Pregnancy Update

Labyrinth of pregnancy (the path can be followed all the way into the spiral belly!)

I had my 28 week prenatal appointment earlier this week. I value my midwife and enjoy our visits, but I had a nighttime epiphany recently that I had more options to choose from, because I miss the kind of relationship I had with my midwife during my second pregnancy.

At this appointment, I had my blood sugar checked (2 hour post-prandial) and it was 91 (same as it was with my first baby at this point). I also had my hemoglobin checked and it was 11.5 (same as with my first baby—with second baby, it was 12.9 at 26 weeks). I now weigh almost as much as I did full term with number two! (still five pounds to go). Baby wiggles a LOT—sometimes it almost hurts, which I don’t remember from before. She also has hiccups regularly, which are always cute. She also seems to be head-down. When I heard that, I felt really strange—like, “there is a head in there?! And, I’m going to give birth to it?!” I have been much more reluctant to read about birth during this pregnancy—I think because I’ve been concentrating so much on successfully growing this baby to term, I don’t want to plant any subconscious ideas too early about giving birth and send myself into labor early, or something. I used to read a lot of birth stories and I have some great books of birth stories, but I don’t feel like reading them until I’m like 36 weeks—just in case. After this appointment, I started to think birthy thoughts some more—thinking about ideas and plans for when she is born. I also had a birth dream—the placenta came out first and after a while I was like, “wait, but I didn’t have the baby yet!” and then she was born—enormously fat with small eyes and she gave me a big hug.

The same night I realized I wish I had some more midwife choices, I had another realization (not exactly a new one, but a new version of it) that I still have a big root fear that something wrong with ME is what caused my miscarriages (like a clotting disorder) and that I still do not trust that I can really give birth to a living baby at the end of this pregnancy. I’m worried that my body was responsible for the loss of my other babies. I don’t know how to get rid of this or work with it really—I’m at an impasse and since I truly do not know the cause and I can’t talk myself out of logically/rationally or just “think positive.” It is buried down there—most of the time I feel happy fine, but when I catch sight of the fear again (that night it was because she wasn’t moving as much as she usually does at that time of night), I realize that it is this bone deep fear-based thing that I don’t know how to shake. I do not want to have a fear-based pregnancy or to live a fear-based life, but there it is…

When it isn’t the middle of the night and I have my logic brain back, I feel more certain that my m/c experiences were chance based—Noah perhaps some kind of abnormality and the second perhaps a progesterone deficiency or something else related to getting pregnant again fairly quickly after a significant loss—and thus have no bearing on my current pregnancy, but still.

However, speaking of fears and returning to my plans for this birth, someone recently expressed surprise to my mom that I’m planning to have this baby at home after what happened with Noah. Hmm. This is completely irrational to me, because what happened to Noah had nothing to do with being at home—he died, we found out, I gave birth to him at home. How would that mean that my new baby should be born in the hospital instead? Not to mention that fact that when I did go to the hospital postpartum because of blood loss, rather than being helped by the assumed-fabulous skills and resources at the hospital, I was dismissed in life-threatening condition! (and was instead helped by a midwife at her home.) Having Noah only reinforced for me that the hospital is not somewhere I want to be when I’m giving birth, postpartum, or in need of compassionate attention. Giving birth to him at home reinforced for me that home is where I can most capably, peacefully, respectfully, powerfully, and safely give birth to my babies.

I keep feeling this “call” to retreat—to quit most of my nonessential responsibilities and just hang around at home. I had this fantasy recently of a year-long postpartum retreat where I just take care of my baby and read and write and play with the kids and look at the clouds (or something). Ever since I had Noah last year, I’ve been feeling like turning inward/away and just spending time by myself. I also felt like I needed to take a break from being of service/helping other people and needed to tend my own hearth and take care of myself instead. I rarely actually follow-up on this urge, even when I have a chance to do so. There is always too much “work” to be done or things to “catch up” with or just “one more thing” and before I know it, my window of alone time has passed. This might just be a fantasy notion—if I really wanted to take the time out, wouldn’t I do it?—but I think it is a true call to self-care that I’m not heeding (even now, here I am writing a blog post while my kids are visiting their grandpa—couldn’t I be having a mini-retreat right now?). This is one reason I’m taking a leave from birth classes and LLL right now—I want to be able to focus on my own pregnancy, birth planning, babymoon, and new baby, rather than focusing on those things for other people. I also feel like writing about my own pregnancy and my own birthing thoughts, rather than writing posts or articles designed to help other people—sometimes I get bogged down in feeling like I should be writing helpful and informative posts and the time for personal reflection passes. Maybe this sounds selfish, but I don’t think so. I’ve always had a fear that if I am not “of service” in some capacity I will cease to exist/have any worth/be a real person—I’d like to get over that!

I often tell my college students that we cannot expect more from our clients than we are willing to do ourselves. I also tell them that sometimes we want to do for others what we are unwilling to do for ourselves. This is where I am right now—I have lots of great ideas for things I’d like to do for other women on pregnancy retreats or in birth classes for women who are having their second or third baby rather than their first and want to deepen their understanding of the meaning of pregnancy and birth in their lives. Why don’t I experiement and do all those things for myself? And, then, see about offering those things to other women…I can see it now—“My Year of Self-Care.” (Inside joke to those who know how I disklike “year of” experiment books.) I feel like I rarely do what I actually want to do with my days, instead of doing what I should do, or what makes the most sense. Sometimes it is what is most pressing, but more often it is should-based or internally driven, rather than an actual issue of priorities.

This actually isn’t the post I set out to write today, which was originally intended to be some self-care tips from Renee Trudeau with a short intro from me about my own “call” to rest and renewal. Perhaps it was the post I needed to write though! Perhaps not, because now I feel like I’ve “wasted” my chance to do some of those other things I’d like to do with my time!

Giveaway: Dreamgenii Pregnancy Pillow

Nov5

This giveaway is now closed, Amee was the winner. FYI, the longer I use this pillow the more I love it, so make sure to go to the Dreamgenii website and check it out!

Recently, I received a Dreamgenii Pregnancy Support Pillow to review. At 29 weeks pregnant, I am just at the right point to benefit from a pillow like this and I was happy to try it out. Unlike the “traditional” body pillow that many women use during pregnancy, the Dreamgenii is much more streamlined and takes up a lot less room in the bed. It has both a leg and “bump” support cushion in front and a back pillow in the back. This also makes it unique—I like feeling like I’m in a little pillow “nest” without having to bunch up and arrange a lot of individual pillows. The bump/leg support is supposed to support you on your left side. I confess that I actually prefer lying with my back to that side (feels cozy and kind of cradled up) and with my belly leaning on the “back support” part. Another neat thing about this pillow is that it can be used as a breastfeeding support pillow after baby is born!

Luckily for you, you now have a chance to win one of these pillows for yourself! To enter, just leave a comment telling me why you’d like to win the pillow. You can earn bonus entries by sharing the giveaway on your Facebook page or blog (please leave an additional separate comment letting me know you did this so that I know to count you twice).

Giveaway ends Friday, Nov. 12th.

Happy Halloween!

Oct30

Today, I officially enter the third trimester. Yay for us! It feels good to leave the second trimester behind, since that was the last milestone I had reached when pregnant with Noah.

We had a playgroup Halloween party on Thursday and I went as Scully from the X-Files (people seemed disappointed that I didn’t have a pumpkin belly to show, but I was going for “minimal effort,” rather than cuteness 🙂

Luckily, my fabulous photographer friend took a cute belly picture of me at the party anyway:

And, today, I shamelessly ripped off my friend Emilia’s idea and had Mark take a pumpkin belly picture of me. This is the first year I’ve been this pregnant on Halloween—I’ve been pregnant on Halloween twice before, but due in May both of those times, not in January.

Celebrate the Woman Pregnant

Oct27

Celebrate the Woman Pregnant

By Ani Tuzman

A woman pregnant,

I long to be seen

belly protruding,

life invisibly visible

churning inside

I want to be seen

honored, revered,

Exalted

not as my person,

but as the Miracle itself

of life begetting life

of human birth

Celebrate the woman

pregnant

don’t set her aside

nor cast her off as disabled,

or ever less woman;

Revel with her

feeling her firmness

knowing her softness

Carve her rare beauty

in smooth white marble

Look upon her.

Celebrate the woman pregnant

Hers is to know

the creative moment

of Life incarnating

——–

This poem came in the pregnancy newsletter I get from Mothering.com and it reminded me of the “magic” of being pregnant. I love that feeling (I’ve written about it before in the “the pregnant glow“). After this new baby is born, we do not plan to have any more children (though I have said to my husband, “what if she’s just so awesome we want to have one more?”) and I’m trying to take special time to savor and enjoy that magic feeling of being pregnant, since I will likely not experience it again personally. I told a friend recently that I feel like maybe I’m not savoring as much as I “should” be and realized that I think when I think of savoring, I think I’m picturing sitting around for hours rubbing my belly—possibly making multiple belly casts and drawing some fabulous art as well. Oh, and making some sculptures. And, then sitting and rubbing some more—preferably in the sunshine 😉 I have been making a very conscious effort to downscale my commitments to allow for more of this. I’m also taking a leave from teaching birth classes—I feel like I want to focus on my own pregnancy, rather than on other people’s. I feel a real inward-draw and not so much like being “of service” to others (I’ve been feeling this inner call since Noah was born last year, actually, but it has taken a while to actually get to the downscaling part). I also find that teaching college classes “uses up” most of my available teaching energy and I don’t have as much to give to birth classes—I am not expecting this to be a permanent leave, birthwork is too important to me for that, but I want to heed my inward call. I’ll have to stick with “virtual” birth education via this blog for a while!

I’ve had a post pending for a while that I guess will never get posted, about life balance and feeling like I’ve not been living up to a good guiding quote—“the things that matter most should never be at the mercy of the things that matter least.” Instead, the things that had been getting cut from my schedule were things like hanging out with my friends, sitting in the sunshine, writing in my journal, rubbing my belly, snuggling with my husband, reading books to my kids, chatting with my mom—HELLO! Not a good idea. So, I’ve done some cutting, some saying no, and also just some mental readjusting about how I think about things (like my to-do list). I’ve also been doing a “conditions of enoughness” thing that I learned from Jen Louden, wherein you set some conditions of enoughness for the day—not, just keep burning until the day is used up, not, “I can probably do this one more thing” and likewise not a “bare minimum” approach, but what is enough on a given day. Usually, this does not mean accomplishing everything on one’s to-do list, and it leaves some time leftover in the day for self-care—which is the piece I’ve been missing too. While everything is not perfect, obviously, I feel better about my life balance in recent weeks. My main reason for this downshifting is actually in preparation to enjoy my new baby when she gets here—I want to be all “cleared out” to enjoy a nice babymoon as well as to be free to take good care of myself as well as my baby.

The picture above was taken by my friend Karen at the park last week. She has launched a new photography business recently and if you click the picture, it will take you to her Facebook fan page. She is going to do both pregnancy photography and birth photography and I hope to have some more pictures in another month or so 🙂

And, I actually have been doing a lot of drawing during this pregnancy. Here is one I did when I was starting to re-incorporate the pregnant identity into my life again, as well as to feel some of the joy of pregnancy rather than just anxiety:

I’ve done others as well and then after finding out she is a girl, I drew this one:

Pregnant Women Driving…

Oct22

“In terms of mortality and injury, we know that driving a car is hundreds of times more dangerous for women and children than giving birth…Though it’s proven to be extremely dangerous and can often be fatal, no one accuses a pregnant woman who drives a car every day of being ‘selfish.’ And, when she arrives at her destination without having a crash, no one tells her how ‘lucky’ she was.” –Jennifer Margulis

I have blogged several times about birth having inherent value in its own right. Process AND “product” (i.e. healthy mom, healthy baby) are both important. A de-emphasis on the birth process only serves to disempower, silence, invalidate, and violate women—to shut down their very real and important reasons for choosing “alternative” birth options (reasons which usually have health of the baby as central anyway). Similarly to the writer above, I also use car/driving analogies when talking about the accusation people make about choosing “the birth experience” over a “healthy baby.” The way I word this same idea is that no one accuses a pregnant woman of placing her desire to get somewhere over her desire for a healthy baby (as women having homebirths are often accused—except in the case of homebirth, unlike with driving, there actually IS NO increased risk of death from staying at home!). I also use the car example in classes when talking about routine IVs—by the logic used to “justify” routine administration of IVs to women in labor, we should all make sure we are hooked up to at least a saline lock every time we drive anywhere!

Arkansas Traveler Baby

Oct14

This past weekend we took a family trip to go quartz mining in Arkansas. On our way, we stopped at Ultrasona of the Ozarks and had one final ultrasound (not going to get into my cognitive dissonance about over-using ultrasound during this pregnancy in this post, but hope to write about it someday). We found out that baby is definitely a girl! It was very obvious—we both could tell before the tech said anything.

Baby's face

Here is the picture of her little face. I know u/s pictures all look the same, but I think she is cute! And, we saw her yawn 🙂

Here are two cute pix of her little feet. The blob nearby is her HEAD, because she is all squished up with her feet by her head.

I’ve been going for “alive” as my primary goal during this whole pregnancy, but having a girl baby is a fun bonus 🙂 It is really important to me to be able to name her and bond with her as fully as possibly while pregnant (which I know is fully possible without ultrasounds, but for me, it has been “humanizing” to see her and think of her as a real baby and not just think, “don’t die” thoughts and “IF I have a baby” thoughts).

We stopped and took some pix overlooking the Buffalo River Gorge (Arkansas Grand Canyon):

We then went on to Mount Ida, AR and to a gem and crystal show/event that was being held (coincidentally) that weekend. The following day, we went to Wegner Crystal Mine. We packed into the back of a pickup and were bounced and jounced up to the top of a mountain where we then dug for quartz. Quartz is mined above ground. These mines are all on National Forest land and while it looks like a somewhat horrible scar/blight on the landscape, they are heavily monitored/restricted, so the actual mine can only cover so much ground, etc. We had a fabulous time and left with two buckets of quartz.

Youngest crystal miner ever 🙂

On Sunday, we took a day trip to Crater of Diamonds State Park in Murfreesboro, AR. I burned out there very quickly and do not recommend diamond mining to anyone who is pregnant! Partially it was the futility—I knew we weren’t going to find any diamonds!—and it was really hot and there was no shade so sun was just blasting down on my head and I felt ill/off. My husband did take home two buckets of jasper and agate, which was his main reason for visiting this park, more than possibly finding any diamonds.

Showing off ALL the diamonds we found...

When I woke up on Monday morning, I had some totally unexpected and unexplained mystery spotting that almost sent us home without going to the final mine. I’ve written on my other blog about my tenuous sense of security and trust during this pregnancy and how I feel like there is no “safe” point anymore. It is really sad to me how very, very quickly my equilibrium can be thrown off and how quickly I sink into negative/depressing thoughts. As soon as I saw the blood, I thought that I was probably going to go into premature labor at a quartz mine and have to be rushed to some Arkansas hospital with a tiny baby struggling for life in an NICU. While I do still have trust in my body’s inherent wisdom, etc., etc. I do not have the same strong sense of my body as an ally anymore—I used to trust it implicitly to take care of and protect my babies. Now, I don’t know if it really knows how to do that, or not. Most of the time, I think it probably does and that it was also body wisdom (not failure) that caused my losses, but then the tiniest thing can happen and then I see that something else is lurking very close under the surface—a lack of confidence that I do know what I’m doing and that my body will look out for and protect my baby girl with its inherent wisdom and comptent design. 😦 Wah. It was a bummer. I cried and was all upset and then realized I’d probably just physiologically taxed myself at the #%&*% diamond mine the day before and this was just a little, “hey! Take care of yourself!” reminder signal, not an indicator of immediate doom. Nothing else happened the rest of the day (or since), just that confidence-shaking morning incident (I’ve NEVER had bleeding/spotting this late in a pregnancy before and have had none at all during this pregnancy).

Anyway, we finished our trip by going to Arrowhead Crystal Mine—this one we drove to ourselves and the road was hideous, but we made it to the top!

And, we found lots of good stuff:

And on the way home, I crocheted a little hat :):

Think it will fit?

I’m starting to spend a little more time thinking about the actual birth and what I’d like and what I’d like to make sure I do to savor and enjoy and celebrate this pregnancy and this baby before she is born. I also have been doing a LOT of thinking of what I will change/let go of after she is born and what I would like for a babymoon as well as making arrangments to take some breaks from some of my commitments so that I can fully enjoy the newborn stage and make sure I am taking really good care of myself. I was offered a class for the January session at the college where I teach—by pure coincidence I hadn’t been on the Jan. schedule at either local campus and I was glad not to have to turn them down (because I really want to do this and by “rejecting” a class offering, I don’t want that to be perceived as a lack of interest from me)—but, then I got offered one after all and then I did have to say, “no.” It is a class I’ve taught before and that I LOVE teaching—it is my favorite one—and saying no to it was hard, but duh, I couldn’t say yes (and, btw, they said that was fine and I could teach it in March instead. So, was that so hard?!). I think I will be teaching an online class during the Jan. session, but that I can handle—I will just make sure to do NOTHING else in addition to that and taking care of the new baby.

Still can’t really believe there’s a baby girl in there. I was just telling a friend about how it is difficult to field comments from others about, “hoping for a girl this time” or, “you finally got your girl” kinds of things—it makes me not want to act too excited about having a girl, because I don’t want anyone to think that I feel that way. I love my boys and wouldn’t have my family any other way—and, I would have been perfectly happy to have another boy (I thought I was going to for sure!). So, acting happy about a girl, makes me feel like I’m saying that I’m not happy with my boys. But, I’m happy about both! I’ve never, ever wished Z was a girl instead—I love having a pair of boys. It’s great. If Noah was here with us as the third member of our band of brothers I would have been pleased as pleased can be. (see my fair warning post on my other blog.) I think it’s too bad we feel like we have to clarify/specify that! And, I hope I remember forever to not ever say those kinds of things to anyone either! So, anyway. A GIRL! I’m excited 🙂

Movement

Oct6

My absolute favorite part of pregnancy is feeling the baby move. I’ve been feeling my new baby moving in earnest since about 16 weeks (I felt early flutters at around 11 weeks, which is typical for my pregnancies). Sometimes my oldest son falls asleep at night with his hand on my belly, feeling the baby move. I love the stage I’m in now—big bumps, jumps, and wiggles, but not so big that I am uncomfortable at all. I’m 24 weeks now and only during the last two weeks or so have I started to feel the baby move while I’m standing, sitting, moving, etc. (vs. just when lying down like before). I haven’t yet had anyone outside of my husband and the kids feel the baby—I still feel “closed in” and protective/secretive about this pregnancy and I’m not sure if that is ever going to change. I have drawn more birth art related pictures and taken more photos than during any other pregnancy, but I have journalled about it less and I talk about it much, much less. That doesn’t mean the baby isn’t always on my mind and frequently reminding me of its company with little wiggles and kicks 🙂

This week in my pregnancy newsletter from Mothering.com, I enjoyed this poem about movement:

Quickening

By Yvette Benavides

This baby moves inside me now

Sending messages at night-

Morse code

About life on the inside:

It is dark

But warm and quiet

With only muffled echoes softly pleading,

Wake up, little one.

I want to know you’re in there,

Happy and safe.

Answers come again-

A sudden flutter-

Secret lyrics of song with no rhythm.

Played with hands and feet.

Someday I will hear the song again-

A high-pitched, quick and breathy humming.

I will teach her that she’s been singing that old song forever,

And reach out for little splayed hands

That have long since held my heart.

—-

No cute pix from this week—I forgot to get one until I was already in my PJs and looking a little bedraggled:

P.S. I now officially weigh more at 24 weeks pregnant than I did the day I gave birth to my first son! Perhaps related to my sudden intense interest in consuming Nutella 🙂

Like one full moon…

Sep28

Last week, I hosted a blessingway/mother blessing ceremony for a friend who is preparing for her second baby. This was the first time we’ve ever had a ceremony at night and something new that we did that turned out nicely was to go outside in the dark and plant our “wish seeds” for our friend, her baby, and her birth (we used the wish seeds—one word wishes—first to sing our Call Down a Blessing blessingway song). I had chosen a reading to read during this time and in a stroke of wonderful coincidence, the moon out that night was nearly full. It was a perfect, unplanned accompaniment to the reading. The reading comes from the book Wild Girls by Patricia Monaghan and was originally written by a nine year old girl. I modified it slightly for this occasion:

We are all Feminine, together.

We may be full of anger,

We may be full of joy,

We may be full of secrets,

We may feel fresh as fruit,

We may feel a sense of new life,

We may feel peaceful,

We may all feel different from one another,

But we are all here together

Like one full moon.

Poem: The Vital Truth

Sep27

In the fall issue of Pathways magazine there was an article called “The Genius of the Unborn Child by Sarah Farrant. I enjoyed this poem in the article’s sidebar:

The Vital Truth

Nature needs no help

just no interference

It’s best not to interfere with

what is a natural process.

Do you help the grass to grow?

Do you help the sun to rise?

Why is it that people feel compelled

to help a baby grow?

Babies know what to do every time,

all the time, in just the right sequence

and at just the right time to allow the expression of

their limitless potential.

Being pregnant feels like magic and I marvel each day at the unfolding of this whole process without my conscious intention or effort. Really incredible!

Book Review: Survivor Moms

Sep24

Book Review: Survivor Moms: Women’s Stories of Birthing, Mothering and Healing after Sexual Abuse

By Mickey Sperlich & Julia Seng
Motherbaby Press, 2008
ISBN 978-1-89-044641-3
245 pages, softcover
http://www.midwiferytoday.com

Reviewed by Molly Remer, MSW, CCCE

Past sexual abuse is an unfortunately common experience for women. Anyone who works with women of childbearing age should be mindful and informed of the effects of an abuse history on the woman’s experience of pregnancy, birthing, and mothering. Indeed, I consider this awareness to be a fundamental professional responsibility. Enter Survivor Moms, published by Motherbaby Press. This book is an incredibly in-depth look at the experiences and need of survivors of sexual abuse during the childbearing year.

One of the best and most unique features of the book is the “tab” format used for much of the clinical, research-based, or fact-based content in the book. Rather than lengthy chapters reviewing research and analyzing the phenomenon, textboxes containing quick facts and reference material are printed in the margins of many of the pages. The bulk of the narrative information in the main body of the text is then in the voices of mothers themselves, interspersed with commentary by the authors linking concepts, explaining ideas, and clarifying essentials. This is a powerful format that makes information readily and quickly available for reference as well as making the overall book very readable and approachable.

As someone with no personal abuse history who is currently pregnant, I did find the book to be a very emotionally difficult, intense, and almost overwhelming read at times. This is not a criticism in any way—sexual abuse is not a light or cheerful topic and it can be one that many people prefer to avoid. This is all the more reason for birth professionals to make a specific effort to be educated and informed.

Written both for mothers themselves and for the professionals who work with them, Survivor Moms is an essential part of any birth professional’s library. As noted in the book’s introduction, “We need to understand the impact of childhood abuse on birthing and mothering deeply, from hearing women’s stories. We also need to understand it broadly—from looking at the impact on samples and populations, on the body and on the culture.” Survivor Moms offers an accessible way of hearing those critically important stories and developing the necessary understanding to care compassionately for birthing women.

—
Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book for review purposes.