Well hello little blog~ sorry it's been awhile. I was hoping to do this weekly, and alas, I've been busy raising my other two kids and working too much and trying to maintain a healthy relationship with my husband (read: not sit together on the couch on our separate laptops), and this blog has not even crossed my mind. Sorry!
What has been taking every last ounce of spare time (including in my dreams for the last few nights) is my grappling with a natural birth. When I was pregnant with Maren, it was my intention to do birth naturally. I mean, I had in the back of my head that I could always get an epidural if I needed it - and I was going to remain open to the process - but I had wanted to do it naturally. What I realized through both birth processes was that I labor long, and I labor hard, and I am not one to sit with pain well. I'm a total wuss. I'm a chicken shit. I just want to be happy, people, and experience joy! What's so wrong with that?! With both Luke and Maren I got an epidural, and loved it. It was heavenly, let me tell you. It didn't complicate my births really at all, and both kiddos I was able to push out efficiently and easily (it's pretty easy, I imagine, when you don't feel the - sorry to say it - tearing). So I was happy with those births. And truly, I should be! They were wonderful for me!
So, why would I even be considering doing something differently this time? I have no freaking idea, except that it has me up at nights, doing hours and hours of research, watching documentaries, going to prenatal yoga, and reading birth stories online until the wee hours of the morning. I really can't shut up about it to Andy. In fact, I just told him about my latest discovery - Orgasmic Birth - and he merely nodded politely. He knows I'm obsessing a bit, I guess, and veering around on cyberspace is taking me to some, ahem, new places. (More on Orgasmic Birth later!)
Here's what this is all about for me, I think: This is it. This is my last baby. There will not be another chance to experience what women for centuries have experienced and (for the most part!) lived to share their amazing stories. Not that every birth story isn't amazing, because they all are. But I just feel like I'm missing something that as a woman I am supposed to experience.
To top that off, there is something deep inside me that wants to do this because I'm afraid that I can't, and to prove it to myself.
Kind of like running 13 miles when two years ago I was sure I couldn't run 3. Now I know I can do it. There was a moment in my training - many, many moments, actually - when I said to myself, "Just walk. This sucks." And I did; easy way out. And one day my neighbor said to me, "Sally, you just have to keep going. Running is 50% mental. Don't let yourself walk. Just keep running." And the next time I ran, every time that thought came into my head I told myself to fricking BUCK UP and keep running... and you know what? I did it. I ran 4 miles, then 6, then 7, then 10, then 12 and finally 13. And I felt amazingly proud of myself.
There will come a point when, in labor - probably many points - when I will say to myself, "This sucks (UNDERSTATEMENT), just stop." But I just want to experience it all this time. (That is terrifying to say, please know, because I'm still a total chicken shit and wuss, and OH MY GOD WHAT AM I SAYING?!)
A few months ago, I read Dooce's labor story, and it inspired me. Really, she is the one who got me thinking like this. If you have time, check it out. Part One, Part Two, and Part Three. The really good part is part 3...
And one of the things she talks about is preparation. And I've sort of happened upon my obsession with preparing, mostly because I'm finding out all these very very simple things that I didn't know before that might have been helpful. Like, if you relax your jaw your cervix actually relaxes. WHA? How come I didn't know that before? Or, if you turn your toes out, it opens up your hips and makes it easier for the baby to descend. Seriously?!
(Why does it seem like all these little things are well-kept secrets, or ones that you can only find out by taking a $350 class or something? There has got to be a better way. )
So, I'm preparing. I'm doing some homework, watching some movies, reading some birth stories, researching relaxation and pain-relieving techniques... and annoying Andy with all my new insight. All of this has to do SOME good, right? I mean, even chicken shits can have babies, right?
I'm still scared. I'm still not entirely sure I'm not insane. I'm still not quite able to visualize this whole thing. But I'm truly enjoying the journey to figure it all out. I really am.
A few weeks ago, I walked into my prenatal yoga class for the first time and read this sign, and literally choked back a little tiny sob:
"She believed she could do it. And she did."
Like a waterfall in slow motion, Part One
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She wants her planet back. Woolfy – “Shooting Stars” Funny how his voice in
this song made me think he ...
3 years ago
1 comment:
Hey Sally,
Just read this. I've got absolutely no idea what's best for you and Andy, but these are some thoughts on the topic in general:
When we had our kids, there was strong feeling that meds were bad for babies, and so lots of "encouragement" to be natural. Plus it fit in with my vague ideas at the time. I remember my own mixed feelings heading into labor. Had one hypo each with Dan and Tony mid labor, nothing with Kate, some useless local anesthetic at delivery with Dan and nothing with Molly.
There was a sense of triumph in each of them - different with each. Included feeling proud of behaving well under extreme stress (dunno why that's such a value, but it is.) One was taking good care of my kids as that was understood at the time.
It wasn't until Len and I were invited to be present at a friends labor that I realized what you are talking about. We were asked to come because Stacy was having a hard time managing the labor. By the time we got there, she'd had an epidural and was reading the newspaper - literally. They had a beautiful baby, but I remember thinking it seemed like there was something missing.
Indigenous peoples have that perplexing tradition of an ordeal as a part of passage into adulthood. I've heard it described as learning to live beyond and through suffering, as a way of teaching young people about courage and not to run away when things are hard. I think it can also be lots of uglier things as well. But I remember thinking that somehow the pain and ordeal of childbirth was part of the marker of how momentous bringing a child into the world truly is. Not something I could explain logically, but I felt it.
If I had believed that pain meds had no negative impact on the baby, I probably wouldn't have tried for natural birth. The medical opinion seems to have changed on that one.
And if you can achieve an orgasmic birth, you're a better woman than I am. For what it's worth, I'd only heard of that once before Andy mentioned it. And this woman had some sort of kundalini experience that flipped her out for months. Can't say I have any understanding on that. She's an interesting lady, but I don't think I'd want to do life her way.
However you choose to do it, the result will be wonderful! It's such a joy to watch the unfolding miracle of the Zimney/Koering family!
Connie
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