Empowering Birth Blog

36 Weeks Pregnant!

Just a quick post to stay I am still here and baby is still inside.  With the upcoming move I barely have a moment to check my email let alone blog.  I am very big and tired but still feeling good.  We shot the virtual tour of my house yesterday, a big load off my plate.  It isn't easy putting a house in immaculate order with two little ones running around! 
Other news...my friend who is a photographer will be photographing the birth so stay tuned for some neat birth pictures.  I have also invited the three wonderful women I apprentice with to the birth.  A bit of a crowd you might say but they don't have to be in the same room with me, and I am not sure if they will all be here since they are all doulas and might be at a birth.  I feel so lucky to be apprenticing with such strong, compassionate, supportive women.  I am looking forward to becoming a midwife with them.
On the apprentice note, I am still attending prenatals with my midwife.  Next week will probably be my last week as I will be 37 weeks and ready to take the last few weeks to relax and nest.

Seven Months Pregnant!

With two little ones to run around after, time flies!  I am quickly approaching my estimated due date.  We are also planning a move which means little time for blogging.  I've been putting together a CD of my favorite gospel songs for the birth (I LOVE Itunes!) and finishing up the last prenatal yoga class that I will be teaching before the baby is born.  I continue to attend prenatal visits with my midwife and am becoming quite confident in my blood pressure taking and fetal heart rate counting skills.  Palpating baby is becoming easier as well though it is quite an art.  I am happy to report my baby is head down.  I palpated the head on my own belly and had my midwife confirm that I was indeed feeling a head.
I promise to blog more when things slow down but with the upcoming move things are bound to be crazy.  We will move shortly after the baby is born.  Once again I am giving birth in a house and then moving.  The first time was tough, this time I am better able to see it as a gift that I am giving this house and the family that will buy this house from us.  So much love is added to a house as a baby is born....

Fen is Weaned...

My goal was to wean Fen as gently as I could.  Knowing that nursing is painful for me during pregnancy (I nursed Khady the first three months of my pregnancy with Fen and gave it up due to the discomfort), I started the process of weaning shortly after I became pregnant.  As I approached six months, I was successfully nursing Fen only every two or three days and hoping my milk would hurry up and dry up!  Last Tuesday (Feb. 12) Fen asked to nurse before bed.  I said, ok but I think the milk might be all gone.  Sure enough, he nursed on one side and said, "all done, other side?," and then nursed on the other side for about thirty seconds only to declare "all done too."  So the milk is all gone and the weaning process complete.  He asks every now and then but I remind him that he tried and the milk was all gone and then distract him, which works.  Six months pregnant with very sore nipples, I am happy that the nursing is over but even more content that I was able to wean him gradually and with very few complaints.  Though it does tear a bit at my heart strings to have to wean a two year old who, without mom's gentle but firm efforts to redirect, would not have stopped nursing so soon...

Too busy growing a baby

I know, I haven't posted for a week, but this baby growing thing takes work!  I am SOOOOO tired.  And I have also begun my apprentice-ship!  I've done a few births with my midwife but to date have not had a regular schedule nor have I been introduced as her apprentice.  Last Tuesday I woke up at the crack of dawn, hurriedly gathered my things together, ate breakfast, packed an ample amount of snacks, and headed up to Frederick, a good hour and fifteen minutes north of DC, without traffic.  I met my midwife and accompanied her for the day on home prenatal visits.  At each stop I palpated the mom's belly to determine position as each mom, took fetal heart tones, and assessed blood pressure.  I was introduced as her apprentice/student.  Oh the joy of riding all day long in a car and visiting mommies with a seasoned midwife that I love dearly.  I will be following my midwife around and/or accompanying her at one of her three offices for prenatals every other week and occasionally on additional days as well.  I am going to try and fit as many prenatal and post-partum visits in as possible before the baby comes, take six months off before I resume prenatal visits and two and 1/2 years after the birth before I resume attending births. 

So there just isn't that much time for blogging.  I am learning to acknowledge that I can't do everything and evenings, I am just too tired to blog.  I used to blog during nap time, and will continue to do so a couple times a week, but usually I end up sleeping the entire time Fen is down.  My midwife suggested that perhaps I am having twins but I think my extreme exhaustion is due to the fact that my body is still producing a lot of milk.  With Khady, my milk dried up by three and a half months but I am almost four months and my body insists on producing copious amounts of milk.  It is an awful lot of work to produce milk AND a baby.  No wonder I eat all the time!

And sometimes when I have free time I just want to relax, like right now.  I am reading a fantastic book, Eat, Love, Pray and I am making turkey stock and turkey soup. Time to check the broth!

Happy Birthday Fenimore!

Two years ago today I had my first VBAC.  It is 7:32 am so Fenimore was already a little over three hours old and snuggled up asleep, wrapped tightly in our bed with yellow flannel sheets.

There are times when, in my naivety, I truly believe that anyone with a bit of desire and a good doula can have a VBAC.  My friends remind me that I worked my butt off to have a VBAC, and indeed I did.  In the end it seemed easy because the work paid off and the birth went so smoothly.  I was so ecstatic, singing throughout the birth, smiling between contractions, so happy to know my body worked, that I would soon hold my baby in my hands.  To this day, focused thoughts on the birth bring tears to my eyes.

But the months before were full of meditation and yoga (lots of hip-openers), no matter how tired I was I woke up and sat on that mat to meditate.  I carefully researched my hospital records to understand exactly what went wrong the first time and talked the head labor and delivery nurse into reviewing my records and giving me her thoughts on what happened (she thought they probably decided I was too tired to push the baby out and the doctor was getting antsy).  My chart stated that my cesarean was for reasons of CPD.  This was the first time I had seen that word, I had no idea I had had a cesarean for CPD.  True CPD is rare and I just couldn't believe my case had been a true case of CPD.  At the same time, it took a LOT of work to squash those nagging doubts installed by the experts, "maybe my pelvis is too small...."

But I covered a lot of ground in those nine months and as my due date approached, I was ready!  Happy Birthday Fenimore, thank you for helping me renew my faith in my body.

Ten Things I love about Me

My good friend Madame Meow tagged me.  After a quick phone call to clear up exactly what tagging was, I am now, as I understand it, supposed to blog on the ten things I LOVE about myself.  I feel slightly like a fifth grader sitting in front of a composition topic due tomorrow, staring longingly at my feet which ache to be shoe-less and outdoors.   I tried to get out of the exercise by thinking, hmm, this is an empowering birth blog, what does this have to do with birth, but since I rarely write about myself I thought, hey why not?  Perhaps people might be a bit curious about who I am and what better time to think about what you LOVE about yourself then when you are pregnant and perhaps not loving yourself enough.  So, modesty aside, here goes....

1. I love that I am a WOMAN (or womyn as my friend Sazz would say, and yes Sazz, I am going to tag you (this does feel like a game of chase!).  I didn't fully understand what it meant to be a woman until I gave birth/began attending births.  After attending a long exhausting labor I often hear the husband remark, wow, I don't think I could have done that.  And I think DAMN are we strong!  It must be the incomprehension/fear of our awesome strength that drives men's desire to oppress women.  Don't we tend to insult that which we really fear?  Ah, there is nothing like the face of a woman in her labor groove; radiant, riding on top of an enormous, uncontrollable energy, and fully in the moment.

2.  I love the passion with which I feel.  Most of my emotions are visceral.  It drives people crazy because if I eat a piece of pie it is the BEST piece of pie I have ever had.  If I read a good nonfiction book, it is the best nonfiction book I have ever read.  My in-laws recently lamented, "everything is always "the best" for you."  It wasn't until recently that I realized that maybe I am better at living in the moment then I thought.  I mean, at that particular moment, it really was the best.

3. I even love the fact that I am full of ups and downs, that I rarely hug the middle of the road.  I am working in my yoga journey to learn how to better hug into the mid-line (an important alignment principal of Anusara yoga), and with this I expect to find greater balance in my life, but I also love that I feel passionately about things.

4.  I love the fact that I have found a way to open up to the spirit and take a yoga pose deeper then I've ever taken it before.  I did that this again last weekend in my Anusara Immersion workshop.  I do not have a super-flexible spine by nature but I've been working for several years to create more space in my pelvis so that I can get deeper back-bends.  And then when I stop trying to control and just ride the spirit, WOW!  Now if only I can learn how to always remain open to the spirit.

5. I love the fact that I am in really good shape.  It is all yoga.  (Well maybe a tiny bit nursing mom. Who would've guessed it takes that much work to make milk!)  I was a field hockey player, swam, and ran in high school but I don't think I was ever as toned as I am now, and this is after two kids!  I certainly don't do yoga for the yoga butt but I will admit, it is a welcomed bonus!

6.  I love my intuition.  It has rarely failed me.  I can sense when it is ok to trust and when I need to be wary of something/someone, though I won't know exactly why.  And I love the palpable connection between people from which that intuition flows.  We are all one.

7. I love that I have an enormous amount of energy.  My energy is the biblical well that never ran dry.  While my abundance of energy can be a curse as well as a blessing (I work very hard to be content with stillness) I love the fact that I can go to the beach with the kids, cook a fancy dinner for a friend, schedule a prenatal, and still have the energy to get my blog done before bed.

8.  I love my blue eyes and the fact that they can look almost Lapis Lazuli in color when I am wearing a deep blue.

9. I love my laugh, I love to laugh.  It has been suspected that it is forced but I protest against that slandering claim.  It is full, loud, joyous, and without containment. 

10. I love that I can still be a kid.  When I go to a pool that has water slides and someone can watch the kids, I will go down them again, and again, and again, each time shouting with glee, thrilled to my viscus with raw joy.

Phew, I'm done!  Ok, I am going to tag Sazz, VBAC Adventure, LaborTrials and Blueberry Baby.  I think we should all spend time thinking about why we love ourself and I have a sneaking suspicion we don't always think about this as much as  we should.  Have fun!

Blog Vacation

It is summer and time to take a vacation from my blog.  Time to spend me time curling up with a good book on Midwifery.  I need to finish my required reading before our planned trip to The Farm this fall (that would be The Farm of Ina May Gaskin fame).  Moms and moms to be, make sure you give yourself a vacation too, especially as you approach your due date.  So expect erratic postings for the next few weeks.

Loss

I learned recently that a fellow mom lost her baby at birth.  This news compels me to share a series of poems I wrote reflecting upon my own experience of growing up in a family who lost a child.  I once shared this series with a close friend who lost her first child and was told it helped a bit.  I am afraid I can't find the final version but here goes....

Remembering

walking the short plot
small stone
small like a stump
December 1970-December 1972

unstrapping the thick packing tape
an attic box
(missing the bold stroke of the fat black
moving pen which always defines contents)
stacks of rubber-band bound photos of
red sushi, surface dull, like wax paper,
and mom barefoot on a bamboo mat
and the "my first step" photo
market Kelly, 1972

a neat black book
tiny names scrawled down the page
like waves
names I had tea with at grandma's
but none ever spoke of that day

Driving with Dad in the volvo
volvo green like the wings
of a Japanese bettle
and something about
"why Dad" and
"maybe I would never
have been born"
and the long tire hum
and a
"well you have no right
to ask such questions"
and my red pepper-hot cheeks

 

The Father

eyes like pools
covered with a thick green tarp for winter
because he was there
twenty years ago
there when they found her still
on the bottom
there two operations later
when the soft heart
smaller than a tangerine
refused to move

in spring the cover pulls away
from the edge of the pool
at the tug of the wind
and I call out for him to catch it

The Mother

Conception
"weeping my endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning" Psalm 30:5

the room
blue
even his face
his white-gold band
and the bed
blue
like snow under
a moon
it was winter

that morning
the sky
too blue
flying home
one week leave
my hand slipped over the
skipping stone smooth box
once, twice and
our hands locked acroos
the thin plastic divider
between the seats

noon
the snow made the long, black
snake-like chain of cars
winding streets just cleared
but already respeckled with
snow, like spilled salt
or powder
difficult
a chain which stopped
and slid

that night the snow fell loosley
blue
no sound
only closeness
pain

The Second Child

Discovering Self

a sense of
two parts
like a sunflower seed
or being a butterfly
with a caterpillar memory
with Kelly I share Japan
grandma's blue eyes
great grandpa's blond hair
and KSH

Self Portrait

as a child I counted backwards 9 months to
12 days after dad found her small and cold,
hair limp like seaweed, floating in a pool
a bitter end to neighborhood hide and seek

a 9 month package
arrived so soon after death,
my mango smallness beat during a pregnancy
tasting tears and smiles

a symphony coursed
through my tiny cord
molding me a poet of ups and downs
feeling enough for 2

Goodbye Mr. Stamz

At first I thought his passing had nothing to do with birth, but after posting, I realized my naivety.  The passing of Mr. Richard Stamz has everything to do with birth for there is little so intimately connected with birth as death.  Any mom who has had a miscarriage knows how close the line can be between the two.   As a midwife, I know one day I too will have to face death and I hope I will be able to face death with a brave heart.

Mr. Stamz passed the day before yesterday at 102.  There was never an odder pair on the surface.  I a young white girl (for at 26, when we met, I was a girl to his 95 years) and he a distinguished African-American gentleman of 95.  Yet both of us craved a world where people could just love each other and do their thing, where things like skin color and age didn't get in the way all the time.  Most people thought he was my great-grandfather and in my heart we was, and then some.  I love you Mr. Stamz and damn am I going to miss you.  It hurts so bad that I didn't get to see you one last time.  I haven't been in Chicago since Fenimore was born...somehow I counted too much on seeing you this summer....  But I know you were ready to go.

Pioneering black DJ 'would not hold back' 
(http://www.suntimes.com/news/obituaries/429590,CST-NWS-xstamz15a.article)

June 15, 2007

BY TERESA SEWELL AND CYNDI LOZA  Staff Reporters

Being 101 years old didn't get cool cat Richard Stamz down.

He was proclaimed by many as a legend -- hopping off a freight train from Tennessee with 50 cents in his pocket and rising to become one of Chicago's first black radio disc jockeys.

Known as "Open the door, Richard!" on his WGES-AM radio show, he was a "jack of all trades" Chicagoan: author, entrepreneur and philosopher. He never stopped spitting out wisdom or wisecracks, and had endless energy to jam.

In April, WVON radio's Pervis Spann invited Mr. Stamz to a ceremony where diva KoKo Taylor performed her signature hit, "Wang Dang Doodle."

"Richard was right there doing the same thing KoKo was doing," Spann said, laughing. "Shaking his tail feather."

Mr. Stamz died Tuesday at Kindred Healthcare Center in Chicago from congestive heart failure and pneumonia.

Born April 10, 1906, in Memphis, Tenn., he arrived in Chicago via freight train at the age of 16, said a daughter, Valeria Hankins. Looking to make a living here in the pre-Depression era, he got a job as a busboy at the Edgewater Hotel. He later got to know some celebrities and worked as a road manager of sorts for years.

 

'He was a fiery person'

It's unclear exactly how he got his start in Chicago radio, but it's clear he was a major hit. His 1950s show was on WGES, the most powerful black radio station at that time, and it opened the door for many others, Spann said. Mr. Stamz also served as an emcee for shows at the Regal Theater in the 1950s. Spann met him there and said their friendship blossomed because Mr. Stamz always spoke the truth.

"He was good as gold," Spann said. "Whatever he told you, that's what he did."

Mr. Stamz also occasionally helped Spann interview music greats like B.B. King and James Brown on his show over the years.

"He was a fiery person," said longtime V-103 disc jockey Herb Kent. "It was nothing laid back about Richard Stamz."

Kent said he doesn't know where Mr. Stamz got the soulful energy that pumped crowds and held the ears of Chicago listeners.

"He was just born with that type of personality," Kent said. "And [he was] gifted with it."

Mr. Stamz rode through the streets in his "Soul Machine" van, playing his music loud and stopping when crowds followed him. He would even pass out "Soul Pills" for those he felt were lacking in the area.

Another daughter, Phyllis Stamz-Willis, described her father as an articulate historian who read many books and stayed up to date on politics. He had attended LeMoyne-Owen College in Memphis for two years, and most said no one could win an argument with him.

Mr. Stamz was also a strong community activist. Hankins said he helped New York congresswoman Shirley Chisholm with her presidential campaign in the early 1970s.

He also once had a memorable showdown with Ku Klux Klan members on the "The Jerry Springer Show" in the 1990s. Hankins said her father wanted people to understand that there were no differences between the races.

"My father was very bold," she said. "He would not hold back."

In recent years, he did book signings for Chicago's Englewood Neighborhood, which he co-wrote with Maria Lettiere Roberts. Mr. Stamz once owned a grocery store on the South Side and Richard's Record Shop on Roosevelt Road.

"I'm liable to do anything," Mr. Stamz said in an April article in Time-Out Chicago. "I should get a medal for it."

He is survived by two more daughters, Yvette White and Harriett Hoskins, seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

A memorial service will be at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Fernwood United Methodist Church, 10057 S. Wallace.

When I am not blogging

                          Friday, May 18th, was our one-year anniversary of moving into this house.  Friday, one year ago, I woke up the kids, dressed them haphazardly and drove them the three and 1/2 blocks to our new but still kitchen-less house.  That night we walked back to my sister's condo, where Khady had been sleeping in a closet, to shower.  A rough day of moving, we just didn't feel up to a cold shower...  New to us, our house was decades away from being a new house.  Built in 1906, the house has amazing energy, you can sense there has been a lot of love between its walls, but it needed/still needs oh so much work. 

Sometimes I miss blogging because I am reading but more often it is because we are working on the house.  Like birth, our house can require limitless patience.