Let’s be honest here…

I think I felt my baby!!!  Last night I was lying very still in bed trying to fall asleep, and lo and behold, there comes a wiggle wiggle.  Now it totally could’ve been gas, that’s definitely a very real possibility….  But I also know what a baby feels like, and I think this was it even though it’s really early.  Yay!

So for all the talk in my previous post about natural childbirth, let me just tell you that it is all new information to me.  I had no desire to go natural for Evelyne’s birth, and other than having a c-section, it was probably one of the most medicated births I could’ve had.

With Evelyne I was induced a week early.  It was the picture of a convenience birth, she was due on December 23rd, and I didn’t want her born too close to Christmas.  I was already dilated about 2 cm. when I checked-in the hospital where they hooked me up to an IV and started antibiotics for my Group Strep-B and gave me Cervadil overnight to hopefully start contractions. That did nothing, and they started Pitocin at 5 a.m.  I couldn’t sleep all night long, so around 4 a.m. at the insistent offer of the nurses, I took an Ambien.  I woke-up around 8 having contractions.  I wanted to wait as long as possible for my epidural since I had heard that it slowed-down labor.  The nurses offered me another painkiller, so I got some Stadol.  (which did nothing to help the pain)  My contractions were getting worse, there was hardly any break between them, so I got my epidural around 11.  It was wonderful, I couldn’t feel anything!  Meanwhile, they had to put me on oxygen because Evelyne’s heart rate was doing weird things, I guess she was having what they call decels.  Later that afternoon the nurses ran in my room and stopped the Pitocin because Ev’s heartrate wasn’t good.  There was talk of a C-section.

Awhile later, after my body didn’t continue contractions on its own, they hooked me back-up to the Pitocin to see if she could handle a little more.  (After I told the doctor that I really really really didn’t want a c-section)  Thankfully, she was ok and I was fully dilated after awhile.  I pushed for an hour and a half.  I couldn’t feel my contractions, I had no urge to push, but they just watched the monitor and told me when to push.  Ev was stuck behind my pelvic bone and an epesiotomy later, came-out sunny-side up with a big conehead and a fever.  She was really groggy, and they told me the reason her heartrate wasn’t responding well to my contractions was probably because she was so drugged-up from my Ambien and Stadol.  Not to mention that I was completely out of it because I was so drugged-up, too!  Between pushes I kept almost falling asleep, the room was spinning, and I was so exhausted I thought I would die.  I kept begging for something to drink (it had been almost 24 hours), but they wouldn’t let me have anything but about 5 ice chips.  I wonder why no one told me that taking so much medication could have an effect on the baby and on my energy, I certainly didn’t know.  When Ev came-out she got put on my chest for about 5 seconds and then taken to be cleaned-up.  I didn’t get to see her for about 10-15 minutes and the whole time I was so nervous and worried that she would be ok since she wasn’t crying.  Thankfully, she was fine, and I had a fabulous postpartum experience at the hospital with some wonderful nurses who took great care of me.

Overall, I’m incredibly thankful that Ev was born healthy and full-term, but I kinda feel like I barely squeaked-by in terms of everything going relatively well for a spontaneous induction that involved lots of unnecessary drugs and almost resulted in a c-section.  There were several times when things really could’ve gone the other way, and I’m thankful that my doctor was very supportive and did everything she could to avoid a cesarean.  However, after watching TBOBB, I kinda see my experience a little differently and wonder what to do about the birth of this child I’m pregnant with and how I’d like things to go.

Clay and I watched this incredible documentary a couple of weeks ago, and it totally blew my mind.  It was just as good as I knew it would be, and I’m afraid it might have ruined me for having my next babies in a way that’s comfortably expected.

Here are a few things I didn’t know before watching this film:

*The U.S. has the second-highest fetal death rate among developed countries.

*The rate of c-section is drastically rising, and I believe it hovers somewhere around 46%.  Many of these are completely medically unnecessary and not by maternal request.

*Epidurals and Pitocin often counteract the effect of one another, thus leading to a much higher rate of unnecessary cesarean births.

*The hospital-mandated position of giving birth while lying flat on your back with your legs in the air is the worst position for which to deliver a baby.  There is a much increased risk of perineal tearing, and the opening of the pelvis is smaller, and gravity is working against you.  Pushing in a more natural squatting or standing position allows the baby to more gently slide through the pelvis as it twists and moves, and the pelvis opens a full 30% larger than it does when the mom is on her back.  Makes ya wonder about all those babies who get “stuck.”  (Evelyne included!)

*The U.S. stands alone in our extremely low use of midwives to assist births and almost complete reliance on hospitals for normal, low-risk births.  Many other developed countries, like England and Japan, rely heavily on midwives and they far out number hospital and obstetrician births.

*Since OB/GYN’s are primarily surgeons and medical intervention is used in almost all U.S. births, many doctors are not familiar with what a natural birth can look like.  They aren’t familiar with what our bodies do under normal circumstances, and because of that, neither are we.

*After watching several unmedicated homebirths in this documentary, I was struck by how beautiful and natural it was.  There was no one yelling at them to “PUSH! PUSH! HARDER!”, there were no flourescent lights in their eyes, they were allowed to move freely however was most comfortable for them, they were able to listen and be guided by their own bodies instead of what someone was telling them to do.  They were able to help “catch” their baby and spend time holding and nursing him instead of nurses wisking him away to be poked and prodded while the poor baby lies there screaming his head off.  It just appeared to me to be closer to the way God designed it to be.

I very strongly suggest that every woman (and every man who plans to have a woman and children in his life) watch this film.  The point is not to convince women that hospitals and OB’s are evil or never necessary, it’s to educate about very real and wonderful options that are out there for childbirth.  To undo a little bit of the bias that the medical profession has instilled in us about what birth is supposed to be like.  To strip away the fear and ignorance we have about giving birth with someone other than an ob/gyn.  As women we have the responsibility to educate ourselves about all of the options out there when it comes to our health and our babies’ health and safety.

So I’ve been reading some great books lately and telling everyone I know about them.  I’ll start with the more educational nonfiction one first and then move-on to the fun stuff.

Jesus for President by Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw

I’m reading this book with a group from church, and we meet once a week to discuss it.  It’s been incredibly eye-opening and informative for me.  I’m still in the second chapter, so I can’t really give a very good review of it, but so far I absolutely love it.  We’ve learned more details of the political climate of the New Testament period leading up to Jesus’ birth and during His lifetime and how this affects the way we understand the context of Scripture.  The book talks about how the kingdom of God is a very different thing from any of our political kingdoms and what can result when we confuse them.  What does it mean for us to live under the rule of Christ as a separate people within our current government structure, and what could it look like for our allegiance to be to Him first?  The goal of the authors is to stir the political imagination of the reader and help us discover how we might become more involved in the issues of our day, yet perhaps in a way that’s different from how many American Christians have always done it.

The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory

This is a GREAT book!  I read it before I watched the movie, and while I enjoyed the movie, the book is (as expected) much better.  If you watched the movie, you haven’t come close to enjoying the depth of the book. It’s a beautifully told story of love, loss, betrayal, family, power, and ambition.  It follows history as closely as possible, and the character development within the historical context makes the period come alive.  I was totally sucked into the drama and couldn’t put it down until I finished it.  I found myself looking-up the characters on Wikipedia to see how their lives compared to the story and out of my own curiosity for happened.  The best part was discovering that Philippa Gregory wrote several other novels in this series about the other wives of King Henry.  Right now I’m reading The Constant Princess about Katherine of Aragon, his first wife.  I never thought I’d be so interested in 16th century England, but my gosh, these people are crazy and fascinating!  I very highly recommend any book in this series (start with this one) for some great summer reading with a little historical lesson thrown-in.

Clay took his physical therapy boards yesterday, and thank GOD they are over!!!  Of course he was so nervous he could barely eat, and he couldn’t sleep at all the night before.  But I’m sure he did great, he’s absolutely brilliant when it comes to doing physical therapy stuff.  It’s definitely the profession that God has chosen for him, he loves it and he’s really good at it.  He won’t find-out if he passed until probably sometime next week, although I have no worries about it.  

So until we move in another three weeks or so, both of us are totally free other than just taking care of Ev.  I kinda don’t know what we’re gonna do with all this free time together, but it should be relaxing and fun.  Evelyne kicked our vacation off with a bang by sleeping-in until almost 8:30 today (one of the few times in her life that she’s slept that late). 

Any cheap/free and child-friendly things we should do in Memphis before we leave in a few weeks???  

This video perfectly captures what goes on inside my head whenever I try to make a point to cut-out the junk in my diet.  Thanks, Dooce, for passing this along.  I totally laughed out loud!!!!

Well, Stage 1 of the Great Move is completed.  On Saturday we moved out of our apartment and into my parent’s house.  We lived on the third floor, so it was a rather daunting task to move everything downstairs and in a truck.  Thank GOD we have such wonderful friends and family that helped!  We had 11 people moving our stuff, and they pretty much emptied our apartment in about 30 minutes!  Everything went so much more smoothly and quickly than what I was expecting, I was very pleasantly shocked!  I spent the rest of the day painting and cleaning, and then a good bit of yesterday cleaning.  I think I killed a lot of brain cells yesterday afternoon from all the fumes from the cleaning products.  (I know, I know, pregnant women aren’t supposed to do that, but there just really wasn’t much choice in the matter, it had to be done.)  

Last night Clay and I went back to wrap-up the loose ends, do a final vacuum, and say good-bye.  On one of our last trips down the stairs to our car, Clay was carrying a HUUUGE garbage bag full of trash, and it broke all over the ground in front of someone’s apartment.  It was already almost 10 p.m. and we were exhausted and so ready to be done.  I think we sat there and stared at it for about ten minutes trying to figure-out how to clean it up since it was our last trash bag and the dumpster was quite a walk away.  Jars of marshmallow creme and jelly and tobasco sauce were spilled everywhere all over the ground.  It was horrible.  We ended-up borrowing a few bags from neighbors, scooping all of our nasty trash into the smaller bags, and walking them to the dumpster.  It was disgusting, but it got the job done.  What a way to go out with a bang.  

Then we had to go say good-bye to our home of four years, the only home we’ve ever known as a couple.  This apartment is where we spent our wedding night, where we brought Evelyne home, and where we got used to life as parents.   Each room holds almost every memory we’ve made as a married couple.  It’s a visual reminder to me of how far we’ve come, how much has changed in four years.  The room that used to be our junk room was painted purple and transformed into a baby room.  Our dining area (that we never really used anyway) was turned into Evelyne’s play area.  A living room once neat and simple was filled with bouncy seats and baby swings, and then cluttered with toys and baby dolls.  Especially since I’m a stay-at-home mom, my life is mostly spent in those rooms.  

Apartment life is usually so temporary, so for the four most significant years of my life to be spent in this one apartment and then quickly left feels really odd.  I imagine someone new will move-in pretty soon.  Hopefully they’ll replace the nasty carpet with all the stains from Ev’s spit-up when she was a baby.  I’m sure they’ll repaint the walls that are marked from our picture frames and Evelyne’s high chair.  It’s weird to think that the new owners can never know the blessings and the life that took place in that home before them.  

So for this month, we’re living with my parents.  Clay takes his physical therapy boards on Wednesday.  After that, he’s free until we move at the end of the month.  Literally the only responsibility either one of us will have is to take care of Evelyne, so it should be a fun next few weeks.  (at least I can sleep-in!)  Stage 1 of the Great Move is complete.  Stage 2 happens in a month.  Time is marching on.

Packing.  Packing.  Lots of packing.

Thanks to MongooseMom, I’ve been tagged to do one of these question/answer things.

1. WHAT DID YOU DO 10 YEARS AGO?

Gosh, ten years ago.  It was 1998 and I had just graduated high school.  I spent my summer going on trips and flirting with boys and pretty much being a carefree adolescent (I was only 17!).  Weird to think about now, I was probably the picture of immaturity!!!

2. FIVE ITEMS ON YOUR TO-DO LIST TODAY:

Hmm, I don’t so much have “to-do lists.”  I plan-on making a dinner and taking it to my sister-in-law who just had a baby, take a good nap, play with Evelyne, read my book, and try to go to bed earlier than I have been!

3. SNACKS I ENJOY:

Anything chocolate, potato chips, Chex Mix, popcorn, fruit, yogurt…. pretty much anything.

4. WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU WERE A BILLIONAIRE?

Wow.  I don’t know.  I would travel a lot, live relatively comfortably, and try to establish some kind of non-profit that would serve a great need in the world.  Which need, I have no idea.  There are too many, I would have to take a lot of time to think about that.  Possibilities: AIDS, poverty, children without families, refugees, etc….

I tag…….. Courtney and Elizabeth!

If you have been tagged recently and you don’t wish to join in on the fun, please don’t feel obligated! Here Are the Rules: Answer the following questions about yourself. At the end of the post you pass on the questions to some other bloggers and list their names. Then write them a comment telling them that they’ve been tagged and ask them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know that you’ve accepted the challenge and refer to your post.

Just wanted to let everyone out there know that there’s been a big crib recall by Jardine, a company that makes many cribs sold at Babies ‘R Us and other stores. Apparently the slats can break and cause entrapment.  Evelyne’s crib was one of the ones that was recalled.  I found the model number and date of manufacture underneath one of the sides, saw that it was one of the ones recalled, and sent-in an information form.  I’m not sure what will happen from here on out, but I encourage everyone to check and see if your crib is one of these that are recalled since there’s such a variety of styles that this includes.

http://www.jardinecribrecall.com/

http://cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml08/08312.html