Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Finally in labor

I am so sorry about the gap in posting! I've been all caught up in work-related stuff and haven't been paying enough attention to my 3 loyal readers.

I was due on July 14th. I knew he (we found out we were having a "he" at our last ultrasound, in case I forgot to tell you) wasn't coming early, as much as I really, really wished he would. I mean, part of me wanted to postpone his arrival for as long as possible because I was freaked out like just about all new parents about what was about to happen, but I was so sick of being pregnant towards the end. All you moms out there know what I'm talking about.

Huge, huge, HUGE! Can't breathe when I'm sitting, can't stand for more than a few minutes. Can't fit more than two bites at a time into my stomach, have to pee every hour.

You know.

And my ears! I forgot to tell you all this before, but the most consistently annoying side effect of pregnancy for me, throughout from week 1 to week 40, was that my ears were stuffed up and muffled. Aarrgh! So annoying!! Because your hormones cause your mucus membranes to get all spongy when you're pregnant (nice), a lot of women have stuffy noses the whole time. Not me. Stuffy ears. I couldn't hear anything anyone was saying. It was like I was wearing a giant marshmallow hat with earflaps. I could tip my head to the side and my hearing would clear up, but then when I tilted my head back upright, within a minute I wouldn't be able to hear again. Seriously annoying.

So, though I was scared, I was also sick of it and I really wanted to be done. But I knew he wasn't coming early. I know first-time moms tend to deliver later rather than sooner, but it could happen. Right? "Dream on, hoser," said my instincts, and they were right. At about 4 pm on my due date, I decided to take a nap. I rolled over from one side to the other at one point and felt a *pop* down there.

"Wait, what was that?"

I got up and went to the bathroom. My water broke!

"Woo hoo!"

"On the way!"

"Wait, what's that? Is that a contraction?"

"Is it?...wha?...um...no."

"Ok, I know this can take some time" (12 hours on average for a first-time mom) "but according to my calculations, I will have a new son by tomorrow morning."

"Yay!" Clap, clap, clap!

Um, not so much.

I called Fran to let her know that my water had broken, to give her a head's up. She told me to call her again when I wanted her to come over. You bet! We'd laid in all our birthing supplies weeks (sometimes months, who am I foolin') ago. Sealed bags of clean towels, lots of absorbent pads, like the kind you can use for disposable changing pads, as well as about 6 yards of that padded vinyl used for outdoor tablecloths, a whole bunch of raspberry leaf tea, and a couple of other herbal concoctions. Fran had given us a list early on. I made the bed up with clean sheets and put another clean fitted sheet over the top of everything so we could just take it off when everything was through. I puttered around the house, pausing for the occasional moderate contraction, and eventually fixed dinner. I made salmon. I remember because I eventually threw it back up. Not right away, mind you, but...yeah.

I took a shower after dinner, and settled in for the big event. My contractions eventually came on stronger and more frequently, so at about 9 pm I called Fran back and told her that I thought it was time for her to come over. I thought, "It won't be long now!"

Wrong.

Monday, February 06, 2006

Pregnant again

What is my deal, taking so long?! Blame it on the Super Bowl.

Oh, Seahawks. I was actually a little hopeful...Bah! Back to the story...

I got pregnant again on October 21, 2003. I know the date because I said, "Hon, if we're going to try to get pregnant this month, we should have sex tonight, or possible tomorrow." Yeah, that's how clock-like I was, not to mention romantic. All signs pointed to Go, and Go it was. Now that I knew what being pregnant felt like, I was pretty sure within a couple of days that I was. And lo, a couple of weeks later I peed on a stick and saw the pink stripe.

From the very beginning, I knew everything was fine with this pregnancy. Just knew it. I didn't have that feeling of dread that clung to me the first time. I wasn't full of ambivalence about being pregnant. I didn't want to be all secretive. I wasn't worried about neural tube defects. Sure, I wasn't going to fully relax until we had our first sonogram, but I knew it would be fine.

Everything about our experience this time was different. I saw Maggie once early on. No blood tests, no hormone supplements, nothing. She had us come in for an early sonogram at 9 weeks because she knew we were anxious. I think Orion was more anxious than I was. He didn't have my pregnant lady knowin'. The sonogram tech was very nice. Maggie'd told her about our history, so she knew what to do. She said, "First, see that little butterfly-shaped thing? That's the developing brain. It all looks perfect." Then she went around, declaring all the various parts "perfect". We saw the little bean's heart beat, and left with our grainy little pictures in hand, elated.

We agreed with Maggie to only see her every couple of months, mostly at milestone points, unless something was wrong, because we were seeing Fran for our regular pre-natal care. I'm telling you right now, if you can find a midwife you like, use her. We can't recommend it enough. We loved Maggie, but even a great doctor only spends maybe 15 or 20 minutes with you. They just can't spend much more than that, unless there's something requiring their attention that justifies the time. Fran would always spend over an hour with us. We saw her once a month early on, then twice a month towards the middle, then every week towards the end. She was also very available between visits, if we had any questions. A typical appointment with Fran went like this: We'd arrive, and I'd go to the bathroom and pee in a cup. She'd test it for all the usual, protein levels and the like. She'd take my blood pressure, then I'd lay down on the big bed and she'd measure my belly. Then she'd get out the Doppler and we'd listen to the heart beat. Sometimes she'd prod my belly a bit to listen for the change in heart rate. Then, she'd ask how I was doing (or sometimes she'd do that first, whatever). We'd talk about how I was feeling, sleeping, eating. Early on, she had me write down everything I ate for a week, then she went over it. We'd talk about whatever was on our minds. She had a pretty large library of pregnancy, labor and delivery, and parenting books, and we'd regularly take a couple home with us, so we always had plenty of questions. We'd talk about what was going to happen during labor, or what sort of stuff we should have on hand for the baby once he arrived. We'd even talk about how we were feeling about impending parenthood. Pretty much the definition of holistic care. We never felt like patients. She had an apprentice, Lilly, who was a professional doula. Lilly was training with Fran to become a midwife, so Fran asked if we'd mind if Lilly sat in on all our sessions. She asked when it was closer if Lilly could also attended the birth. We were happy to have her, and so we got another birth attendant at no charge. Lilly was also great. We're still in touch.

I had an uneventful pregnancy, mercifully. Most of my complaints were the usual, minor stuff - aches and pains, trouble getting comfortable in bed at night, trouble staying awake during the day, can't stand how anything smells, totally starving yet completely full-feeling at the same time. You know.

This time around, we'd planned a home birth from the beginning. A couple of the 6 of you who read this page regularly might be thinking, "What kind of crazy, granola-eating, mother-goddess-worshiping kook is she?!" Nope. Not me. I don't like granola. I've told you before that I'm all for modern medicine. I think it's great that we don't all die toothless at the age of 40. However, I also think that pregnancy and childbirth are natural processes, and unless you have some complication that warrants it, I don't think it should be managed like a disease, which is what happens to many women. Now, this is just me. You do whatever you want. I feel strongly that a woman should feel fully supported, no matter what sort of birth she has. A woman who wants to have her baby in the hospital and have an epidural should do it and feel good about it. A woman who wants to have her baby naturally in a birthing center should do it and feel good about it. Same with someone who wants to do a home birth. I'm going to say this only once, and if you want the supporting literature, I'm happy to point you to it: a planned home birth with a trained midwife in attendance is just as safe, if not safer, than a hospital birth. I'm not anti-hospital, though I don't really want to spend any time in one if I can help it (not a big fan of resistant staph). It was always our plan that if there was some reason for us to be in the hospital, then we wouldn't hesitate to go.

I could really go on at length about this stuff, but I won't. You came for the birth story, and I have yet to deliver (heh). Next post I'll actually get to the delivery, I swear!

Friday, February 03, 2006

Another short interlude

Do you know what's balm for the soul? Lou Rawls voice, that's what. I'm serious. If you don't have a copy of Lou Rawls singing "Your Good Thing", get it.

You can thank me later.