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.

Why No Ultrasounds?

I have never had an ultrasound during a pregnancy. Happily, my babes have so far grown perfectly without any need to check and make sure that they are okay. I have nothing against someone else having an ultrasound for whatever reasons they deem fit, but they just aren't for me.

I would have an ultrasound if the health and well-being of me or the baby were in question and I wouldn't hesitate. I am fully in support of using the magic of technology and modern medicine to prevent problems and save lives. In this writing I am considering only the routine ultrasounds done throughout a pregnancy.

There are a number of questions surrounding routine ultrasound, and you can read about them in Mothering's article here, if you are interested. I'm writing about why I don't ultrasound my pregnancies.

My superficial hesitation - those ultrasound images are kind of creepy and alien. The images of the standard ultrasound are odd enough, but the newer 3-D images look to me like someone has tried to sculpt Winston Churchill out of pudding and failed...I don't really want that to be a "first" visual of my baby.

Sister-Bug has a cuddle, hoping to be kicked in the head. 

I've been surprised at every pregnancy the amount of judgement extended to a family who chooses not to find out the baby's gender. You, random stranger in the grocery store, need to know the gender of my baby for what reason? We should know the gender so we...know what to buy? Additional judgement is extended when it's revealed that we don't have any ultrasounds, with or without gender. It's as though I am intentionally endangering my baby because of sheer pig-headedness, as though I'm a bad parent for not counting the baby's fingers and toes before it joins my reality.
I marvel as my belly grows each time. I wonder if it's a boy or girl...but even more I wonder what idiosyncrasies, what personality quirks and traits have manifested as this baby grows inside me. I wonder if it will have a secret dimple like it's sister, or the funny ribs that Brother-Bug inherited from me. These things won't be revealed by an ultrasound, and I wouldn't want them to be.

We do use an ultrasound doppler with our midwife to hear the baby's heartbeat, and without fail all three babies have, as soon as they were big enough, moved away from it's waves, deeper into my cavities. They don't like it (how I can tell they don't like it is a topic for another post). The doppler is a very low-level wave, much lower than the wave needed to see the outlines of a baby. If my babies don't like this little wave, if we can tell that they are distressed by it, how much more might they be distressed by the larger sonics of a visual ultrasound?

But ultimately what it comes down to is this: My body has made this dark and protected cave in which my baby takes its first movements, begins its heartbeats, and turns to the gentle stimuli that come through the layers of my skin and muscle. It is the quintessence of private and intimate. The idea of ultrasound penetrating this privacy just doesn't work for me; it violates something sacred.

There are lots of people in the world for whom ultrasound is an important part of their journey through pregnancy, and I applaud their decision and ability to choose what is right for their body and baby. But it's not a route I plan on taking - for a third time around.

A Tandem Nursing Story

Happy World Breastfeeding Week! Nursing a baby is magical - that the food I eat turns to rich milk, that my beautiful children thrive from that milk... It's really special. There is nothing like a baby or child looking up into your eyes as they nurse. That is beyond really special.

In honor of World Breastfeeding Week, I want to talk about Tandem Nursing.

What? Is that like extreme nursing on a tandem bike or something?

The definition of Tandem Nursing is nursing two kids at the same time. A mother of twins might be a tandem nurser. A mother who has one older nurseling and a new nursing baby is a tandem nurser. And so on. Tandem Nursing is somewhat controversial, especially in this culture that frequently frowns upon nursing past a year (despite the recommendations from the AAP and WHO). Nursing two (or more...some moms nurse more!) children, when one is able to sustain themselves with solid food is a whole other kind of cultural taboo.

Before we delve into Tandem Nursing, I want to talk a little bit about Extended Nursing - or nursing into the toddler or preschooler years. Nursing is not a mere mechanical food delivery system; babies and children nurse for food, for medicine, for comfort, for connection, and because it's really good stuff. There is a dance and relationship that develops between baby and mother. The choice to nurse a child is deeply personal, and the length of time that a mother chooses to nurse is also deeply personal. Because it is a relationship between two people, the choice to end or change that relationship must happen between those two people. It's not my doctor's business how long I nurse (barring some extreme medical situations), and likewise it's not relevant to my friends, family, or strangers on the bus. People can and will share their opinions with me, but at the end of the day the decision has to be between the two people in the relationship. Nursing should stop when either party in the relationship is done. If the child no longer wants to nurse - Done. If nursing is too much for the mother - Done. If the dentist says nursing past a year is highly questionable - Find a New Dentist. You wouldn't let your dentist decide if you should break up your relationship with your partner, or stop speaking to your best friend, right?


On to Tandem Nursing.

When Brother-Bug was almost three, I found out I was pregnant with the being who would come to be Sister-Bug. Brother-Bug was nursing 4-ish times a day and I still cherished that time with him. It felt especially important as I contemplated sharing myself bewteen two kids - it was a time to relish my first child and the ability I had for those years to lavish attention on him without distraction. And he didn't want to stop nursing anyway. So we didn't. We talked to our midwife, did some reading, and decided to take it one day at a time. At any point I might have been done, and we would have helped Brother-Bug with the transition to not nursing.

Eventually, Brother-Bug learned to curl his body around my growing belly, and we explored different nursing positions. He would pat and rub the belly while he nursed. I gave him more of a schedule of nursing times (waking up, nap time, going to bed) and we talked about how the baby would get to nurse whenever.

It wasn't all blissful. Brother-Bug's initial latch-on hurt my pregnancy-sensitized nipples. But it only hurt for a minute and it was something I decided I could live with. I gritted my teeth for the latch moment and breathed through it. It passed fairly quickly, and stopped almost entirely somewhere in my second trimester.

Eventually, Sister-Bug made her way into the world. Brother-Bug was present at her birth. When she was about half an hour old it was time for her first attempt at nursing. She latched on my left, Brother-Bug latched on my right, sitting next to me. I looked down at my two beautiful babes and Brother-Bug reached his arm to wrap it around his new sister, gently stroking her back as they nursed together. That one moment was worth every painful latch I experienced.

Sister-Bug is about 6 hours old here. I love the smile in Brother-Bug's eyes.

As they grew together they would hold hands while they nursed, smile at each other, and connect while piled up on me. There were a few moments in which I felt overwhemed, under my two nurslings, but for the most part it was wonderful. Brother-Bug had a very easy adjustment to being the older of two and I attribute some of it to Tandem Nursing - that they could share this special relationship helped him understand the link between he and his sister. I loved having an extra tummy when I was just making too much milk - he was always happy to help take some of the pressure off! As he grew, his nursing slacked off, and just before Sister-Bug turned one, I asked him to be done nursing. He wasn't remembering to nurse and then feeling frustrated because he had missed it. His brain still wanted it sometimes, but the rest of him had grown out of nursing. He had a last nurse, we celebrated with ice cream, and I continued to enjoy nursing Sister-Bug.

Fast forward to Sister-Bug's second birthday. I was newly pregnant with the current Fetus-Bug. Still nursing. Again, we are taking it one day at a time. Sister-Bug is a LOT less committed to nursing. Sometimes she skips whole days and doesn't even notice. But we are still nursing and I plan on doing so until she is done...or I am done. I won't be surprised if she stops nursing before this new baby is born. Latching on is still uncomfortable, but I know that it's worth it for me. I treasure these moments when I can right the wrongs in her world so easily; the moments where she snuggles up to me, gazing up as we nurse. She will be a big girl so soon. I'm watching curiously to see where she goes and when she stops. The differences between my children fascinates me.

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Tandem Nursing will not work for every mother. Some women have intense nipple and breast pain and must stop nursing. Some just don't want to keep nursing. And they shouldn't. Every woman's experience of nursing is different and should be supported and honored. If it's something you are considering, check out these sites:

La Leche League - Tandem Nursing : A great list of all their posts and links to Tandem Information

Breastfeeding Basics - Tandem Nursing : A very informative FAQ

Also buy yourself a copy of Adventures in Tandem Nursing, by Hilary Flowers. Good stuff there, and an invaluable reference to flip though as you nurse...and nurse...and nurse...

I've loved almost every moment of my Tandem Nursing experiences so far. If Sister-Bug does entirely wean herself before the baby is born, I will feel a little sad not to see that relationship develop as the baby sits on her lap while they nurse together. I love the way my arms and body encompass my children and feed them.

It's the best magic I can do. 

A Co-Sleeping Story

The Little-Bugs and I have been visiting Brother-Bug's Godmommies over the holiday weekend. On our last night there, he decided to have a sleep over with his Godmommies, cuddling up in their bed instead of the bed that he was sharing with Sister-Bug and I. This is common - he loves them so, and since we see them only a few times a year we try to fill him up with as much Godmommie time and love as possible!

Sister-Bug was upset that she didn't get to have a sleep over too. Sad face! I offered her the option of having a special Mama sleep over, just the two of us, or making her a bed for her very own self on the floor. She chose her own bed on the floor. I folded a comfortor into a sleeping bag shape and she tucked herself in. She fell asleep, on her own, a few minutes later.

Cozied up...she looks so little to me, to be sleeping all by herself...but that's my bias.

I think it has been close to six years since I had a bed all to myself at night.

I wish I could say I fell asleep reveling in the freedom to shift to any comfortable position, unhindered by son, daughter, husband, dog, or cat. But without those anchors that give my sleep definiton, I was restless. I kept waking, confused by the lack of bodies. Sister-Bug slept for about two hours on her own and when she called me, I chose to pull her into bed with me so that I could get some solid rest. I wrapped my arms around her sweaty toddler self and finally fell deeply asleep.

Co-sleeping is really important to our family. I relish these years that my children want to be close to me. I treasure the moments when dimpled arms reach out to make sure I am still there. I adore how they shift in their sleep to find me, knowing I'm not ever far away. I know that soon they will be independant and lanky teenagers, or even their own adults in beds far from mine, so I soak up every night that I share with them.

But co-sleeping is not as important to me as respecting my child's right to their own space, and their ability to make good decisions for themselves. There has been a lot of chatter about Attachment Parenting recently, both good and bad. If you've read my blog at all, you know that I'm pretty attached and I like it that way. It works for us.

In my heart of hearts, this decision process - the offering of options, supporting choice, listening to needs - is the very essence of attachment parenting. And last night, Sister-Bug showed a perfect example of a Securely Attached Child: she made a choice, having faith in its rightness for her, sure that she would be cared for if she needed care. She felt loved and attached all night long, alone in her floor-bed or cuddled up with me in the wee hours. My Attachment relationship with her contributed greately to her ability to confindently make that choice.

None of my kids will sleep with me forever, but I am happy to know that they will choose when to move on from my sides when it is right for them.

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Update:
Last night after posting this, Sister-bug requested that we make her a bed for herself. We did, but exhausted after a long travel day, she fell asleep in my arms and I put her to bed with us. I woke her up to pee at about 3:00 and in her stupor she insisted on her own bed. She slept there till 6:30, when she happily got herself up and came to find me.

Nursing On Demand or Nursing By Desire?

I love this recent blog post from Nurshable. It resonates so very deeply. As I move toward nursing my third child (while still nursing my second) I am still stunned by the look in my daughter's eyes when she gazes at me while we nurse. There is so much love and trust there. I would not trade that for anything.

Me and my kids - tandem nursing on Sister-Bug's first day. Brother on the bottom, Sister on the top.

I've been thinking about the term "On Demand Nursing" and I don't like it. A Google search defines demand as:

de·mand/diˈmand/

Noun:	An insistent and peremptory request, made as if by right.
Verb:	Ask authoritatively or brusquely

Certainly as a nursing mom I've experienced demands from both my children, but our nursing relationship is much deeper than that. "On Demand" implies that I am held to the whims of a tiny tyrant, that I have little choice in the matter. But we need a new phrase - one that connotates the positive action of meeting our baby/toddler/child's needs because we have the desire to be the best mother we can be. A similar Google search defines desire as:

de·sire/dəˈzī(ə)r/

Noun:	A strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen.
Verb:	Strongly wish for or want (something).

That's more the kind of word I'm looking for.

Desire is a good thing. Desire motivates us to seek out satiation. Often we share our desires with others, especially those we love deeply. I chose to nurse this way because I desired this amazing closeness with my children. I chose this because my understanding and experience led me to the decision that this is best for both of us and, like all parents, I desire to do what is best for my family.

Sometimes, as babies grow to toddlers, I say "No. I can't nurse this minute." And we discuss when we will settle and nurse. There are two (sometimes more) people in the equation, with unique needs, demands, and desires. I honor the building and unfolding of that nursing relationship. My desire is to aid and support it to the best of my ability.

Much as I reject the designation of "Human Pacifier", I will no longer practice "On Demand Nursing". I'm changing it. My kids and I will Nurse By Desire.

This Phone is Smarter Than Me

In a fit of curiosity, I am blogging from our car using my husband's iPhone. I resist these smart phones and yet they seem to have many tools that could be useful. My least favorite part is the touch screen. It feels so... Un-real maybe. And I make so many errors, so frequently, that any iPhone use usually leaves me fuming and helping the kids learn exciting new vocabulary.

Anyway. I am thing of delving into this wacky world of smarter-than-me-phones. This post from the car is a way of dipping my toes into an iPhone, if you will. I hope my husband doesn't mind toe prints.

I contemplate either an iPhone or a Blackberry Torch. All my siblings have iPhones - do I join the pack or be an individual? How do I really feel about this touch screen? Do I really want a smart phone? These are definitely questions I need to answer before I delve - if I delve.

I would be most appreciative of comments and thoughts from iPhone and Blackberry Torch owners.