Ready to Blow!

These photos were taken the day before Labor day. At this point I am in the home stretch of the pregnancy. You know you are in the homestretch when you ask your husband to take the baby out, LOL! Of course, I want the baby to come on or around October 15th as anticipated. I have so much shit to get together in these last weeks; it's crazy how overwhelming it can be. I will be working up until I go into labor. That's pretty intense but I have a lot of stuff that has to be done before I take my leave so I am really trying to get everything squared away sooner rather than later. My mom wants me and the baby to go stay with them 2 weeks after he's born. I told her that we would see because who knows how I will feel. I mean sheesh, 2 week old baby, I am not sure if I am going to feel like changing locations at that point. And meanwhile I just feel like a stuffed christmas pig, ready for slaughter. And I can feel the pressure in my cervix building. Sometimes walking is even a chore. I have been taking the bus more and more when I am in Brooklyn, 8 blocks to the subway station after work has become difficult, especially if I pick up some groceries. It does not help that my back hurts and I change positions all throughout the night. Yes indeed, it will feel really good to have my body back. Pregnancy is cool and all but the changes in the body can be so dramatic. I want to feel sporty again; I hate feeling exhausted after climbing a flight of stairs. I much rather be jogging with the baby in tow enjoying the ride than feeling my belly bouncing along as stroll down the boulevard. And let me tell you right now, this little guy, Bojangles aka BPW, is an active fellow. The stuff I see and feel him doing inside my belly would have received gold in gymnastic floor exercise at this summer's Olympic games! I swear he twists, turns, swivels and sticks his little elbows out all day long and especially at night. I was like "Damn son! I am trying to watch Lord of the Rings:Return of the King and you got my cervix straight trippin' right now!" I wonder how much he weighs now. At my sonogram to confirm his position, he was allegedly 4 pounds and 3 ounces, but we all know that sonogram estimates can be WAY off so I am not putting my money on that. He must be like 5 pounds by now. As long as he's in the 6 pound to 8 pound range, I am cool. I don't want an underweight baby nor do I want a little 10 pound monster! That's a whole lotta baby to push! Wednesday I will be 35 weeks! Craziness! I am so curious about what this little bugger is going to look like. I want him to look like the boy version of me, but who knows what he will look like. He may look like a grandparent or even great grandparent. And I wonder what my labor will be like. My doula says she knows I am going to have a beautiful birth. That is my meditation and mantra. I also know that just like a penis, my vagina can grow large to accommodate the baby and then shrink right back down to its original size. Penises don't stay stretched out of shape after erections; why is there so much mythology surrounded around the size and capabilities of the woman's anatomy, i.e. the vagina and pelvis. I plan on having an ecstatic or even orgasmic birth. I know some people don't think it's possible but I really believe in it. Think of it this way, it's uncomfortable for anything to enter the vagina if the vagina is not engorged with the proper blood flow from arousal. Trying to push a baby forcefully without proper preparation to the cervix will of course cause problems including tearing, burning and discomfort. It's very logical but women following the techno-medical model of maternity care really don't trust their bodies so they allow these doctors to cut them, episiotomy, making a large incision, sometimes vagina to asshole. And trust, that shit hurts! And the recovery is ALOT longer and more painful than even a really bad tear. Here is nice way of visualizing it: take a piece of paper and tear it in half; take another piece of paper and cut it in half with scissors. Now which is easier to match back the pieces? Now imagine it being human tissue... Yeah cringe worthy but necessary in understanding the folly of it all. Ok this little piggy(yeah I feel like a piggy!) is ready to call it a day on the blog. Hurricane Hanna has got me feeling lethargic!
peace!

Dealing with those who follow the techno-medical model

I am realizing more and more that people in the United States have been completely brainwashed by the techno-medical model of maternity care which has existed for less than 200 years. Did you know that the whole laying back with your legs spread to have the baby is fairly new in the history of the world. People want to know what the big deal is. Why are some people so upset with the hospital model of maternity care? Because it is not focused on the health of the mother and the baby. It's all about economics. Around the turn of the century, the medical community launched a smear campaign against midwives because they wanted women to start having their babies in the hospital. The hospital model of care is very male centered. It's about a patriarchal system telling women that their bodies are naturally incapable of giving birth. It's about stripping the power from women when in fact women have been supporting other women in the beautiful life event that is the birth of a child since the beginning of time. People think that technology has to be part of it. In the techno-medical model of maternity care, pregnancy is classified as a disease and childbirth is a medical emergency. In the midwifery model of care, pregnancy and childbirth is not something that just happens to women; birth is what women do and have done for years. Midwives assume that a woman's body is built for and is capable of delivering a baby naturally and normally. And if you look at the statistics, homebirths that end up in hospital transfer are very low and the amount of infant mortality in homebirths versus hospital births are even lower. Did you know that out of the 23 richest nations in the world, the US is NUMBER ONE in infant mortality??? And apparently Memphis has the highest rate of infant mortality in the US. A baby dies there every 43 hours. I mean that is similar to developing world statistics. And there are so many families who can not afford to bury their deceased infants so the health department has to do mass burials of these babies in a potter's field also referred to as "Babyland". If the US maternity care is working so well, than why are things like this happening in 2008???

"When we give the mother drugs to help her deal with pain, we destroy these natural coping hormones and more importantly, the baby now has no pain-relieving hormones available. The drugs for inducing labor, for pain and anesthesia all go to the baby and eventually interfere, sometimes in a big ways, with how easy it will be for the baby to be born and attach to a breast"- Waterbirth: The Heart and Soul of Gentle Birth, Barbara Harper

To me if you are a low risk pregnancy with no serious preexisting health conditions, choosing medical intervention is pretty selfish. You are putting your baby at risk. Of course emergencies come up and I am glad that in these cases the innovations are available. But when a woman is just left to labor naturally with really good support from her partners, midwives, doulas, family, etc...the outcome is normally fine if not great. Our society has turned childbirth into a medical event. There is nothing emotional or holistic about being stuck on a bed during labor and birth because you can't move around with your epidural. Or being so wacked out by narcotics that you don't even know what's going on while your baby is being born. I don't know if I am going to have anymore children so for me, I am treating this birth like it is the first and last. People act like natural birth means that you just take the pain. That's not it at all. There are so many non-narcotic ways of coping with labor pain: massage, water therapy, different positions, breathing techniques, meditation, acupuncture, visualization, etc... These things don't have possible side effects. People are just not educated. We tell pregnant women not to take drugs or alcohol during their pregnancy YET it is totally acceptable to take strong narcotics during labor that pass right through the placenta directly to the baby. Epidurals pretty much paralyze you from the waist down. Often you don't even feel the urge to push or pee for that matter. Of course if a woman is in a hospital bed in the throes of labor and she is given the option of epidural to the numb the pain or just taking the pain, she is going to choose an epidural. She is not being given any alternative options. And one medical intervention in labor usually leads to another, which can snowball into the mother of all intervention, cesarean section. The rate of c-sections in the US is sky high. It's really a shame. But sometimes I think ignorance is a choice. I did not just wake up knowing what all my childbirth options were; it's been a journey of education that I gladly took not just for my sake, but for the sake of my child. I think the love of your unborn baby is universal across race, class and religion.