Approaching deadlines and celebrations of the best kind...

First, my youngest son turned 2 yesterday (Happy Birthday big guy!), my husband and I are celebrating 5 wonderful (crazy and grace-filled (thank you God)) years of marriage on the 3rd and Feb. is going to be the month of BABIES. Yes, there are 8 babies due in Feb. for the midwife I assist (and adore). Wow!! I'm going to be birthed-out I tell you! No, not really, there is no such thing - rather, I'm going to be learning a LOT, gone a LOT. I really need to find someone happy to take my chillins' for pay on short notice. Pray I find someone very fast (I pay well).

Recently I went to a birth with my midwife friend and it scared the living daylights out of me, gave me a bit of a reality check, and renewed my gratefulness in God for the safe arrival of so many little ones around the world. Aside from a difficult labor (it wasn't until she swelled her cervix up a lot with pushing too early) where Mom had to deny the urge to push for over 3+ hours and was in increasing pain, getting discouraged, etc., it was a shoulder distocia. Not one caused by all the crap everyone else did to Mom during labor or pushing, but an actual distocia. I swear I've never seen time go by so freaking slowly as it did during that time. I mean literally... it was only four ("only") mintues between when baby's head was born and baby's body was born but wow... wow, wow, wow. It felt like 15 at least. Seriously, it really did. I kept swearing I'd screwed up the time or something but nope.

So Mom is pushing and finally gets baby to move down and baby's head appears, second push and baby's head (to the forehead) is out ("Hmmmm", I think). Another push and baby's head is out to the chin (and I think, "Uh oh") as baby stays there... no rotation, no furthur budging as Mom pushes again, again and one more time. By this time I realize baby is not going to move out on their own... but my midwife friend is ahead of me and already is working to turn baby this way, that way (like a corkscrew) and still nothing. Then, a small rotation of baby and again, stuck. Midwife friend of mine hooks baby under their arm and starts pulling (Mom on hands/knees already) and working (HARD)... still nothing. Again, Mom is pushing (now it's been 5 ctx since baby's head has been out), we are encouraging her with everything we have (I'm praying in tongues and working to not freak out as I know it won't help a lick), midwife friend working hard and finally, the arm comes free, baby is out immediately. A small gurgle or two but my midwife friend assisted with 2 puffs of air from her mouth. Side note: If you ever get the chance, Karen Strange's Neo-natal resucitation class is AMAZING and I took it this summer with my friend in this story. She (the teacher) says that while you know baby is going to breathe, they are attemtping and all is fine, leaving them to struggle on their own causes them to feel alone, scared, etc. (imagine yourself in that position and you'll know what I mean) - assisting them (for the baby's peace of heart and mind) is good midwifery. I couldn't agree more. So this, is what my friend was doing for the baby. We also gave baby oxygen by blowbye, but for our own sense of peace (and it did help me feel better).

After all of this, baby is now warm, screaming their head off (who could blame them?) and purple face to a "T" because of petikia (head out for so long, causes purple bruising of the face), I could almost not hold back tears. Oh my gosh, they were okay, everyone was alive, not too worse for the wear! I wanted to do a dance around the room, honestly. Oh the relief! I had to keep busy to keep from bawling.

So after all of this... as I was thinking about it later (and believe me, I've thought about it A LOT), I was thinking... you know what? If she'd not had a midwife or someone who knew what they were doing (I wouldn't have beyond the corkscrew), it would have been bad. Baaaad bad. The thought just chills me. I know in my heart that this is the exception, NOT the rule, but it's hard to see all the same. Baby's head was 13 3/4 and baby's chest (without arms included) was 15 1/2 inches. That is a big, big chest. Baby was also 24 inches long and weighed 9lb 10oz (a full 2.5 lb. bigger than baby's siblings were at birth). So was it sugar? Did this Mom eat too much? I've heard that she did. Would that have caused such a situation?

Whew, is all I can say, I'm glad it turned out ok. I'm still scared about it - the memory is just so nerve wracking. I pray that when it is my turn to have my baby this next time, it isn't this memory that comes up, but rather the trust and power in birth I have at the deepest part of my heart.

Alright then, that's enough for now. Take care.

Acupuncture, pregnancy, sleeping and more

I must say after months of feeling like the barely-walking-dead, I got my first pg acupuncture treatment done on Saturday afternoon and already today I am feeling better - like a *lot* better! Shocking! Acupuncture has been a good thing for me in general when I am need of it (my body responds to it quickly and well), so I should have gone in a long time ago, but not until I was waking up feeling like puking (or it was waking me up, either way) did I feel seriously compelled to get myself to the acupuncturist (heck, I'm barely feeling compelled to eat so sometimes it takes a bit to get me there). It was the best thing I could have done, and for a mere $45 I am happy as a clam. If I get any sense of not feeling good again I'm going to be back in a flash... but for now, I'm doing pretty alright!

And as for sleeping... there is something inherent in our children to know exactly when we need it most and then they signal each other to cut it as short as in toddler-possible. So what is this 1/2 hour crap? :sigh: It's a conspiracy I'm afraid. Well, maybe my heavenly 2 hour napping is now done for the rest of pg (tears)... but I'm holding out just in case.

I've also been to two births with my midwife friend recently and they have been awesome! I'm learning SO stinking much... about charting, about collecting cord blood, blood-typing babies (whos Moms are Rh-), doing heart tones, setting everything up and putting it all away. I don't think I can do a whole lot more than that (though I am desperately needing to learn how to take blood pressure... unfortunately I suck at it SO badly that I'm not letting myself do it until I get practice on non-laboring Moms). I keep trying on my friend but I just haven't had good experience - how pathetic. Oh well!

I tried to find my sister's baby's heartbeat on Sat. but I wasn't able to... I kept hearing shadows of it though I swear. It's funny, baby being all of about 1 inch... it was hard to pinpoint and once they know you are looking with the doppler, they get out of the way (since the doppler (condensed ultrasound waves) heats their tissues and makes a loud noise to them). That's awful huh? Make you never want to use a doppler (or it does me anyways).

Things are going well... I'm 9w pg and praying for a long time still - it's feeling much more real and I'm starting to kind of enjoy it (not feeling like crap-ola all day). I'm wondering though, now that acupuncture has made me feel so much better, if my sense that it's a girl is going to be SO totally wrong now. Oh well, adds a little fun to the end I guess. : ) My chances of having a girl this time are like 25% or so (because we already have two boys). Still... that's my bet.

Gotta get the boys out of the bath.

And... thought I should add

that I don't think I'm above so-and-so or have it figured out... I don't mean to sound self righteous in my previous entry... more than anything with all things kind of coming to the same spot, I've been just surprised how everything is... well, orchestrated so perfectly. Sometimes it takes me off guard to know I'm not entirely in charge of my life and that God is along the ride with me. Anyways, I didn't want it to sound selfish... I mean it in a "wow" kind of way.

Another birth, but with different midwife (and etc.)

I got the chance to go to a birth with a different midwife than I normally go with - she was one of my midwives (she works in a pair) when I had my kiddos and I love them a lot. Right now they were able to use some help (not that I'm overly helpful esp. since I have to learn how they do things and all) so I got a call last night and got to go to a birth with one of them. It was a learning experience in that I learned a lot about how to chart what she was saying, I learned some newborn breathing stuff (always helpful) and some of how to acess gestational age. What I found was so profound is that the midwife I normally 'work' with is an entirely different kind of midwife than the midwife (midwives) I was able to work with yesterday. I see different things in each of them I love, and some in one that I don't love. I learn what approach I want to take and more importantly WHY I want to take that approach. I am able to examine through watching them what my Midwife-Heart actually looks like and where it stems from. I get to ask myself questions like, "Why would I do (or not do) _____?" In particular I ask myself these kinds of questions if something that is done shocks my heart, or feels especially 'right'.

Because of some life choices I made along the way as an early-adult, I found myself a part of a group that taught you to take your leadership from a person, follow what they believed, heard from God or thought was right/good/holy. It has been an interesting road from that point to here, but I feel that in some ways, part of my 'healing' to be able to follow that compass inside of my heart is in my midwife dream. I am not as certain as I remember always being, but I do know that with some things, there is no question in my heart about them. I feel that I get stronger in this as time and practice goes on. In finding my Midwife-Heart, I'm finding my own... kind of cool.

I have also recently been a part of the midwifery politics in my state - there are some things in the works that would give away some autonomy that midwives carry in this state - and I've found it kind of sad that there is no such thing as simple midwifery. You'd think that a woman getting educated to serve women in childbirth and then doing that would be rather simple (or at least straight forward), but that's not the case... there's more political crap that goes with anything medical (people vying for the position that carries the most power - like the food chain) than you'd ever expect. In my city there is a midwife on trial here at the end of the month... maybe she didn't make an excellent choice in what is up for trial, but I feel that more than anything she is being made an example of. That just rubs me the wrong way... to persecute someone not necessarily because of what they did but because of what they represent. I mean aren't we out of the dark ages? We go from persecuting colors to occupations. None of that is right.

But I should step down from my soap box since a lot of this is just opinion anyways (with some observation). Better tend to my kids.

Low energy... slow blog

Sorry about the slow blog, things have been hectic on the outside world and I'm coordinating a lot of stuff the past few months and it's going to continue for a few more - I want to write on here more but I'm using all my energy to DO the stuff I have already on my plate and that leaves (literally) none left. So sorry...

Happy (and very fun) news is that my sister is pregnant as well and due on Aug. 26th (I am due on the 28th) with her first baby. We keep joking how twins can have twins but the possibility is teeny and I already have two... so I keep telling her it's her turn (she can take over that one). Thankfully my parents took it SUPER well and are still about to die of shock, it was a laugh. I've also been (as has my sister) feeling like CRAP and really wanting to die for at least 1/2 of the day. The second half of the day I'm playing catch-up to the first half that I feel like I missed entirely. Leaves me at a deficit every evening (which lends to feeling kind of panicky as I lead a pretty darn full schedule as it is). Low level of energy, high amount of things to do, 1/2 the day feeling incapacitated - and well, you get the picture. ((So all I need is a housekeeper to come by every other week and maybe someone to help me cook, and I'll be good.)) ; )

7 weeks today so still in the scary-part-of-pg part... but hoping time goes quickly.