Birth link

I haven't posted anything birthy in a while, but I saw this post today and thought, yes!!!

I've been thinking about the Infant's birth lately. I remember labor as not painless, but intense and overwhelming; there was pain, but it was the good feeling of muscles working hard. The one time I remember thinking "the e word"*, it wasn't because I hurt so badly, it was because the sensations were so overwhelming I was having trouble coping with them anymore. Because of my training, the small portion of my analytical brain that still worked at that point told me that that meant I was almost done. Also, my doula helped me let go, to surrender to the waves. I might have done it without her, but it wold have been tremendously more difficult!

Some women report feeling amazing empowerment after giving birth; I can't say that I did. I think perhaps that's because I don't generally feel disempowered. Birth was amazing, and wonderful, and I want to do it again, but I didn't have that "if I can do this, I can do anything" feeling so many women express.

Mothering a toddler - now that's giving me that feeling!

*epidural

Drinking game!

Because I can't do anything for my friend and client A, who's in the hospital right now dealing with preterm labor, I'm going to rough out a drinking game based on Thomas the Tank Engine.

Essentially, take a drink every time one of the following occurs: any of the characters exclaims (cinders and ashes, flatten my funnel, etc.); any time the words "useful" or "reliable" are mentioned; any time Sir Toppham Hatt is pompous. Following these guidelines, you should be nicely tipsy by the end of a single episode!

On a completely different note, all you Jane Austen nuts should go read this. Now. Swallow first, and if you don't, don't say I didn't warn you.

Threefer Thursday

1) I got to check the inside of the Infanta's mouth this afternoon, and three more molars are peeking through. It's just one point each so far, but they're there. She also has at least one canine trying to make it in... That's everything but her second year molars making an appearance, and she's still short an incisor. I'm beginning to wonder vaguely if I should be concerned. But only vaguely.

2) I have three client meetings in three days this week! Makes me feel like a real doula or something. One's a postpartum visit, one's mostly a formality with a mom that (re)hired me in February (the instant she got the positive test, basically), and only one's a new client... but still! Business! It's awesome!

3) Did you know that I tweet? (In case you didn't know, that's the commonly accepted present tense for the verb to Twitter.) I succumbed a few months back when I discovered that the Yarn Harlot tweets... and I'm hooked. *sigh* Anyway, if you don't get a Twitter feed yourself, you can follow my random thoughts over on the sidebar. It's currently stuck a ways down, but I'll move it higher at some point.

Another day, another adventure...

I spent a lot of time sleeping today; sleeping, and reassuring the Infanta that I really do still love her and haven't abandoned her. You see, I spent the last two days at the hospital, working with a client. 36 hours of being wrung through the hospital wringer later, she has a beautiful little girl... but man, I'm still tired. And all I did was cheer-lead!

I can't talk about the birth here; it's not my story and it would violate ethics, contracts, friendship, and good manners... but it was intense, and I don't think I would have held up nearly as well if my friend and fellow doula Stacey hadn't been willing to cheer me on via text message. I am especially grateful to her for doing so despite being more than ready to give birth herself, and in fact was in prodromal labor herself pretty much the whole time we were consulting. Stacey, remind me to bring chocolate to our date! I owe you. :)

Anyway... I knew before that I didn't want to give birth at the hospital here in town, but now I know I REFUSE to do so. Especially since my client has the same insurance we do... and so I would be subject to the same doctors she was. So not interested. And I really did like the care I received at the hospital where I gave birth to the Infanta, so despite its being 45 minutes away in good traffic, I think it's worth it. Of course, what I would really prefer would be to simply stay home, but I don't see that happening in the near future. So... I'll drive the 45 minutes to be cared for by the midwife I'm already established with (and whom I like very much), and drive the same to give birth again at the Baby-Friendly hospital.

Time flies when you're roasting.

It's been over a week since I posted last - yikes! I didn't realize until Mom called last night, wanting to know how things were since I hadn't posted... It's been hot. If you don't follow the weather in the Willamette Valley as slavishly as do the people who live here, we're on the down side of a really nasty heat wave - I think even my friends who live in places like California, New Mexico and Texas will agree that 108 is really, really hot! It's even worse when you live in a place that's rainy for 10 months of the year, and where 95 is usually considered roasting. As I type, it's about 92... and it feels a bit warmer than we'd really prefer, but it's not horrid. Two days ago? 108. Happily for us, we could go take refuge with my in-laws and their central AC for the afternoon; I'm not sure what we'd have done without that option. I've been feeling ambivalent about the fancy, expensive windows we had installed last year, but no more! With this heat, they've really been showing their worth, keeping our poorly insulated house mostly tolerable.

What else, what else... well, I'm on call for a mom whose EDD was two days ago, and that's pretty central to my life right now. It's hard to relax into doing much of anything when I know that any moment I'll get The Call, and have an hour to get ready and be over at her house (or wherever she wants me to meet them). I'm very excited to attend this birth, but being on call is really a strain.

At the same time, I'm instituting some changes with nursing the Infanta. I've really been feeling that her nursing has strongly contributed to losing two pregnancies now (early this month I had what I believe was a chemical pregnancy, where the egg is fertilized, but never implants). Since we really want to become pregnant again, I'm making an effort to reduce the number of times a day that she nurses. I'm aiming for about three hours between sessions (with the intent of stretching it longer bit by bit over time), which really isn't all that long, but is quite a lot longer than the 45 minutes or so she was doing earlier this month! It's a change for all of us, especially as Josh and I have to pay much more attention to giving her real food and drink to replace the mommy-moo we're trying to cut down on. I'm *not* weaning her completely, simply trying to adjust the proportion of milk to solids. I think it's going ok at the moment, but I'm also at a point of my cycle where she is much more relaxed about my supply. She does start getting frantic to nurse about a half hour before I'm ready to, which means that we're practicing the fine art of toddler distraction.

Perhaps by the time I post again, I'll have double the number of doula births under my belt. :)

Has it really been since Thursday?

I guess it has. Rest assured, life has improved since that very dreary post. Among other details, the Infanta is walking more than crawling. That is, she's at about 60% walking, 40% crawling; I think we can say that "she's walking" now.

But I'm posting because I found this tidbit through my Reader just now. I like this blog a lot, by the way; I don't agree with all of her politics (because she's very anti-choice, and I'm, well, very pro-choice), but in general she has a lot of really smart things to say. All of you third trimester mamas take heart!

A point I've been anting to make for a while...

...said brilliantly at the Unnecesarean.

If you're happy and you know it..

The Infanta has now discovered how to clap her hands. Happily, she doesn't yet know how to do it effectively enough to actually make a big noise, so her doing it for minutes on end is just cute, not irritating.

On another note, one of my fellow doulas made a suggestion this evening about a simple knitted product that would probably sell like hotcakes to a certain population. This bears thought...

And the intarwebs provide

Go read hedra's gorgeous doula/birth story here. No, Bethany, I'm not trying to make your ovaries twitch worse.

An unusual birth story

I woke up this morning to a woman laboring in bed with me. Go read about it on my doula blog!

Two things

For a laugh, go check this out. Then come back.

For something not really funny, but heartwrenching and amazing, watch this film. The link's been making the rounds of the birth blogosphere recently, and I finally made time to watch it today. Very inspiring, and since I'm now a mom myself, I also have a much better understanding of just how hard that woman works. Just... amazing. Take an hour and go watch it, you won't regret it.

A Doula Event

Take a look over at my doula blog.

8. Clients?

We're off to the babywearing meeting this morning. Such a pain to make the trip take twice as long, just because I have to take the bus.. but it's better than staying in and never seeing anyone.

I found two potential clients last night! One is the wife of a guy Josh games with. The other is one of the local knitters. Although the knitter is due around the beginning of August, I'll still leap at the chance to be her doula - we even joked about her being due for the Sock Summit. :)

It's about time!

Go check out my new doula blog!