a woman to badger, fight or argue with an OB/MW/BP... but I encourage women to pick the path they want or themselves and find a birth professional that will assist them on that paht. if a hospital birth is for you, find someone who fits that bill, if you like homebirths, go find a homebirthing midwife you feel comfortable with. If you desire a labour with all the bells and whistles (ie: epidural, inductions, augmentations...) though I would highly encourage you read up about it first, go find someone who is willing to help you on that path....

do NOT however... sign over your rights as a mother to ANYONE. period. There is a big difference, in heeded the suggestions, and recommendations of who who is knowledgable on a subject, but it does not cancel out what you as a mother know instinctually about your baby. both should be taken into consideration any decisions should be made based on those together.

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so back to the topic I started with, the "baby labour, OB handles".... read the discription on amazon. does this seem like something that is helpful to mothers and babies, or to "medical personal"? I will tell you this, any product that helps out a nurse or doctor so they don't  have to be at your every beck and call, is most certainly not a good thing. you HIRE your birthing professionals to be there for you when you need them. It is NOT asking too much to ask them to help your thru your labour and birth. if that means holding a leg, that's their job. if that means helping you onto a bedpan, that's also their job... and if it means sitting near by quietly reassuring you that you infact are doing it all just the way you need to be, that too is there job. Nothing you need while your birthing should be too much to ask. 

I found out one of my good doula friends. (as in a good friend, not a good doula... thought she is also a good doula!) is pregnant with her first baby. so exciting! she was beaming with that nervous glow on her face that every first time mama has. the first pregnancy is so exciting, a scary and worrisome and wonderful.

it's like a first kiss, you never enjoy it as much as you wish you had in retrospect. but then again you're not experience enough in pregnancy to know what you should be enjoying.

my first pregnancy I dmit wasn't much enjoying. I'm a lucky duck who gets Hyperemesis gravidarum - which in english just means I puke so much with out stopping I have to be hospitalized and get IV treatment for a few weeks before I calm down. happened in both my pregnancies. it's a major ordeal and very hard on everyone in my family. we wanted a lot of kids... ok well I wanted a lot of kids, at one point... but now I don't know. who knows. maybe... but it's hard to parent when you're so ill for 9 months of the year!

anyhow I said all that to say there was still many things I wish I had known to enjoy. like the feeling the baby move, and being able to just laydown and read a book or fold baby clothes and dream to myself about the new baby to come. with my second pregnancy I was so busy I didn't have much daydreaming time!

This coming month I've been invited to attend the homebirth a a good friend's baby. I am WAY excited. it's wonderful to be able to attend your friend's birth. what a bonding experience! getting to be abel to help women thru birth is not only a good feeling but a blessing. you get to take home a tiny bit of that joy with you. you are witness to a miraculous experience! how can you not go home feeling a little warm after wards? nothing makes you feel closer to god than death and birth. your own and others. it's a beautiful thing.