7 Mini Mantras You Can Share With Your Kids

As a new mother, I am getting in the habit of making sure my daughter gets empowering messages on a daily basis. Rather than only hearing she’s adorable (which, granted, she is), I want her to hear about the volume of her power, depth of her compassion, and the scope of her abilities. I recently wrote an article for Inner Fire on this topic: 7 Mini Mantras You Can Share With Your Kids. Although it’s presented as suggestions for others, I wrote it as a commitment to myself; these are the yogic messages I want my daughter to grow up on.

Some of these messages I emulate naturally: from the day she was born my daughter has struck me with her sense of determination and purposefulness. To convey other messages, though, I have to overcome my own quirks and reservations. One of the hardest messages for me to commit to when the baby topples over or gets scared is:

5. “It’s okay to have feelings”: Accepting loss and change is not easy. It is normal to feel grief, sadness, frustration, and anger. Resisting these feelings or pretending they’re not there only creates more suffering. Being okay with unpleasant feelings (santosa) and expressing them in healthy ways won’t make them go away immediately, but it will allow you to move through them with grace.

When she falls or gets startled, my automatic reaction is to swoop in to hug her, kiss her, cuddle her, distract her from what happened, and prevent her from crying. I like to think that my daughter is getting 24/7 on-call private yoga instruction from me, but this is the exact opposite of how I encourage my yoga students to face challenges. When I’m being more mindful with my daughter, I put a hand on her to let her know I’m there, and say, “How was that, little one?” Often, once she gets past the shock, she goes back to what she was doing as if nothing happened. Sometimes she cries, and then I hold her close if she reaches for me and reassure her, “It’s okay to cry. It’s okay to process what happened.” I think she picks up on it. I notice that from the safety and security of my arms, she immediately looks back to the location of the fall or to the stranger who surprised her and moves through the negative emotion so she can go back to exploring confidently.

Read the rest of the article over at Inner Fire>> 

Mindful Pregnancy Table of Contents

This blog series is not meant to express an opinion about how anyone else should navigate pregnancy, childbirth, or parenting; this is simply the story of how one urban yogi in America moved through her own normal, relatively uncomplicated first pregnancy and childbirth. Although my posts end on positive notes, many parts of the process were challenging for me, and writing this blog helped me stay sane. My hope is that by being authentic about my experience I will empower other mamas to do the same. Because I shared what I was going through, friends from near and far reached out to support me, which made the difficult moments manageable and the joyful moments ecstatic. I thought it would be the birthing process that was empowering, but it was the solidarity from other women that gave me the fortitude to rise fully and completely to the challenge of motherhood. My hope for other mamas-to-be is that you will acknowledge your experience as it is (whether whether that’s blissful, horrible, or somewhere in between), will be unashamed to express that, and will be able to attain the resources you need to navigate your path.

I blogged my whole first trimester after-the-fact (alternating with present day posts), which makes it a little hard to navigate my Mindful Pregnancy posts in order. Here is an ordered week-by-week list of all my posts:

2 – Conception
3 – Pre-Conception Nutrition
4 – First Symptoms of Pregnancy

Bound Side Angle

4 Weeks Pregnant.


5 – Peeing on a Stick
6 – Secrets
7 – Nausea
8 – Surrendering Control (Or Not)
9 – New Joys
10 – Sharing the Joy (And Splitting My Pants)
11 – Hypermobility and Pregnancy
12 – Head Cold with a Side of Morning Sickness

12 Weeks Pregnant

12 Weeks Pregnant.

13 – Ascending From the Haze of the First Trimester
14 – So, What Type of Birth Are You Having?
15 – Beginning to Plan for Birth
16 – So When Do I Get That Baby Bump?
17 – Big Feelings
18 – Pregnancy Firsts

18 Weeks

18 Weeks Pregnant.

19 – It’s a Girl!
20 – Coping with Insomnia
21 – Beyond-The-Basics Nutrition
22- Pregnancy Book Reviews

22 Weeks Bump

22 Weeks Pregnant.

23 – To Work or Not To Work?
24 – Horizontal Growth Spurt
25 – Tis the Season to Dress to the Nines
26 – Baby Movements
27 – Home for Christmas
28 – 13 Misconceptions I Had About Babies

28 Weeks Pregnant

28 Weeks Pregnant.

29 – Nursery Mania
30 – Things I Love About My (Early) Third Trimester
31 – Healing an Eroded Body Image
32 – Birth Prep Class
33 – Dessert Decoration, Dog Deodorizing, and Dutailier
34 – Commitments to my Daughter
35 – “Lightening,” An Early Sign of Labor

35 Weeks Pregnant

35 Weeks Pregnant.

36 – Thoughts About Labor
37 – An Epileptic Mama’s Postpartum Plan
38 – Selfie Photoshoot, Stuck Rings, and Staycation

prenatal-belly-gaze

38 Weeks Pregnant.

39 – Encouraging Labor Naturally
40 – Equinox Firestorm’s Birth Story
40+ – Mindful Pregnancy Epilogue: The Fourth Trimester

Mindful Pregnancy Epilogue: The Fourth Trimester

Equinox Firestorm*

The usual narrative is usually that newborns are helpless. Growing up, I was repeatedly instructed, “Make sure to support her head!” whenever I was trusted to hold a baby. For the first three months they’re still supposed to essentially be fetuses; many people call them blobs. This was not my experience with Equinox Firestorm.

I don’t get ethereal often, so grant me this one paragraph. I’ve always found it a little woo woo when people say they’re “old souls,” but I’m going to say it about Equinox anyway: when she was born there was a wisdom, purposefulness, and fearlessness about her. As I’ve watched her develop from that newborn sage into a cute, pudgy three-month-old baby, it’s seemed as if she had to slowly forget her innate understanding of her place in the universe in order to learn how to smile, babble, and bat at her hanging toys. It’s like she’s doing the eight limbs of yoga backwards: letting go of samadhi (transcendence) so she can learn how to do asana (poses). Before she was born, I bought her a copy of, The Little Soul and The Sun, and this heartwarming children’s parable has come to my mind many times over the last twelve weeks. My hope for Equinox is that one day she will remember who she is; she is an ember with the potential to one day ignite a Firestorm.

During pregnancy, when the baby kicked strangers told me she would be a soccer player, but friends suspected she was actually doing rock-n-roll vinyasa in my belly. Turns out my friends were right: from our first days home she was already doing a perfect locust pose on Daddy’s tummy as he reclined back on the couch, and now she is weirdly comfortable resting in sphinx pose for several minutes at a time. I tried to lovingly support Equinox’s head when she was born, but she wouldn’t have any of it. Although her movements were uncoordinated at first, she’s always had control her head, and resists restraint. From day one, if she was hungry she would repeatedly thrust her gaping mouth against the chest of whomever was holding her making primal “gnar” sounds until she was lined up with a source of milk. All we could do was try to spot her. If I were to get a stick figure family for my Subaru, I’d get a mommy, a daddy, and a little tiny velociraptor.

Baby Locust

Equinox, my little yogini, doing locust pose at two weeks.

Motherly Love

The big feelings of pregnancy have nothing on the big feelings of the postpartum period. I expected to feel warm, fuzzy motherly love the moment my little one was placed on my chest. But, as I mentioned in Equinox’s birth story, that moment was completely overwhelming for me. I don’t think I began to feel a soft, glowy, buttery type of love until six weeks when she started smiling at me; before that I felt an uncomfortable psycho-stalker infatuation type of love. One of the first of many sleeping arrangements Richard and I tried was to take two-hour shifts with the baby. I didn’t sleep during my shifts even though the baby did; I just stared at her, obsessively counting her breaths. Finally I bought a meticulously-researched mesh-walled co-sleeper that sat on the center of the bed, and was finally able to rest lying face-to-face with her.

To keep my epilepsy at bay, in Equinox’s fourth week, Richard began taking the her to the guest room all night long with a bottle of expressed milk on hand so I could get a solid seven hours of sleep. However, I had been feeding the baby on demand for a several weeks and our bodies were so in sync that, despite wearing earplugs and being on the opposite side of the house, I’d wake up at the same time as she did, literally (my breasts were engorged with milk) aching to be near her. Richard made me promise to stay in my bedroom and get some much-needed sleep. I was so drawn to the baby, that most nights it took every calming pranayama and yoga nidra practice I know to keep me in bed. Some nights it took half a tissue box worth of tears. And some nights none of that was enough: before the baby woke up, I’d tiptoe into the guestroom without waking Richard just to check on Equinox. If I was gazing at her with heart-melting motherly love this would have been sweet, but it wasn’t that; I was staring at her with compulsive, overly-obsessed mama bear love.

Overly-Obsessed Mama

Overly-Obsessed Mama

The weirdest thing that happened in that first month was that every time I woke up, I would think I was holding her nestled in my arms. My visual cortex would very clearly morph a fold in the quilt in my peripheral vision into the image of her face. If I didn’t know from studying Cognitive Science that peripheral vision is almost completely fabricated by the brain, I would have thought I was going nuts (most of the rest of the time she was in my arms, so my brain made a reasonable guess). For weeks, I lived out the first verse of You Are My Sunshine every time I woke up.

Thankfully, as the post-pregnancy hormones dissipated and I settled into motherhood the craziness subsided and was replaced by the type of love they portray in Similac commercials. Her smiles bring me endless joy, and I will do the most ridiculous goofball things to get a laugh out of her (she just laughed for the first time this week *melt*).

Mommy Tummy

I thought I would be at least a little upset about my mommy tummy, but I wasn’t. I had realistic expectations, so when I still looked six months pregnant after giving birth it didn’t phase me. For the first couple days postpartum, my belly felt weirdly empty and I felt bizarre shifts as my internal organs began returning to their rightful places. When I laughed, my belly jiggled like one of those jell-o cakes a neighbor would have brought to my door had I given birth in the fifties; the appearance and sensation made me want to laugh harder, but I had to resist for the sake of my stitches down below.

With the industry built around losing baby weight, I thought it would be much harder than it actually was. I gained thirty-seven pounds during pregnancy, which is slightly above the “ideal” range. A big chunk of that was just water, which I sweated, bled, peed, cried, and lactated out quickly. Without doing any exercise, within a few weeks of giving birth, I hovered at eight pounds above my pre-pregnancy weight (which I probably needed for breastfeeding), and by three months I was back down around my pre-pregnancy weight. I don’t have a celebrity-grade, airbrushed flat stomach or anything (I never have), but I really don’t feel like I have much extra fat to lose.

That said, my abdominal muscles became weak and overstretched during pregnancy, so I started going to mommy and baby Pilates when Equinox was six weeks old. Also, my skin is a little worse for wear: I’m now sporting my fair share of stretch marks and the fading remnants of a linea nigra. During adolescence, I got stretch marks on my hips, thighs, and calves, so these new ones are just another addition to the collection, and I know from experience that they will fade. I think now I actually might be more likely to wear a bikini than I was before to make a body-positive statement that I shouldn’t have to hide my normal, healthy mommy tummy.

Postpartum Recovery

(This section may be TMI for some readers. Consider yourself warned, and skip it if you’d rather not know).

I’d always heard Cesarean births were tough to recover from, but I was not prepared for how long and frustrating the recovery from a vaginal birth would be. I think women don’t talk about this because chatting about the recovery process is unglamorous and low-priority; by the time we’re done telling postpartum guests about our unique birth story and about how our precious baby is doing it’s time for them to go home. I had no clue what I was in for.

Between the tear, catheter (I was too swollen to urinate after childbirth, and I needed another dose of fentanyl to stop sobbing, “No, please just let me try to pee on my own one more time! I can do it!” long enough for them to painfully insert a catheter), and painful varicosities (a common aftereffect of pushing), my “bottom,” as the nurses called it, was a disaster. My expectation was that it would kind of hurt to sit down for a couple days after birth, I’d bleed for a week or two, and then I’d feel all better. No. It took six weeks for the lochia (bleeding) to stop and to just be able to imagine that one day I might feel normal again down there. For the first day or two, my crotch was so sore that just getting up out of bed took several excruciating minutes and instead of walking around our hospital room, I shuffled around like an ancient mummy.

Sitting was surprisingly painful for the next two or three weeks, which made breastfeeding uncomfortable. Frustratingly, I couldn’t go from sitting to standing or vice versa while holding the baby, which made me feel helpless and dependent on others (although, why shouldn’t I have been? American culture has weirdly unrealistic expectations of new moms). What used to take two minutes in the bathroom took ten, and involved heavy-duty maxi pads, anesthetic spray, and a squeezable water bottle the hospital gave me to use a poor man’s bidet. They tell us that it’s safe for to have sex after six weeks, but for the record, “safe” doesn’t necessitate that one will be able to fathom attempting it so soon after pushing a human out of one’s body nor that it will feel good.

But, as we tell our postpartum guests if we do mention our discomfort at all, it was all worth it for my beautiful baby. And, as far as newborns go, I really do feel like I won the baby lottery. That’s not to say it’s been easy—we have all the typical newborn challenges (sometimes I can’t fathom baby care is just a normal, natural, no-big-deal thing humans have been doing since the dawn of our species), but that’s the thing: they’re typical. She’s the baby they write the books about. Harvey Karp’s Five S’s worked on her in the early weeks, she went through all the weird skin phases Baby 411 warned me about, and she hit her Wonder Weeks (i.e. the most non-wonderful weeks you can imagine) right on cue. She even speaks the Dunston Baby Language.

Postpartum Bliss

I’ve spoken with two camps of people: those who say, “Stay in the hospital for as long as they’ll let you and enjoy the ’round-the-clock care and free meals,” and those who say, “Get the hell out of that God-awful place as quickly as you can!” It turns out Richard and I fall into the latter camp. Although the midwives were wonderful and the lactation support I got was amazing, we couldn’t wait to escape being disrupted at least every two hours ’round the clock (especially since they inexplicably chose midnight as the ideal time to whisk the baby off to be weighed and measured); the cramped room alive with annoying indicator lights; and the suspiciously geometric food (although, admittedly Stoeffer’s and DiGiorno were staples in our diet for many weeks after the baby was born). Also, to protect their liability, the hospital staff was obligated to overreact to my epilepsy; At 3 a.m., one nurse took it upon herself to coerce me into interventions that I’d previously declined when I was too groggy to stand my ground. However, our first few days home were total bliss.

Throughout pregnancy I’d had debilitating hypermobility issues, but childbirth turned out to be the best chiropractic adjustment ever. I’d worked hard to build the strength to carry thirty-seven extra pounds on my hips, so my pelvic stability was better than ever when I instantly dropped a significant amount of that weight. During pregnancy, I was sure we’d bought a defective mattress for our new bed, but my first night home from the hospital I laid down sans the pile of pillows I’d needed to support my pregnant body, and it felt like I was sleeping on a wonderful, billowy cloud.

When I read stories about women who just loved being pregnant while I was waiting for Equinox, I rolled my eyes so hard because it wasn’t like that at all for me. This part of the story is going to be like that for parents with anything but the easiest of babies. If you had issues with breastfeeding or a sensitive baby (links to blogs by friends who dealt with these experiences), you may want to skip the rest of this section.

I have the type of good problems that they tell you not to confess to other parents: My breast milk fountains out so quickly and easily that it’s embarrassing to breastfeed in public: Equinox pulls off coughing loudly as milk jets uncontrollably all over her face (I did not know this was even possible). Needless to say, my clothes, sheets, furniture, and floors are all spattered with milk and my freezer is overflowing with full medela storage bags. I used to worry Equinox slept for too long of stretches, and I woke her up periodically to eat. I also used to think she was dangerously subdued (she nearly never cries inconsolably); I’ve accepted that she is just a good-natured, soothable baby.

A friend attributed her chill baby to having a chill pregnancy, and I took that to heart during my own pregnancy. So—sample size two—it’s worth taking those warm chamomile-lavender epsom salt baths if you are privileged enough to have the time and means.

My first few days at home with the baby were so joyful it was surreal. We could have been on the cover of a Hallmark card: we would take family naps with the baby in a cosleeper in the middle of the bed, and Richard and I spooning it on either side, our ankles intertwined with each other’s as if our bodies were forming a heart around the baby.

In the first week of breastfeeding, the hormones sent me into a state of euphoria. The day my milk came in, I felt like I was back on the fentanyl. Nowadays, I’ll catch up on the world news, apply filters to the daily baby photo I send to my mom, or even make a phone call while breastfeeding, but in those first couple weeks all of that just felt wrong. All I wanted to do was gaze down lovingly at the baby and marvel, Wow, she’s the most beautiful baby in the whole wide world.

Granted, the extreme highs were complemented by heavy lows. From about halfway through my first week to halfway through my third week postpartum, my “baby blues” (experienced by 70-80% of new moms) were like clockwork: I’d get inexplicably sad from about seven to nine in the evening, and cry over nothing, which was hard on both Richard and me, especially before we recognized what it was, that it was okay, and that it was temporary.

Postpartum Doula

A huge reason the first days went so smoothly was because we hired, Melitta Hoder, a postpartum doula. I cannot recommend her—and postpartum doulas in general—enough; she worked with me for nearly fifty hours over the first six weeks, and it cost less than what I paid my birth doula. She stopped by the hospital while we were there to make sure breastfeeding was going well, came over on our first night home to get us settled, and helped us get out the door with a packed diaper bag for our first pediatrician appointment (which neither Richard nor I would have even thought to bring at all). She taught me how to tie a Moby wrap, use my breast pump, and introduce a bottle without causing nipple confusion. She told me when to expect growth spurts so the all-night feeding frenzies didn’t come as a shock. When I worried about my milk supply (which I did constantly), she brought a scale to weigh Equinox before and after breastfeeding to find out exactly how much milk she was getting.

New parenthood is an incredibly sensitive, challenging, emotional time, and postpartum doulas are trained (and in Melitta’s case, experienced) in supporting this transition. My mom and sister graciously calmed the baby when she was fussy while they were in town during Equinox’s third week (not to mention that they concocted homemade granola bars and cleaned my toilets), but most visitors will thrust a baby back into his or her parents’ arms in horror the moment he or she begins to cry. Melitta let me feed the baby and have some precious bonding time with her while she was contented, then took her when she needed to be burped, soothed, or changed and urged me to go take a nap. When I woke up, the dishes had been washed, the laundry had been done, and there was a plate of apples, almond butter, boiled eggs, oatmeal cookies and cheese for me to snack on next to my breastfeeding spot. I began watching Melitta carefully to learn how she managed to care for the baby and do all of that at the same time.

Melitta was compassionate and supportive of me being where I was in my process of learning how to be a parent, but she gently and constantly lead me toward the next step. For example, while I ate lunch she would talk to the Equinox, saying, “I’m going to hold you for a bit so Mommy can eat lunch. One day, Mommy will learn to breastfeed with one hand, and you’ll both be able to eat at the same time!” I hadn’t been around enough breastfeeding mothers to know this was the next step.

Then Things Got Hard…

One of the things Melitta repeatedly warned me about was that babies get progressively fussier until six to eight weeks, and then they plateau (and maybe get better). It took at least eight weeks. Because I have what I would still consider to be an easy baby, I can say with some authority that when parents of older children tell you, “Cherish this time, you’re going to miss it,” they either think your newborn baby is a joyful, curious three-month-old who smiles and plays or they completely repressed the newborn stage. Once the initial bliss and novelty wore off for us, shit got real.

Although Equinox slept well (a couple four-hour stretches at night), we didn’t. When she was a newborn she had a repertoire of sleep sounds from humming to croaking, which made it nearly impossible to sleep in the same room as her. Then, when she had the odd segment of quiet sleep I compulsively checked her to make sure she hadn’t suffocated. Richard was less paranoid, but he started developing nervous tics from listening to the obnoxiously loud white noise the baby needed to sleep all night long. Every few nights we changed sleeping arrangements, trying to find a configuration in which everyone could sleep. There wasn’t one.

When Equinox was about a month old, she went through a phase in which she would only sleep while we were walking her around in the baby carrier. I don’t know what we would have done without Melitta coming by with knowledge and energy (which we definitely lacked after a few days of this) to teach us how to get her to nap in our Rock N’ Play (a rocking bassinet).

When Richard was heading back to work and Equinox was an alert and awake one-month-old (meaning less nap time for me when sleep deprivation is my main seizure trigger), I listened to some early signals from my body and begrudgingly went on epilepsy medication. I cried the last time I breastfed the baby without traces of the drugs in my milk (even though my doctors and lactation consultant say there’s no evidence that what I’m taking is hazardous to her). I was meticulous about prenatal nutrition, and choose to believe that made her resilient enough to handle a little bit of medicine. Going on medication was heart-wrenching at the time, but it’s improved the quality of my life and relationship with the baby so much that I have let go of much of the guilt I initially felt. Before I was on the medication, I needed the baby to sleep at certain times so I could catch up on my own sleep, and looking back over the commitments I made to my daughter reminded that this was not who I wanted to be as a mother. Months ago, I wrote:

I hold onto no disillusion that I possess you, control you, or am entitled to anything from you.

It feels good to not need anything from my little one.

I still exclusively breastfeed Equinox, and hope to continue breastfeeding her for as long as there are proven benefits. Breast milk advocates will tell you that it is a beautiful, amazing bonding experience with the baby—and it is. It is also one of the most isolating things I’ve ever done. Once the initial novelty and gaga hormones wore off, I realized I was spending a third of my day in a dimly-lit nursery with no other adults to talk to, my only company a tiny human leaching nutrients out of my body. When I started breastfeeding in public, many people avoided looking at me. I was eager to introduce bottle feeding so Richard could give me a break, but for every bottle I have to go back to my lonely glider chair and have a robot leach nutrients from my body (side note: I laughed out loud the first time I used my breast pump. It is so weird).

I am thankful I found the New Moms’ Support Group at Natural Resources in San Francisco around five weeks postpartum. Nursing alongside other mamas brought a social element and a sense of solidarity to the experience. Having a supportive community where I could vent without judgement and be reassured that it would get easier as the baby developed was relieving and helped me recharge. (Sure enough, breastfeeding sessions are now a third as long as they used to be).

A friend of mine had a baby after she’d been with her partner for ten years, and she reported that it hadn’t shaken their relationship because after all those years together they were totally in sync. Richard and I have been together for seven years, and I thought we’d be the same. Nope. Babies are warm, soft, squishy wedges that drive themselves between partners, and we had some pretty brutal fights in the first six weeks. Long before I got pregnant I read Misadventures of a Parenting Yogi by Brian Leaf, and a quote from him came back to me many times in the early days:

I don’t think couples with small children should be allowed to divorce. With no time to connect, lacking sleep, and always feeling overwhelmed parents of very small children, it seems to me, are not of sound mind to make such a life-changing decision.

Things never got that bad, but reflecting on this quote helped me keep the experience we had in perspective. As time went on, the intensity of our arguments dropped off as we relearned how to communicate and were able to spend more alone time together as Equinox’s sleep patterns became more predictable.

…Then Things Got So Much Better

For the first eight weeks I was in survival mode, and I had to really try to be present and cherish the joyful moments. At three months now, we’ve hit a sweet spot in which Equinox constantly draws me into presence, so many moments are unforgettable, and time is starting to move too quickly. Although she has her occasional regressions that have me up every hour all night, her sleep is becoming more manageable and predictable. Every morning when she opens her eyes and sees my face, she breaks into big gummy smile. When I play with her she discovers exciting new skills she integrated overnight. Sometimes she’s energetic and will let out guttural laugh when the dog licks her face. Sometimes she’s mellow and wants nothing more than to cuddle up with me all afternoon, nursing and sleeping.

My biggest challenge lately is giving her the space to explore her independence. For example, she is now learning to soothe herself to sleep, and it takes all my effort to resist swooping in at the first sign of fussiness. I thought empowering her would be my forte, but it is surprisingly hard for me. Lately I’ve found myself drawing strength from one of the commitments I made to her before she was born:

I give you enough structure for you to develop security and trust, and enough freedom to explore, express your creativity, and make your own mistakes. I allow this balance to shift as you grow and develop.

It was worth it to write these commitments down before I moved into the alternate dimension of motherhood.

Equinox is not a newborn any more, and it’s exciting, and overwhelming, and amazing, and terrifying all at the same time. Every day requires me to take another step farther outside my comfort zone, and every day I manage to meet that challenge. All the techniques I learned for childbirth (cleansing breaths, letting go of control, trusting my instincts, integrating with my partner, etc.) have turned out to apply even more to parenthood than it did to the birthing process. I’ve only practiced yoga in a studio once since I gave birth, but somehow I don’t feel like I’m missing out. I’m still practicing the eight limbs of yoga on a daily (or hourly, or minutely) basis but in a different form. If yoga class is the “practice,” then motherhood is the real thing.

13 Weeks

Equinox at thirteen weeks with Foxy. #thatdimple

*Name changed.

40 Weeks Pregnant: Equinox Firestorm*’s Birth Story

*Name changed to make this less Google-able by my daughter’s future classmates. We used the name Equinox Namaste-Firestorm in the subject line of our birth announcement to get a laugh out of our friends and family (although, I’m sure at least someone was disappointed. If hadn’t been for Richard’s vetos she might’ve gotten a name like that from me!).

March 23 – March 27: 40 Weeks 0 Days – 40 Weeks 4 Days.

Forewarning: Those of you who’ve been following along with my pregnancy, may be looking forward to reading a story about a natural, hypnotic childbirth. If you’re limiting your exposure to only stories about that type of birth, this is not the one for you to read. This is not a story about a woman who remained calm, relaxed, graceful, or even positive during childbirth. That said, it’s not a horror story either; it was a normal birth and nothing went terribly awry. I look back on the experience with no regrets, and–now–feel incredibly positive and grateful now about how it went. If you’re okay with that type of story, please read on.

Last days of pregnancy

I was feeling antsy to get labor started in week thirty-nine, so you can imagine I was beside myself by week forty. I kept busy alternating swimming in the sunshine on one day (and, as a Canadian, being amazed that an outdoor pool was open in March) and practicing prenatal yoga the next. On my guess date (Monday) I treated myself to a comically large almond bubble tea smoothie (the place I went was automatically upgrading every order to their 32oz size that day. Nobody needs that much bubble tea! I drank it all anyway). That afternoon I had a prenatal massage with acupressure from Carole Moore, who has a track record for kickstarting labor. Sure enough, that night I awoke several times to sporadic contractions, but they were gone by the next morning. After swimming on Wednesday, I indulged in another bucket of bubble tea (the promotion was still on) and then got a pedicure. The women at the nail salon were impressed that I was out-and-about past my due date (little did any of us know I’d go into labor that very night). I knew that our baby’s middle name was probably going to be Firestorm, so when I saw the ostentatious orange and yellow glitter polish, I couldn’t resist. During my labor, several of the hospital staff commented on my glitzy pedicure, reminding me that everything I was going through was so we could meet our little Firestorm.

40 Weeks Pregnant

Wavering on my prenatal nutrition at 40 weeks.

Labor At Home

Typical labor is an ascent: contractions begin mild, short (thirty to forty seconds long), and widely-spaced (five to twenty minutes apart), and gradually progress to intense, longer (sixty to ninety seconds long), back-to-back (two to three minutes from the start of one to the start of the next). My labor was more of a relentless cross-country trek in which I didn’t know if the mounting intensity was due to progress or fatigue. I didn’t get to make cupcakes or do any watercolor painting because I either skipped typical early labor or slept through it. I woke up to regular contractions around 4:15 a.m. on Thursday, March 26th. I tried to sleep, but they were intense enough that I had to focus and use breathing techniques to relax, and there wasn’t enough time in between them to doze off.

I knew Richard would be able to help me most during labor if he got as much sleep as possible, so I wanted to delay waking him up until there was actually something he could do to support me. By 5:30 a.m., the sensation was intense enough that I was already gently shaking him awake to let him know that labor had definitely started, and it was coming on strong. He came out to the living room with me and started timing my contractions. We’d discussed that he wouldn’t tell me any numbers during the experience to keep me out of my neocortex, but later he told me they were thirty seconds long and about a minute-and-a-half apart (i.e. I got a minute off between contractions). In fact, that was the timing of my contractions for the next 26 hours of so.

We labored at home until around 7 p.m., and out of this fourteen-hour period, I only have about three hours of specific memories. There was so much repetition that, even in the moment, one contraction/rest cycle blurred into another. We began in the living room, where I alternated between two positions

  1. Kneeling in front of the couch so I could lean forward and rest my body weight on the cushion between surges.
  2. Side lying on the couch so I could look out the window.

When Richard first opened the curtains, I marveled at the deep orange hue of the sunrise shining against back fence, and remarked, “Just like Firestorm.” Richard wrote down some of his thoughts about the birth, and shared this memory:

One thing we were both able to enjoy, between contractions anyways, was the beauty of the moment. It was a gorgeous sunny day. We opened the drapes and the sun was coming up, and it was casting warm sunlight onto our back fence and overgrown green garden, which was bright and wet from the fog and dew. It was a beautiful day to be born. At one point, we were provided a brief respite from the intensity and duration and able to fall asleep on each other on the couch next to the beautiful scene outside… It was, in a sense, a very intimate and uniting experience for me. I was there for her when she really needed me, providing support for her in whatever way she needed it, whether it was food, massage, reassuring words, preparing the bath, or simply giving her a sip of water. I’m really happy and proud I was there for her.

I thought about making myself a soundtrack for labor ahead of time but I decided it would be a waste of time. I had no idea what I’d want to hear during labor. That intuition was spot on. After settling in the living room, I asked Richard to play an album I hadn’t thought about in years: Camaradas by Three Altos, which features amazing three-part harmonies. Richard and I learned the song “O Mama Bakudala” at a yoga retreat we did together shortly before getting engaged, and we still sing it together sometimes. “Camarada” I sang to Richard at our wedding. We listened to that album twice through, and then switched to Rachel Yellin’s Ultra Depth Relaxation and Birth Rehearsal tracks. These hypnosis tracks helped me soften. It felt like my contractions often started or ended in sync with Rachel’s cues. After we changed locations, we never ended up putting Rachel’s tracks back on.

Our doula, Britt Fohrman, was giving Richard advice over the phone, and suggested we try the shower. I’d been avoiding it because I didn’t want to be standing up, but Richard helped me set up by kneeling on towels so I could rest my forearms on the side of the tub. During contractions, he would hold my head between his arm and his waist, which felt so supportive and comforting. The soothing sensation of water cascading down my back made the contractions feel easier. The warmer the water, the better it felt. The downside of that (or, the upside for California’s drought) was I could only stay in the shower for so long before overheating.

After my first shower, we migrated to the bedroom, instead of back to the couch, where I spent some time side-lying with my Snoogle pillow. When I was in the bedroom, I felt the most supported and able to rest. Richard remarked later that as labor progressed, I spent more and more time in the bedroom, the most cave-like room in the house. My animal instincts must have been taking over.

We spent the day cycling through the living room, shower, and bedroom. Every time we changed positions, Richard would have to cart along plain water and coconut water, both fitted with bendy straws; a plate of sliced boiled eggs, mango pieces, and cheese; and a four-foot-tall oscillating fan. Between every contraction he would give me a bite of food and a sip of water. Normally, I’m not a fan of coconut water, but I thought my body might crave nutrition and hydration enough during labor to enjoy it (just like I savor Gatorade on a long run, even though it’s normally unpalatable). Nope, it was still awful. Richard made me have a sip every other contraction anyway.

By the afternoon, my experience had intensified. Richard shared this memory:

Barbie was vocalizing a lot, so we started saying lots of positive affirming things instead of just moaning, groaning or screaming. She had sent me and our doulas a list of positive affirming things that resonated with her the week before, so I was able to integrate those, some of the things from [our childbirth preparation class], and the doula’s advice into useful things to say during exhales. “Yessssss”, “I cannnnnnnnn”, and “Let gooooooo” were some of the best. “Let go of the sensation, let go of your body, let go of the baby, they know just what to do” was another good one. Every now and then I could work in a reference to meeting the baby, and it would get a small smile or a relaxed face.

I could really see the difference in her with and without this support. Without it, she would forget her breath, was more likely to just yell out, and was more visibly exhausted at the end. With it, she maintained a smooth rhythm and recovered faster, which mattered a lot with only 30 to 60 seconds between waves to recover.

During pregnancy I wondered which would be more intense: labor or running a marathon. I wish my current-self could go back and laugh in my past-self’s face for thinking the two would be comparable. Although I was in extreme discomfort when I ran the marathon that I barely trained for in shoes that were half a size too small, I still painstakingly ran the whole thing. During contractions, I couldn’t even walk let alone stand unsupported. Before experiencing it, I simply did not have the framework to imagine what the intensity of labor would be like. Now, looking back, I don’t even think I have the framework to fully remember what it was like. To everyone who warned me of exactly these things: I apologize for never genuinely believing you.

By three o’clock, my contractions started to feeling unmanageable. The coping techniques I’d been using were either not enough, or maybe I’d simply burnt out on them. I also have a vague recollection of being at just the right (or wrong, in this case) angle to see the clock on the oven, and how it did not seem to be progressing at all. I told Richard it was time to call the doula.

Britt arrived around 4pm, and we were in the bedroom. Richard shared this:

Britt was able to speak a lot better to Barbie than I was and got her into more powerful trance-like states, and switched her to some different poses that might help. Meanwhile, I was able to focus on physical touch and stroked her body in various ways. Things steadily got more intense over the next several hours. At the start, with Britt’s help, Barbie was able to really focus inward and became very still as she dealt with the surges.

I don’t remember much of what Britt said or did. I do remember ascending out of those trance-like states though. It felt like I’d fallen asleep, and I had no idea if 10 seconds or an hour had elapsed. There was a period where labor felt manageable again.

At some point I started shaking. It was like intense shivering, but I wasn’t cold. Britt told me that the shaking was the energy of birth, and to let it happen rather than resisting it. She kept telling me that this meant things were moving in the right direction, and internally I asked, “But when? How much longer?” I never voiced these questions, because I knew that Britt couldn’t answer them. Not even a midwife or a doctor could’ve. Another question I screamed internally when my experience became more intense was, “Why?!” I didn’t vocalize this because I already knew the answer was in who, what, and how: Equinox Firestorm being born vaginally.

We tried a couple new positions: on the toilet, kneeling in the shower with chest and arms on an exercise ball, standing bent over in front of the bathroom sink with my forehead resting against my hands on the counter. In the last position, I could see my sparkly toe nails and thought about meeting our daughter. Against the counter, I mimicked something I’d practiced in Britt’s prenatal yoga class: I squatted up and down during contractions, and chanted, “Down baby,” on my exhales. This foreshadowed the position in which I would push my baby out.

Firestorm Toes

Glitzy Firestorm toes.

In the shower, Britt suggested I sit on the exercise ball, but I couldn’t handle the increased intensity of doing so. By the time I asked her to come I was already on the downslope to exhaustion. Perhaps earlier in labor I could have handled more intense positions that may have spurred labor to progress faster. Since the birth I’ve found myself wondering maybe if I’d asked Britt to come sooner, or maybe if we’d put Rachel Yellin’s tracks back on, or maybe if something else I would’ve been able to labor naturally for longer (or even have a completely unmedicated birth). But it’s not really worth musing over. As Rachel Yellin said repeatedly in our birth prep class, “Birth is mystery.” Maybe if I’d labored naturally for longer I wouldn’t have had the energy to push my baby out. It’s impossible to know. Also, my next birth will progress in its own unique way and may be nothing like this one. The one thing I’ll do differently next time is write down a clear list of birth techniques that resonated with me because I didn’t get a long enough rest during between contractions to think about trying anything different than what I was doing, let alone ask for help or support in doing so.

After a couple hours, we weren’t able to really keep her breathing or focused through the powerful surges. While I think she had enough physical energy (we had been feeding her a steady stream of food and drink), she was definitely burning out emotionally. She started saying “I can’t do this” and “No” pretty often as her faith waned and the surges overwhelmed her. She cried and sobbed a lot. This was really tough. There wasn’t much we could do, and it started to feel like I was forcing my will on her to keep going. It felt very touch-and-go. Some surges she would breathe through, but more often she’d cry, sob, or lose her breath.

In our last round in the shower, I got a subtle sign that my epilepsy might be starting to get aggravated. It takes a lot for me to have a grand mal seizure, and the flutter I experienced in my eyelids was a long way from that (maybe it wasn’t even epilepsy-related), but it still shook my confidence and impaired my ability to completely relax. When intense sensation meets fear, it becomes unendurable pain. I became less and less able to handle the contractions. When I dragged myself back into bed to labor there, I had a flashback to a conversation I had in which one of my yoga students was telling me what a great experience she’d had with her epidural when she gave birth many years ago. She’d been trying to labor drug-free, and when she caved and got the epidural, she thought, Wow, why didn’t I do this sooner? I told her it was important to me to labor naturally, and added, “But if I get to the point that I’m absolutely suffering instead of softening, I’ll request pain medication.” Curled over in fetal position on the bed, I thought, I’m suffering.

I told Britt it was time to go to the hospital, and she diligently tried to tease out my reasoning and make sure it was actually what I wanted. I told her I needed to sleep. My epilepsy, or at least my anxiety about my epilepsy, combined with the relentless and mounting intensity was too much for me to keep meeting. In our prenatal meetings, we’d discussed that if my epilepsy became a factor we’d head to the labor and delivery ward. Britt and Richard started gathering up what we needed for the hospital. Right before we left around 7 p.m.:

As I walked into the bedroom where Barbie was, I heard the distinct sound of chunky water dumping into a bucket. When I turned the corner, my mind couldn’t quite comprehend the scene. Britt and I were so proud of feeding Barbie and getting her liquids the whole time….Barbie returned the favor by vomiting it all out everywhere. The bed, the floor, the surge protector, all the cables, the night stand, and some into the trash. 12 hours worth of eggs, mango, and coconut water all over. I think this is the reason why Britt drove us to the hospital with me and Barbie in the back, and a gallon sized plastic ziploc just in case.

Labor in the Hospital

When we got to the hospital Britt asked me if I wanted to walk or get a wheelchair, which in my mind was a ridiculous question; of course I wanted a wheelchair, I was done. We went up to the labor and delivery floor, where they got us into a triage room. They had to monitor the baby and me for twenty minutes, which felt like it lasted forever. Richard told me later that one of the nurses watching the monitors called my contractions inhumane (although maybe the fact that I was bawling through every surge influenced her opinion). A pregnant friend of mine told me she was hesitant to tour the labor and delivery ward of her hospital for fear of hearing women screaming during labor. I responded that I didn’t think women really made as much of a ruckus in real life as they did on TV. Well, I was wrong. Hopefully no one was touring the floor when I first arrived.

They put the head of the bed on an incline so I could kneel with my forearms at the top of the bed. They also did a vaginal exam, and asked me if I wanted to know how dilated I was. I don’t know why I bothered finding out; I’d already made up my mind. The only way I was going to skip out on that epidural was if they told me I couldn’t get it because it was time to push. I was six or seven (out of ten) centimeters dilated, which felt perfect. I was happy that all those hours laboring had been to some avail and grateful that I’d come to the hospital for some relief because there was still a ways to go (although it’s impossible to know how fast a cervix will dilate. I could’ve completed those last three centimeters in an hour or in two days and an hour).

As they were monitoring me, someone brought up fentanyl, an opioid they can give laboring women so they can get a couple hours of sleep and then come back strong once it wears off. I read the Wikipedia article on it later, and apparently it’s fifteen to twenty times more potent than heroin. I’d heard that it didn’t necessarily do much for the pain, but it made you care about the pain less. They said I could get a dose to take the edge off until I could get the epidural. At first, I was adamant that I did not want fentanyl. I did not want to feel high. The idea of being in an altered headspace freaked me out. However, at the peak of a contraction someone said the right thing and I agreed to it. They injected it into my IV, and as my next contraction faded, I got sleepy and melted down onto the bed. I remember thinking woozily, The fentanyl was a good decision.

I had more time than usual to think about what I was going to write for this blog post during the constant cycle of breastfeeding, changing diapers, soothing, and drifting in and out of sleep-when-the-baby-sleeps naps since Equinox was born–it doesn’t leave much time to actually write. During a breastfeeding-induced oxytocin high (which was remarkably similar to a fentanyl high in our first blissful week postpartum) I was contemplating Equinox’s birth story and toying with drawing an analogy between my labor and playing Super Mario Brothers (it was a long, steady course, the regular closely-spaced contractions were like flying turtles, there was a princess at the end…). Ultimately I abandoned the analogy because the music was all wrong. However, I stand by one piece: when you get your magic mushroom of an epidural, you swell up to twice your normal size. Luckily someone warned me ahead of time that when you ask for an epidural, it takes about forty-five minutes to actually get it because they have to spend that time pumping the mama full of IV fluids first as a precautionary measure. Britt took some photos during my labor, and I can’t believe how puffy I was!

I don’t remember what the anesthesiologist’s name was, but in my mind I call him Dr. Mike. Postpartum, Richard confirmed that—it wasn’t just the fentanyl—Dr. Mike was just as I remembered him:

The anesthesiologist looked like a TV doctor on a soap opera. I’m not kidding. He was a good looking guy, obnoxiously loud, and had a swagger to him. In retrospect, it was comical with how he burst in the door with his little cart of drugs and declared how his medicine (always “medicine”, never a drug by name, as if it was magic elixir) was going to make her feel all better.

To Dr. Mike’s credit, the epidural was a breeze, and once it set in, I was able to get several hours of sleep. Well, several hours of sleep at fifteen-minute intervals. They fit me with a blood pressure cuff that automatically whirred tight every fifteen minutes to make sure my blood pressure was still in the safe range. I wasn’t as completely numb as I thought I’d be. I could still wiggle my toes, and I felt it when my mucus plug came out and when my water broke in the middle of the night. However, I was numb enough that if I wanted to roll over to my other side, I had to press my call button so the nurses could come help me.

The midwife, Becca, told me that when it was closer to the time to push, I’d start to feel pressure breaking through the epidural. During the night, I started feeling some sensation again. Becca checked me and found out I was 9.5 centimeters dilated and there was still an unbroken piece of my bag of water covering the baby’s head. Becca said we could 1) use the drug pitocin to augment contractions and speed things up (she thought that was overkill), 2) break the forebag so the baby could descend more easily, or 3) watch and wait. After taking some time alone to discuss our options with each other and Britt over the phone (she’d gone home to rest while we did), Richard and I chose to break the forebag.

I slept a little longer before I started shaking with the energy of birth again. Becca offered to check my dilation, but I chose to wait. Both she and I were on the same page that we wanted to delay active pushing not only until I was ten centimeters dilated, but until the baby had descended most of the way via the involuntary contractions of my uterus, and I didn’t think I was experiencing intense enough sensation for that to be the case.

However, I told Becca the shaking was making me nervous because of my epilepsy. She had the most amazing reply, and I feel overwhelmed with gratitude I got this response in a hospital setting. She could have reacted, “Oh my God, I’ll install the padded bed rails and push a dose of Keppra immediately!” But instead, she said something like this: “Pay attention to the shaking for a moment. Can you feel that it’s different from the shaking you get when having a seizure? Yes? Good. Keep tapping into that.” That was exactly what I needed to hear to keep feeling empowered and reclaim ownership of my body.

I have no concept of time, but well before dawn sensation started to get overwhelmingly intense and I began to get an urge to push. It wasn’t breakthrough pressure; the epidural had worn off. Mentally, I had cut a deal with the pain that if I held out until I got the epidural it would go away forever, so I was not open to its return. Becca checked me, and I was ten centimeters dilated, but the baby hadn’t descended. That meant it was safe for me to push, but ill-advised because there was such a long way to go that I would get exhausted actively pushing the whole time.

They called Dr. Mike to come back and reinstate his “medicine” so I could wait out the baby a little longer. In the meantime, I was having a hard time softening to the pain and was getting increasingly agitated by the delay. A nurse came in and told me Dr. Mike was on his way and wanted me to “press the button” twice until he could get there. “Where’s your button?” she asked. I was confused and pointed her to the call button that summoned the nurses. “No, the button for your epidural that gives you a dose of medicine.” What?! There’s a button??? It turned out I didn’t have one installed. With how wildly uncomfortable I was, I was furious at Dr. Mike for stiffing me on the button.

The only thing that made be feel better was to push, so Becca coached me through pushing with one knee pulled into my chest. During contractions, she had me take a deep breath, hold it for ten seconds as I pushed, and then release. I could fit in three or four cycles per contraction. Everyone knew that it was just a coping strategy and I wasn’t actually going to push the baby out in that moment, but in retrospect it was a good practice session. I learned the breathing and how to engage in a productive way. Still, I kept asking when the anesthesiologist was going to get there and as time went on, I started sobbing, “He’s not coming! He’s not going to come at all, is he?” Richard called Britt to come back and support me, and she made it there from home before Dr. Mike arrived. At some point Britt remarked that I’d gotten the epidural at the right time as it hadn’t slowed down or impeded my labor at all.

Eventually the nurse came back in with instructions on how to give me a dose or two more until Dr. Mike could get there. Despite the proud look of accomplishment on the nurse’s face, I don’t think it worked. Finally, over an hour after the nurses called, Dr. Mike showed up in his charismatic, boisterous manner, and showed me a big syringe of “more powerful medicine” that would make all the sensation go away for a little while, then he’d give me a couple more doses of the regular epidural. After all that set in, all my fury toward Dr. Mike was forgiven and I got a couple more hours of sleep.

Childbirth

When the epidural next wore off in the morning, Becca checked me and let me know that the baby had descended much more than before and I could push if I wanted to. I wasn’t about to wait another hour for Dr. Mike to come dose me up again, so I started pushing with Becca and Britt coaching me.

At first I was laying on my back and hugging one knee into my chest with the support of a Becca, Britt, or a nurse. Then they set up the squat bar on the bed and looped a sheet over it so I could pull myself up into a crunching position and get more power. Maybe because the squat bar was right there in front of me, I had a moment of clarity and thought, This is stupid. Why am I trying to push my baby out on my back? I gasped, “I need to be in a position where gravity can help me.” Someone expressed doubt about me being able to move with the epidural, and I don’t think I responded aloud, but in my mind I screamed, There’s no fucking epidural! It has long since worn off! I have full and complete function in my legs! After all was said and done, one of the nurses discovered that the epidural tube had actually popped out of my back during all the movement I did pushing, so by the time the baby was coming out, there was literally no epidural.

Britt and Becca helped me into a squatting position and got Richard to sit behind me on the bed. I’d never thought to tell anyone this, but I’d always visualized Richard sitting behind me whispering in my ear as I gave birth, so this was absolutely perfect. He breathed with me through every surge and then between them he repeated affirmations to me and told me I was amazing.

I felt most productive when I pushed up into the squat bar as hard as I could with my hands. Becca told me she would give me a dollar for every time I pooped, and it’s true, it does feel pretty much the same as pooping. At some points I unreservedly pushed back into Richard as hard as I could. Later, he told me at times I squished him so flat he couldn’t breathe. He was a total champ and rode it out without complaint. Honestly, when I think about all I have put this man through over the years and how he has stepped up, I’m overwhelmed with gratitude and joy to have him as a birth partner, a husband, and the father of my child.

I think I pushed for a little over an hour. I’ve heard many times that pushing is a relief because you actually get to do something. And it was at first. Then the baby’s head started to emerge. They had me reach down and feel her head a couple times, but it wasn’t progressing nearly as quickly as I wanted it to, so I stopped feeling for it. They offered to hold up a mirror so I could see my progress, but I thought it would just freak me out.

The hardest moment of my life to that point was when Equinox’s head was 20% of the way out. Then after the next contraction when her head was 30% of the way out, that was the hardest moment of my life. 40% was harder still. At all of these points I knew for a fact that I couldn’t go on. I was done. I was sobbing, “I can’t! I can’t.” But I also knew for a fact that there was no choice, and that I had to. Britt made this concrete for me. Everything about that room was a little hazy, but then Britt got her face right in front of mine, and that image was crystal clear. I don’t remember her exact words, but she said something like. “Barbie, this is it. There is no more fentanyl, there are no more epidurals, there is no choice. The only thing you can do is push your baby out. Now’s the time to just fucking do it. Be a warrior.” The last phrase was said subtly softer like the toughest yoga teacher you’ve ever been to; it gave me the image of warrior pose rather than a soldier. The rest was said like a no-nonsense boot camp drill sergeant, and that was exactly was I needed in that moment.

When I read or heard about tearing during pregnancy, it always seemed to be presented as something that happened to women, completely outside of their control. To an extent that’s true. Equinox surprised everyone by coming out “sunny-side-up” (face toward the front of my body). When babies are born in this position (occiput posterior) they are much harder to push out (thank you Preggo Pilates for giving me the strength) and mothers are much more likely to tear, so there may have been nothing I could do to avoid it. However, it didn’t just happen to me. To get my baby out, I actively pushed so hard that my baby tore through my flesh. Nothing prepared me for how willful this would be.

I know I’m supposed to think that everything about birth is beautiful and empowering, but I still think consciously ripping apart my own skin and muscle tissue was a little messed up. That night, when the memory was still visceral, I was afraid to fall asleep for fear I’d dream about it. However, the next day, I still remembered that it was hard, but I’d let go of (or repressed) the raw, kinesthetic memory of what it was like. All of this said, the purposefulness of pushing Equinox out outweighed the trauma. Immediately after birth, instead of thinking, Wow, I am never going to do that again, I remember distinctly thinking, Wow, that is going to be so hard to do again next time.

Thankfully, after the baby’s head was out, the rest of her emerged easily. Immediately after Equinox was born, they placed her on my chest. The first thing I said was, “She’s so big.” I could not believe that she been in my body, let alone passed through it. A couple months before I gave birth, Richard and I visited a friend and her month-old baby who had been born six weeks premature. That was the size I’d been visualizing, and my baby had to be at least fifty percent bigger!

Equinox and I didn’t get much peace. She was breathing and making little noises, but because she didn’t immediately cry loudly, there were four frantic hands, poking her, prodding her, and bulb syringing her the whole time she was on my chest. It was overwhelming. After honoring my wish for delayed cord clamping they clamped and cut the cord, and whisked her away to make sure she was breathing okay. Richard went along with her so she wouldn’t be alone. Our birth preference was to delay all newborn procedures until after the first breastfeeding session, but when Richard turned his back for a moment to update me, they gave her the vitamin K shot after he’d expressly told them to wait (they said something about wanting to make her cry and achieving both that and the injection at once). They took time to weigh her too, which obviously wasn’t urgent. Richard’s thought was:

I think they just have a big checklist of all the stuff they have to do, and since things are either done or not done, “wait” isn’t really captured by their checklist.

A friend of mine shared her birth story in which her baby was born prematurely and they missed out on that whole “Golden Hour” of skin-to-skin contact with baby on mama’s chest (I’d like to rename our first hour with the baby the Golden Shower Hour since Equinox peed on me and pooped on both Richard and me multiple times within that span). My friend told me in retrospect it seemed ridiculous that she was so worried about that first hour, because there was so much more time to bond with the baby after he was stable. Also, they had no problem breastfeeding despite not initiating it until quite some time after birth. I was grateful to have heard her story because when the nurses and doctor finished up with the baby and brought her back to me, I felt too overwhelmed to take her. I still had to deliver the placenta and get stitches—I wasn’t feeling relaxed and ready to be present with my baby. Someone suggested that Daddy do skin-on-skin contact with the baby, and he didn’t need to be asked twice to fling his shirt off. It was so sweet and heartwarming to see the two of them bonding while I was finishing up with what I needed to do.

It’s worth noting that I chose to get postpartum pitocin to help my uterus clamp down and release the placenta without hemorrhage (this was the one drug I had been planning to get all along unless I had an absolutely average birth—I didn’t want the thought of bleeding out taking up head space). One of the purported side-effects of postpartum pitocin is that it can interfere with the mother and baby’s bonding. Maybe it contributed to my need for space, maybe I was just plain overwhelmed from going through the most arduous experience of my life. However, I can second my friend’s experience: there was so much more time and opportunity than that first hour to fall madly, deeply, obsessively in love with my little one, and she’s been such a great eater that the pediatrician is letting her skip her one-month appointment.

When the placenta came out all in one push, I said the same thing as I did about the baby: “It’s so big.” I still can’t believe all that stuff was inside of me. Beforehand I’d told everyone, “Don’t show me the placenta, I don’t want to see it, don’t bring it close to my face.” When I saw how big it was, I immediately thought, WTF, lemme get a closer look at that thing! Britt showed me how the bag of waters was still attached so I could visualize where the baby had been all this time, and that the veins on the baby’s side of the placenta formed a tree shape–she called it the tree of life.

I’ve had several people tell me the stitches were the most painful part of childbirth, but they weren’t too bad for me. Because the epidural was long since gone, they used several lidocaine injections to numb the area. The hardest thing about it was how annoyingly long it took. I felt like the obstetrician and the new midwife who’d just come on shift were being overly social across my perineum as he explained the stitches he was doing to her, but I was probably just anxious to be done. I asked them how many stitches I was getting, and they said it wasn’t so much individual stitches as it was one long thread that followed an atypical (but nothing to worry about) path. The gesture the OB made with his hand made it look like a winding trail that hooked around at the end. Yikes. It was a second degree tear, which is the most common type. The recovery time was much longer than I expected: they recommended I avoid exercise and keep my legs together—both figuratively and literally—for six weeks!

Finally, all the unpleasantries were out of the way and I was ready to have my baby back on my chest. I think it was Britt who asked if we wanted to do the milk crawl. I enthusiastically agreed and asked her to show me what to do. We moved Equinox down onto my belly and I put my hands under her feet. She pushed with her strong little legs against my hands and started crawling up toward one of my breasts. One of the reasons we delayed the antibiotic eye ointment was so that she could clearly see the darker nipple with respect to the rest of the breast. Without any guidance from us, she found her way up to my nipple and instinctively latched on. Richard reflected:

We watched the baby do the milk crawl, and I had tears in my eyes. It was a really beautiful thing to watch.

Britt snapped a picture of Equinox and me in this moment, and Equinox’s facial expression is one I’ve seen many times while breastfeeding since: instinctual, animalistic, feral. Just like my birth affirmations say, my baby knows exactly what to do. A childbirth technique I could never really connect to was to use the baby as an inspiration, but I finally get it now. In one sense Equinox is totally helpless, but in another sense she is incredibly intelligent, fierce, and tapped into an intuition and instinct most of us have forgotten how to access. Next time I give birth, I know both Equinox Firestorm and the little one to come will be some of my most powerful inspirations.

Milk crawl

Equinox Firestorm’s first attempt at a latch at the end of her milk crawl. (Photo credit: Britt Fohrman)

29 Weeks Pregnant: Nursery Mania

January 5 – January 1: 29 Weeks 0 Days – 29 Weeks 6 Days.

I’m not usually into consumerism. When we bought our house I hit up yard sales, Craigslist, and a friend’s garage to get the furniture we needed—I didn’t buy any large items new. I know that businesses gouge people around big, emotional life events, so when Richard and I got married I made a conscious effort to avoid letting the wedding industry drain our bank accounts. I bought my decorations and (amazing) dress on Craigslist, held the whole event at one venue, chose caterers that didn’t have a special elevated price for weddings, and gratefully accepted help from friends and family for everything from cake-making to officiating. Somehow the baby industry has gotten to me though. I can’t seem to resist wanting the new, the shiny, and the top-of-the-line.

I didn’t initially have a theme in mind for the nursery. In fact, I think themes are kind of silly. Our wedding didn’t have a theme—we had a Barbie and Ken cake, truth or dare fortune cookie favors, and Craigslist personals ad-themed place cards. Nothing fit together, and that was the way I wanted it.

 

Tree Shelves

My mom bought us this amazing alternative to the tree bookshelf on Etsy for a fraction of the price. (Sitting on easy-sliding cardboard until we decide on it’s final location because it’s heavy as, well, a stump).

When I started working on my baby registry, I quickly found out I couldn’t just add generic “crib sheets” to my list. I had to pick out specific sheets, and the ones with the little forest animals on them were cute, so why not? Add. Then there was an adorable mobile with a fox, raccoon, owl, and hedgehog on Etsy. Add (My sister ended up hand-making me something similar, yay!). Then were sweet fox-themed hooded towels, bibs, and burp cloths. Add, add, add. Then I found out those forest friends crib sheets had a whole matching nursery set. Resist. Aagh, can’t. Add lamp, add hamper, and add area rug. Then I found the $80 (each) handmade wooden forest animal bookends on Etsy—expensive, but if someone wanted to get them for me I wouldn’t stop them! Add. Then the $2100 tree-shaped bookshelf from the same Etsy artist. ADD.

Delta Bennington Dresser

Delta Bennington Dresser and changing top (mine is a little darker to match the crib)

Ladies and gentlemen, a nursery theme and a manic, starry-eyed consumer are born. Once a theme had clearly emerged, I deleted several items from my registry that didn’t fit, and added versions that matched my nursery theme, even if they were a little pricier. To give provide some context to show how out-of-character all of this is for me, nothing matches in our house. In our bedroom, we have a mahogany-colored bed frame, a honey-colored bedside table, and a white bedside table. In our office space, we have two cabinets and two desks, each with a different colors of wood. In contrast, when we started looking for cribs, my first filter was for models I could get in a dark wooden color to fit my forest theme. My second filter was that it had to have a matching dresser with a changing top. I’ve officially been seduced by the baby products industry.

Forest animal outlet covers

I had to admit I had a problem when I observed myself asking Richard if we could hire an electrician to install a different type of outlet in the nursery to fit these adorable outlet covers. Luckily I came to my senses. (If they fit your outlets, the artist who makes them can be found here: https://www.etsy.com/shop/cathyscraftycovers . Send me pics so I can live vicariously through you!)

To cut myself some slack, shopping for nursery furniture is overwhelming and I needed to decrease the search space somehowI stand by getting a dresser and changing table in one—that’s a money saver—but I would have saved more money, new-product fumes, and a disturbing amount of Styrofoam packing material had been less picky about matching furniture and found one used.

Foxy tears up Styrofoam

We had the horrifying amount of styrofoam that came with the nursery furniture all bagged up for disposal (5 bags, ughhh), and while we were out Foxy unwrapped it all.

Nursery themes aside, cribs are the gateway to getting hooked on new products. The experts tell you to buy cribs and mattresses new to make sure they’re up to the latest safety standards. Looking for a new crib funneled me into baby stores full of stainless, unscratched, pill-free baby paraphernalia and furniture. Ogle. It also got me worrying about the safety of used items. There are several baby bathtubs selling for $3.50 at my local baby thrift shop, and even though they look like the exact same one I have on my registry, I haven’t bought one because I’ve been irrationally worried about their safety. Reality check: a baby bathtub is just a big bucket that I would never leave my baby unattended in anyway—it would be hard to go wrong.

Delta Bennington 3-in-1 Crib

Delta Bennington 3-in-1 Crib.

Once I got the superficial filtering out of the way, I did take some time to research and critically compare my favorite cribs (The Consumer Reports crib buying guide was helpful). We chose a crib made of pine, which was affordable, but pine is a softer wood so we can expect a multitude of dents and scratches. I ruled out cribs that contained particle board (common in IKEA furniture) as I’ve read it releases toxic chemicals into the air. However, the crib’s matching dresser has particle board in the back and in the drawers. I thought it would be negligible, but it smells awful! It’s locked away in the nursery-to-be spending some quality time with our purifier. It will be months before the baby sleeps in there, so hopefully it will get most of its off-gassing out of the way by then. The crib has a painfully basic design—it doesn’t have any extravagant nobs, posts, or details that could easily catch a baby’s clothing and be a strangulation hazard. We decided that a crib that converts into a toddler bed (and a day bed, whatever that is) would be enough (some convert into full beds as well). One salesperson advised us that if we bought a pine crib, by the time the child was at full bed age, the wood would be so beat up we wouldn’t want to use it as a full bed (maybe she was just trying to upsell us though).

Selecting a crib mattress was initially confusing (why are there so many??), but I did some research to help me narrow it down (Again Consumer Reports was a God-send). I chose a mattress (the Simmons Kids ComforPedic) with a foam core (instead of coils) because they’re much lighter, which will make frequent sheet changing easier. It also has a waterproof cover for easy cleaning. It’s firm on one side for infants (firm mattresses reduce SIDS risk) and plusher on the other side for toddlers (makes sense to have a two-in-one mattress since our crib converts to a toddler bed). I chose this mattress over less expensive ones because it is Greenguard and CertiPUR-US certified, meaning it is less likely to contain toxic chemical or emit noxious fumes. It’s also got a 35-year warranty; I’ve rarely made use of a warranty, even if something breaks, but it shows that the manufacturers stand by their product.

Now that I’ve bought the stuff that parents are “supposed to” buy new, my intention is to overcome my nursery mania and acquire most of the rest of my baby items used. Here are some of the things I’m looking for, if you have any leads:

  • My Brest Friend nursing pillow (preferably a forest-y color, but I’ll get over it if it’s not)
  • Glider chair and ottoman (non-rickety; many of the seem prone to falling apart)
  • Baby Bathtub
  • Baby Wipes Warmer (I chose the Munchkin Glow on my registry, but that may have just been because it came in green…)
  • Laundry hamper
  • Fitted crib sheets (forrest-y colors and patterns would be irresistible)
  • Sun shades for backseat windows
  • Baby clothes (preferably not pilled and stained)