Second Birth - Sister-Bug Joins the Family

On Brother-Bug's birthday last month I shared his birth story. I'm sharing Sister-Bug's story now, far before her March birthday. This is part of my preparation for sharing a third birth story sometime next month (or later...when I get around to it). Enjoy!

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I was less impatient with the waiting time for Sister-Bug. I knew from experience that I would miss the fluttery baby kicks, even as I loved holding my newborn. My due date came and went and I barely noticed. We were looking for a house to buy, a nicely diverting task but one we were not having much luck with. Finally we found a house we could envision our kids growing up in. We decided to put in an offer and that evening some contractions kicked in. My sister and Brothers came over for a game of Apples-to-Apples. We played and laughed, but the contractions never changed to the real thing. We kept waiting.

Brother-Bug trying to convince the baby to come out and meet him.

Brother-Bug was impatient - with the house hunting, with waiting for the baby, with the increasingly snappish Mama... Our midwife assured us that everything was fine and the baby would come in its own time. However, somewhere in the back of my mind I could feel something holding me up. I was ready. The baby was ready. Something was in the way. I was up in the middle of the night, journaling. The offer we had put on the house had stalled - it was a reserve offer, second in line, and looked unlikely - so I was writing about that process. Finally it hit me

I am an introvert and a very home-oriented person. I love to simply be at home. The stress of looking for a new home was confusing my body. Here I was in the house we had lived in for 5 years, where I had given birth to Brother-Bug, but every other day I was looking for a new home. This key component of what makes me feel happy and safe was is flux. My brain didn't know where home was, so my body didn't want to give birth not know where we might end up. I woke Pap-Bug up, sobbing. We talked it out, I cried it out, and we emailed our realtor. Looking for a house was too much right now and we would be in touch when we felt it was a better time. We went back to bed and I slept the first night of truly deep sleep I had experienced in weeks. I slept the next night too.

At my last prenatal we found the baby face-out - a hard way to have a baby, so the midwife and I tried to move it into a face-in position. Nope. That baby flipped right back to sunny-side-up. We sighed and prepared for a posterior labor.

On the Spring Equinox, my sister came over to give me a massage. She hit the labor stimulating points on my legs. It was a gorgeous and warm day and I got my massage in the backyard under the apple tree. But no resultant labor. Baby stayed, happily kicking and hanging out face-out. We put ourselves to bed. I sat up reading. Twenty pages, or so, from the end of my book the first real contraction washed through me. I noted the time (10:45) and kept reading. As I finished and closed my book, another contraction. I gritted my teeth through it, not quite ready to wake Brother-Bug. I woke up Papa-Bug, we talked a little, another contraction. On the fourth contraction I couldn't grit my teeth any longer. Even though I tried to be a little quiet, my roar woke up Brother-Bug. He was confused at first, then wary, finally excited. The baby was finally coming!! He called his God-Mommies, who lived right across the street at the time, and they came over. We called my sister and our midwife. Papa-Bug got the birth sheets on the bed and people began to assemble.

Papa-Bug was singing "You Turn Me Right Round" to convince the baby to shift from face up to face down. He ended up getting that song stuck in my head for most of the labor. I hated it at the time, but now it has made that song strangely special to me.

When the midwife checked the baby between contractions, we were relieved to find that it had turned itself face down and was ready to go. I'm pretty sure the turn happened long before Papa-Bug annoyed me with '80s dance music. Like my labor with Brother-Bug I roared through each contraction and tried to rest in the brief spells between.

The difference I noticed between my first labor and this second labor was that I wasn't scared. I knew what was coming and I knew that my body could do it. With Brother-Bug I had to work hard to trust that my body knew what it was doing and that I would be okay. This time I had that experience and could let go much deeper into each contraction, because I had come through this already. I knew it was hard.

Brother-Bug was unsure. He stayed close to his God-Mommies, even going across the street to play in a quieter space for much of the labor. Our midwife explained what was going on and everyone (apparently including me) was loving and supportive of his feelings and the space he needed to take. At one point he fulfilled his personal labor mission and brought me some juice with a bendy straw. He helped. He felt proud.

As with Brother-Bug's birth, I rocked on my hands and knees, roaring through contraction after contraction. It had been a hot night for the end of March and we had our window open. We woke the neighbors. And between each contaction I could hear the spring frogs singing out back. It was a very magical sound, and now every time we hear those frogs we know that Sister-Bug's birthday is near and we remember the night she was born. (I wrote a Cowbird Story about it...)

Finally things began to intensify - as though they weren't intense enough already. I stopped listening to the frogs, or paying attention to much of anything. The breaks between contractions were no longer lengthy enough to pull my focus away from the work I was doing. I could feel the baby coming, and coming fast. It was faster than I was comfortable with. My sister remembers seeing the baby moving downward, sending a slow wave down my spine. As that baby moved faster than my body could go, before I was ready to push, my sister saw me stretch during contractions from my hands and knees into a full and straight plank, holding the baby back just a little longer. I don't remember doing that action, but I do remember the feeling of "Not Yet BABY!" and doing what I could to slow down just a little bit.

Papa-Bug called across the street and asked Brother-Bug to come back, since we knew he wanted to be there right away when the baby came. His Godmommies hustled him home and they sat just outside our bedroom, watching.

My midwife watched me and leaned over me after a contraction. She said "I'm watching your body and it looks to me like you are being called to catch this baby yourself." I looked at her, probably with confusion. "I want to hold you up on your next contractions so you can deliver your baby." I nodded, and she and Papa-Bug helped me up into a squat, supporting me under my arms and around my back. Another contraction crashed through me and I just about knocked both of them over getting back to my hands and knees. They decided to leave me be and watch me do it my way.

Another contraction; maybe two or three more... I couldn't say. And the baby was crowning. I lurched up onto my knees and used my hands to help the head through my birth canal, creating muscle support where I needed it. In one mighty push this baby was born, into my own hands, from head to toe.

This was the most amazing, Godly, awe inspring moment of my life.

At that moment it was just me and this baby. Everyone else felt so distant. I said, "You are my baby and I caught you my own self." I was shaking with Exhaustion and Grace.

Focus returned around me, people slid back into view. We looked and found we had a girl. We brought Brother-Bug onto the bed to meet his sister. As with his birth, we were wrapped in blankets and left in candlelight for a while. We marveled at our new baby, her perfect fingers and tiny nose. As always, I was confused by the little fingernails - they are so tiny and perfect and complete on a newborn and they seems...out of place...somehow.

So perfect.

Eventually the midwife and my sister came back in. We delivered the placenta, and I nursed our new one. As I wrote in my post about tandem nursing, Brother-Bug curled up on my other side, nursing the right while his new sister nursed the left, and wrapped his arm around her tiny body. It was a perfect moment. After nursing, I handed the baby to Papa-Bug and my sister took me to the bathroom where she helped me into the shower and washed the birth mess off me. Looking back on two births and forward to another one, I think this is my favorite ritual I have with my sister. There is something deeply sacred about this, and I don't know if I would want anyone else's help. After my shower we tucked into bed with clean sheets and a fresh baby.

Sister-Bug arrived at 3:15 in the morning. Somewhere around 5:00, my sister took Brother-Bug off to cuddle with her and have a special "sleepover", while Papa-Bug and I settled down with Sister-Bug for a few hours of sleep.

Blissful, birthed, and so content.

Home Birthing

There are plenty of people in this world who wonder at my deep commitment to having my babies at home. They question the safety and comfort, and sometimes my sanity.

As I wrote in this post, I was privileged to attend my mom's two home births; the hospital as a 'normal' place to birth didn't really occur to me. Additionally, in my late teens I developed a close relationship with a woman who was, and is, an outstanding midwife. She has been my midwife through this pregnancy, both my other pregnancies and home births (you can read Brother-Bug's story here), a couple of early term miscarriages, and continues to be a force of love and support as my kids grow. But besides this early education, I have my own reasons I have my babies at home, and I thought I would share.

While birth can become a medical event, I believe that a healthy birth is pretty much non-medical and should be treated as a family event instead of a medical situation. I trust my body and my midwife to be aware of the situations that would lead us to seek hospital assistance, and much like my position on ultrasound, I would transport to the hospital if my midwife, my body, or the baby, told me that transport was the best plan.

I want to decide who is with me during each passage and who helps me welcome the baby to our family. This includes siblings (not allowed in hospital delivery rooms usually), my husband, my sister, and a close friend or two to help the kids - and our midwife. It does not include strange nurses, a doctor I've potentially never met, or any other hospital staff. This is the most amazing and intimate thing I am ever going to do with my body; this is the most vulnerable I will ever be. I don't want to share it with just anyone. And that's just during the birth! After the birth there are nurses that have to bathe my baby, test it, photograph it, and poke and prod me and my knitting body.

At home, the midwife and all other non-immediate family members leave the room once the baby is out and obviously well. We just sit in bliss with our baby from somewhere between a half-hour and eternity - time is irrelevant. Eventually the birth team returns to clean things up, help me deliver my placenta, see that the baby nurses well, and check its vitals. We don't bathe the babe for several days, letting its skin gradually sluff off vernix while loving that fresh-baby smell. Papa-Bug holds our baby skin-to-skin while my sister washes my aching and exhausted body in the shower. We sleep naked with baby on my chest, still a part of each others' breathing and heartbeats. Siblings cuddle parents and support people, we all marvel at the details of a newborn, everyone takes candid pictures. Soon after the birth - 2-3 hours maybe - everyone goes home and a magical post-birth stillness descends on our home. We have time and deep peace to get to know our new person; to watch our family structure stretch and change.

I believe that babies need the minimal amount of stimulation and interaction during their first days. Except for our midwife doing important baby-wellness checks, no one touches or holds our baby except for Mama, Papa, and Siblings for the first several days. We never pass a baby from stranger to stranger (because even if you are a grandparent or bestest friend, you are still a completely strange situation to a newborn), respecting a time of adjustment for both Baby and Mama.  We have no visitors besides the people who attended the birth for several days. It's just US, extending that post-birth time until we are ready to open up. We can't know a newborn's perspective on things, but I try to think about what each new experience might be like for this being, and we adjust our behaviors to encourage comfort for this new person. Slowly family begins to hold baby for short times, with us watching for its communications that it is looking for Mama/Papa/Boob.

Besides that, I know that home birth is safer for me. I'm an introvert. I dislike strange situations and interacting with strange people. I tend to shut down in these situations, going on a polite auto-pilot until I feel safe or return to my place. This is not a good thing to do if you are giving birth - nor a good thing to have to override during the intensity of helping a person into this world. I want to feel safe - physically, emotionally, spiritually - and I do that best at home. The very idea of getting in a car when contractions are rocking my body seems insane. There are lots of statistics and studies done on the safety of home birth, and you can look those up. It is statistically safer provided that you've made the decision to stay home, gotten good support from a knowledgeable person, and are prepared for the adventure.

Women birth in all positions, making all kinds of noises. Myself, I seem to like hands and knees and lots of lion-esque roars. I prefer my bedroom, but have found that I like to be in different areas early on in labor. I don't like people to touch me much, I don't want to be forced to eat or drink or rest (unless things are going on and on and its for my & baby's well-being), I don't want to be confined to a single room or position - especially one based on a monitor's best position. At home, I am free to find the most comfortable postions, make as much noise as I want, use whatever space I want, and generally go deeply into my experience with the level of interaction from other people that is right for me. The people with me know me very well, have known me for many years, and can be flexible with my needs in each moment.

These are my reasons for home birthing, and what works for me might not work for everyone or anyone else. I think the most essential aspect of home birth - or any other birth - is that it comes from a place of informed choice. I don't think everyone should default to hospital/doctor assisted birth OR home/midwife assisted birth. I fundamentally believe that babies will come best when the mama feels good about her situation and is able to labor and birth with support, as opposed to falling into a decision based on assumptions or pressure.

Birth is radical and wonderful. I wouldn't say I'm looking forward to the deep, aching pull of contractions that are coming in a couple months... But at the same time, I kind of am. It's an amazing experience and I feel so lucky to have had that experience twice, in my own time, way, and space.

First Birth - Brother-Bug

Today is September 11th. It's a day that marks many things. Most importantly, in our world, it is Brother-Bug's Birthday. I thought that I would share the Little-Bugs' birth stories, starting today on his birthday; on the Birth Day that made me a Mama. Soon I will get Sister-Bug's story up. Someday Baby-Bug will arrive and have a story also. But this is Brother-Bug's story. 

Our Birthday-Bug last year. 

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9 days past my due date and ready to have my baby. Papa-Bug fiddled on his computer. I took naps, read books, went on walks. My sister and her sweetie were in town, waiting...waiting...waiting...with us.

Finally, the night of September 10th my contractions ramped up. We cooked dinner. I danced and danced to Peter, Paul & Mary; my body didn't want to stop moving. We called the midwife to let her know how things were going. "Eat" she said. "Take it easy. These things can take a while." We ate and danced. Papa-Bug held me during some contractions. We called the midwife. "Rest. Watch a movie. Try to sleep. You're going to need your energy." we settled on the bed with my sister and watched the incomparable Audrey Hepburn in Sabrina. My contractions slowed and stopped and I fell asleep.

I woke up in the middle of the night, and heaved my body into the bathroom. As I stood up from the toilet, I noticed that something sticky and clear was leaking. It wasn't a gush of waters, but more of a trickle. We called the midwife and she came out to our house. She looked at me - hugely pregnant, exhausted, and scared of what might be coming next. "Well, this baby is coming soon, buy not yet. Would you feel better if I was here on the couch?" I nodded. She and Papa-Bug made up the couch while I went back to bed. The next thing I knew, it was 8:00 in the morning. The midwife poked her head in to say she was going home to check on her daughter, but would come back if we needed her.

Papa-Bug and I were so disappointed. We had been so sure we would be holding our baby - or at least well on our way there. But here was another morning and another day to fill with meaningless tasks while we

waited.

In the afternoon, my sister and I decided to henna our hair. We mixed the mud and applied it. We waited, now for the henna to be ready to rinse; a much less antsy waiting. She and her sweetie got in the shower to rinse off. I paced in the hall, now impatient to get this henna done and find the next thing to do. I just wanted the henna out of my hair. They finished and it was my turn.

Mid-hair washing, I was struck by a contraction that brought me to my knees in the shower. It passed, I finished and troweled off. I dressed and told Papa-Bug I had experienced this crazy-strong contraction. We should take a walk to try and keep things going. Papa-Bug agreed and went to find my shoes. My little brother handed me the phone - my dad wanted to say hello and how were things going? Another rib-twisting contraction caused me to toss the phone at my brother, crouching on the floor while it passed. I lay on the couch. Papa-Bug brought my shoes and I told him I wasn't walking anywhere.

We talked about the contractions, should we call the midwife, and another contraction rocked me to howling. Papa-Bug started timing. 13 minutes between each wave. I yelled and swore, not knowing how to anticipate or understand what my body was doing. Later, my sister's sweetie would remark that he didn't know the lyrics of the birth-song were "Jesus. F**K!!!"

We kept timing the contractions. The midwife had said that a good time to call her was when they were 4-5 minutes apart. My sister's sweetie and my brother left the house to give us space. My sister took herself out of our area, waiting in case we needed or wanted her. The contractions were coming closer together and each one seemed more ferocious than the last. Papa-Bug called the midwife and left a panicked message on her voicemail (she saved it and played it for us a couple dats later), then he called my best friend - a homebirth mother of two - who listened to my howls through a contraction. She gave me the best piece of advice I received in either birth - scream low. I changed my howls to roars and felt much better. The midwife called back, listened to the roars from me and the panic from Papa-Bug and said she would be right over.

The midwife arrived. She and Papa-Bug put the plastic sheet and birth sheets on the bed. I rocked and roared and roared some more. The waves of contractions were unlike anything I had ever felt. Once the bed was made I ended up on my hands and knees, arching and twisting through each contraction. Between contractions Papa-Bug and the midwife would try to get me to lay back and rest, but by the time I arranged my shaking and awkward body on pillows the next contraction would pull me, roaring, back onto my hands and knees.

My first contraction in the shower was around 6:15. At first I had a sense of time, but as the contractions pushed and pulled at my body I lost all sense of everything except the process and rhythm of contraction-breathe-contraction-breathe. My only clear memory of this time is looking up and seeing my midwife, sitting on her toolbox, holding me in the most loving, glowing smile I have ever seen.

I really didn't think I could do it. As the baby moved down and the labor intensified, I cried and roared. It was as scared as I have ever been, sure that each contraction would rend me in two. I found out later that as I roared, full volume through each contraction, the neighbors dogs would howl and moan, another neighbors birds would chirp, and the alley cats would meow. I was, apparently, leading a chorus of creatures.

Finally I came to transition. I threw up, the amniotic sac finally broke, flooding down my legs, and I was (and still am) deeply grateful for the midwife who lovingly cleaned my body as it released everything un preparations for the baby's release. The midwife called my sister from the other room as she saw baby was getting close. She knew Papa-Bug needed to be behind me to catch the baby, but he had been supporting my shoulders, holding me up through the contractions. My sister came in and I gripped her shoulders as the baby's head moved lower and lower.

After several eternities, the baby was crowning. I know it hurt, but by then I was so deep into the process and do far out of my body that I am unable to describe the sensations. I do remember that the feeling was so intense bit my sister on the shoulder. It wasn't hard enough to draw blood, but I did leave a mark that lingered for eventual days, which she proudly showed to everyone including the clerk at the grocery store.

The baby's head came and somewhere I heard the midwife note the time (head delivered at 11:10 PM) and exclamations from Papa-Bug. Another contraction and the midwife adjusted the shoulders. Another contraction and the baby's body slid from mine into Papa-Bug's hands.

The midwife had coached us on what to do once the baby had been caught, but Papa-Bug faltered, somewhat shocked to find a whole, tiny person in his grasp. I heard "Let's pass that baby to the Mama." and Papa-Bug agreed. He tried first to pass the baby around my side, forgetting that we were still connected by the umbilical cord. "No, pass the baby through her legs, then help her lean back." But he tried to pass the baby sideways instead of head-first, bumping the wee head into my thigh. Finally the midwife helped him orient the baby just right, and I found myself looking at this tiny being. The first thing I said was, " Are you my baby?!"

Papa-Bug and the midwife helped me shift to lounging with pillows. We just looked at the baby for a minute or eternity, eventually realizing we wanted to know who this was. We looked and saw we had a little boy. The midwife lit candles, wrapped us in blankets, and left us for alone for the first getting to know our small son.

We traced his cheeks and the way his back curved. His tiny fingernails seemed so perfect and so ridiculous. His face was chubby and somewhat swollen from his birth, so he had a deep wrinkle between his eyes, making him look very serious. This was bliss.

Eventually the midwife and my sister came back into our bedroom. I delivered the placenta and helped our boy with his first nursing. My sister helped me to the shower while Papa-Bug held baby and the midwife put clean sheets on the bed. We weighed and checked out our baby: 8 lbs, 12 oz., 20 1/2 inches long, and (ouch!) a 14 1/2 inch head. He was perfect in every way.

I am still so in awe of how small he used to be, how he once fit inside my body. It seems un-real.

The midwife finished helping clean up, my brother and my sister's sweetheart came back and newborn gazed for a time. The baby, Papa-Bug, and I curled around each other. Everyone went off to bed, and our family let ourselves float in the bliss of our first night with each other.

Siblings At Birth

In my recent pregnancy post I mentioned that the Little-Bugs will be here with us, around the house, while I labor and deliver our new baby. A comment was left about how to prepare children to attend birth, and it's worth a better thought-out response than another comment.

The Why:
I attended my brothers' two homebirths. I was 5 1/2 and rubbing my mom's feet when I watched, totally fascinated, as he crowned. At 9, I was not in the room for my second brother's delivery - he was a surprise breech and the midwife didn't want any additional distractions. Dad called us in as soon as Mom and Baby were stable. Both of the experiences taught me that birth is a healthy and normal process that takes place in the context of family. These lessons I brought with me when I decided to have a homebirth, and they are one of the greatest gifts I have received from my Mom. By being involved in the process, by watching my Mom trusting her body to create this miracle, I never questioned my body's ability to pull off the same miracle (well...not until I was in the thick of contractions with Brother-Bug...but that's a different story).

I want that for my kids. I want them to know and to see that our bodies are amazing, that birth is safe and joyful, if hard. I want Sister-Bug in particular, to learn from me as I learned from my mom that her body can do this if she chooses to be a mother. I want to do my little part to dispell the myths that labor and delivery are inherantly dangerous and medical. I want my children to be empowered in whatever choices they make for their bodies, and I think that watching me birth a baby is a step toward that.

Tandem nursing right after birth.

The other large component to having the kids present is the addition of another person to their pack. The concept of Mama leaving the house pregnant and laboring (which is likely scary to a little person with maybe a vague understanding of what is happening), and then appearing in a hospital room later with a baby... Many kids meeting new siblings are not old enough to make that huge mental jump. "Meeting the Baby" is an important ritual, but I prefer that my kids are involved in the process of supporting me while I bring the Baby out and into the circle of our family.

I'm not a stoic birther - I'm loud. I scream and cuss and thrash and cry. I do what my body needs to do, and Brother-Bug got kind of freaked out for the first couple of contractions I had with Sister-Bug. But he was supported through that and now has only fond memories. I have heard him explaining this process to Sister-Bug.


"Mama will scream and be really loud. If it's too much we leave the room, but she's just working really hard and having a baby hurts her. But it's okay and the midwife is there to help her and then we have our new baby. I'll take care of you..."

See what I mean about empowering my kids through their presence?

Brother-Bug was cuddled up with me and his newborn Sister within 5 minutes of her arrival. He "met" her, but it was just a part of that entire experience for him, and when he woke up the next morning he wasn't surprised that a baby was in my arms because he had witnessed her arrival there.


The How:

In every part of this process that leads to the birth, I try to find a place that the Little-Bugs can be involved.

We read books together, take their advice on names, make plans, talk through the coming months and what will happen as we wait for the baby. We talk about the birth almost daily with Sister-Bug especially. Nothing serious, just passing conversation to keep it fresh in her mind, even though we have a while to wait. As soon as they can feel it move we will play games like "get the baby to kick you in the head". When we pull out the newborn stuff they will help sort, wash, and fold. Even though we don't need any newborn clothes (we have so many that we could clothe twins and still have extras), we will make a trip to the thrift store and they can pick out a couple of things for their baby to wear.  But all of that is easy, and most people do those things. Having kids at an actual birth is something that needs extra thought and resources.

A loving person: Regardless of the age of your child, make sure that some one is available to be their support person. Mama has the Papa and the midwife, maybe there is a doula or a close friend to support the midwife and Papa. Kiddo needs a person to help, explain, cuddle, take out of the room, play with, or anything else that child needs. Select a person who Mama is comfortable with (afterall, labor and birth is about is intimate as it gets) and your kid really enjoys spending time with. Make sure that the two of them get plenty of time before the birth to hang out and establish a strong relationship.

The person you ask needs to undertand and be comfortable that they are not really there to attend the new baby's birth. They are there to lavish attention on the older sibling, whatever that means to that kid. In my mind, the people coming to care for Brother & Sister-Bug are more essential than our midwife. I can be in labor for a while before the midwife shows up, and I think I could even feel okay if I had to deliver a baby without her help, but I don't want to try to lovingly parent and support my kids while doing any of that...and I want Papa-Bug to be able to take care of me knowing the kids have what they need. 

I think this applies even for an older child. Maybe you have a 10 or 12 year old who needs an adult who is willing to come play favorite games while Mama labors. If something goes awry, it's important for the Mama and Papa to know that the older sibling has loving support and care. If Mama and Papa aren't at home, or the sibling is not able to be present in the birth room, it's important for someone with adult communication skills and less emotional attachment to be there and help communicate if necessary. 

Holding Sister-Bug on her first morning with us.

Participation from the First: the Little-Bugs go to all the prenatals. Our excellent midwife teaches them how her tools work and carefully helps them learn to use those tools with her. The kids wander in and out, see my rare internal exam, and hold the various sized fetus models our midwife keeps around for just this purpose. We answer the kids questions and engage them, and in a low pressure way we keep the focus on me. They slowly grow used to their midwife being present mostly for Mama. They see me trust her with my body. She helped me bring both kids into the world and they are familiar with her role in their stories. When she shows up at the labor, she's familiar and already very safe. She's part of their family, and we've all been working together to be ready for our labor day.

A to-do list: Find a list of age-appropriate tasks that your child can do during the birth. I was rubbing my Mom's feet at my brother's birth. I felt so helpful. Brother-Bug brought be a cup of juice with a straw while I was in labor with Sister-Bug. He's looking forward to doing that again. Your list of things to do should be:
*things that are not necessary, in case the prevailing feelings of the older sibling prevent participation.
*some tasks in the birth area and some in other rooms, should the older sibling want space from a very intense situation. 
*within your child's skill level, something they can be successful at (with help from their support person).

Our list of to-do's includes hanging up our family birthday banner, bringing me juice when I need it, drawing a birthday card for the baby, and similar tasks. 


Watch movies: This is currently Sister-Bug's favorite thing to do. I previewed a lot of homebirth movies on YouTube and came up with a couple that she watches over and over. As she watches we talk about what we see happening. Because I know my birth habits (not quiet) I made sure to choose movies that feature some good Mama-screaming. I also looked out for movies with older siblings attending. Do be sure that you pre-watch them - birth can get pretty intense pretty fast!

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I cannot express how magical it is to help and support children learn about and become comfortable with the beauty, mess and reality of birth. Afterall, we all were born once...shouldn't we all know what that process is like?