The grave yard at the back of the fridge.

Thought of the day - you know you're not going to win any house keeping awards when you find hot cross buns in the back of your fridge half way through June.

Preparing for Ella Bo Bella

Okay, this isn't even the birth story. This is how I prepared for the HBAC (Home Birth After Cesarean) of EBB. It's long and probably isn't of interest to every one. However if you are planning a birth after surgery yourself, or just like this sort of thing, I hope it's useful/interesting for you. If you have any questions/comments I'm happy to  reply to them*.
*Unless you're being a jerk and then I'll just delete your comment. This isn't a forum - it's a blog.

For the birth of my first child I booked into a hospital home birth program. I thought that this sort of program would offer me a 'safe' middle way between a hospital birth and the 'dangers' or being completely out of the system. I'll give you a moment to collect yourself...

I had a long and exhausting pre-labour with lots of vomiting and no sleep. My MW had just come off a long shift and was in and out of our unit every few hours in five minute bursts. The contractions became more painful but never established. I was told my son was posterior and the labour would be long and painful. My husband and I were panicked and exhausted by the time she said my son was distressed and we needed to transfer. Of course he wasn't in distress by the time we made it in! Then followed an epidural, syntocin, purple pushing for 2 hours, seeing the very top of his head in the mirror they had brought in to show me how to push and then, finally, surgery. I don't know why I could see his head and not push him out. I have no idea why the decision to have a c-sec was made.

After my surgery, like so many women, I promised myself and my future baby that next time would be different. I'm going to be honest though, right up until labour started for my second baby I wasn't sure it would be different in the sense that I'd have a 'proper' homebirth or different in that I'd just book myself in for an elective. And it wasn't until I felt her crown that I really knew that I could birth her.

Time and time again I read in VBAC stories – “I believed in my body,” “I knew I could birth this baby”. I didn't know any of that. I had trusted my body before and it had let me down.

My initial steps forward into an HBAC was decided by my idea that if I really wanted a c-sec I could turn up at a hospital at any point and tell them that's what I wanted no matter what I had previously planned but if I wanted a home birth with an independent midwife (IM) I couldn't leave my planning to the last minute. The local hospital had a successful VBAC rate of 9.8% so I knew booking in for any thing other than repeat surgery was a joke. So with a total lack of gung-ho, confidence or chutzpah I proceeded to plan for my daughter's birth.

I began to search for an IM and through a birth/parenting forum I'm a member of I met the wonderful Rachele. I think the most important thing (but not the only thing!) she provided me with during the pregnancy was the time and space to talk through my son's birth over and over again. Being able to vocalise my memories in the context of being pregnant and preparing to birth again took away a lot of their sting. It also reminded me that my surgery happened for a variety of reasons and while it might be impossible to accurately pin point the place where it went wrong there were reasons and not some bogey man sitting on my shoulder cursing me to have a bad birth.

Despite this I was still very afraid. My fear started out fairly simply – I would go through the same labour and have the same out come. Then it developed into the fear that many women with a previous uterine scar have – a catastrophic rupture. All the statistics showed how unlikely it was, how an unhindered labour and birth were better not just for myself and this baby but for any future pregnancies I might have and yet... I wanted a guarantee. I wanted to know with out doubt that every thing was going to be ok. And cowardly and immaturely, I wanted to be free of the responsibility of the outcome for myself and my baby. If some thing went wrong I wanted to be able to point to some one, any one else and say “you're to blame”. But wherever I birthed, wherever I put my trust it was ultimately my choice and my responsibility – as it is for every other pregnant woman who knowingly or unknowingly makes these decisions. (Obviously this does not extend to cases of genuine medical negligence however as a woman with previous surgery I had to be aware of certain things ie – surgery was more likely than a normal birth if I fronted up to a hospital.)

My husband had more faith in the process than I did. He'd tell me that we were more likely to be in a car accident driving to the hospital than being injured having a birth at home. It didn't help that I was a fairly nervous driver! Finally it was advise from my longest standing friend that helped me to let go: “Every one starts labour at home any way so you might as well stay there for as long as you feel comfortable with that. If you need a second opinion then that's what you have a midwife for. It's silly to do yourself out of some thing you want because you're afraid.” I resolved to play the cards that had been given to me. If every thing progressed normally I would push a baby out where the labour commenced. If not I'd go to the hospital but there was nothing that fear would achieve. This became the theme of my pregnancy – letting go of fear.

I started to accept that there was nothing any one could tell me, any book I could read or study that I could memorise that was going to guarantee me a good outcome. 'Knowledge' was not my talisman against evil. All I could do was stack the odds in the favour of myself and my baby knowing that even a 99% success rate still allows for a 1% failure rate. At 31 it's a bit odd to think of taking further steps into adulthood but I feel that during this pregnancy I became more mature in my outlook on life as a whole.

My local GP was actually of great assistance to me. Every time I saw her – be it for me or my son or husband – she would keep insisting that there were things I 'had' to do. Tests that 'needed' to be done. Things I 'needed' her for. Each time she talked over the top of me, talked down to me, was not able to provide me with further information as to the 'whys' behind certain routines being followed or the potential side effects of tests I became more firmly convinced that having an IM was gold class care and that the current medical model was better suited for cattle than women. Honestly, if she had been knowledgeable, compassionate or in any way interested in my pregnancy beyond it being a mechanical event or in me as a person rather than a potential pathological case I would have struggled with my reasons for avoiding the medical establishment. However, she gave me some thing to 'kick' against and over all I am stronger for having to defend myself. In the end I had two scans to check for the placement of the placenta and I monitored my own blood sugar. I did not have bloods taken and I did not have the GD test. Rachele took my blood pressure each time we met and used a doppler to check the baby's heart beat from around sixteen weeks. I decided on every test I would have or not making my decision based on careful research. Nothing was done 'just because'.

The thought that kept returning to me however was that I simply could not imagine enduring the pain of labour all the way through to the end. I'm not stoic and I don't aspire to stoicism. How could I experience what I was sure was going to be much more pain than my first labour without relief? I prayed a lot. St Jude – the patron saint of hopeless cases - heard from me quite frequently (but we've been friends for awhile :) ). I enlisted other women – one woman from the birth/parenting forum and an old school friend – to pray for me. I thought about Mary freebirthing in a shed full of animals after riding for days on a donkey. And I thought of all of the millions of women before me who had birthed knowing it was literally do or die. They didn't have to think about resisting the temptation of epidurals, they weren't burdened with trimesters or 'post dates', if they weren't dilating at exactly 1cm per hour then they just didn't – you went into labour and birthed because there was no other options. I tried to see myself as being like them. Of course, if I or my baby were at risk I would go to hospital but if I had an intervention it would up the odds of every thing else fucking up. So I had to do every thing in my power to stay at home and stay safe.

I got to 40 weeks. I was frustrated because from the start I felt that this baby was going to be coming closer to 39 weeks. At 40+3 mum called and told me not to let the pregnancy go on too long. Then at 40+4 she rang and asked if it was okay for her to come the next day to spend the weekend with me. This was challenging. It's the first rule of homebirthing isn't it? Protect your space. How could I home birth with a house guest? On another level I felt like this was a vote of 'no confidence'. Mum told me later that she had a strong feeling that she was 'needed'. Mum has often had these sorts of intuitions and they're right often enough for me to have learnt not to roll my eyes when she says it.

Then I figured that this was just life. Mum comes to stay quite frequently during the year and it's always good to have her here. So what if I'm expecting to go into labour? I wasn't planning on putting any other part of my life on hold so why shouldn't my mother visit? I also figured that if I were really uncomfortable with her staying I just wouldn't go into labour at all! Mum promised to vacate to a hotel if labour started and I told her that she wasn't to stress me out while she was here :)

So mum arrived on the Friday afternoon. I was not expecting anything to happen until the following Tuesday. That night, at 40+6, I was woken about 6 times with period like pain in my abdomen...

To be continued...

Fail

Just tried to 'follow' another blog. Ended up 'following' my own blog. The definition of narcissism. Well bollocks. It's too late and I'm too tired to try to fix it.

Hideeho Good Neighbours

Hello to every one who is taking the time to drop by my humble blog.
From the stats it seems as though I have had visitors from Australia, the USA, China and Germany this week alone! Thanks so much for dropping by :)

In a totally platonic way of course. No tongue. (That means you people from Germany!) (Just kidding)

Zoom zoom zoom

I'm a timid driver. Timid to the point where I think I should buy a soft felt hat so the motorists behind me have no misconceptions about exactly how slowly I intend to drive. It takes me five minutes to change lanes. I will drive behind an L plater doing 60 in a 90 zone rather than over take. Trust me, you don't want to be travelling behind me. Which is fine because I don't want you behind me either. Nor do I want you infront of me. Infact, it would be better for every one if we could just clear the road entirely. Please?
But in my heart dear reader it is a very different story. In my heart I am a master of the road. I merge through three lanes of traffic with out hesitation. I zoom around corners with out gripping on to the wheel like grim death. In my heart I drive a manual.
I was making my way home late one night when I felt the rumble of a mighty sub woofer from some where in the distance. I felt the music before I heard it. I had just exited the highway when a car materialized behind me, streaked past at what must have been close to 120km, merged through four lanes of traffic with out indicating (and I suspect with out looking), turned left with out slowing down and disappeared with a flash of blue as it entered light speed (okay, I may have over stated that last bit). I was so shaken that I nearly had a panic attack behind the wheel. I mean really! How dangerous! How irresponsible! How freaking cool*. 
I don't want to be a speed demon. I don't want to be an incautious driver.
But I'd like to think I would be able to... should I ever want to.
So my fellow driver I take my pink felted hat off to you. Could you give me some pointers on reverse parking?

The Driver I Am

The Driver I Would Like To Be

*I'd just like to make clear should I or any member of my family be injured or killed because of an accident caused by such a knob jockey I would be extremely angry and upset. Of course I don't really want to be such an idiot driver in the same way you, dear reader, don't want to have a light saber to chop down people who annoy you (except of course, you kinda do. Don't you? But not really.)

Hell is other people and all of them have blogs.

Ella has been in a feeding frenzy for the last 24 hours. Being pretty much confined to the sofa for large parts of the day gave me time to trawl through other blogs. Such a mistake. Don't want to feel fat? Don't buy fashion mags. Don't want to feel old? Don't be friends with people younger than yourself on Facebook. Don't want to feel like a failure as a parent, a slob as a house keeper, totally under accomplished in every single aspect of your life including in some areas which you never realised should be part of your life? Don't read blogs. It's not that these people are wizards with a glue gun, inspired play mates to and educators of their off spring, wonderful and frugal chefs and able to 'repurpose' old curtains into first communion dresses for their daughters it's that they are so freaking cheerful and organised and Pollyanna about every bloody thing. You know what it is? It's honest to goodness, darn tootin' wholesomeness. It makes me want to inject heroin into my eye.
Example - one woman decided to repaint her laundry. The previous colour was too 'country' so she decided to re paint it 'milk'. Well, that clashed with the colour of the the window sill so she repainted the whole thing again to some thing more 'exotic'. What's on my laundry's walls? Lint. Had it ever occurred to me that a laundry could be 'country' or 'exotic' or any thing other than a place where you keep your washer and drier? Nope.
They organise their kids lunches into muffin trays in rainbow themed colours instead of throwing whatever doesn't look too ratty in the fridge onto a hastily rinsed plate. They turn old dresses into blouses into a girl's skirt into a doll's overalls. These become heirlooms and carefully packed away in moth balls until their own daughters produce the next generation of happy home makers.  They decorate jam jars with buttons and lace cut offs so that their husbands find their breakfast tray prettier. Ask me what my husband has for breakfast. I don't know. I'm not up by then.
But the real question is why? Not why do they do it - I don't care why they do it. But why does it bother me that they do it at all?
I think because deep down it's because I'm a pretendy adult. I'm not really grown up. I'm not really responsible. Things that adults should know or do - how to use a lawn mower, change a tire, toilet train a 2.5 year old, make a consumme, know what a consumme is, who to call when the smoke detector won't stop beeping, make a pair of lounge pants from an old T-shirt, recover a lamp shade or a sofa, remember to wash the sheets once a week, do the washing up twice a day, getting the Christmas tree up before Christmas Eve and down before Lent - I have no idea about. I've been on my red P plates for awhile now. When am I meant to move on to my greens? No idea.
Deep down I think I will know that I'm an adult when I can do every thing I remember my own mother doing. I suspect that she is the imprint in my mind of what a real proper grown up woman is like. So I guess it's reasonable to assume I will be that same imprint for Ella.
Who knows? Maybe she'll appreciate how far I've lowered the bar.

Trodgor and Ella Bo Bella

People are different. I know this. I have met many people in my life. And you know what? They were all different. Even people who are twins. Even people who are twins, were separated at birth, reunited at 41, featured on Oprah where a big deal is made out of the fact they're both over weight truckers, with a penchant for checked shirts, married to women called Joan who also look like they're twins (to each other, not to the truckers) - even those people are different.
Maybe it's because I'm an only child. Maybe I just lack imagination. But every day I am surprised all over again by how different Troggers and EBB are from each other. I knew there would be boy/girl differences. I knew there would be age differences. But deep down I kinda thought that EBB would be more-or-less just a version of Trogdor. Yeah... not so much

1. Differences in the pregnancy. Warning - vomit is mentioned frequently in the next paragraph.
For Troggers I experienced a day or two of feeling queasy and I got a bad cold at around 6 months. All in all it was a breezy, easy pregnancy which I smugly and mistakenly put down to my own will power. While I was pregnant with Ella I did not experience a vomit free trimester. First trimester = 'morning' sickness which occurred at night as I was trying to get home from work. Many a journey was interrupted by me fleeing from the bus to vomit into public bins. Classy. Second trimester = three stomach bugs and a cough which was so violent it would trigger my gag reflex and I would vomit. Third trimester - reflux like I can't even describe. Vomiting stomach acid is less fun than vomiting any thing else I can think of. I lost 7kg by the end of the pregnancy.
Troggers was also a very busy baby. He would kick and kick and kick. It was like he was building extensions in there. When he pushed his little arm or leg out I was never sure if it were a limb or if he had just finished erecting a pagoda. Ella was a much more chilled baby. Occasionally she'd roll over. Every now and then she might have a stretch. At times the doppler would pick up refrains of what sounded like "Don't worry be happy" echoing in the waters...

2. Differences in the first month. Trogdor was awake and alert and just thrilled to be on the other side of the womb. Ella slept. In every 24 hour period she was awake for maybe 6 hours all up. At the end of the first month I felt like I had hardly bonded with her at all. In fact some times it surprised me to find a baby on my boob, asleep in my bed or in the pram as I pushed it down the street. As a mother of a new born I never expected my first reaction to hearing my little one cry to be "Oh that's right. I've had another one."

3. Boob is no longer a cure-all. Whatever was wrong with Trogdor, whether he were hungry, sad, happy, scared, bored, sick, tired, suffering existential angst,  it could all be fixed by popping a boob in his mouth. Ella is not so easily placated. Honestly I can see now that in life pre-EBB I completely believed every thing could be solved by lots of boob and lots of co-sleeping. EBB has taught me better. Of course, she might want boob but only if she's hungry. Conversely she might need to be carried so she can see over your shoulder room to room until she falls asleep. It's possible that her nappy is ever so slightly damp and must be changed IMMEDIATELY. She could need to lie in a darkened room while some one gently kisses her face. She might need to be carried cradled in arms listening to Prog Rock (Porcupine Tree for preference). Do not attempt to play Pop at this point. It will not be received well. In short she is a baby of decided tastes and she accepts no substitutions.

4.Sickness.  Trogdor was better at being sick. When Trogdor had a cold all he needed was some one to sleep next to him and he would tough it out. Not so with EBB. Gentle whispers of "It's alright. Mummy's here" in the middle of the night are greeted with hysterical wails. "Yes woman, I know you're there," her little shrieks seem to say, "now how are you going to fix me?"

5. Nom noms. EBB loves her food. Trogdor spent weeks staring at us while we were eating and making little chewing movements with his mouth. When we finally let him have some pureed apple he was kind of interested but the novelty value wore off pretty quickly. EBB on the other hand really didn't seem to be all that enthused at the idea of eating solids but one day I tentatively offered her some mushy fruit just to see what she thought. I nearly lost my hand. She loves to eat. Already she's desperate to move on from fruit and keeps eyeing off her brother's Vegemite toast. Maybe she'll be Australia's youngest Masterchef?

The fact is the biggest difference between them is that she is my Ella Bo Bella and he is my Trogdor. It seems silly now to expect them to be similar to each other when they are so busy being themselves. They are so unique and perfectly their own person. It seems amazing and yet so obvious that I could scour the world and I would never find them replicated. It's an amazing gift and a profound responsibility.

Welcome Ella Bo Bella

Yes, I know. I'm never here, I never write and I suck. In my defense I've been a bit busy. Who could think about blogging with some thing so gorgeous and time consuming in the house?

Ella Bo Bella was born on the 27th of November 2010 at home, in the water after a quick and intense labour. I was supported by Spidermonkey, my great friend Tyd, my Mum and my midwife Rachele (if you're in NSW and looking for an awesome midwife contact me and I'll pass on her details).  Her birth story just keeps getting more epic each time I revisit it. One day I'll finish it and post it up.
It's hard to believe that she's six months old already. She and Trogdor are thick as thieves and will shortly put their plans for world domination into action.