definitely doula-ing

I'm moving forward with the doula bit. I'm going to try and find one. I think it's just too important to not do... a' doula'do!

It's kind of funny - I remember I was pretty sure I was going to get an epidural and go the drug route. I was just like, well, whyever not? I'm no super-pain-lady, total wimp-assed me. The thing that changed me was reading about what it does to the baby. Moxie's got enough going on with her, you know. She doesn't need more. Like residual drugs in her system, a heart monitor on her little scalp... a vacuum sucking her out.

Knowing how much of a wuss I am, knowing how paralyzed Mikey gets when I'm upset, I really think we're going to need someone else there to keep us on track, keep me from succumbing to spinal taps and lovely drugs and keep the hospital from splicing me open. And hopefully do something wickedly nice with the hospital atmosphere (there were some pretty good stories in the books about that atmospheres created by doulas...).

I really wish I could go to The Farm though and have her with Ina May Gaskin and her awesome army of midwives. Wouldn't that be the greatest?

a doula-do

It struck me all of the sudden that Mikey and I are like newborn babes in this whole area of childbirth. Yes, I've had a child - but since it was a scheduled c-section (breech), I know nothing but nothing of labour. The stages. What to expect. Nada!

All I do know is that everyone in my world that's had a baby in the past three years had an emergency c-section. Except for Stefanie, who was also the only one who brought a doula in with her. Every*one else had an emergency c-section. That's quite a lot of people actually, and is definitely worrisome to me, me who is only slightly terrified of having another c-section and having to face that hideous recovery. Shudder.

I waddled over to my trusty local library and took out lots of books on childbirth: The Birth Book (by Sears), Ina May's Guide to Childbirth (Ina May Gaskin), Your Best Birth (by Ricki Lake and her friend) and yes, Birthing From Within (Pam Horowitz). Thanks to rampant insomnia, I'm almost done with all of them.

It makes me so sad that the whole birth experience has boiled down to this fight... you know, getting rid of these interventions that tend to do more harm than good. Getting an advocate for yourself. And at the same time, I'm rolling up my sleeves to prepare for said fight. I just don't want to put my baby through a lot of drugs, I don't want to put myself through a long, rough recovery. I want - no, make that need - to be able to walk after birth. I must be able to walk. I need to be able to watch and care for Micah on my leave as well as Moxie. That is definitely not going to happen if I have another c-section.

I'm thinking I need to get a doula. No, we can't really afford one, but then, can I really afford to be so struck with another major surgery?

pregnantly procrastinating

I'm supposed to have been working assiduously from home all this past week... the furloughs that blanket the university don't (fortunately or not) affect me, with my outside-funded salary. Yes, so I was supposed to have been pounding out proposals and plans in addition to the emails and reports.

I didn't though. I only worked on emails and reports. I am terrifically uninspired for the proposals and plans right now. Miss-Jaded-Me thinks why bother? What's the point? What's actually going to happen, hmm? I'll write some 5-page proposal and put my heart in it and then it'll just sit around and not be implemented. Or worse, be "implemented" by some slacker that won't do squat. I'll come back from maternity leave and fix everything up; said slacker will get credit. Because this is what happens and I think I just don't feel like doing it right now...

I'm not motivated.

Of course this is coupled to the fact that my brain power seems to be directly decreasing in proportion to my belly burgeoning. I don't care about the proposals the way I care about the dust in the corner of my bedroom. Or the baby clothes that need to be sorted. Filling up the wiper warmer, buying some infant diapers. Finding a car seat that is pink.

That kind of thing.

Lying right next to my hands as I type are a lot of of contract budgets and I'm soooooooooooo bored. But I have got to finish this - I'm too much of a working ox to not. Mooo.

growing wings

I found the thing that got me out of my rut: I'm just glad and grateful that I've been able to have the experience of growing and having children. That I somehow found the right partner for me.

This time, just 3 short years ago, I was giving up on it ever happening.

And now, look. How blessed am I. My Mikey. My beautiful, wonderful toddling boy, Micah. Growing rainbow-tiger-girl, Moxie. I'm bitching because I won't get much time off - but think of all that I do have. It's pretty amazing. Pretty glorious. Pretty damn awesome.

I am grateful.


PS -
I still think the US has barbaric maternity leave policies

a knotted ache

I'm trying to keep in mind everyone who has it worse than me in regard to maternity leave:

1. My cousin Sue: besides the fact that she left the hospital the same day she pushed her son out (she couldn't afford to stay longer as she didn't have insurance), she only had 2 weeks off for maternity leave

2. Pat N: she went back to work after 6 weeks (this is getting close to me though - only 2 weeks' difference)

3. The Chinese lady from the Good Earth: she popped out her baby in the rice field and went right back to hoeing

In some ways, I can't say I think #3 had it all that bad - I don't mind working - that's not the issue. I mind leaving my baby.

A coworker recently returned from her 5-month maternity leave, all a'glow, positively beaming. She boiled her happiness down to her baby being in good care (MIL and sister) and the fact that she hadn't had a day away from her baby for her whole leave - only lots of date and regular nights out...

Ha! My own mother took care of my baby when I went back to work and not only did I not have a day away from my boy during my 5-month maternity leave, but I didn't have any date nights or nights out either.

And I was a wreck, mildly put.

I literally felt like my heart had been ripped out, my brain simply could not function. I am not the type of person who is wired to be away from my babies. No matter who is taking care of them, no matter how much time I've had, no matter what.

Which brings me back to this. I don't know what to do. I feel like just packing a bag and leaving. If we move back to Fiji, I know how to live off the land (thanks, Mom and Dad, for insisting on being subsistence farmers!). Maybe we could move to Montana? Montana seems to be an exotic place, ripe with possibility. Except for those winters, maybe.

If I find a way to supplement the income, I can stay at home for longer. I can get up to 5 months off - it's just that any time after June 30th is unpaid. I'm just struggling in how to strum up the energy to get a supplemental income together.

I was thinking that - HOLY SHIT - I am only going to have enough time to heal and then bam, I'll be back. No time for much else.

Bleh. What a long, depressing post. Sorry about that. I need to figure out a way to not be sad about this and make something positive happen. I think I'm going to take a shower now and think of cousin Sue and then think of stay-at-home jobs...

If you think of anything, would you let me know? Please?

For some reason, it also helps to hear of other people that have also done this and stayed sane... or people who have worse leaves.

Thanks

this plush american life

Still fiercely miserable in the throes of my last month of being pregnant, I got caught up this week in the details of my maternity leave.

Let me just say: I think the US is barbaric. It's just wrong for a society to have no universal standard of maternity leave, in which a job like mine is considered good because I can take 10 weeks off at 70% pay. Teachers, after all, get nothing.

It's so fucked up.

When I was looking at the calendars with the HR lady yesterday and together trying to work out my best plan of action, I was struggling to not lay my head down on my desk and just bawl. Little tears were escaping in the corners of my right eye - I just kept my hand up on my face so she wouldn't notice (she didn't).

The finally-crafted end plan has me out from mid-April to the end of June. Returning to work July 1st, but using a combination of vacation days, leave without pay and regular working time, I'll be making 70% pay for that month and working mostly 1-2 days a week.

And this is good for the US - that I can have "that much" time... and "that much" time means I'll leave my little baby when she is 2 months old.

I don't know how I'm going to be able to do this.

cheese and...

My hands resemble raw pale, pink, plump, pork sausages. Constant pain from the swelling and the carpal tunnel. My wedding band, usually so loose, now cuts into all that swollen finger flesh.

The left side of my upper rib cage is in perpetual pain - dull, aching. Then the space right under my left boob is digs in sharply. Like a cramp or something. I have trouble breathing. My belly is heavy and feels like it's falling out. My feet are so gigantic I am now a full size and a half larger than usual. And they hurt, they really*really hurt. My back aches. My skin is dry, uncontrollably itchy, even right after I slather lotion on. It just is. I have horrible heartburn, even just from drinking water.

To top off this whine list is (no! not cheese!) but the fact that this baby kicks.
I mean, she WALLOPS me. I was kind of curious about whether or not it was quite this way with Micah, but according to my blog at that time, it wasn't, really: it was more like, discomfort. He was just a little soccer player. Not a head-butting bladder blaster who riverdances on the side.

This little girl is at it. To say she's 'got Moxie' is such an understatement.

One thing that is pretty freakin' awesome about this is that I am not longer worried about Ds. I mean, zilch. It's not on the spectrum of my frame anymore. The reality is: this is a little person. A baby in me. An extremely active baby. I'm in the final stages of growing this person.

This hits 'people first' in a whole new way. It's like I can't think of anything OTHER than people first right now.

Frankly, it's a relief.

feet up!

I've been doing the happy dance for a couple of days now - Moxie's head-down!! Here's what we have from our ultrasound on Wednesday:



Yep, it's not the full thing and we started filming rather late. But she's head down all right! It was pretty strange seeing her from that perspective - I've never actually seen a baby head-down.

Such a relief thinking that at the very least, a VBAC will really be an option for us.

That brings me to wondering a bit WHY this should be such good news for me?! What did Erma Bombeck call a vaginal childbirth? Something like squeezing a horse through a walnut? And I'm excited about that?!!

ha!

girls and gifts

Over-analyzing everything as usual, I think I'm packaging the sum total of everything that's been difficult for me in my life (especially disability-wise), putting it into a little box, wrapping it and then giving it to Moxie.

You know?

My story is my own and I should not project it on her. Her life and experiences will be very different from mine. I can't just blanket it all and just not be scared/worried. But I also don't need to make my story hers.

If she's got Ds, she's going to have a completely different picture. And of course it goes without saying (so why am I saying it?) that she's going to have a completely different parental unit than I had. Not that I'm all-better than mine, but I do get stuff regarding disability and not fitting in that I don't honestly think my parents ever did.

So anyway. That's my thought o' the day.

My goal of the week is be be a little more open with people about what I'm going through. It is hard to get support, after all, if no one knows I need it. And I need to give people a chance to pull through and not fuck up in their responses. I mean, I've only told a handful of people about all of this!

I need to chill out. Trust some more. Relax a lot. And quit projecting.

Right?

girlie thoughts

Mind you, I'd be terrified if I was having a 'normal' girl. Make no doubt about that.

I know that my being scared about having Moxie isn't 100% to do with Ds. I mean, unless the amnio was wrong about her gender, she's a girl. And girls...girls are such complex creatures, so vulnerable. So strong. So multi-faceted.

In my chock-full-of-stereotypes mind, boys are just... easy. When they are little, it's about play and trains and gidgety gadgety. They need to be taught skills to pay the bills. Be personable. But life is really pretty straightforward and non-complex for most boys, I think.

It just doesn't seem to be that way with girls. Girls are faced with so much - they have such high expectations on them from society: be pretty and smart, have a successful career. Be a great wife, great mom. Not age much past 30. Have a hot body at 50 (thank you, Madonna). Bear babies, breastfeed and have perky boobs - forever. Shave our legs. And so much more.

I've always been scared of having a daughter - a child that I'll love with all my heart and a child that will probably break my heart over what she'll have to go through in the course of her girl-life.

In some ways, if Moxie does have Ds, a chunk of that pressure and worry will automatically fall off. That would be a relief. A very good thing. I'd be far less worried about guiding her through the myriad of stressors, much more concerned with her just being happy and fulfilled as a person. And it seems like while with most 'normal' girls, societal expectations are sky-high for what they can/will/should accomplish in the course of their lives, they are at an amazing low for anyone with Ds. It seems like if she does anything at all, she'll be an instant success.

Maybe that's not so bad, is it?

a mother's dream

I had a dream the other night and duly brought it to my trusty therapist for interpretation.

In my dream I was very pregnant. Um, kind of like now. And living in some type of communal housing place. There was no one around. We had a dog, a Collie (we have a big fat cat in real life), and the dog was the only living creature around me.

I fell asleep.

When I woke up, there was a little pink, shiny, embryo-looking creature lying next to me. I thought, oh! I've given birth! And she's so clean - the dog must have licked her off! (I know... this is weird)

She looked like babies do in the early embryonic stages - kind of like a fish. Not very human-looking. I didn't know where her mouth was and as I thought I should feed her, I was holding a breast and kind of waving it around to see where it might make sense to put it. Then (just like in the movie Avatar, where they connect with the animals via hair ends) what was her mouth and my nipple kind of glowed and fused together. I was happy. Went back to sleep.

When I woke up again, she had grown to be a little child - maybe a year old or so. She had very long, huge, big hair. New Jersey Hair. Hair that looked like wig hair - dry and fake-looking. She said she wanted me to do something about her hair before I introduced her to anyone. I said, sure! how 'bout we cut it? She said no! Then I went for styling it - no! - no matter what I suggested, she said no. There wasn't anything I could do to her hair, given the parameters she was giving me.

The end.

My therapist said that it seems like I'm scared I won't know how to mother this child.

She also said that there could be something to do with wanting to help her when/if she's frustrated and not knowing how.

Her interpretation resonated.

looking through fear

I'm so scared again.

So. Freakin'. Scared.

Scared.

I'm having weird dreams about Moxie. I cry most of the way to and from work and am back to playing my playlist on rapid repeat.

One of the songs that helped me get through the worst stuff of last year is "Just Look Up". Rather unbelievably, it's supposed to be children's song - it's part of Folk Playground. I never really listened to it, until one day recently after my miscarriage, when I was seriously wondering how I could continue existing, the gods of itune shuffle slipped it in. It held me together. You can listen to it here, and here are the lyrics:

Every life must have its sorrows and its pain
Yes it will
Where there's sunlight there are shadows and sometimes rain
When you're down and can't get up
Lay both hands on a lovin' cup
Make each teardrop like a diamond
Just look up

Just look up when storm clouds block the sun (Just look up)
Just look up when there's nowhere left to run (Nowhere to run)
Remember how the trees must bend
And the mighty rivers went
There's a rainbow waiting for you
Just look up

For each promise of forever
There'll be times, yes there will
When you crawl 'til you swear you've had your fill
Keep your heart right on your sleeve
Stand your ground when you want to leave
There's a love that'll last forever
Just look up

Just look up when storm clouds block the sun (Just look up)
Just look up when there's nowhere left to run (Got nowhere to run)
Remember how the trees must bend
And the mighty rivers went T
here's a rainbow waiting for you
Just look up (Just look up)

When you 've lost that light that guides you from despair (From despair)
And the memories of dear ones fade with earthly cares
Know the spirits burnin' bright
Throughout all you're darkest nights
Make your life a testimony
Just Look Up

Just look up when storm clouds block the sun (Just look up)
Just look up when there's nowhere left to run (Nowhere to run)
Remember how the trees must bend
And the mighty rivers went
There's a rainbow waiting for you
Just look up (Just look up)

So that's where I am right now. Listening to this and trying to look up.