Descisions & Listening To Your Inner Baby...

Well, so the pool thing was fun - but it was a LOT colder than I expected, so it didn't last long. But! It was a fun little spontaneous bonding adventure for hubby & I...and then we snuggled really well during sleep and I'm pretty sure I managed a full night without punching him. :D I'm sure he's pretty happy about that as well. 


Little Ana is SUPER active today.  I'm enjoying my salads, fruits, veggies and she's having a little party in there. I need to keep reminding myself to stick to healthy this week; glucose testing on Friday! I'm hoping I pass the 1-hour and don't have to do the dreaded 3-hour. I generally eat rather healthy and don't much care for sweets or breads (the breads are a total pregnant anti-craving for me). I drink tons of water every day and limit my tea to 1 glass of green-jasmine-sweet-tea when I get to work. I'm thinking I'll be ok hopefully. My BP has been completely awesome the whole time (and has actually gotten better as I progress) and I still haven't gained more than 2lbs...contrary to how my belly looks. I swear little Ana is taking everything I eat, lol.


So my monthly midwife appointment is this Friday - the last meeting wasn't too awesome. It followed my 20wk sono which ended with the flighty dr saying she couldn't see all of the heart well enough to get a picture of all 4 chambers at once. She assured my mom and I that it was probably okay, but they were going to send me to Children's to get another look "just to be sure". The midwife called me quite concerned and said that the dr put on the report that something was probably wrong and that I needed a fetal-echo to get the full heart picture...and even labeled it as Hypoplastic Right Heart Syndrome. All based on an uncertainty. I was pissed. But, getting pissed doesn't change anything...and neither does worrying. So, I decided to not allow it to affect me (mostly). I'm working on my mind-over-matter bit and picturing Ana's little healthy heart beating away all happy and bouncy like. I've sent many prayers up to the big dude in the sky.  We'll see what happens at the testing on Wed.


On top of that whole possibility-facing-mess, the midwife (who is decidedly NOT the one I want to use...which I realize I may not have a choice) launches into a story about how her grandson had HLHS and had the operations after being born and died. *BAM!* The End. No uplifting words, no encouragement...just "Oh this happened to me and he died." We didn't respond how she wanted us to...not quite sure how she expected us to react, but yeah...WHO DOES THAT??? 


So we skip over that part and move to the next topic: how I'm doing, what I'm eating, what vitamins I'm taking, and birthing classes. When I was in there 2x previously, both midwives were in the middle of labour-delivery and I met with a student-midwife who told me simply to look into birthing classes. She didn't give me specifics, so I went on my own search for different styles and classes.  I came across Hypnobabies - which uses self-hypnosis as a relaxation technique. I'm used to using meditation and other hippie-friendly things (diet change, sleep, natural remedies, etc) and this seems like a complete fit for how I envision my birth going: peaceful, happy, and actually exciting! 


Go back to most recent MW visit with Ms. Negative: "We use the Bradley method, you should do that class first and use hypnobabies next time." Complete disregard for my reasoning on why I thought it was a good fit for me. On the dietary things we went over, "juice is full of sugar, you should get your vitamin C from supplements." Again, completely ignoring me when I said that I use mostly organics and natural foods (less sugars/no added-sugar) and that I have 1 glass of juice a day...the rest is all real happy fruits. I understand that I can take vitamin supplements and that I need to make sure I'm getting the right amounts, but I also believe that if you eat healthy, the need for supplements is negated. I've never eaten so healthy in my life! My cravings are all fruits/veggies lately. I eat a salad a day at least.  Hubby and I both left that appointment feeling less than happy with her...but fortunately, we both have an awesome need to support each other and we collectively decided to disregard her attitude as a single instance for right now and reassess after the heart exam this Wed. 


So, now I'm in preparation mode for the test on Wed and the MW appointment on Friday...I haven't started taking the extra vitamin C (btw, my multi-vitamin I am taking has 100% in it already), or the pro-biotic (which I do want to start taking - but figure if I start taking it that day, I can say "yes, I'm taking it"), and I haven't signed up for any birthing classes as of yet.  The whole experience last month with her made me sink back into grrrr-panic-NO! mode...which I know isn't productive or good for the baby. I know I need to take classes and be prepared or natural will just not be any fun...so I did more research today. Thank God for the interwebs! 


When I started my research today, I was of the mindset of: "well, she does have years of experience and I should follow what she says." I started looking into The Bradley Method and found no real concrete description of what it consisted of really...until I found the instructor pages which listed the curriculum. 12 weeks of classes (vs. 6 wks with the Hypnobabies), and no emphasis on techniques/relaxation practices other than weekly points of focus. Part of the whole Hypnobabies concept that strikes me as "right" is that you're given CDs to listen to where you have to devote 45 min daily to practicing with and relaxing. To me, this isn't simply a once-needed class but something that can be (should be) adapted to every-day life to make it more tranquil overall. 


I still wasn't quite convinced in switching back to my original class tho - the one instructor I had contacted took 3 weeks to respond to me and didn't pay attention to the information I was asking for - it took me 3x to get the cost of the course from her. I get easily turned off by people who don't pay attention after multiple attempts. So, I looked further to see if there were any other instructors, and I found another Hypnobabies instructor local to me who had MUCH more information on her site than the one I first contacted. I emailed Susan and she responded relatively immediately on her way back from NY even!! I've always known I'm an intuition kind of gal - and I believe in signs...a quick-response time vs. 3 wks is a pretty good sign of dependability to me - and a multitude of information available is even more reassuring. 


I felt good about finding the right instructor, but how to comfortably counter the midwife on my decision was a different matter. More interweb-research!! I found this really awesome board from my google of Bradley Method vs. Hypnobabies and have MUCH thanks to the poster "Sudonk" who, I think, compared the methods quite concisely and informatively. In trying to decide which method to go with, I was worried that Hypnobabies might lack some of the information from Bradley Method...but after reading the posts in that entry (and others following), I feel like it would be an even better choice especially given that Hypnobabies was created by a previous-Bradley-instructor. The main difference being that TBM treats birthing as a painful experience that moms need to deal with and learn how to manage; whereas HB treats it as a peaceful experience that you can attain through knowing your body and how to guide the brain/body into a positive natural flow of birth. 


What I've learned today: trust my instincts, do the research to back it up, go back to midwives prepared to say "No, this is my birth, I wanna try this way." and see what they say. :)  I told Tim about my research and he's with me 100% of the way - it's such an awesome thing to have such a solid, positive, cheerful, and equally-obstinate husband and partner. I loves him to PIECES!!!! <3!  I'm focusing on lesson 1 of the Hypnobabies ideals: picture the happy birth and how it should be - and applying it to my 2 appointments this week. I'm picturing a happy healthy heart in my happy little baby, and I'm picturing a happy MW visit with my favoured midwife where everything goes happy and how I want it to be. :D

It's All in the Delivery...

       So, I seem to be having a very difficult internal struggle with my decision of Midwife/Birthing-Center vs. OBGYN/Birthing-Inn/Hospital. For the longest time, I've really reaaaaaally wanted to do water birth - the whole thing, in the little pool. I'm a fish. I love water. I'm most comfortable and relaxed in the water. Aside from that, I've done rather extensive research on the benefits of water birthing vs. on a table flat on your back, legs in the air. I've also done plenty of research that leads me in a no-questions-about-it decision of wanting natural vs. drugs for the delivery - which also leads right back to the awesomeness of water birthing. (Scary factoid: 40% of Northern Va hospital births end up in cesarean section.)


The dilemma here is threefold:
       1) This is my first pregnancy and I have no idea what to expect. Everything is going normal as of now, all of my bloodwork and tests are "boring" according to the OBGYN I'm currently seeing. However, I still have 6 months to go...well, 6-7 depending on how long I incubate this little sprog. Anything could happen. I have no past experience to go off of to determine if my body will react normal or weird to this whole pregnancy thing.
       2) The OBGYN I'm seeing currently is really awesome; however, they work with the Loudoun Birthing Inn which is off of Loudoun County Hospital - which does not allow full water birth. They allow you to sit in a nice warm bubbly tub for the laboring part, but then you have to get out and lay on the slab to actually birth the child. So you get part of the benefit at least, but the whole idea is that water birthing allows for a less traumatic transition from mommy-belly to real-world, plus less risk of tearing. The facilities are nicer than a hospital, yet still look semi-hospitalish (the same uncomfortable bed and the "sleep-chair" for the spouse looks less-than-comfy), but you are expected to stay over-night - which I kind of like for monitoring the first 24 hours. They also have people to assist with first-24-hr feeding so new-mommy can rest, and they have a super secure facility and nursery. Also, if anything does go wrong, the hospital is right there, and there's a nic-u for baby-emergencies. If an emergency arises, I know minutes mean the difference between safe and not. 
       3) The Birthing Center/Midwife: There's only one full-on birthing-center in this area - Chantilly. They have 4 rooms with real furnishings: Queen sized bed, couches in the rooms, chairs, your own bathroom, a birthing tub IN the room where you can do the full complete birth and after-birth relaxation in the tub. You're not separated from your baby after birth, you're allowed to have whomever and as many people as you want with you (friends/family - I'm sure there's a limit, but they mention 4-5 people like it's nothing - not that I'd want an audience), you are encouraged to bring your own snacks/drinks and to ingest fluids throughout labor and move around rather than being strapped to an IV and continuous monitoring system (they do incremental monitoring). All of this is supposed to help further the natural process of childbirth. It sounds perfect for me. But I'm still scared....it's 8 min from the hospital, it's my first pregnancy....granted, it's my first pregnancy and a hospital-setting is the farthest thing from relaxing & happy to me...and I should be comfortable and this experience should be magical...but is the risk high enough to warrant forgoing comfort? Oh, and the whole process leads to the mommy not staying overnight - you leave within a few hours of birth (which I'm not too sure about - I like the idea of monitoring for 24 hrs before release).


       I would definitely welcome any educated advice from mommies out there on this decision. (Please don't read that as needing advice on natural vs. medicated child birth - I've already had more people than not try to push me and tell me I dont want that...no, no...I'm pretty sure I know what I want and why - I just don't know where.)