| THIS IS A READ-ONLY ARCHIVE FROM THE SORABJI.COM MESSAGE BOARDS (1995-2016). |
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Ahem. |
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but we call him pud. |
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what was the dream about, kazu? i've frequently been having nights where i dream the whole night through. i wake up periodically and fall right back straight into the dream state. it is exhausting and feels not at all like sleeping. not all of the dreams are good or bad dreams. for example, first i'll dream about having raunchy sex. following that a nightmare that i can't find my daughter. then a dream about ice cream. random. |
maybe two or three. You were telling me about being pregnant and her birth. From what you were saying, it was 100 times worse than what you posted here, like IV treatments your entire first trimester for your hyperemesis and that you actually went into a coma for a while after your c-section. I think you were pregnant again in the dream because you were saying that you really hoped it wouldn't go that way again, but it would be worth it if it did. I've been having lots of dreams about birth stories I've read on-line ever since I miscarried on March 5th. I hate March 5th. |
march sucks. truly. my birthday is so fired. |
March really is a crappy month. Here's hoping April kicks ass for all. |
I have only to get big enough boxes, then it's away. |
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I think you may have been in one of the dreams. |
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So it goes. Patrick, how is Eva? |
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fuckity fuck fuck. so sorry you guys! but i'm happy you're trying. and trying is fun, right? the next one will stick, don't worry. |
im sorry to read that kazu, sem. im hoping you can find a shred of light in the dark. eva is.....well.....she's brilliant . she's semi-literate, can count to 100 and has several online pets. she is just a doll right now because shes at the age where she just wants to be helpful , she's ridiculously charming. im not sure if ive been back since i left the old print media publishing job but for over a year now i work at latw.org. we are a producer and publisher of radio plays....traditional radio theatre. its a pretty interesting gig, i get to meet interesting people. i deal with the published work after the show's been done and our weekly radio show on public radio airs. i work with libraries, wholesalers, itunes etc. last weeks was show week (we do 1 play a month for 10 months in a year). it was a 'docu drama' about the pentagon papers. not only was the chief of police for lapd, chief bratton there, but so was congresswoman jane harmon came, eli broad probably the biggest philanthropist in town, publisher of the latimes and many other local publishing and government big wigs. since we use a mix of actors from screen and stage i get to work with a variety of talent. in the last year henry winkler, neil patrick harris, justine bateman, richard kind, jobeth williams and many others, some more obscure than others. its a non profit organization so i dont make what im worth but its rewarding. and i get to bring the dog to the office, which is housed in the old courthouse in venice beach. i finally got some work published and up in two separate gallery events in jan and feb. here's one local blog summary. you can see one of the pieces that actually sold at the end of the thread. http://laist.com/2008/02/26/photo_essay_vel.php i suppose thats the jist of things as of late..... i have a lot of catching up. |
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How old is Eva now? 4? |
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on March 1st i helped a woman give birth and helped deliver her baby. the woman is a dear friend of mine whom i met years ago in hawaii. she is from texas, and only lived in hawaii for a couple years. we hooked up again when i moved to austin. she asked me to be her birth partner, and i happily agreed. she has no husband. she was divorced late last year, and her baby's father is not her ex-husband. she was pregnant with her second child. she had a midwife for both of her pregnancies, but the first pregnancy ended in an emergency c-section 6 weeks before her due date. she and the baby, her daughter who is now 4.5 years old, were both fine, healthy. when i got pregnant last year, my friend referred me to her midwife. senor and i visited with her, and, honestly, in the end, if it were not for the fact that having a baby in a hospital - as long as you're insured and we are - is far cheaper than having a midwife, there is a good chance i would have gone with the midwife. but i didn't. and you all know how that worked out for me. in any case, my friend desperately wanted this second pregnancy to go full term and to deliver her baby at her midwife's birthing center. the midwife's birthing center is actually like a guest house behind her home in central austin, separated by a greenhouse and a breezeway. the downstairs has futons and low-to-the-ground seating areas, a library, a mini kitchen, and a full luxurious bathroom with a gigantic jacuzzi tub. the upstairs is one big room separated in two parts by a curtain. on one side of the curtain there is a queen sized bed, windows all the way around, covered by ancient, intricate lace curtains. the other side of the curtain is not immediately visible, but contains large industrial sized tool boxes full of, what turned out to be, a wide variety of medical supplies. my friend called me around 10 p.m. on february 29th and said she was in labor and she was in the car with her mother who was driving her down to the birthing center. she said she starting noticing that she was having contractions at about 4 p.m. i met my friend at the birthing center at 11 p.m. when i arrived, both her mother and her daughter were there, the midwife, and the midwife's daughter, who is in nursing school and apprenticing with her mother. the midwife remembered meeting with me. i got the feeling she was slightly annoyed by my arrival, for what turned out to be a good reason, but i'll get to that later. there was some drama unfolding between my friend and her mother. her mother was bringing in some pretty heavy, negative energy, and my friend was trying to get her mother to go home without hurting her mother's feelings. the midwife was trying to intervene and soothe the situation. in the meantime, her daughter was wired and a little on the wild side. it was very late for a 4 year old to be up and awake, so instead of helping my friend get through her contractions, i spent my first hour there between helping my friend and handling her daughter, trying to get her daughter to settle down for the night. she was crying and i held her and read her a bedtime story and laid down on the futon with her until she finally went to sleep. by that time, my friend wanted to labor in the tub, and her contractions were getting pretty tough. so i got in the tub with her and massaged her back and hips through her contractions. she labored in the tub for about 90 minutes. during this time, the midwife went to bed for a few hours of sleep, while the midwife's daughter sat in the bathroom with us, and monitored the baby's heartbeat every 20 minutes or so. baby's heart sounded strong, so everything was right on course. the midwife woke up around 3 a.m. and suggested the my friend move upstairs to labor in the rocking chair or on the bed, for two reasons. while laboring in the tub makes it a little less painful for the mother, the lack of gravity slows dilation. the other reason was that she said that in almost all long, overnight labors she's attended, labor slows down between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m., during the body's normal deep resting period. she said that as soon as the sun comes up, the body naturally responds, and soon it's time to push. so we moved my friend upstairs, and i laid in bed with her and continued to rub her and talk her through her contractions, which were getting really hairy. up until this point, she wasn't making any grunting noises, just breathing heavily through her contractions. after she got out of the tub, however, she clearly was in a terrifying amount of pain. but she handled it so well. she grunted. she chanted. she prayed to god for strength. she hallucinated. and she called out to her widwife, who sat in the rocking chair, so calm, almost seeming bored. so accustomed to witnessing what is a great drama unfolding for my laboring friend. between contractions, my friend would ask, "Am I okay? Is everything okay?" and the midwife assured her that she was fine, that everything she was experiencing was normal and the way it is supposed to be. and it really felt that way. around 9:30 in the morning on the 1st, my friend hit transition and it was time to push. i suggested that i sit on the bed behind my friend and hold her while she squatted to push. it was at that moment that the midwife looked at me with a glint of respect. as my friend squatted and pushed, the midwife's hand never left the top of the baby's head. with each push she could feel the baby descend farther and farther down the birth canal. right before the baby was about to crown, me, the midwife, and her daughter hoisted my friend onto the bed. i grabbed the video camera. the midwife's daughter brought in a household kitchen pressure cooker filled with sterilized medical tools. the midwife broke the bag of waters, and in one more push, the baby's head was out. one more push, and out came the rest of the baby. it was a boy. the daughter placed the baby boy on his mother's chest, then suctioned out some fluid from the baby's nose and mouth. i watched as the placenta was born - baby on one end of the umbilical cord, the placenta on the other, still attached. my friend cut the cord herself as she held her baby, who only let out one little cry at his own birth. he was so quiet, i was afraid something was wrong, but he was fine. my friend ended up having a very small tear requiring two stitches. the midwife asked me to hold the lamp. a table lamp. so that she could see clearly through the blood in order to sew her up. she asked me if i could handle it, and i said i could. she said if you feel faint, let us know, because we really need that light. if someone had asked me before that day if i could watch someone's vagina being stitched up, i would have said no. hell no. me and blood do not get along. but it's true, that when you're in a situation where your help is urgently needed, there is something inside that kicks in. and you just do it, you just do the thing that needs to get done. when all of this was done, when my friend had come back down to earth from being far far away in labor land, and her son was breast feeding, and the midwife was cleaning everything up, she said: this is exactly how it's supposed to be. women helping women give birth. my friend was extraordinary. she worked so hard all night long, enduring what i know, what i remember, what i believe to be the most intense pain a woman could ever feel. and it was all perfect. i went home around 11 a.m. to get back to my family. when i walked in the door and saw my beautiful little daughter, i cried and held her so close to me. later that night, my friend called me and said that her midwife and the midwife's daughter gave me the highest compliment they could give anyone - they said i should be a doula. my friend said that typically they do not like most women's birth partners - that they tend to be useless and clumsy and in the way. needless to say, i was very proud and happy that i did a good job of helping my friend. and in retrospect, the amount of money that the midwife makes for doing what she does seems like pennies. and not that there isn't a time and a place for giving birth in a hospital where medical intervention saves the lives of babies and mothers, but i feel like a fool and a coward for not having the guts to trust the midwife, trust myself, trust nature first. especially now that i've seen it work first hand. |
spider eva will be 5 in two weeks. shes a big girl now! |
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hi patrick. sorry, i didn't mean to ignore you. glad you dropped by and to hear you're doing so well! yes, i have a daughter. she's four and a half months old, and her name is Charlotte. she's super mellow and super happy. she kicks ass. |
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rabies. He is pretty much attached to my hip (just ask Sem what happens if he tries to take him for a walk): http://www.flickr.com/photos/saucyintellectualtart/ |
more blood drawn and there was a pregnant woman whose water had just broke. Then I saw the woman who would have been my midwife in the lab. I hate this month. |
It never works. |
once before Ada was born. You body just has to get used to the whole pregnancy idea. |