you say the words episiotomy, my placenta'll kick your ass.
i'm fascinated with naturalbirth. its so damn educational. reading Ina May has been, too.
but what's been the most enlightening thing that's happened to me since the day i picked up The Red Tent was the realization i had (while sitting at the dinner table with my parents, grandparents, and cousins) that i was allowed to tell my family: "if you don't have anything nice to say to my uterus, don't say anything at all."
the cessation of fear is such a wonderful thing. for so long i was terrified of so many things surrounding childbirth...the biggest issue being the fact that i didn't seem to want to do it. that i'd have to have The Talk with my mother. the "i know i'm an only child but my biological clock is broken so there will be no grandkids" talk. there was no ticking. none. of course, the Goddess knows what She's doing and as soon as i met Richard, it didnt just start ticking, it started BEATING ME IN THE OVARIES WITH A BASEBALL BAT. but it wasn't just his pheromones that helped, it was the education i was getting from hanging around with pagan women who didnt see birth as a horrible painful slimy, gory, violent thing...but as a wonderful powerful, potentially fun, easily doable thing.
and i realized that all this time, i'd been scared because i'd been bullied into feeling that way.
even in college, talking to some of my (i assumed) educated female friends about waterbirth. i nearly got my head snapped off. (what was i, stupid? birth is supposed to be violent. if they dont slap the baby around and dangle it by its feet it'll suffocate and DIE. didnt i know that?) aaand the horror stories. from everyone. every women i knew had a tale to tell about pain and drugs and cutting and drugs and pain and stitches and drugs.
yeah, cant wait.
until i met the wonderful pagan ladies that helped fix my injured brain...and now i really CANT wait (woot). which delights my mother. but along with a fierce desire to procreate came that old fierce interest in natural childbirth. my family doesn't know what to make of that, mostly because its an offshoot of my Major Problem With Authority. the day i learned that i actually might have to defend myself against what amounts to assault by medical staff in order to simply have a baby, I Got Real Ornery Real Fast.
so...they might try to convince me that i need a csec just because they want to go home early for the weekend? stick needles in my spine and cut open my abdomen and fuck around with my internal organs just because they're lazy? stick me full of IVs and strap my arms down and slice into bits of me for no reason other than to drive up the bill?
oh. fuck. no.
some women are fierce about feminism and natural childbirth and reproductive rights because of intellectual and moral and spiritual ideas.
me?
i just see medical staff (especially male medical staff) in the delivery room as potential attackers and a threat to my personal safety. you want to come at me with a knife, you'd better have a damn good reason, you've better done a damn good job of convincing me that your reason is valid, and (just to be safe) you might want to get me that epidural quick, because i might just try to kick you in the face anyway if you dont immobilize my legs.
(i think it'll be so much more pleasant for everyone if i just do this at home. no one wants to be subjected to me in this mood NOW, let alone at the end of 9 long months of pregnancy hormones.)
i had to tell my mother and various female relatives that if they ever wanted to see grandkids, they'd refrain from telling me any more of the requisite Birth Horror Stories. i wont be playing that game any longer. to my mind, making yourself feel better about your own birth experience by willfully terrifying a young women with a bunch of gory birth stories is abuse. its no different than bullying the new kid at school to mask your own insecurities. and karma is a bitch.
this is all different, of course, from one women telling another sympathetic listener her birth story in a safe environment, in order to heal and better understand the experience. thats not what i was getting, though. i was getting the condescending war stories, the shit i didn't need. well, i was. not anymore. heh.
whatever has to happen to bring me a healthy child will happen. but i can control what gets put in my head, and i wont be bullied, scared, intimidated, discouraged, grossed out, or underestimated. and neither will this cervix of mine, kthnxbye.
but what's been the most enlightening thing that's happened to me since the day i picked up The Red Tent was the realization i had (while sitting at the dinner table with my parents, grandparents, and cousins) that i was allowed to tell my family: "if you don't have anything nice to say to my uterus, don't say anything at all."
the cessation of fear is such a wonderful thing. for so long i was terrified of so many things surrounding childbirth...the biggest issue being the fact that i didn't seem to want to do it. that i'd have to have The Talk with my mother. the "i know i'm an only child but my biological clock is broken so there will be no grandkids" talk. there was no ticking. none. of course, the Goddess knows what She's doing and as soon as i met Richard, it didnt just start ticking, it started BEATING ME IN THE OVARIES WITH A BASEBALL BAT. but it wasn't just his pheromones that helped, it was the education i was getting from hanging around with pagan women who didnt see birth as a horrible painful slimy, gory, violent thing...but as a wonderful powerful, potentially fun, easily doable thing.
and i realized that all this time, i'd been scared because i'd been bullied into feeling that way.
even in college, talking to some of my (i assumed) educated female friends about waterbirth. i nearly got my head snapped off. (what was i, stupid? birth is supposed to be violent. if they dont slap the baby around and dangle it by its feet it'll suffocate and DIE. didnt i know that?) aaand the horror stories. from everyone. every women i knew had a tale to tell about pain and drugs and cutting and drugs and pain and stitches and drugs.
yeah, cant wait.
until i met the wonderful pagan ladies that helped fix my injured brain...and now i really CANT wait (woot). which delights my mother. but along with a fierce desire to procreate came that old fierce interest in natural childbirth. my family doesn't know what to make of that, mostly because its an offshoot of my Major Problem With Authority. the day i learned that i actually might have to defend myself against what amounts to assault by medical staff in order to simply have a baby, I Got Real Ornery Real Fast.
so...they might try to convince me that i need a csec just because they want to go home early for the weekend? stick needles in my spine and cut open my abdomen and fuck around with my internal organs just because they're lazy? stick me full of IVs and strap my arms down and slice into bits of me for no reason other than to drive up the bill?
oh. fuck. no.
some women are fierce about feminism and natural childbirth and reproductive rights because of intellectual and moral and spiritual ideas.
me?
i just see medical staff (especially male medical staff) in the delivery room as potential attackers and a threat to my personal safety. you want to come at me with a knife, you'd better have a damn good reason, you've better done a damn good job of convincing me that your reason is valid, and (just to be safe) you might want to get me that epidural quick, because i might just try to kick you in the face anyway if you dont immobilize my legs.
(i think it'll be so much more pleasant for everyone if i just do this at home. no one wants to be subjected to me in this mood NOW, let alone at the end of 9 long months of pregnancy hormones.)
i had to tell my mother and various female relatives that if they ever wanted to see grandkids, they'd refrain from telling me any more of the requisite Birth Horror Stories. i wont be playing that game any longer. to my mind, making yourself feel better about your own birth experience by willfully terrifying a young women with a bunch of gory birth stories is abuse. its no different than bullying the new kid at school to mask your own insecurities. and karma is a bitch.
this is all different, of course, from one women telling another sympathetic listener her birth story in a safe environment, in order to heal and better understand the experience. thats not what i was getting, though. i was getting the condescending war stories, the shit i didn't need. well, i was. not anymore. heh.
whatever has to happen to bring me a healthy child will happen. but i can control what gets put in my head, and i wont be bullied, scared, intimidated, discouraged, grossed out, or underestimated. and neither will this cervix of mine, kthnxbye.