At one point in the movie Julia Roberts decides she's been a chameleon far too long. She follows others' leads and never really figures out what it is that she likes. Until one day she decides to try all types of eggs. (I think her favorite ends up being Egg Benedict.)
Now, eggs have been quite appealing to me my whole pregnancy, and recently my favorite has been poached eggs my mom's way. (Not just boiling eggs in water. You start it like a fried egg, add milk, salt and pepper, cover and steam cook until your desired doneness. I love eating it with toast for dipping in the milk sauce. I never knew how boring traditional poached eggs were until I left home.)
Despite all of this, my post is not going to be about eggs. Rather, it's about--what else--but labor preparation. I feel like my searching for a good labor preparation fit is like Julia's egg tasting. You've got to try out a couple things to really find what fits you.
I consider myself a fairly low maintenance and easy to please person. Because of this, I often find myself conforming to other people's wishes (unless I feel strongly otherwise). Sometimes I later find myself wishing I'd done something differently, but most of the time I don't really think about it if all turns out reasonably well. I've really not questioned how things will unfold in my pregnancy and labor because I figured it would "just happen" how it would happen. I'd follow the Dr.'s lead. She's the professional, right?
I've found that isn't always the best thing to do. It's been fun (and educational) to hear other people's birth stories, what they've learned, and what they'd do differently.
My grandma told me her mama's birthing advice that stemmed from my grandma's birth. She was told to walk, so she walked until she was exhausted. She ended up having to go through birth flat on her back and exhausted (attended to by a horse physician without any sort of medicine) and was mad about it the rest of her life.
Her advice from that experience: Don't exhaust yourself before the birth. You will need all your strength to birth your baby. But, don't go to bed and stay there either. Rest as you need to, but staying on your feet does help gravity do it's job. When the contractions are closer together, stand with your feet apart, hold the back of a chair and gently push. It eases the pain to gently push.
My mom shared her story about one of my brother's births. Her water broke before going to the hospital, but because she hadn't had contractions, she went about finishing her "to do" list before heading to the hospital. He was early and she felt her house wasn't ready. He ended up having his umbilical cord wrapped around his neck. Though he survived birth and was a healthy boy, she felt the scare was a direct result from mopping and doing other chores without the fluid cushioning the baby. Her advice: Don't mop the floor (or do other similar chores) after your water has broken. Just go to the hospital.
I've been doing quite a bit of reading lately. I've read the labor chapters in What to Expect, the whole Nursing Companion's Guide, and I'm half way through Birthing From Within. My friend who lent me the last one today had her first two kids in the hospital with inductions and epidurals. Her last two kids were born naturally at home with the help of a midwife. (One weighing 11 lbs! and one weighing 9 lbs.) So it was interesting to hear the differences in her experiences.
She said one thing that seemed very "right" to me. She said with her 11 lb boy she hit a point where, had she been in the hospital, she would have requested an epidural. She told her midwife that she was getting scared. Her midwife said to acknowledge the pain, embrace it, and let the fear of it go. She said a prayer, and even though it still hurt, she was peaceful about it and was able to do just fine without the epidural. The other thing she said that helped her was envisioning a perimeter around her pain. It was her stomach/pelvic area in pain during contractions. Not her whole body the whole time.
Anyway, the Birthing From Within book has probably felt the most "right" of anything I've read or heard so far. There are some things in the book that are a little "out there" for me (it is very tribal in some aspects) , but the woman writes as though she's having a conversation with you. I love that. She's a midwife who's helped people in hospitals, birthing centers, and at home. She's all about the "everyone's experience and needs are different" approach, which I also like. I think when I'm done I'll post the points I like most about her approach and some of the conclusions I've reached about my hopes for my birth experience.
I've tried to ask around my ward to see if anyone had hypnobirthing material I could borrow, but no one had even heard of it! The library here doesn't have any books or media on it either. I guess we're behind in the times here!
7 comments:
Whatever you do, don't count on the doctor AT ALL!!! When it comes down to it, they are overworked and overtired. They come in for the last 5 minutes of your 2-24+ hour labor for safety reasons. I have heard a lot of nurses say that their expertise is indispensable in emergency situations, so you definitely need them there, but by that point you will be totally past the point of needing help for you pain.
I love your idea of asking around and reading a lot. that is how i like to do most things in life, especially parenting issues. read a lot, really educate yourself on the whole spectrum, and then go with what feels right to you.
my only other piece of advice is to not to go into it totally set on one way or another. my sister-in-law really wanted to go all natural her first time, but her labor was 56 hours (!!!!), and although her contractions weren't strong enough to be admitted to the hospital for the first 48 hours, they were painful and constant enough that she couldn't sleep that whole time. she was so exhausted that she got an epidural, and the birthing experience wasn't what she had wanted it to be.
sorry you still have a few months to stew about it.
So, when you are finally admitted to the hospital, are you mostly still left to labor alone (in your own way) with nurses checking on you every so often?
Since I am married to a doctor and I would have died without the help of a doctor (or so I think) I think that the whole midwife thing at home is NOT the way to go. I am down with the whole "natural" thing, but like I said earlier don't be disappointed if your birth experience isn't perfect.
From all of my great childbearing experience (j/k) it was pretty much Sam and I the whole time alone in our room while I labored in the hospital. That was with an OB, this time I am going to a group of midwives that deliver at the hospital and I hope to have a bit more interaction and support from them than I did before, I also plan on taking more control of the nurses that assist me since I had some that I still have negative feelings about. Someone told me you can just ask for a different nurse even if her shift isn't over. It seems mean, but it made such a negative impact on me, that I think I'm going to do it if I get any that I don't get along with. Good luck, I'm excited to hear the points from your book, I know you'll do great whatever you decide.
I think you're on the right track for making your own plan. I found that, perhaps due to my induction, there was pretty much always a nurse in the room, and not much time alone. My dr was receiving remote transmissions of my external monitoring at his office and he was there for the last five hours, mostly in my room except leaving to deliver another drs patient when he couldn't make it on time. Two of those hours were trying to get my from a 9.5 to a 10 and then three hours were pushing, and then he did my c-section when the baby was in distress and just plain stuck. Not all dr's are heartless and absentee. Ask how yours usually handles things.
The other thing is just the being OK with it going down any way that it might. Get OK with the idea of an epidural, get OK with the idea of natural, get OK with the idea of a C--it leaves a lot less room for dissappointment when it doesn't go exactly as planned. My dr said he hates the term "birth plan" and instead asked me to make a wish list that he and I could talk about in the last month or two of pregnancy.
I just decided the number one goal was a healthy baby and minimal damage to my personal self, so even though I had every crappy thing imaginable go wrong I still feel OK about how things went. Now I'm starting to get stressed about whether or not to try for a V-BAC. :) It just never ends!
I wasn't trying to bag on doctors. But after 4 babies, it seems like it is pretty much protocol that the doctors let the nurses take care of everything as long as it is a normal labor. the dr. might check in occasionally if they have time, but if it is the middle of the night, the nurses usually let the doctor sleep until right before delivery when they really need them. If it is the middle of the day, the doctor is usually seeing other patients unless they are part of a clinic, in which case there is usually a doctor on rotation at the hospital (who is delivering babies for all five doctors, so they are usually busy). I don't think it is bad or heartless, I think it is just the system.
also, I had my first with a midwife, and they were a LOT more attentive at doctor's appointments and were the type that were there during labor rubbing your back during contractions. they were also a lot more spportive of natural birth. BUT in retrospect I can see that they made a few mistakes that a doctor wouldn't have made, and I have heard a few horror stories about people who had emergencies that the midwives weren't quite trained to handle. I have always just gone with the doctor since then and been just fine with it, even if they only came for the last five minutes of labor and delivery. I should give them credit too for all of teh work before and after delivery that counts a lot too.
After reading some of the other comments again, I just thought I would let you know that I always felt like the nurses were always there if I needed them. They are very well trained and all of my OB nurse friends say that they could deliver a baby if they had to, but they have seen enough emergency situations that they definitely want the doctor there every time.
I appreciate all these comments. Amanda, I knew what you meant. I actually read the same thing in that book last night. The majority of Dr.'s aren't there with you except for the last little bit.
I think I'd prefer being left alone with Matt (with a nurse checking on me periodically) to labor for the most part. I think I'd rather do what seems right to my body rather than what seems right to someone else.
I haven't discussed a birth plan with my Dr. yet, but I could see why they wouldn't be over appreciative of it. While it can help give you a sense of control it seems a little inflexible and maybe a little...simplistic. But I do think it's a good idea to make wishes known. Like I'd prefer not to have an episiotomy unless the baby's in distress. And I'd rather not have an epidural unless I request it (without people prompting me).
Jess, that's good to know that if you are having a bad experience with a nurse that you can request someone else. There's not much worse than feeling stuck in a hard situation with someone less than compatible.
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