Reactions to home birth

The reactions I've gotten as my husband proudly announces (to everyone) that we are doing a home birth. Even my own mother, who bravely had her two children at the end of the sixties when drugs and hospitals were at the height of the birthing fashion, said to me, "so you are really going to have your baby at home? - hope everything goes ok..." With an ever so slight implication of "are you sure you know what your doing?" but who would she be if she weren't the concerned, even fearful mother, even at the risk of being negative? My mother in-law also had an averse reaction... In fact it was the one person Israel didn't feel comfortable telling that we are doing a home birth. He generously handed me the phone to explain that no we were not going to the hospital, that yes we are going to have a midwife and then I proceeded to reassure her that if a problem arose we indeed did have a plan B (to deliver ourselves to the hospital). I was glad to take the call (as it was not my mother). Some good friends of ours said, why would you go back to primitive days of giving birth at home when now we have so much information?

They are mostly worried and concerned responses however, on occasion we do get the excited and supportive ones. The other day I was in the park swinging Zoe and got into a conversation with a women - she was pregnant and Im pregnant, (noticeably) She eventually asked me where Im giving birth and I told her a little reluctantly. She said, wow so am I! Soon to be mother of three she delivered the first one in the hospital (in Australia) her second at home with Cara and now the third again at home. Her husband is a doctor and at first was a little reluctant but of course did his own risk assessment and come to realize for low-risk pregnancies having a baby at home is actually a lower risk!.

Funny though lately when someone says to me they are delivering in the hospital I have a different kind of unease- Mine comes from the thought of not bonding during those first precious moments of life. About women turing over their power and authority to someone they don't necessarily share similar values with. - I think a safe and loving experience of birthing (one where the baby is honored and welcomed into the world) could serve the mother in feeling confident and trusting in her own instincts about what that child needs which goes on for the rest of his or her life. This isn't to say that if you have delivered in a hospital you wont be bonded with your baby - there are tons of factors and opportunities to build this relationship.

I don't believe anyone wants to put their unborn child at risk - I think there is a distinction between being careless and being clearly intentioned, a context that is, is there an emergency? If not, then can we brave just to be in a state of trust and at the same time mindful? Can we be open to the possibility that there is nothing wrong until there is something wrong? What if mothers really were encouraged to embrace & develop their intuitions - (what if that were automatic rather than, life equals a medical emergency) what kind of world would it be?

Eric Carle book event

On Sunday, November 30 (2pm), there will be a performance of "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" (as well as other Eric Carle books) at the Brooklyn Center for Performing Arts. Tickets are only $6 each.

Obligatory Donations

I got a call the other day from the school, I have my daughter currently enrolled in, asking me for a donation. The way the person on the line approached the conversation is to begin with an assumption. Or actually quite a few assumptions. She said, the fundraiser is due on Wednesday" The first assumption, was that I received "the fundraising package" explaining what the fundraiser was all about. The second assumption was that I was going to donate rather than volunteer making either one seem obligatory. I found it off-putting to say the least and luckily was there the week before and spoke with the Director of the school personally. During our meeting I specifically asked her if it was an obligation to donate and she said no- I did offer at that time to re-do the school website as it was, and still is, in (great) need of a re-design. Anyway she declined my offer. Granted this is her choice but that's where I felt I could make the most difference since its my area of expertise. So to get a call after offering something that is of a much higher monetary value to them (probably much bigger than my donation would be) was to me thoughtless and on some level leaves me feeling like either the organization doesn't communicate with one another or they just don't care.

What do you parents think. Should parents have to donate after paying tuition and actually teaching our children? And if so, shouldn't it be an invitation, at least in part, in the context of love and service of our community and our kids?

Film screening with Pros

If you haven't seen this film - its moving and educational and during the screening there are a few pro's there including Miriam, my now midwife who will answer questions. (see below)

"Birth Day Presence and Prenatal Yoga Center are proud to present a 
screening of the new film, Orgasmic Birth, followed by a Q&A with 
local birth professionals.

 Date: Sat, Nov 22
Time: 7pm
Location: BAX/Brooklyn Arts Exchange, 421 5th Ave, 3rd Floor 
(btwn 7th and 8th St. in Park Slope, Brooklyn)
Cost: $15 in advance, $20 at the door.
To purchase tickets, please visit
www.birthdaypresence.net/classdescriptions.html


Powerful, passionate and thought-provoking, with commentary by a dozen 
preeminent health professionals--including midwife Ina May Gaskin and 
Dr. Christiane Northrup--and 11 women and their partners who share
 their birthing journey, Orgasmic Birth dismantles untruths about labor 
and birth that women have been told for generations. The women in the 
film are transfigured and transformed by the power of their own 
bodies. Pioneering first-time filmmaker Debra Pascali-Bonaro brings to
 the screen the ultimate challenge to our cultural myths by inviting 
viewers to see first hand the glorious emotional, spiritual, and
 physical heights attainable through the miracle of birth. Featuring 
the birth photography of Jada Shapiro, co-founder of Birth Day Presence.

 Stay after for a panel on birth with various local birth
 professionals, including Miriam Schwartzchild and Kristen Leonard
(local homebirth midwives), Amanda Segilia (St. Lukes Roosevelt birth 
center midwife), Terry Richmond and Jada Shapiro (birth doulas and
co-founders of Birth Day Presence), and more.

"

Also a good friend of mine, and lactation consultant, sent me this link - Again Miriam delivering a baby at home. In case anyone is curious what one home birth looks like, here you go. 

The road to home birth...

With Zoe I had a safe (a little long) but remarkably smooth natural delivery with my husband at my side coaching me, and a fantastic mid-wife Susan Haas. (We also had a few others there that played a major role in creating a kind of insulated and safe birthing experience). At that time we couldn't have asked for anything more.

Partially because we didn't know what not to ask for or of what to ask. We did know that we wanted to re-create something similar if not even more of a "natural birth" experience as our first.  But what is a natural birth anyway? Even though we had this "natural birth" we started looking a little deeper,  even if by accident at first... It started with my some good freinds inviting us to a movie called "Orgasmic Birth" my husband dragged us.  I was thinking, "you have got to be kidding me"-but went anyway, if for nothing else the entertainment value. Yes the movie did have some orgasms but the major focus was about home birthing and creating a soothing and relaxing environment for women to birth their babies.

From a variety of different sources from movies to books (education came mostly through movies since I hardly have time for reading except for Hypnobirthing) we were slooooowly impacted. I began to realize that I had been turning my authority over to an illusion that I didn't even necessarily believe. The illusion is, that hospitals are the safest place to have a baby. The general but underlying context of most hospital settings started to be revealed to us. They are always standing by waiting for a medical emergency to occur - sometimes they even, believe it or not, cause them! Through The Business of Birth, What Babies Want & Orgasmic Birth I learned what a cool, relaxed and natural birth experience could be.

So now, looking back on our natural child birth I could nitpick about things that they did in the hospital that I never even questioned because they were "protocol" from wiping the baby down to the vitamin K shot within the first few minutes. Now I see there is no good reason to take the baby away from the mother (barring a medical emergency). Birth, I learned, is not a medical state of affairs. Its, as some old doctors that used to make house calls for births, conceived of as, a "family affair". Having said that, we feel lucky to have had the birth we had as well as the midwife we had. And now we can do our best to create the setting that is the most comforting to our new baby arriving into this crazy world.

In the meantime, we were leaning towards a birthing center (the best of both worlds we thought). We ruled out a couple off the birthing centers pretty soon in our search. A free-standing birth center in Brooklyn that, to me, defeated the idea of going to a birth center with no Nicu or backup defeated the purpose of leaving my house. The other option was Bellvue which has a lovely birth center but its so disconnected from the heart of any supporting philosohy and my experience of the hostpital was one of total bureaucracy. There was a water birthing option at LI hospital but call me spoiled but I thought the hospital was a little run down (Though we got to meet and talk to the nurse there who built the water birthing room and that was really neat). Finally we went to Roosevelt/ St. Lukes and got a tour. There were 80 people that day for 3 birthing rooms. That's 26 per room! Well as crazy as it sounds, I was willing to take my bets at Roosevelt/St. Lukes even with these crazy numbers and yet on a side note I was still entertaining a small chance of having a home birth. However, I had concerns.

One of them was a real medical emergency. The other was the one who I really trusted to accompany and guide us in a home birth, Susan Haas, said she didn't do home births and unless I found someone who I was really comfortable with it wasn't really a major priority for me.

I had had such a trusting experience with my former mid-wife, Susan Haas, that I was reluctant to go elsewhere and yet really wanted to create the generous setting that I now knew was possible. I went back to Susan one last time to say good-bye, I thought. In that meeting she said to me, "don't trade one hospital experience for another". She urged me to make a few calls and at least meet with a few home birthing midwifes. She recommended three. I did call a few of the referrals that Susan gave me, one of them was Cara (who was the main midwife in The Business of Birthing) She was unavailable. I then called Mirium Shwarzchild. (From her name I thought either she is going to be really old and Jewish or she is going to be too touchy-freely).

By the way, in the background of all of this ideal vision and planning there is a whole other discussion of insurance matters. Long story short, I'm 95% sure, we are covered.

Three weeks ago we were still oscillating between a birthing center and a home birth. Around this same time, something mechanical came to my attention about the fourth stage of birth and the typical way it was handled in hospitals which was disturbing. To say the least, it prodded me to do a little research and in my research I found info that addressed one of my major concerns about home birthing. (Which was the possibility of hemorrhaging). Anyway I got more clarity on the myths and facts and was not only reassured but a little shocked at what I found- if you want ill tell you later). I was willing to at least meet with one home birthing midwife. I went ahead and set up an apt with Mirium Shwarzchild.

I still wasn't convinced until Mirium walked through my door and I was convinced. I knew right away. I trusted her whole demeanor, her casual yet experienced and professional manner impressed me. I could then picture giving birth at home. She walked though some of my other concerns about having a plan B but mostly we just talked and she's great. Its been a really enlightening process of examining what we think we know and want to know to examining our underlying beliefs about what is, what isn't and in the end what we want to create for our life.

PS Susan (my original mid-wife) offered to come during the home birth. I mean how often do you get to attend a home birth?

Zoe and school?

This will be my first entry so I hope it will be somewhat compelling.  For me - the dilemmas and concerns of being a new mommy (of 2 years) was impressive enough to start a conversation about. 

My most recent adventure has been putting my daughter Zoe in preschool and... taking her out. She is very independent and social and we felt, at first that she would do well to be with other kids more than she had been. However, other factors played a role; creating time for my work-life and a new baby on the way. Both being good-enough reasons for preschool on their own. Moving a career forward in small blocks of time can be eh hum challenging. We also wanted to make sure that we were creating enough stimulation for Zoe as well as attempting to offset any possible jealousy of the new baby with the distraction of school-life. Yet, after a good trial period - one solid month from 9:30-4PM (enough time for everyone to adjust) well, I just wasn't sold on my own brilliant plan any longer. Nothing really seemed "wrong" with the school. The teachers were attentive - a little limited in their child development philosophy - but the curriculum seemed decent enough.  The other kids seemed really sweet and always welcomed Zoe, etc. You see, when picking her up from school, I would spy through the gate (hopefully not encouraging others, of the non-parental role, to do the same) and I would see her either clinging to the teachers or finally just sitting alone, staring at her shoes. Seeing her not playing with the other kids like she always had in other situations was foreign to me. That was what did it for me- there is no reason that a 2 year old should not be engaged whenever there is ample opportunity. Not to mention that she would often talk to her dolls and tell them, "I miss you all day."  Almost every day that I picked her up, she told me that she missed mommy and daddy and she had been crying in school.  Looking back, I can't believe I waited so long but I wanted to give it a fair shake for all the reasons mentioned above. Plus, what made the decision even more complex, is that she would get excited about specific things at school which had us waiver.

Currently, she is mostly at home with mom and we go to a "mommy and me" type of school where I take her for two days from 12-2PM. She gets to socialize with other kids and still have me nearby. I've noticed that she is more clingy than she used to be and hope we haven't already traumatized her. I have yet to find a solution for my time management - especially when it comes to working from home.  Now we have the added dilemma of figuring out what exciting activities to do on the days that she is not in school.  But I'm sure this will be another adjustment period as it seems parenthood is chock full of them - ad infinitum. Thankfully, I do have one full-day offered by Israel's mom. Israel is going to take her on Friday afternoons and if I can get one more day covered by a Hebrew speaking nanny, I would be set for a little while, that is, until the new arrival comes. 

Any ideas for cool things to do on days off? We were thinking music, gymnastics (though she may still be a little young), art and, of course, finger painting and story time are always staples.