Cognosco

…I still agonize over when to be pregnant.

I still worry if I will be hired for a job if I am pregnant.

I worry about whether or not I will be able to keep a job or get tenure if I have a baby.

And I am one of the lucky ones. I had my first child while in graduate school, which is actually a great time to have a baby in my opinion. But I’m set to graduate next year with a Ph.D. and get some kind of job in academia. There are few career paths more liberal than academia. Furthermore, my area is psychology, which when combined with academia leads to so much liberalism that you can almost choke on it. I will have my own office so pumping will not be a problem. There is quite a bit of flexibility in the schedule of an academic, so long as you somehow manage to work 50 (+?) hours per week. Doing what you love. Not bad, really. I am incredibly lucky, especially given that I am the first in my family (including cousins ) to even graduate from college with a four-year degree, let alone an advanced degree.

And yet…

…the whole thing has been keeping me up at night. In order to have my kids two years apart, I’ll have to get pregnant in the next few months. Be pregnant on job talks. In academia, job talks can be a two or three day affair, packed with meetings and interviews and presentations and intensity. I wouldn’t want to fly past 34 weeks in a pregnancy. Job talks take place from about November through February for the nicest jobs. For less nice jobs, they can continue through the May. So, we reasoned that if I get pregnant in August, the due date would be in May, which is also the same month I’ll be graduating. Then I’d start a new job the following August. Granted, most programs tend to be a wee bit forgiving in the first year because you are adjusting, but compounding that adjustment with a new baby, sleep deprivation, breastfeeding…what a recipe for disaster. And, I would miss a lot of that child’s first year because I’d be focusing on so many other things.

Sound crazy? I think so too. I’ve been in a constant state of fretting.

So, I decided that I would go for the "easier" jobs. Little or no research. Smaller schools. More teaching. Familiar. Not too challenging.

And then I stopped caring about schoolwork. I couldn’t focus on anything. Writer’s block set in like someone had wrapped gauze around my brain.

Because wait a minute–I love research. I love mentoring. I love teaching too, but to only teach would be like cutting off a limb.

    "For a minute there,

    I lost myself,

    I lost myself."

        –Radiohead

I love my family. But I love my dreams too. 

So, one day, I asked myself why I wanted my kids to be two years apart. Well, my brother and I are 2 years and 3 months apart. I think I never questioned that two years was the best spacing for kids, because it was normal for me.

It would be "inadvisable" to have a baby during the first year or two of a new job. While most universities will stop the tenure clock during that time, you may still be judged negatively for having a child during that time. And really, it would be nice to be settled in first anyway for my own sanity. So, if I have my next child after two years on a job, Albert would be four years old.

I began to contemplate this, and took the same approach to this question that I do most things. I researched it ad nauseum. Turns out that if you ask people what the best spacing is, everyone gives a different answer. There are good things and bad things about any age difference. And it seems that the most important factor in how your kids get along isn’t their age (up to about a 5 year difference), but their personalities. Good luck planning that.

When I let myself accept the possibility that this might be a better choice for our family, a tremendous disappeared from my shoulders. The brain fog lifted. I wanted to do school work again. I felt motivated. My writer’s block disappeared. I felt calm.

The down side is that my future job is not likely to be in the Phoenix area. Even if there was a job here, I don’t want to stay here. Which means that I will not have Connie as my midwife, or Leigh as my doula. And that kind of sucks.

But to be honest, I’ve always had trouble envisioning Connie at my next birth. Maybe it’s because she’s just not meant to be.

And I can accept that Leigh will likely not be there because I can entice her to visit me with the promise of chocolate and the scent of a newborn. And then we can bask in new babyness while we watch the birth video, eat brownies, and laugh.

I think MB can be coerced with chocolate too… 

Nonetheless, I still think it’s bullshit that this whole process has been agonizing. It’s bullshit that I can’t just think about what’s best for our family without worrying about damaging my career. And I am one of the lucky ones.

We have come so far, and yet have so much further to go. 

So, I totally missed Blog for Choice Day this year. Here’s my post from last year about why I’m pro choice. The topic this year was supposed to be why I vote pro-choice. Because I do. But I don’t know if I can articulate why I vote pro-choice. It’s just such a core value to me because it is related to so many other issues on so many other levels. Gender equality. Respect. Compassion. Trust in women. Trust in mothers. Commitment to help women in other countries with reproductive options. Deliverance from reproductive slavery and the body as a commodity. Access to birth control. Aid for impoverished women. Good prenatal care. Gentle birth. Informed choices. A rejection of Crisis Pregnancy Centers and their intimidation tactics and the lies they tell women about abortion. A rejection of the abstinence-only education that is putting our teenagers in danger. A rejection of all of the blantant lies fed to our children about their bodies.

It is no wonder that women give birth in a hospital completely uninformed. Many of them have been lied to about their bodies since they were preteens. I am of the mind that sexuality is pretty much the be all end all core of our beings in one way or another. If you can control someone’s sexuality and their reproductive potential, you have control over their entire life.

So for me, reproductive freedom must be protected because it is akin to freedom of one’s soul. And it is under constant attack. Even birth control is under attack because it is "anti-woman" and "anti-life" and preventing pregnancy is the same as saying you hate children and having sex for anything but procreation is equating women with whores. Read the article. I’m not kidding.

I vote pro-choice with the hope that the people I elect have the same passion for protecting my reproductive rights as those who oppose these rights. 

And because I am a pro-choice voter, I am voting for Barack Obama. I think this article sums up my justification for doing so. There are so many other reasons, but if I had to point to one, this is it.

Oh, and he also spoke out against this stupid war we’re involved in. Don’t tell me "we didn’t have all of the facts" at the time. I was one of the people who marched against us going to war because many of us knew, even then, that there weren’t enough facts to go to war, and that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. We had no business invading that country. It’s great that Saddam is dead. Fine. So let’s get the hell out and let those people have their country back.

Arizona primaries are Tuesday along with all of the other "Super Tuesday" states. To be honest, I am just giddy about the fact that we got to watch a debate last week and there was no white man on the stage. Pretty amazing. Both of the democratic candidates are great choices. I’ll happily vote for either in the general election. But I’d be just a little happier to vote for Obama.

So, apparently, Tuesday was my very first blog-o-versary. I discovered the blog world when I was looking for info on homebirths. I was led to Jeanette’s blog, and then Leigh’s blog, and MB’s blog. Then I followed their links. And then those folks’ links. That was back when I could stay up until three in the morning without someone being up for the day two hours later.  And then I had the makings of an addiction. So I decided to start one myself. I don’t know how many readers I have. My stats say lots of people come here, but only a handful leave comments, and I don’t understand all of the stats anyway. But at the very least I have a nice record of the last year of my life.

I went back to read the first few posts, and I find it hard to believe that I had ever thought I would willingly have a hospital birth. I look at the belly pictures, and am amazed that that bump is now the monster pulling up on my chair, grabbing at my computer cord, and conducting all sorts of physics experiments (a.k.a. throwing, dropping, and banging things).

I find it hard to believe that there was a time in my life when I didn’t know M and C, my sweet and loving midwife team. It’s even harder to believe that I didn’t know the wonderful mama friends I have made in the last several months as a result of this blog. That alone has made any time I have put into this so worth it.

The lovely midwife who attended Albert’s birth wrote a really funny post over at Earth Hearth about what she carries for birth "emergencies".

The post made me laugh because number one, I remember being fanned during labor, and seriously, I don’t know if I could have held out without that relief. We had turned the heat high when I started pushing, because we all assumed the the baby would arrive soon. Sooner became later, and so I had some serious work to do while being seriously HOT. Between the fan, icy washcloths, and gatorade, I survived. I hate being hot. Hate it.

Number two, I remember asking a similar question at one of my prenatal appointments. I switched care around 32 weeks, and this was particular appointment was probably the third time I had seen M. I asked whether or not she had a "neonatal transport unit" in case of emergencies. I’m not really sure what that is, but someone had asked me that question, so I asked it of her. She didn’t know what it was either (I don’t think such a thing exists) and then said that her neonatal transport unit was *this* and formed her arms into a cradle shape as if she was holding a baby. She laughed really hard after that. She did go on to tell me about some of the equipment they carried like oxygen, a "space blanket" (which she had not had to use in a very long time), etc. But every once in awhile, she would giggle, make the cradle sign, and say "neonatal transport unit".

It cracks me up every time I think about it.

What does she really carry for emergencies? What is the most important thing a midwife has for emergencies (in my opinion)?

Her hands. It was her hands that helped me push. It was her hands that pushed hair out of my face. It was her hands that gave me strength. It was her hands that brought me gatorade. Her hands that helped me wash up afterwards when I was too weak to stand in the shower.

And what was it that she used to help free Albert from shoulder dystocia?

Not forceps. Not a vacuum. Not a caesarean section.

Her hands.

Period.

I think those hands might just rival the fan for #1. 

…or shall we say, schizophrenia?

 When I was taking prenatal yoga, I remember the instructor talked about "motherhood amnesia". You know, that thing that sets in eventually after each difficult child-related event, such as pregnancy and varicose veins, labor, birth, sleep deprivation, baby blues, endless newborn screaming, etc. The night that Albert was born, I remarked to H that at that point in time, I didn’t think I ever wanted to go through childbirth again and that one child might really be enough. I had a hard time sleeping that night because I couldn’t stop having the sensation of pushing and pushing and pushin. I thought about the amnesia thing then, and couldn’t imagine I could forget the intensity of childbirth that easily. I thought it would take months.

How long did it take for amnesia to set in?

About 24 hours.

The length of time between each difficult period and its subsequent amnesia has only decreased over time. To the point where now, I can utter a statement such as, “what was I thinking having a kid?” or “I am so tired I could die,” only to casually mention within the next 60 seconds I can’t wait to have another child and that it is so much more fun than I thought it would be.

Because when I look at him and he is smiling, it is really hard to focus on any of the negatives.

I was prepared to experience this amnesia thing. I just didn’t think that it would occur simultaneously with the challenging times. It makes me dizzy just thinking about it.

I am in love with the Feministing blog. This weekly summary of stories is just a cornucopia of interesting tidbits…

Feministing.com 

Just a quick update on my preggo status. No new news to report. Although I will say that the baby has moved to some newfangled uncomfortable position with one big bump up by my ribs and a smaller one on the other side a little lower. I am hoping neither of them is the head. Because really, at this point, how can I better spend my time than worrying about a breech presentation? Seriously, though, I have no idea where the feet are any more.

Leigh says I am killing her by not giving any updates. But there’s not so much to tell.

I did see my midwife today, and I am about 1 cm dilated and 40% effaced. She asked if I wanted her to "semi-sweep my membranes". I declined, reasoning that if I have dilated painlessly thus far, that I’d like to keep that up a little longer. However, the baby is now estimated at 8 lbs. so I’m thinking that if I make it to next week’s appointment (without going into labor prior to that), I’ll probably take her up on it.

So, that’s pretty much it. Now it’s all just hurry up and wait… 

I had some bloody show this morning. It was considerably more blood that I expected, but a large part of the shock factor was that it has been so long since I have seen blood…it initially scared the bejeebus out of me, until I remembered that it was supposed to happen.

I’m excited, because this means that there is a very high probability the baby will be born in the next two weeks. Yay.

About a year and a half ago, I was asked to speak to a group of high school students about the Roe v. Wade case from the pro-choice point of view. I was informed that there would also be pro-life person there. Silly me, I thought that we were going to talk about the court case from our legal perspectives (which I knew little about until I spent the preceding weekend doing nothing but reading legal briefs…and I am not a lawyer).

Anyhoo, things did not stick to legal arguments or anything of the like. She opened her speech by passing around plastic fetuses.

I was stunned, and unprepared, and pissed off because I had been duped.

If there are any pro-choice folks out there ever asked to speak alongside a pro-life person, no matter what the topic is, be prepared to argue against a lot of visceral tricky arguments that have nothing to do with the topic at hand.

She argued that abortion was wrong under all circumstances. She argued that a woman who is raped is not likely to get pregnant because you have to be relaxed to conceive. She argued that to carry a rape baby to term can help the woman heal. She argued that even if a woman already has children to care for and there is an extremely high risk that her life is in danger if she carries another pregnancy to term, that she should say the hell with the other children and not be permitted to have an abortion.

In short, for all of her rhetoric about life, she was one of the most uncompassionate people I have ever encountered. I was disgusted.

I was first pro-choice because that’s just how I was raised. When I faced an unplanned pregnancy and abortion as a teenager, my mother told about her abortion experience. Abortion was legal at that time under some circumstances in California. It was a pre-Roe era. She was forced to come before a panel of 4 doctors, all male, and plead with them to let her follow through on a decision about her body. She was forced to convince them she wasn’t crazy, but that she would suffer mental anguish if not allowed to have the abortion. She was humiliated. She said the worst thing about the whole experience wasn’t the procedure or any residual feelings. It was the memory of having to beg to be allowed her own autonomy before a panel of strange men.

I have been pro-choice for as long as I can remember, which doesn’t mean that I have not questioned my beliefs or tried to see the other side. I am now 35 weeks pregnant. I have been feeling my baby move inside of me for 17 weeks now. When does it become a baby? I say, when it is wanted. I know that pregnancy is magical. I don’t know how this power is called forth from the abyss to grow from a cell to a sentient being. I just know it is amazing. And to me, it is far too precious a gift to be wasted.

I know that there are people who could never choose abortion. I know that there are people who could never put their baby up for adoption. There are women who, against all odds, are determined to keep and raise their babies. And I support those choices as much as I support the right to terminate a pregnancy. I support access to prenatal care and resources for women to keep their babies, which is something many of those who oppose abortion are all too willing to cut funding for.

I have realized recently that choice is about birthing choices too. The right to choose to have an unmedicated birth free from intervention. The right to have a VBAC at home (which is not legal in Arizona if you want to be safe and be attended by a midwife). Being pro-choice, to me, is about being pro-woman and trusting that each woman knows what is best for her body and her reproductive well-being. It is about trusting a woman and her own relationship to her conscience and the divine.

I am pro-choice because I believe that women make tough decisions based on many factors that other people may not understand. Because I believe that no one is more qualified to tell a woman what to do with her body than the woman herself. No politicians. No doctors. No one.

I am pro-choice because I believe it is the compassionate position, and the pro-choice activists I have known are some of the most compassionate people I have ever met. I am pro-choice because I trust and believe in women.

I got a henna belly tattoo on Saturday. I think it has reached its darkness peak and so we got a few pictures. The friend who is throwing my shower this weekend wanted a few pics of us in all my pregnant glory (at which point we realized that we hadn’t gotten any pictures of "us" while I’ve been pregnant…)
 

This second one was our total rip-off of the Patrick Dempsey "Life" cover last weekend. 

I’m going to wear a button-down shirt to the shower and leave the bottom undone to show off the tattoo. Now I really dig my pregnant belly (but oh my, it’s getting big…)

I had mistakenly assumed that when I got pregnant, I would simply spend my large uncomfortable period in overalls. I have heard dresses are nice, but I’m not much of a dress kind of girl. Apparently, this overall assumption was naivete on my part. I’m not sure when it happened, but apparently, overalls are no longer part of the standard maternity options. I am disheartened. JC Penny doesn’t have them. Sears doesn’t have them. Target rarely has anything in my size anyway, so I didn’t even try. I found a pair of "Take Nine" maternity overalls at a thrift store somewhere around month 4 that have served me nicely, but they are only a large, and I wear an XL, so I think I’ve got one week left with them. The Motherhood store at the mall has a strange sense of what an XL is–I couldn’t even get their tan overalls over my hips. But I did find a basic denim pair there that fits, but I have to roll up the legs a little. I don’t really like them, but they do not have a waistband. And at this point, lack of waistband takes priority over fashion sensibility.

Finding a comfortable bra has been no less of a nightmare. I did not realize that I am in the upper percentiles of boobiness until I tried to find a bra that didn’t make me want to rip it off and tear it into little pieces with my teeth. I finally  had some success at "Baby, Mother and More" on Gilbert and Southern. Great store. They carry the Medela bras–even the bigger sizes. I don’t like ordering things online and had a bitch of a time finding large Medela bras anywhere else. The owner is actually a man, but he is fantastic. They also offer free breastfeeding classes and I attended one on Sunday. It was  a pretty good class. I was familiar with most of the material, but it was nice to hear it all at once and nice for my husband to hear it too. Although she did recommend wearing a bra 24/7 in the first weeks of nursing and I was soooo not taking that seriously. I can’t sleep in a bra. I’ll just put a towel on the bed for leakage. I hate bras. It is the first thing I take off when I come home. I don’t even intend to wear a shirt during the first few weeks, unless people arrive at the door.

And while I’m having a little pregnancy bitch session–what is with the drooling? I remember reading about "increased saliva production" but Jeebus, I wake up in a puddle of drool at least once, usually several times, every night. I have never been a drooler. It is disgusting. I told my husband this must be my body’s way of getting me reading for the drool monster on the way… 

I had an appointment with the midwife today. Got to do the pee stick thing I love so much. The only thing that strayed from the optimal color was a trace amount of ketones. I was pleased.

My husband and I have started to do perineum massage. I was not prepared for how uncomfortable it is. I just tell myself it will pay off during the birth. It doesn’t really hurt–it’s just kind of weird.  

Hubbie and I are going to drive up to Sedona on Friday. We’re going to stop in Page Springs for lunch because there is this little restaurant there that overlooks the river that’s really cute and I haven’t been there in years. And then we have a jacuzzi/fireplace room for the night. I am stoked to get away, even though we have to head back relatively early on Saturday. Who knows when the two of us will get away alone again? It will be awhile.

Then, on Saturday, I’m getting a henna belly tattoo. I am totally psyched about that. It will still be nice and dark for my baby shower on the 20th. If I get lucky and have an early baby, it’ll still be around for the birth. I’ll make sure to post pictures. 

New belly pics…

32 weeks:

 33 weeks:

 33 weeks (full frontal bellity):

I am fascinated by this last one, and how very eggish it looks… 

I had an appointment with my midwife on Wednesday (and yes, it’s taken me this long to write about it). It was an appointment where she and her assistant came to my house and we did all the medical history forms, etc. and then she did a belly exam. It was really cool, and it really makes me wish that I’d made this decision sooner. When I would go to the doctor, I always had to leave a urine sample, but I didn’t know what happened to it after it disappeared behind the little metal door. The doctors never said anything about it one way or another, and I don’t even think they usually got the results before they saw me that day anyway. So I had no idea what it was used for. Well, the midwife made me pee on a stick that had several little colored squares on it and tests for things such as infection, glucose, ketones, protein, etc. 

Anyway, after I peed on the stick, she had me compare it to a little diagnostic chart of colors. So I was able to see for myself that there was a little protein in my urine (probably need more fluids), some ketones in my urine (I was hungry), and my pH was a little off (not surprising). By the way, these are not pictures I took–I simply stole them from somewhere else. None of these deviated from normal enough to be of real concern. But you have to understand that I’m an overachiever. And had I been able to see this little stick all along in pregnancy, I guarantee you I’d have been drinking enough water and whatever else was necessary to get the perfect pee-stick score.

The other thing that she gave me is a sheet to keep track of my diet. Now, having read 15+ books on pregnancy, I have had more than one opportunity to make use of a diet sheet to keep track of what I was eating. I just didn’t. And I haven’t eaten badly—I just didn’t really give it too much thought. But when someone else gives me a sheet to use, that’s different. And it’s not mandatory. She’s not going to drop me as a client if I don’t fill out the sheet. She’s not going to send me to my room, either. And besides, I could just lie on the sheet. But just the fact that someone else is encouraging me to monitor my food and actually gives a damn about my diet made me actually start using the sheet. And I’m getting more protein than I thought I was but have discovered that I just don’t eat enough grains. Period. Unless corn chips, tortillas, or white bread count. In fact, I’m lucky if I get in one whole grain serving per day, let alone FOUR. So in the past two days, when I got hungry for a 9 p.m. snack, I was able to look at the sheet and figure out something to eat that optimized the categories I hadn’t already fulfilled. I still am coming up a little short, but I refuse to eat when not hungry, so it’s a tricky balance. Nonetheless, I am already eating better than I was a week ago simply because someone asked me to pay attention.

After we did all of the medical-form-informed-consent-form-diet-sheet-agreement-to-pay stuff I laid down on my bed (which was weird but very cool) and she did a belly exam. I’d had a terrible fear that the baby was not going to turn ever since the ultrasound tech uttered the words “bicornuate uterus” at 12 weeks. Which in and of itself was not scary. Until I googled it. Oops. Don’t do that. But, apparently the baby is already head down, so I am less concerned now and can move on to obsessively worrying about other things.

Then I called my insurance companies on Thursday. The woman at the corporate office for my primary insurance said midwives were covered, but she was clueless about homebirth. And actually, I had to tell her where to find the midwife info on their own website. I talked to our insurance rep at ASU who looked at some fine print documents that said that midwives are only covered under doctor supervision and if they deliver in hospitals. Which is crap because they cover birth centers. (???). Anyway, for the form that is going to the midwife’s biller, I just wrote down what the corporate rep said because she really should be able to give me accurate information. So, United will be a crapshoot. However, I am covered under my husband’s Starbucks Aetna policy as well. So I called them too. And after asking what state I live in they said yes, without a doubt, licensed midwives are covered and so are homebirths. Which is awesome. So again, there’s one less thing for me to worry about.

31 weeks tomorrow.

Still an "innie". Apparently the turkey still has some cooking to do.

Note the overalls. Which are the only things I want to wear. Ever. Unless it’s nothing at all. And last time I checked, you have to actually wear clothes out in public. Bah. Waistbands are the enemy.

Dear Baby,

I will be 31 weeks pregnant tomorrow, and I’m getting more excited every day. You are active, A LOT, and I never grow tired of feeling you move and tumble and kick and hiccup. Even when it keeps me awake, I am still delighted. I am amazed with how different your movements have felt through each little phase. First, it was like butterflies. Then, it was like I had “swallowed a bag of ferrets”, which is someone else’s quote but I don’t remember the name. But that really was what it felt like. And then I could feel your somersaults. And now, you shake my whole abdomen sometimes and other times it just feels like rippling under my skin. It must be getting tight in there. If I were you, I’d be kicking like crazy too. It’s no wonder we aren’t all born ridiculously claustrophobic!

I used to think it was silly when people would talk about being excited to “meet” their baby, but now I understand. I can’t wait to meet you and look into your eyes and cuddle with you and hold you close. It seems strange, because you’ve already been a part of me for so long, but I have never actually seen you. I already love playing with you—when you poke me, I poke back, and sometimes it becomes a fantastic game. In fact, I will sort of miss this intimacy.

I have lately been playing you songs from “Kind of Blue” by Miles Davis because it is my favorite album of all time and I think the bass tones are something you would like. You certainly seem to like it, because you seem to tap wherever I put the speakers repeatedly. Maybe you hate it, but I assume that then you would just move away. Maybe you are trying to tap along with the beat. I do hope that you will love music and be one of those children who moves along with it unconsciously. My nickname when I was little was “boogie” because I couldn’t stay still when there was music around. It is the one trait that I really hope you inherit from me.

Your daddy can’t wait to meet you either. He talks to you regularly and asks often how you are and if you’ve been moving. He is amazed by the strength of your movements and the fact that he can feel it so strongly when he’s just lying next to me. I tell him, he has no idea what it’s like from the inside. Sometimes I feel sorry for him, because he hasn’t gotten to know you the way I have, but all in good time…

There have been many times in my life when I felt the down side of being female. But now, I feel so lucky to be a woman. I wouldn’t trade sexes for anything. To experience this magic is such a blessing.

Well, we’re committed now… I had my last appointment with my OB yesterday. She seemed, um, disappointed in my decision. Or in losing a patient. Or something. I knew that she would have to terminate care as soon as I told her about the homebirth, but I didn’t expect it to be done so abruptly. She said she supported my decision, but didn’t seem genuinely supportive.

About two months ago, I saw one of the other docs in her practice, who said that I needed a 32 week ultrasound for a low-lying placenta. Because I haven’t had any spotting and because I know that placentas tend to move upward, I wasn’t particularly concerned. I did ask the OB about this before she vanished out the door, and she said that it was low-lying, not previa, so she saw no reason for another ultrasound and wasn’t concerned. This difference in doctor opinion is exactly why I didn’t want to continue my care there. I also had an experience at around 12 weeks where one doc told me I could take a few drugs in combination for allergies, and a month later my doc said she’d much rather I just suffer through sleepiness with Benadryl and keep all drugs to a minimum. I adored my doctor, but the discrepancy between her model of care and the other two doctors was just enough to make me uneasy. How differently would they view labor and delivery? How differently would they view the "necessity" of interventions? So, although I was sad to leave her care, the last little exchange about the ultrasound made me really feel like I was making the right decision.

My mother was initially, shall we say, uneasy, with my homebirth decision. But she trusts me and trusts that I had done my research and had made a responsible decision. Funny thing is, once I started talking about the problems with hospitals and that model of care, she opened up about her experience birthing me. What a nightmare…

She was overdue, so they induced. This was 1977. They induced her on a Saturday, and after 2 days of non-productive labor with no food and water, she said fuck this, I’m going home. They said she couldn’t. She said watch me. So, she went home on Monday and went into active labor on Tuesday. I figure once she was home she actually relaxed enough to let labor progress. So, she went back to the hospital. Where she was of course tied up and knocked out and tended to by a doctor she had never met. She was so knocked out that three nurses were pushing on her stomach to try to get me out. Because of the position they had her in, her tailbone was in the way of my descent, and "surprisingly" I was in distress. Really, I am shocked that a baby who’d been through two days of induction and now was receiving valium would be distressed…So, because her tailbone was in the way and they needed to get me out immediately (due to their own mismanagment of labor), they reached in, broke her tailbone, and yanked me out with forceps. I was horrified by this story. She also said that she found the whole process demeaning as someone had their hands up her cooch every hour, and they were people she had never met. My mother at that point in her life already had a history of being sexually assaulted, so I can only imagine how horrible the whole experience must have been. I felt like crying. I told her that now, if someone has two days of unproductive induced labor, they just cut you open, and that was exactly why I didn’t want to go to the hospital. I think she gets it.

When she was pregnant with my brother, she found an kindly old OB who didn’t believe in inductions because babies come when they come and he had seen too many preterm babies be delivered as a result of inductions. My brother was late, and my mother labored at home and did what my great grandmother had told her to do which was stand up for every contraction. It worked for her. She arrived at the hospital 20 minutes before he was delivered and thus missed out on unnecessary exams and drugs. He was still delivered by forceps, because of course, she delivered on her back, but at least she didn’t feel violated. She said that the forceps were necessary because he had a big head. I said, "I bet you could have got him out just fine if they’d let you squat." She said, "You’re probably right". And there you have it.

Interesting side note…we were both delivered with the bag of waters still intact. I thought that was really cool for some reason. Though I was surprised they didn’t rupture it intentionally anywhere along the way. 

I never knew that my mother had an abortion when she was young until I faced an unplanned pregnancy when I was eighteen. I never knew she had a second abortion until I was pregnant again six months later. I never knew what her birth experiences were like until I was months away from my own. I wonder what else I will find out in the years ahead.

So I met with M yesterday, and decided to hire her as my midwife. I felt very comfortable with her, and loved that she had a background in political theory because homebirth, to me, is a political action. I’m really excited about working with her. I am a little sad to let my doc go, because I do really like her, but I know due to her liability insurance that there’s no way to continue care with both. And, let’s face it, the doc delivers in hospitals. An idea that seems more wrong to me with each passing day.

I ordered a birth tub (kiddie pool) the night before last. Some coral reef something or another that was sold out on pretty much every website and so when I found one I snagged it NOW. Thought about renting a "proper" tub, but damn, they are expensive, and who knows if I’ll even spend much time in there. Marinah said to crank the water heater, and that she’ll just constantly boil water anyway because "she’s a midwife" which made me laugh.

A few weeks ago we bought a cheap stethoscope becuase supposedly, the baby was big enough to hear the heartbeat. That didn’t work out so well, and the thing had just become a frustrating little tool that I repeatedly tried to use while never hearing ANYTHING except my own stomach goings on (which are frightening, really). But the night before last, I got lucky. And I could totally hear the heartbeat, and it sounded really different than the doppler thing. It just sounded like…a heartbeat. And I listened to it for a long time before the baby turned somehow and I could no longer hear it. Suffice it to say, the $12.95 was finally worth it. 

DH finally hunted down all of the belly pics through the last several months and gave me the files. Hooray, now I can post them. It never occurred to me to take them clothed and so here is my nekkid belly through the months in all its glory. I was a little, shall we say, buxom, to begin with, so to me, nothing really looked different until the last month or so.