Birthday Boy

 

Last weekend we celebrated my little boy's seventh birthday. I can't believe he's seven! I think he will always be my baby. I love when he comes and snuggles under my chin and he still has a sweet voice that reminds me of when he was a toddler. Being my youngest and last baby, I think his birthdays are always bittersweet; just a reminder of how long it's been since I birthed a child.

His birth was such a transformative experience. Birthing him at home, in my own bed, almost entirely unassisted (our midwife arrived 10 minutes before his arrival) made me feel so powerful. I don't think I realized what my body was really capable of until I surrendered to the experience and trusted my body. Raising a child with special needs has also taught me strength I didn't know I had. I once wallowed in the idea that my child would be handicapped by a motor processing disorder. I often blamed myself though Apraxia in children doesn't have a single known cause. Again, once I trusted in my child to succeed and I turned from a worrier to an advocate, those years of Apraxia treatment became transformative. 

He makes me so proud. He's so sweet and kind. When we play games together, even if it isn't a cooperative game, he tries to help out others so there are no "losers". He's silly and wild. Sometimes I have to remind myself that his boundless energy is a good thing. Though he struggles with language arts, he has a very scientifically inclined mind. He absorbs facts about nature and animals and will teach me things I've completely forgotten or sometimes even things I never knew. I love him endlessly.

A Boy

There is a reason I haven't been on this space and his name is Finn. He came 2 weeks earlier than anticipated so we were caught a little off guard but he is so welcome in our family. I'm likely going to be away for a while longer while we enjoy these sweet baby moments (and help our first born recover from a nasty virus). There will be much more Finn updates coming soon.

April's Birth Quilt

This quilt has been in the works since December. There were lots of delays (and procrastinating on my part because, well, I hate quilting) but at last it is complete. This quilt is in celebration of April's birth. I was inspired by the days when people used to make quilts to celebrate big life changes such as a wedding or a baby. Friends and family each made a square and I assembled it (and made some squares of my own. You can click on the picture to see it larger.

Clockwise from the top left:
My mom made this square. It is modeled after our wedding invitations and has the initials of everyone that made a square embroidered on the tree trunk.
My friend Lindsay made this one. She traced her daughters hands. She was inspired by these quotes: "A mother's heart is always with her children" and "Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.”
Jon's aunt Mary Ann made this one. I'm not sure of the story behind it.
My grandmother made this one. The two large hearts are attached at the shoulder and the little heart is attached to one of the big hearts by a little umbilical cord.
My aunt Karen made this one. She modeled it after the design on our wedding program. They are two love birds and the mommy bird has a baby in her belly.
My friend Kyrie made this one. A strong family tree grown from love.
I made this one to commemorate April and my shared love of music. I hope to sing and make music with her her whole life.
My mom also made this one. When I was little my favorite thing about my stuffy was the tag on the back. I loved to rub the tag in my fingers. April loves tags too. This little bear has the perfect tag (by his foot).
I also made this one. I embroidered a baby sleeping under the stars. It is my sweet dreams square.
Jon's mom made this one. It reads Eyes Wide View Miracles. It was to remind me to keep my eyes open when April was being born (but I was so focused on pushing I kind of forgot).
Jon's aunt Joan made this one. In the center heart is a little head down embryo, surrounded by love.
My aunt Karen also made this one. It is April's initials and an umbrella. All made from her wedding dress fabric.
And finally, I made the center square. I was inspired by a quote I heard once. "Before you were born I carried you under my heart. From the moment you arrived in this world until the moment I leave it, I will always carry you in my heart."
I will hang this quilt on her wall for now, but when she is older I think I'll let her use it for special days like when she is sick or hurt and needs to be surrounded with love. I really hope this quilt stands the test of time and gets passed down to her children.
Thank you to everyone who helped create this quilt.

Pregnancy Reads

I've been doing a little reflecting on my pregnancy and I've started putting away some of my pregnancy books and I thought I would make a few notes here about what books I found helpful. There were some that I did mean to read but just ran out of time.

Magical Beginnings, Enchanted Lives by Deepak Chopra
I really liked this book. At first I found it to be a little strange (one of the early exercises asked you to imagine yourself inside your womb holding your baby and I found myself laughing at the image it conjured) but in the end I found real benefit from the positive tone and uplifting exercises. This book offered some great suggestions for coping with the physical and emotional changes that accompany pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum.
Pregnancy, Childbirth and the Newborn by Penny Simkin
This was my go-to book whenever I had a concern or issue I wanted to look up. Penny Simkin is great a taking a pretty neutral stance on birth. She has information in there for both the homebirth setting and hospital setting. I never really sat down and read this book instead I just kept coming back to it from 8 weeks onward.
Birthing from Within by Pam England
This book was an interesting read. I think it is more geared towards women who have a lot a fear and anxiety about childbirth. I didn't really feel that I fell into that category so some of the exercises in this book seemed a little pointless to me. I did enjoy reading the chapter on dealing with the pain of childbirth. I thought she offered a lot of good tips for coping with the fear that accompanies pain.
Ina May's Guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskin
This is one of the very first books I read in regards to a more natural approach to childbirth. I think it is really hard these days to find women with positive birth stories. When I first started investigating midwives and homebirth I put this book on the top of my list to read. The first half of the book is a collection of really inspiring and empowering stories of natural births. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in learning more about birthing in a natural way.
The Birth Partner by Penny Simkin
This is a great book to share with your birth partner. I left it out for Jon to read but he never really got into it. I ended up reading through it and folding down the corners on the pages I thought had the most valuable information and asked him to read one of those sections each day. I choose the topics on birth positions and different touch techniques that I wanted him to try. This book is a great companion to birth classes. It just takes the info taught there to the next level. I think it is a good book for boosting the confidence of a partner who is about to attend their first birth.
Dr. Jack Newman's Guide to Breastfeeding by Dr. Jack Newman
Again this is a book that I didn't really read cover-to-cover but I'm using as a reference. I don't really think this book should be read cover-to-cover because I feel it could increase a mother's anxiety about breastfeeding. I found that reading about potential problems actually made me feel really nervous about nursing rather than confident that we could do it. Instead I put the book down and came back to it for tips on sore nipples and painfully engorged breasts. I would recommend any breastfeeding mother have this book on hand.

There were a few more books that I read but I don't really feel are worth mentioning. I think there is a fine line between reading to expand your options and open your mind and reading too much and creating anxiety. Choose carefully what kind of books you read during pregnancy, try to choose ones with a neutral stand on birth (ones that don't discourage homebirth or hospital birth) and ones with a positive tone.

April's Birth Story

April's birth certainly did not go the way I had planned and wished for it to go however I still feel it is important for me to put it writing.
Days before real early labor began I started having agonizing back pain. It was so painful I couldn't really sleep. So by the time my contractions were coming every 20 mins early Friday morning, I was so sleep deprived and in so much pain that I couldn't really imagine how I was going to cope. I called the midwife around 9am on Friday and she came to the house and checked me only to find I was only 1 cm dilated. She recommended I take some Tylenol and Gravol and get some sleep. The Tylenol took the edge off the back pain but by the time I was feeling drowsy enough to sleep my contractions had really picked up. I had had a little bit of bloody mucus in the middle of the night but I wouldn't say I had my bloody show until just before lunch on Friday. I decided at that point it was time to call Jon and have him come home and support me. Once he got home around 1pm we lay in bed and had a quick snack. The back pain started picking up again and we moved to using the birth ball. I did really enjoy the relief I got when I lay across the birth ball.
Around 5pm my water broke. It was filled with meconium.  I was so disappointed because I knew that I would have to decide whether to risk it and stay at home or transfer. After my water broke the contractions really picked up so Jon and I hopped in the shower. The heat was soothing but not enough to curb the endless back pain. We stayed in the shower anyways until the hot water ran out. The one coping mechanism that seemed effective in letting go was sound. I was definitely loud but it was the best way for me to release that pain and tension.
Our midwife came around 6:30pm and checked me again. I was only dilated 3 cms but I was contracting every 2-3 minutes. It was really intense because between contractions I didn't feel I had a break due to the horrible back pain. After about a half hour of serious thought and discussion we decided to transfer to the hospital because I just couldn't live with myself if she was born with meconium in her lungs and got sick because we were at home.
The drive to the hospital was awful. I was sprawled over the birth ball in the back seat but the drive is at least 20 minutes and I had a bunch of really intense contractions. Being so limited in movement inside the car meant that my back pain just got worse as we drove. I was also feeling less relaxed and really nervous about the hospital. I'm sure the tension didn't help my pain. I was just praying it would end.
Our hospital room was small and limiting. I was definitely crying as we "set up" the room. I tried using the shower for my back pain (I was actually encouraged by the promise of endless hot water) but every time someone on the floor flushed a toilet the temperature would change. It was hard to relax when the water went from too cold to too hot. I ended up just lying on my side in the bed. I had written up motivating flashcards that I had brought with us and I was trying to read them to stay positive but I couldn't even focus my eyes. I was really struggling.
By this point I just couldn't cope with the back pain. The pain was so intense and so unbearable that I really couldn't feel anything in my abdominal muscles, all I felt was back pain. We tried the laughing gas but I found all it did was make me dozy between contractions instead of helping during contractions. We tried some morphine, which did absolutely nothing for the pain. I'm really surprised that it is even offered for back labor because it was that ineffective. Finally, I was just beside myself. I had not had a break from the pain in almost 24 hours, I had not slept for 3 days, I begged for the epidural.
Getting the epidural took a while but once I got it I felt so good. I tried to sleep but I was really overcome with sadness over the loss of my natural homebirth. I cried for most of the night. I felt that I had completely lost control. However, my midwife helped me feel a bit better about getting the interventions by showing me how April's heart rate didn't change. I was concerned she would be stressed by the drugs but she was strong the whole time. That helped to lessen my guilt but didn't take away my sadness. My midwife and talked for a while and tried to salvage my birth plan and keep some of the things that were important to me (such as low light when she was delivered, let the cord finish pulsing on it's own, skin-to-skin immediately after birth, etc.). Jon, who had been such a patient partner, was grateful for the rest too. Lucky guy got 4 hours of sleep.
Five hours later, I could really feel the pressure in my rectum. I knew she was low, really low. At 4:30 am they told me it was time to wake Jon and push. Pushing was such a release. I thought I wouldn't be able to feel anything or know when to push but I really did. I could feel her moving down and the stretching in my perineum. Getting to the pushing stage is a little strange. I was used to the contractions coming one after the other but I was surprised at how we had to wait for the contraction (sometimes about 5 minutes would pass before I felt another). It took just 30 minutes of pushing and then there she was on my chest.
I was definitely in shock. I didn't believe Jon when he said it was a girl, I couldn't believe how dark her hair was, she was so amazing. She stared at me and I stared back. I loved that moment. We waited for the cord to stop pulsing, then Jon got to cut it. Unfortunately, because of the meconium, the pediatrician took her to the warming table and pumped the meconium out of her stomach. I felt so sad for her, what an awful first experience. But once they were done Jon got to have some skin-to-skin time with her while I delivered the placenta and got stitches (I had 2nd degree tearing so I needed about 6). Finally, I got to feed her and man was she ready. She latched on right away and stayed there for the next 2 hours.
At 7am we got moved to Motherbabe and luckily did not have to share a room. We nursed, snuggled and April slept. I just could not rest in the hospital. People were coming in to drop off food, pick up the trash, check my IV, etc. We decided to stay just long enough for my epidural to wear off and then go home.
It was sad to go home and see my house still all set up for a homebirth but I was so blissful with my new baby that I didn't worry about it too much. I hope that time will ease my disappointment. I do feel that I was present and proactive during my birth. I did what I had to to bring April into this world healthy and safe. In the end I do believe that my birth was exactly as it was meant to be.

Where We Stand

Everyone has their own views on how to raise children. It seems logical that many of us raise our own children the way we were raised. Not that my parents did anything wrong in raising me, in fact I think I turned out pretty good. The journey to adulthood however was a rocky one and I'm hoping by recognizing what I felt I needed in my childhood (and ultimately didn't really get) that I can give my own child a better journey towards the grown up they choose to be. Here are my thoughts on how we plan on raising our child (these are just thoughts, I want to be totally flexible so that I can adjust to my child's needs as well as my own).

Birth: Seems like the logical place to start. We are planning a peaceful homebirth. I have a great husband, doula and midwife so my confidence in our choice to birth at home is really high. I feel like I can be relaxed here and that things are more likely to go the way nature intended it if we are away from the medical world. Plus I can't tell you how wonderful it sounds to give birth in your home, have a shower in your own bathroom and crawl into your own bed with your new little baby and sleep uninterrupted by nurses and hospital going-ons.

Breastfeeding: The benefits of breastfeeding are impossible to ignore. Formula is not an option for us. We have a postpartum doula who will help me get the hang of breastfeeding if needed. I am also hoping to breastfeed for an extended period of time. It would be great if we could breastfeed until age 4 or 5 but we will just have to go with the flow on that one.

Sleeping: I was "taught" to sleep using the Faber method of crying it out. I don't think this method taught me to self soothe but rather taught me anxiety. We plan to co-sleep to the best of our abilities. We have a very small bedroom so we don't really have room for a family bed. We have a side-car co-sleeper for the early days but once the baby is older we are going to have find a different solution to the bed issue. The other problem that could affect our ability to co-sleep is that I am a light sleeper and Jon snores. If our baby is a light sleeper Jon may have to sleep elsewhere or if the baby makes noises all night I may not be able to handle so little sleep between the two of them. Again, we will just have to see how it goes.

Diapering/Pottying: I think I've mentioned before that we are going to try to practice Elimination Communication with our child. Jon and I both find it really strange to teach your child to eliminate into a diaper only to tell them a few years later that they should actually eliminate into the toilet. Baby's have the ability to recognize when they need to potty and if you recognize those cues of when they need to go and take them to the potty they will learn from the beginning to communicate with you about their elimination needs. Being that this is our first child I'm not putting a lot of pressure on myself to catch every pee or poop but I do hope that we can communicate regularly enough that eventually we don't really have to work at it, it will just be as natural as nursing. I do recognize that we will need to use diapers and when it comes to diapers I'm going to try to be strictly cloth diapering. We do have some disposables but I'm hoping to only use those when we are traveling and can't wash diapers or if we run out of clean diapers (which really should never happen but hey, it's good to be prepared).

Parenting: I believe in attachment parenting. I believe that children are to be respected as individuals from infancy. I'm not here to lord over my children, I'm here to love them and guide them. Creating a strong bond between mother and child is not about coddling them but about establishing love and trust. I want my child to be free to express themselves from an early age and be allowed to make their own decisions. However, I don't want to be disrespected in the process (for example, I don't want my needs for quiet or rest to be ignore because my child wants to run around yelling whenever he/she feels like it). We've been looking into the Montessori philosophy and reading books like Montessori from the Start and How to Raise an Amazing Child The Montessori Way. While I don't plan on using everything outlined in those books, I do really appreciate the emphasis on responsibility and respect. I feel that manners are an important social attribute and I like the way Montessori goes about teaching manners. We also plan on using the philosophy of consensual living in our home. Consensual living means that the needs of everyone are not only acknowledged but are included in the decision making process and solutions are mutually agreed upon. And finally I hope that in my communications with my family that I can continue to practice non-violent communication. I will admit that it can be real challenge, especially when I'm tired or stressed, but I do notice people respond well to it and I think it will be an effective method of communication with my child.

Schooling: Our plan regarding school is up in the air. I know that I do not want to send my child through the public school system however I'm not overly comfortable with homeschooling. I've been thinking of either a Montessori school (though many in the area don't go past grade 3) or a bio-regional school. I'm thinking that I will just put our child on the waiting lists and decide later. I've got more research to do.

Face of Birth

This looks fantastic! I can not wait to see it. This film is not only about the power of homebirth but about the important issue of choice. No one should be told that because they choose not be poked with needles, talked to like they are idiots, told to ignore what their body is telling them and to lay on their back or that they cannot eat or drink too much that they are breaking the law. I believe in homebirth. I believe that you have the right to choose your maternity care just as you have the right to choose your dental or specialty care. There is no one who knows your body better than you do and I truly believe that mothers know how to birth, no matter how scared or unprepared you are, your mind and body can do it. Homebirth, to me, it the safest choice for both mother and child.