Birth is Normal, Not a Medical Condition

My Godson and his wife have been sufficiently scared by their OB-GYN to agree to go in for an induction tonight, in order to seduce their first-born son to come out and join them, apparently, before he is quite ready to come out. This is no great surprise to me. As a retired La Leche League leader and birth doula, I have watched this same scenario play out more times than I care to recall. Back in the 1980's, when I was having babies myself, you counted back from your last menstrual period to arrive at an expected date of delivery. It was an educated GUESS, and it could be plus or minus 2 weeks. You might have an ultrasound once or twice during the pregnancy to gauge the position of the fetus or to rule out any issues.

Nowadays, in our lawsuit-happy world, ultrasounds are routinely done almost monthly, expected due dates are changed routinely based on baby's bone length, and doctors are almost sure to suggest an induction of labor if you go past your due date, which is apparently set in stone now. No thought at all is given to a female fetus' ova, which are all formed in utero and, as some studies suggest, can be damaged by all the ultrasounds done during the mother's pregnancy. As most current research done on labor and childbirth suggests, induction of labor will almost always lead to a C-section, mainly for a FAILURE TO PROGRESS diagnosis. It leaves a woman feeling as if her body has failed her, she has failed her baby, and with a painful incision and an 8 week recovery period from major surgery WHILE adjusting to the lack of sleep and the newborn's constant need to nurse.  Which will then usually lead to a FAILURE TO THRIVE diagnosis which the baby's pediatrician will make shortly after birth, leading the mother to again feel as if her body has failed her, she has failed her baby, and the quick change from breast milk to formula seems a godsend. An very expensive godsend that makes a woman forget how strong she is and what a miraculous thing her own body is made for.

It's no big secret that surgical birth is more expensive than vaginal birth and it's really no secret at all that breast milk is free, perfect for an infant and readily available at the right temperature, while formula is expensive and of a different species of mammal, or worse, a plant oil, and needs to be trucked in big old smelly diesel trucks to supermarket shelves, where, it must be mixed properly and heated properly to be safe before consumed in bottles with nipples that must be washed and sterilized. If you are lucky your baby will do well with the standard cow's milk formulas, but, if the baby should develop an allergy to it, the expenses increase even more for the "hypoallergenic" varieties of non-human breast milk substitutes (a.k.a. infant formula.) Ugh.

It's so hard, especially when you are an advocate for natural birth, to reassure parents who are being scared to death by their doctors, that nature has carefully crafted the symbiotic relationship between unborn baby and expectant mother. The baby's readiness to be born signals chemicals in the placenta to be released in the mother's blood in order to soften and elongate the mother's cervix in readiness for birth, as well as loosen the ligaments and joints in the hips and pelvis of the mother. That medical induction is almost certainly the path to a Cesarean surgical birth, if they have not waited long enough for these natural actions to have occurred. Especially first-time parents, who are so nervous and don't want to do anything to show that they do not trust the provider they have chosen. The whole obstetrical industry has caused many women to view 'scheduling' their baby's birth as the most logical and easiest thing in the world. Little do they know that a normal, natural, vaginal birth would have them back on their feet in hours, the baby nursing like a champ to increase their milk supply without drugs or pain killers in the mother's bloodstream making both she and the baby less likely to get nursing off to a good start.

It's a sad and all too common phenomenon these days. And it is all driven by money. The fear of losing it in a lawsuit should there be even a slight complication that a lawyer could blame on the physician not suggesting a C-Section sooner, the want of making more of it and having a clear weekend schedule by scheduling the inductions and then placing the standard 24 hour window on a 'trial of labor' and the pushing of the formula companies to have the hospitals hand out their brand of infant formula, to all new mothers.

I can only hope that my Godson's baby is ready and that my gut feeling that she's going to have a C-section in spite of the doctors assurances that according to the ultrasounds, the baby is very big and past due, will not come to pass. I fervently wish all newly pregnant mothers and fathers would seek Nurse/Midwives and only use the medical establishment when there is an identified high risk issue. Pregnancy and birth are normal and natural functions,not medical conditions, and it is a shame and a disgrace that so many women are left wondering why everything went so terribly wrong, when the medical community makes it so that natural vaginal birth is almost surely going to fail. These women did not fail, the whole system has failed them.

Good information arriving a bit later than the universe probably intended!

About two minutes after pressing the PUBLISH button on my rant yesterday, I was included in a private Facebook note which someone much like me decided to put out into the universe. Struggling with midlife issues, while very politically minded and frustrated with the state of the world today, he has finally realized that he is also the happiest he has been in his life. He suggested that we all need to take a break from the daily barrage of bad news we see in social media, from our own thoughts of despair and frustration with the way things are, and a midst all the chaos of this life, remember that most people are good and we really do have many reasons to be happy and should remember to project our gratitude and our joy in relation to all the good things in our life so that we don't appear jaded and feel lousy on the inside.

Oops. I had been furious over the past 3 days, writing yesterday's rant. I was being judgmental of a whole religion because of the actions of one rich fundamentalist Christian congregation in Texas, wasn't I? I was being hypocritical and angry and ungrateful. I've really gotta watch that. After all, I'm only human. But, through friends, both old and new, I'm learning every day.

Today, I received a Word Press Daily Digest email suggesting that "Long form Posts" (read: very long, non-brief, wordy, wordy, wordy posts) should receive a tag indicating them as such so people who are interested can read them when they know they have a bit more time! :-D. One thing I've always had a problem with in my writing is brevity. In a college writing course way back in the horse and buggy days, my professor would give me my papers back over and over, asking me to condense, condense, condense. I would ultimately get a decent grade and good commentary, but not before a lot of drafting and redrafting; trying to say what I want to say with fewer words. I guess this WP Daily Digest note came a little too late for yesterday's rant. I will try harder to draft, reread, condense, draft, reread, draft, condense, and so on.......  LOL

Do All Roads Lead to Heaven?

A good portion of the day yesterday was spent writing copy for an appeal to the community to raise funds for my daughter's church program. At some point, I checked in on my reader and was made aware in a post titled, "Noah’s ark, manna and a convenient device for ignoring the inconvenient point." http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2013/03/17/noahs-ark-manna-and-a-convenient-device-for-ignoring-the-inconvenient-point/ (which I follow in my never-ending quest for THE TRUTH) of a church in Texas that had the unveiling, just this weekend, of a life-size replica of Noah's ark that was built for only FIVE MILLION DOLLARS. Complete with life-size animatronics, guided tours, food and rides, it certainly must be a sight to behold. I was so incensed as I continued in my deliberations to come up with just the right words for my appeal, trying desperately to find a way to touch the hearts and persuade the people in my local community to support my daughter's church, which is a small congregation of developmentally disabled adults, most of whom live in group homes and most who can only throw a couple of coins or a dollar bill into the offering each week as they subsist on state and federal programs which are being cut to the bone. As I labored, I kept obsessing on this Christian fundamentalist church in Texas that has created a Disney-like, five million dollar extension on their mega church in order to "prove" that creationism, as written of in the book of Genesis, COULD HAVE and ABSOLUTELY DID actually happen. Is that what Jesus would have done with all that money? With all the sick, hungry, and homeless currently in the world? No wonder I am so conflicted about religion! 

Let me provide you a little of my religious background. I was born and baptized a Presbyterian and attended Sunday school in the same church where my parents had been married until I was about 5. Then, they suddenly seemed to abandon my religious upbringing. As I recall, I did not consider it a big deal. Kindergarten and learning to read were taking up most of my time and weekends were for my beloved books and doing homework.

During the 6th grade, when a lot of the Protestant kids in middle school were making their first communions and preparing to be confirmed in 8th grade by taking classes, a new friend, whose dad was a pastor at the local Lutheran Church in the town we currently lived in, expressed concern for my unchurched soul. I was an extremely overweight child and pre-teen with a limited number of true friends and many tormentors so it didn't hurt that the pastor's daughter was the prettiest and most popular girl in middle school and was concerned for MY soul. She was also very nice to me and didn't seem to notice how fat and ugly I was, or if she did notice, it didn't seem bother her at all, as it bothered those who were cruel and mean to me everyday because of it. She saw me for the me on the inside.

It wasn't long before I was going to church every Sunday and making my first communion and taking confirmation classes during the week. I also basked in the reflected light of my beautiful new friend's popularity while I got re-acquainted with Jesus. The high jinx of lock-ins at the church and the thrill of Camp Koinonia in the summer, fishing with the Pastor during the day, sneaking the leftover communion wine with the older class at night which they supposedly had properly disposed of earlier in the day; that was all a part of the thrill of Christian fellowship for me.

After making my confirmation, I did not attend church as often as during middle school, but I did make the effort to go every once in a while, and I did pray often as I made my way through the high school years, battling an eating disorder that had me drop a tremendous amount of weight, navigating the wonderful world of drug use, paranoia, depression and the munchies, and feeling that I had to be someone who looked and acted like my beautiful friend, the pastor's daughter, instead of my authentic self, in order to be loved and accepted by my peers. By the end of my sophomore year, I was a complete mess. I dropped out of the drug scene, never using alcohol or drugs again after I turned 16. I avoided everyone except my boyfriend, who I had met while very thin and blonde, but who was still willing to hang out with me while I let my natural hair color come back in and put on weight again. I went to school in the mornings, went to a full-time job in the afternoons and became responsible.

When I married this same boy at just 20, and I'm sure many thought it was because I was pregnant; (but it was really because his dysfunctional family had abandoned him and he had nowhere to live, but that's a story for another day!) it was at this same Lutheran Church that we were married, although my husband had been brought up Catholic and was not practicing any religion at that time. Each of our children was baptized in the Lutheran Church and when my youngest was just a baby, I was approached by the pastor of the new church I was attending with the kids in the state we had moved to, to become a Sunday School teacher. I stepped up to the plate, attended the semi-monthly Board of Christian Education meetings, and proceeded to become a teacher to the 3-4 year old souls of the church. When my husband's Catholic grandfather died, we traveled back to our home state with our 3 kids to attend the services and mourn his loss. At the next Board of Christian Education meeting, I innocently mentioned taking communion at the funeral mass. Well, the pastor almost became apoplectic, telling me I had committed a mortal sin and asking me if I was ready to repent of it. I told this pastor, who was older than my beautiful friend's father was, that I did not believe taking communion anywhere was ever a sin and I would not ask for forgiveness for doing it. He promptly removed me from my Sunday school teaching position. I left the church and never looked back. For awhile I attended a Methodist church as I felt guilty that my children were not getting a religious upbringing, but the hypocrisy I found there as that congregation turned against a young, loving, open and progressive minister who wanted to open up the church to the LGBT community, and which eventually led to his dismissal, turned me away not soon after. My kids stated they really did not want to go to church anyway, it was boring and my middle son could never sit still and behave himself. So, church went by the wayside.

As the years passed, I turned more and more to studying Eastern philosophies, continuing to read many books on the many various religious traditions around the world, finally deciding that I was probably an agnostic, with leanings toward Buddhism. I do believe that Jesus existed, and I believe that he was a true messenger, sent here by the loving, universal creator of the cosmos to teach, just as the earlier messengers of many other cultures and religions were sent before him, that LOVE is the religion we should follow, and COMPASSION and KINDNESS are where holiness and the sacred lie in each and every human being. I am not concerned about some after-life, I am concerned with the here and now.

Now, present day....my husband of 30 years has finally begun to address his alcohol and substance abuse issues and has become a Christian, a non-denominational, BORN-AGAIN Christian, which has given me a lot to think about and caused some changes in our marriage, some which have been good, some which have almost ended our marriage. But, I am not one to take away from or make light of any religion or practice of faith if it brings comfort and peace to the person following it. I believe we are all free to make up our own minds and follow our own conscience. I support him in his addressing his issues and if the religion he has chosen is helpful to him, I am happy.

My oldest son is agnostic, and my younger son has studied and, at one time, considered becoming a Jew, as he very much believes in God and feels that the Jewish religion is the one he feels most comfortable with, although he has not made any move toward converting at this time. My youngest, my daughter, about four years ago, out of nowhere, asked me if she could start attending church again to learn about Jesus. She was only about 6 years old when her formal religious training ended, and I was surprised by her request at age 18. I explained to her that she would have to attend these services on her own, without me, as I could not, in good conscience, sit through and listen to things I did not agree with. I hoped she would forget about it. But alas, she would not let up on me. I had to find her a place to learn what she needed to learn. All while nursing my dying parents and working a 40 hour a week job.

My daughter has developmental disabilities and functions academically at about an 8 or 9-year-old level and has social skills deficits and trouble relating to "normal" peers. She's always felt more comfortable out of the mainstream and interacts best with others who are a bit lower functioning than she is, as she likes to be helpful and to be compassionate with people. Her emotional intelligence is higher than most "so-called" geniuses I know who have a higher IQ, but no common sense or compassion. I've always tried to be honest with her about her limitations, while encouraging her to always do her best and to always try harder. She learned to read and do other things that I was told she might never do when she was first diagnosed as a toddler. When we go to the library, one of her favorite activities, she brings home stacks of 1st and 2nd grade readers and maybe one 3rd grade chapter book to 'try' to challenge herself, because she is so much like her mother, she loves to read!

I have to be truthful here. I really did not want to attend any Christian church again, not even with my wonderful daughter, who was so set on it. So, I went on a search and finally found this little congregation a few towns away, where I felt comfortable after several visits together with her, to sit in the parking lot reading while she is inside worshiping with a community of people who are being ministered to by a wonderful woman pastor who has a great love for this demographic group, and gears the one hour service toward their capabilities, while not taking away from the Christian message, just making it more understandable for them. My daughter is very happy there. After listening to Pastor Judy tell me recently how hard it is getting to finance the whole program; the bible study during the week, the choir practice, the movie and pizza nights she tries to hold at least once a month for this group of individuals, most of whose only socialization takes place because of these activities the church provides, which are free of charge, I decided to try to help her raise money. Not because I am a Christian, not because I'll make points to go to heaven or because the money can "prove" that anything that the bible tells us is true because we can build it to the specifications of ancient times, not for ANY reason except because it is a kind and a compassionate thing to do. I'm going to mail a copy of my local appeal to the church out in Texas that has five million dollars to spend on their Disney-like theme park of Noah's Ark and see if they can spare a little money for a small, broke church in NJ that caters to an under-served, poor population of wonderful people who love Jesus. Yeah, that's what I'm gonna do. Wicked, agnostic sinner with Buddhist leanings that I am.

Grief & Guilt

Yesterday should have been a fine day. My best friend's (since the 2nd grade) son, who is also my Godson, is expecting a child with his wife and we were going to be attending her baby shower luncheon. It should have been a really happy occasion.

Unfortunately, I awoke to the news that my friend's ex-husband, and the father of her five almost all grown kids, including my Godson, whose wife's 1st baby shower was to be held this same day, had finally succeeded at killing himself after years of substance abuse issues and untreated mental illness. God forgive me, my first thought was "the selfish bastard had to ruin her day." My second thought was, "OMG, did my wishing for his disappearing from the earth on many an occasion somehow contribute to this?"

The truth is, and my head realizes this although my heart still has trouble grasping it, I have no control over anyone else's actions, not even if I hope and wish and yes, even pray in my frustration and anger and fear for someone to disappear from the earth. I watched my best friend suffer for many years in her marriage and often counseled her to find the strength to leave. When she did finally find that strength close to 7 years ago, I was so glad. And so scared for her and her children. I sometimes secretly and sometimes not so secretly hoped and prayed for something to happen to him to end the family's repeatedly suffering his abuse, his drug-induced rages and his repeated threats to hurt himself if he could not manipulate them to do what he wanted them to do for him.

Sure, there were years when our kids were all small and we were unaware of how bad the drug use and mental illness actually were, that we went on family vacations together and he could be quite decent and quite generous with both his children and mine.  There were some good times in the past. But, you were always waiting for the good time to suddenly end with a rage, with the air in their home feeling as if it weighed against your lungs and your heart until all the air was sucked right out of the room and you had to get out of there.

Today, 24 hours or so after learning of his death and after seeing my best friend and all but two of her kids, YES, I feel guilty that maybe I didn't do enough to help him, YES, I feel so much sadness for the unresolved issues of my friend and her children, one of whom had not spoken to his father over the last two years. But, no, nothing I did or did not do caused him to finally succeed at taking his life, whether accidentally or on purpose; it was his own mental health issues which he CHOSE not to address, and his self-medicating with both illegal and with prescription drugs for many, many years that ultimately killed him.  No one is responsible for his actions but him.  I certainly hope all of his children get that and do not suffer any more. And I do wish that wherever his soul has gone, he is finally experiencing a peace he was unable to ever experience here on earth.

Letting Go To Grow

For most of my 50 years, I have been a caretaker. During my childhood, I had a mom who was not very well and I was always told I needed to be a "good girl" so that mom would be okay. I always internalized this to mean if I misbehaved, mom would have another stroke and might die. It took me a lot of therapy and a lot of pounds were packed on from binge eating and stuffing my feelings before I figured that out.

I married very young to escape my childhood home, full of sickness and guilt at never being 'good enough' but went right from taking care of my mom to taking care of my husband and my bills and responsibilities. I was married by age 20, had my first son before I was 24, another son by 26 and a daughter before I was 30. My daughter was born with developmental delays, cognitive and behavioral issues and, ultimately, before she turned 7, given a diagnosis on the autistic spectrum. Before my baby girl was 4 years old, in the midst of my perpetual search to figure out what was wrong with her and 'fix' it, we moved back to my home state and into a home we shared with my mom and my dad, were who both very physically disabled by that time. I again became a caretaker to both parents and my three children. Although my husband thought it was the 'right thing' to care for his in-laws and I love him for the sentiment, it was not good for me to be back under the same roof with the "behave or you'll kill your mother" messenger, my dad. I'll delve into all of that another time.

Over the past 2 years, I have lost both my dad and my mom, my mother-in-law also passed unexpectedly, and I lost a job I'd had outside the home for over 10 years with an amazing boss the likes of whom I'll never find again. I lost some very dearly held illusions about my marriage. It has been a period of many losses. My sons are independent although one is still living at home and my daughter is now graduated out of the special education system and all the advocating I had done for her during her school years is finished. I'm learning to navigate the adult services world with her and it's going to take a lot more advocating. She now attends a day program where she is learning job skills and socializing for six hours, 5 days a week. Back in November, only a few months after becoming unemployed, losing my mom and having my daughter's high school 'graduation' party, I felt fairly lost when she went off to her adult program and I was left at home with no one to care for. I became even more addicted to my computer than I ever was before. Eventually, I allowed myself to truly grieve all the losses I'd gone through over such a short, sad time. Now, I am feeling as if I am emerging into a new, uncharted territory where I can do or be anything I'd like to be. Of course, there are the issues of having no money, going through a personal bankruptcy, trying to save our home and negotiate a modification of our mortgage as we recover from my husband's loss of our primary income for the better part of the last 2 years, and the value of our home becoming less than what we owe on it, but, all that aside, I am feeling as if I am finally letting go of the caretaker role that had been thrust on me for most of my life and beginning to experience a  release and a great relief.  It feels good to stay in bed until I feel like waking up. It feels good to experiment with recipes when I thought I'd lost my talent and my drive for cooking good, nutritious and tasty meals. And, it feels good to know that I can safely let go of my past preoccupation about everyone else's health and well-being, and put that same preoccupation into my own health and well-being and the health and well-being of my marriage. I do not need to feel guilty that I don't have a job right now; I've had many jobs since I was a little girl and I did them as well as I could.  As a good friend said to me recently when I complained of feeling useless and needing to find my true purpose in life.....maybe I've already served my purpose and now is the time to just find me and just BE.  I think I'm truly ready for that now!