Baby Mammals

Our chapter leader Amy has long wished to write a blog post about the Pittsburgh Zoo, and I don't want to steal her thunder. But I just read something interesting in my Zoo Insider that made me think about the way our society regards birth and the postpartum period.

There's a little article in the Insider about how one of the sea lions is pregnant. The article says sea lions have about 15% infant mortality and that a huge factor in survival is the mother/baby bond. It emphasizes how crucial it is for moms to accept their pups and begin nursing right away.

When I think back to the way my birth experience affected the early days of my mothering experience, I shudder. I had such a difficult time bonding with my baby, mostly because I was wigged out of my mind on drugs for several weeks, but also because I was in a bad way emotionally. The fact that I didn't even get to lay eyes upon my baby right away meant we instantly got off to a delayed start for our bonding process. But, because of various medical complications from my birth, it was literally weeks until I even looked at my son without painkillers and steroids affecting my vision.

I just feel like it's a little backwards when we totally emphasize the mother/baby bond for zoo mammals and write newsletters about its importance, but yet deliver 33% of our human babies in such a way that breastfeeding and bonding is compromised. What sort of difference might it make if OBs and regular old American families got newsletters about mother/infant bonding, urging everyone to root for new human moms and their babies in this way?

Of course I am rooting for Maggie and her new baby to have a great experience. I also want society at large to know that birth matters and that mothers' experiences are really, really important for getting our human families off to a strong start.

Ina May's Guide to Childbirth

An ICAN friend leant me a copy of Ina May's Guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskin. I am about halfway through reading it and find it a very emotional process.

The first half of the book consists of beautiful birth stories. There are 130 pages of women describing their natural births. I finish each story in tears, either because the story was so beautiful or because I learned something about my own body or birth that makes me feel...well, just really eager to try again.

Of particular interest to me were the VBAC stories in the collection. I felt like the mothers in this book did a fantastic job of verbalizing my own thoughts and feelings about birth and I really felt like I rejoiced with them when they placed their own newborn babies on their stomachs or started nursing right away.

I am just a few pages into the second section of the book, where Ina May discusses the birth process and what I assume will be her guidance through a beautiful labor. She has a lot to say about fear and its affect on the cervix. I find myself wondering (well, who am I kidding! Fixating!) whether my anxieties about motherhood and my fear of medical interventions lead to the chain of events resulting in my c-section.

I feel like if Ina May had been in that LDR room, she would have told me first to blow raspberries and make out with Corey during contracts, then to verbally tell my body to open, and then she would have made me feel like 18 hours is still a "normal" time for a cervix to open up. Yes. Even 18 hours.

One thing I feel certain of is that this book is a fantastic read for any birth junkie and probably should be essential reading for pregnant women. I'm so glad Emily let me borrow it!

Fear!

I haven't written in awhile. Yes, I have been busy with work, but mostly I've been afraid. Somewhere on facebook, I saw a discussion about (of course!) birth and one mother mentioned something frightening about her c-section. This mother had been convinced by her OB that she was in an emergent, dangerous situation and needed what she believed was an emergency cesarean. Later, this mother reviewed her medical records and saw the word "elective" instead of emergency.

I haven't been able to sleep since. I am so terrified to even request my records. What if mine reflect the same thing? When I've tried to talk to some friends about this, they typically say, "What's the difference?" How do I begin to explain the wide, wide world of difference there?

The fear that my surgery was an unneccessarian has been clouding my ability to think. I am trying to summon up the courage to call Magee and snag a copy of my medical record. I don't think I can read it alone. I think it's important to know, though, what it says about me, right? Why should I let someone else tell my story without my input or knowledge? But what can I do if I disagree with the story it tells?

Rock on, Tilda!

I was reading the latest issue of Bust magazine and came across what I felt was an awesome bit of insight from actress Tilda Swinton. When asked about new motherhood, Tilda told Bust, "It's like a new person comes into being--you as a mother. But the old person, the not-mother, goes on. And you ignore her at your own peril! If you think she's not going to come bite you in the ass 20 years later, then...you'll have a big surprise on your hands."

I think that's so great to read because I felt like she captured something I'm feeling. Instead of changing into just one new person, I felt like motherhood sort of smashed my old self into this new self and sometimes, well sometimes I can feel them both sort of needing attention. I love that a well-read magazine publishes sentiments like these to let women know it's definitely ok to need to pamper your "not-mother" self every now and then.

Body Image

At the first ICAN meeting I attended, Amy (our leader) mentioned that many women feel betrayed by their bodies after a traumatic birth experience. This resonated with me so strongly!

I think I had pretty good body image before I got pregnant. Sure, I felt awkward about bathing suit season, but I felt really confident in my fitness and my muscles and I knew my body could do anything I asked it to. And I asked it to do a lot of things! I had all these exciting goals I was working toward, like pull-ups and rope climbs. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I played rugby for ten years.

And then my birth experience turned everything upside-down. I really felt, for a long time, that it was my body's deficiency that somehow caused my c-section. WHY hadn't my baby descended into my pelvis despite such strong contractions? WHY was my cervix stalling at 5 cm? The questions came from everywhere, relentlessly, and they were all focused on what I viewed as my body's betrayal of my mind.

My midwives were great at answering the technical questions about my birth. The therapist I started seeing was great about helping me to realize that sometimes, there is no answer, there is no specific person or thing to blame, and things just happen.

But the sense of betrayal and even anger at my body lingered for a really long time. It seeped into every other thing I did, including my breastfeeding experience. Through my research as a writer, I've spoken to a number of new mothers who felt this body anger. Women kept saying, "If only!"

If only I had pushed harder. If only I had bigger hips. If only I hadn't succombed to the pain and begged for the epidural...we women, it seems, turn to our bodies when we seek something to "blame" for our birth experiences.

I think it can take a really long time, and most certainly a strong support network, to overcome these feelings. One thing that I found really helpful in the beginning was affirmations. My therapist suggested I find something, each day, that my body had done and to verbally affirm this amazing achievement.

My body grew a healthy baby! My body is amazing.

My body carried laundry up and down stairs on 3 hours of sleep. My body is amazing.

What has your body done today?

Physical Activity After the C-Section

I haven't posted in a few days because I was preparing for, playing, then recovering from my first rugby game in almost 2 years. You see, before I became a mother, I was a competitive athlete (in addition to all my other roles and identities). For ten years, I trained like a fiend for the only full-contact sport in the world where the rules are the same for men and women alike.

Rugby is an intense sport for many reasons, the biggest of which is probably the cardiovascular fitness and strength the game requires. I was in amazing shape when I got pregnant and, with the approval of my midwives, was able to continue working out up until the day I delivered. I actually had gone to the weight room and done 75 overhead olympic lifts the morning before I had my son. I tell other athletic moms-to-be that power cleans were my secret labor inducer.

All kidding aside, one of the most difficult things for me to mentally adjust to was the physical limitations after surgery. I was going to have a natural birth and start working out again after, like, one week off. And then, instead, I was flat on my back unable to sneeze. Training had always been my way of dealing with stress, too. There was nothing a sweaty workout couldn't clear up.

So, having to face the most intense experience of my life (motherhood PLUS my first experience with any sort of physical complication, injury, or surgery) and then spend five weeks "taking it easy," well that was tough.

It's been ten months since Miles was born, and I am only very recently beginning to feel rested enough and recovered enough to truly test myself physically. It feels so, so, so amazing to exercise again! But boy, my body is really different now. For one thing, I still can't sit up from lying flat on my back. Other things seem much easier (like any sort of lift mimicking hoisting up a 21 lb baby...).

Returning to fitness is a slow and winding road. It sure feels good to be driving it.

Staples vs Stitches?

I noticed an article on Stroller Derby the other day where the authors started a debate around staples vs stitches for a c-section incision. The article references a study done at the University of Insubria in Italy that found, cosmetically, the two methods produce equal results. It then refers to an earlier study that found staples increase the chances of complications post-surgery.

When I had my c-section, I had internal stitches and external staples for a few days. These were then replaced with those butterfly sticky things, which stayed put for more than a month before coming off in the shower. My scar is in pretty good shape these days in the sense that it's pale pink and only gently raised.

What sort of closure method did other moms encounter? I don't recall being given a choice or discussion about it, but then my surgery was an emergency one and not a planned or scheduled operation. Did other moms have a similar experience? How are your scars holding up these days?