another year wiser....

...last month i turned 24!

it's been a busy year considering i was unmarried, with one child less, when i turned 23.

my beloveds honored me with some unique gift giving  :)

D came to visit, my dear friend...with lovely flowers and a homemade square dancing dress. :) also with a book titled "this precious earth." she knows me.

and tyler, my sweet, sweet husband, found these old mushroom prints at the thrift store. i love them.

he also thrifted this handsome cock... don't you love the things your mate thinks you'll love? and i do love it. beside the rooster is an oyster mushroom growing kit. i think people know that i like mushrooms. and i do.

he now graces our kitchen; kitchen god.

my second mother tami subscribed me to the absolute coolest magazine in existence...wowza. see if your library has it, there are some amazing articles.

(notice door: dingy gray; before shot.)

(notice door: WOW turquoise! all adobe style. gives the house a bit of personality.) tyler made one of my dreams come true and painted the front door blue. awwwwwww. he's trimming roses with a sleeping babe. now isn't that ideal? :)

thank you, thank you all.

and my 3 readers have probably noticed that the posts here have slacked....with a new pup in the house i figure a post a month keeps me at a semi-active status. ;)

hopefully more to come: craziness is life, truly transcending suburbia, before/after, the wedding....(aren't i ambitious? i think i can. i think i can.)

"she's gone....

oh i, i better learn how to face it...she's gone, i'd pay the devil to replace her..."

i'm in love i'm in love and i don't care who knows it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



...with my mother-in-law, tami casper.

today she drove away after staying at my house for two months, and i called my husband and cried.

there's an ache in my heart that can only be described as the flattened carpet of where her air mattress used to be, or the future dirty dishes that will pile up in the once sparkling sink....

how can i tell you, internet readers, how much this grand lady means to me?

she was there in a time of great need within my very own little family.

she has seen me naked, she has seen me scream and sob, she has seen me greasy and scared to live another day...

never once did she tell me how to be a mother, or a wife, or a home maker.

she was never anything but compassionate, and helpful, and selfless, and pleasant; a friend.

she shopped for the house and cooked meals and kept the house clean round the clock...

she entertained and fed a rowdy four year old, did laundry, and was an extra set of hands for when the baby was fussy...

she sewed 30 beautiful cloth diapers.

she stayed at our house, away from her husband, and two other daughters that are equally busy with their own little families


she saved our lives.

see how cute his diapers are?

i love you tami casper. and the only way i know how to thank you is by promising that i'll get better, and that everything is going to be okay here. we'll stay in touch. we've had some good times, eh? ;) (i know, what a paltry way to describe the end of an era but i'm floundering here for the words.... you.... so ...special....)

 love, dolly

in like a lion....

out with a lamb (wrapped up skin to skin in the moby)

40 weeks

<the real birth day of lincoln>

TO HELL AND BACK, our survivor speaks.
my HBAC (home birth after cesarean.)
a few things have changed in my house:
first off, we've turned the heater on for the very first time-
secondish, i am no longer pregnant.


in the past two weeks i've replayed the day over and over in my head;
the strange sensory details, the subtle nuances of labor, the breaking of my body, the moment of contact-
the fear--- and the triumph.

let's just say it was more than i ever imagined it to be, harder than i ever knew.
the only way to know to is to do.

let's hop back to three weeks ago.


i was very pregnant and tired of it. i spent my days walking, cleaning, and trying not to get my hopes up too high whenever i felt the practice contractions. it's really easy to do, even when you've completely deconstructed the idea of a "due date." i knew realistically that i could have a gestational period of 43 weeks, and i was trying to stay patient since i was going to let nature do her thing and have a completely spontaneous labor. so we went about our daily lives, pretending like we weren't waiting.

exploring the last wild swampy places in empty lots and between the strip malls, getting tadpoles

i wore this just about everyday. i'll get it back to you, mom.

planted a kumquat and mandarin tree in our front yard, used our lovely compost.

my mother-in-law tami gave me a pedicure...i was pregnantladyzilla that day.

my last day pregnant, who knew. 

now the story starts: on sunday night, around 11, i put down my reading material and turned off the lamp. tyler is already asleep and ready to get up early for work. i wake up at midnight with what feels like a really pinchy menstrual cramp at the base of my uterus. i wait a few minutes; it's consistent. i want to wake up tyler and tell him he doesn't have to go to work in the morning, but i don't want to cry wolf. i'm trying not to get excited. once upon a time my natural child birth educator specifically said to try to get back to sleep if awoken by contractions. the number one reason home births transfer to hospitals is from maternal exhaustion. (im sorry for the poorly constructed run-on sentences....my brain is a little tired..)

but i am excited. my whole pregnancy i was nervous i would never go into labor (crazy idea, i know, but i was induced with teddy so there was a lot of institution-instilled doubt.) deep inside i was terrified i would fail, and end up with another c-section. i tried to stay faithful to nature.

i wake up tyler with little fanfare, and go to the kitchen to start an early labor project: food. i ate a whole box of spongebob mac and cheese (an unusual, but welcome treat) and started cringing from the contractions. i tried to go back to sleep. no luck. at around 5,or was it 6? i tell tyler to call deborah, the midwife. my contractions are strong and regular and i'm convinced the baby will come by lunchtime. i am already so tired.

"mother is proud. baby is proud." we both cry a little. a wise woman once said the baby who cries needs to tell their tale.

 okay, so i realize this story is about a year long...let me try to condense to reduce everyone's screen time;
i know it's the new thing to hire a labor and birth photographer, but while i was in labor the thought never even crossed my mind. i'll paint you a basic picture: me, shuffling silently across the floor slowly in a house coat, chin tucked to chest, breathing slowly. tyler watches on with doleful and attentive eyes. i smile at him wanly between contractions. i don't want to be touched. we don't speak. he'll attest that it was the quietest i've ever been (until labor progressed that is.) the midwives sit in silence on the couch in my bedroom, occasionally taking food/bathroom breaks, checking my blood pressure, and listening to the baby's heart beat. the midwives were really hands-off, trusting completely in the birth process. initially i didn't even want cervical checks, but eventually i started asking for them, hoping my hours of pain were making progress. at around noon was the first check. hesitantly deborah told me i was at a "4." talk about bitter disappointment after 10 hours of painful labor. i think it was then i learned how to pace myself. in pain the mind learns to do weird things to cope..laborland... thoughts are repeated over and over, like when falling asleep. i must of heard "i'm just a teenage dirt bag baby, listen to iron maiden baby with me..." a million times in my mind. (thank you, wheatus, for partially getting me through labor..)

the baby is still part of the mother's body. birth is just the beginning.

 i thought, "i am the Uterus Queen!"  i thought, "the pain is normal, my body is opening up, the pain is purposeful, allow the body to open..." in my bathroom we threw a plastic backed table cloth on the floor. it crunched under my feet as i paced it in circles, like a ritual. i learned how to handle contractions on the toilet, sitting, and opening up...i'd sit for three contractions, and then get back to my pacing. i was bleeding all over my beloved strangely comforting table cloth, my cervix was disintegrating.

rachel, and deborah, the coolest midwives ever.

 essentially it was this: the peak of my reproductive cycle, a climax of sorts. the whole time i thought i was so stupid to do it without drugs. what was the point? i practically drooled when i thought of teddy's birth, general anesthesia with a c-section...i wouldn't have lasted in a hospital. i would've had that epidural after an hour of labor, and a c-section a few hours later. i'd wander out to where the midwives were sitting. i'd tell them i couldn't go any longer, that i was dying...i wanted them to take over for me, to manage my birth. luckily they were so non-reactionary... they would just smile and say, "you're doing great, every thing is fine..." and then i'd wander back to my table cloth. there was no quitting, labor just happened, and i had to be open to it. occasionally i'd have a mental break through and think,  "this is my birth. i need to own it. no one else can do this for me." it was mystifying. i prayed for strength...the words of cheesy pregnancy affirmation cd's come to me: "your ancestors are waiting with a banner for you and your child"... .it was a battle. my pelvis had a stick of dynamite in it every minute for hours, and the baby was turned the wrong way. there was a bowling ball being pressed through my hips, crushing my bones. there is no way to prepare for that kind of pain.

rachel showing us the placenta's tree of life. it has since then been encapsulated.

 i labored on my feet for nearly 21 hours, with little to eat or drink in the mean time. i stayed mainly in my bathroom, the "pit of dispair," my darkened lair, for the majority of the event. i thought, maybe this is the only way to prepare me to be a mother again. i was in a self-hypnosis, waiting for transition, waiting to push, waiting for a time to rest. i got up on the bed, on my hands and knees, and my water broke. SWOOSH, all over. there was a change in the contractions, and i started pushing with them.

i am so happy to see teddy.

 it hurt, but it also felt so good to push. i could actually now participate in labor. it was the very first time that i felt i would actually meet my baby, that this was real, and not just painful. it. was. exciting. the uterus is strong! and i pushed so hard with every contraction. no one told me when to push, or how to push; the body just knows. people have likened the pushing to major pooping, but no, that's inaccurate. what it really feels like is pushing a baby out of the birth canal! i growled, nay, i roared with every push, like a lioness. la gritanda! i was going to get that baby out of me! there was a major stretch, but i kept on pushing...who can think about tearing at a time like this? POP, his massive fat head is OUT! i can see tyler's face...fascinated and wide eyed with anticipation and concern. i'm panting now, with his head out, waiting for the next contraction. i ask: does he have hair?! i reach down and feel his warm little wrinkly head! one more push, oh! his shoulders slide out, and his hips, and he is placed on top of my belly. i laugh and sob and tyler wipes a tear from his eye. "i did it! I'M DONE!"  mainly i'm impressed that i am, in fact, still alive. :)

 my body washes over with relief and peace and pure happiness. we remain that way for another hour, tyler cuts the cord after it is done pulsing. tami and my mom come in with teddy. there is rejoicing....and admiring. and i am hungry. tyler feeds me apples and peanut butter, i gulp down some soda. oh so good.

the throne of learning how to breastfeed.

 tyler holds his baby and the midwives give him a check-over. he's perfect..he breathes a little fast but deborah isn't one to freak out about those kinds of things. he weighs 9.8lbs and is 22 1/4 inches long. and his head is bigger than teddy's was..(another reason why they told me i needed a c-section.)

first bath with grandma tami casper.

 TRIUMPH!

 now i feed a pink gorilla baby as much as he wants. Ho bio-LOGICAL life. he's hardly ever been dressed, we hang out skin to skin mainly...for me it smooths out that transition from womb to world for both of us.

entering the system: off to auburn for the birth certificate, complying with california law. ;)

 there is nothing like seeing tyler with lincoln. i love everything, so much. i enjoy their shared company to the fullest.

my mother in law tami, at this very moment, is sewing the COOLEST cloth diapers and flannel liners. i couldn't be more excited about this. tami, you da bomb, for a million different reasons. (notice the cup o' human milk.. i rain milk, like a milky lady cloud)

i look at this picture and i wonder, when did i become a mother? let alone mother to two beautiful little people--- balancing youth/individuality and parenthood really isn't that hard; they just will go exploring with me. it's about learning, and it all comes down to love. there's a lot of love in the world.

the roundness of life...

let's get one thing straight:

(caps lock, please) I AM SO EXCITED.   ! ! !

 (AKA: cuz i'm all there, baby....and other pregnancy musings...this will be a long ramblerific post, and i don't care...this has been half written for months and i am determined to get it off the docket.)

ICAN hooked me up with a free photo shoot, the photographer was looking to expand her maternity portfolio.

(or: the journey to try to comprehend everything in about nine months...)

home birth. i am planning one.

i'll try to keep this simple: to me, a home birth just makes sense...this has nothing to do with my supposed distaste for the mainstream, nor is it a conspiratorial rampage toward the birthing preferences of other women. every woman has the right to choose an epidural, or a cesarean, or a water birth, etc.. we all do what we feel is right, and i appreciate the many choices. (and for that i apologize now for the biased approach this will soon take toward birthing attitudes/ locations...let's just say i've found myself within the intriguing world of "normal birth.." i'm not going to go into the politics, statistics, or try to convert anyone. i'm trying to steer clear of the "debater" blog; this is just my story. )

an amateur face painter was also looking to expand into the growing world of baby belly painting. made my bathtub blue.

with that said, the past few months have been an incredible learning journey for me, along with the pregnancy.


most of my readers (me, tyler, and a choice few others) know that teddy was delivered via c-section. at the time i was disappointed, but looking back i know that i was wildly self-uneducated about birth.

this was probably the only book i picked up with the subject during that time, most likely due to my ambivalence/ denial. i believe that my culture has been trained to fear and mistrust birth. it's rarely "felt" beyond the discomforts of heartburn and the vanity pains of preventing stretch-marks.

 here's your typical go-to: a cutesy, surface spit shine on the pregnancy experience. (but if you are curious about heart burn, hemorrhoids, etc, it can be useful.)

this is a small sample of the different books i've picked up/borrowed this time around , motivated initially with merely avoiding a repeat c-section for when i would deliver in the nearest hospital.

a few months into this pregnancy i found myself dragging my feet about the most typical aspects of the "pregnancy experience." finding an ob, going to check-ups, and getting blood work all stopped containing relevance. the prescribed monthly check-ups and dna screening was beyond tedium for me; i felt like my pregnancy was being forced through a narrow, "everyone has to conform to this protocol" tube.  i felt like an outlaw when i quit that business altogether...




my ob told me that a vbac (vaginal birth after c-section) was unlikely for me, and to not get my hopes up.

pregnancy and child birth for a healthy woman is about as complicated as digestion, in it's own miraculous way.

i think that was the first time that i realized something was wrong, about everything, but i didn't know how to explain how i felt because i didn't know there was an alternative (even with my own mother birthing 7 of my siblings at home..) it made me really mad. and sad. i went home and tore up the typewriter with some p.o'ed lady poetry, writing about my pelvis that she deemed irregular.

jokingly i told tyler that i was just going to have the baby at home. at the time i was mostly teasing, because i knew how he'd react, and also because i knew so very little about home birth.

i hated going to the doctor's office. it seemed to turn a miracle into a medical routine. i wanted to reclaim my pregnancy.

finally this whole birth thing was making sense to me:    
"one cannot help an involuntary process. the point is to not disturb it." -dr. micheal odent

one is part of the natural continuum of life, and the other is a sad deviation from it.

the way i feel about home birth to a medical birth is like seeing an old forest over a sprawling gray strip mall.

which brings me to one of many valid conclusions: NATURE CANNOT BE IMPROVED UPON.
throughout my life this has been my subconscious motto. and of course it would follow me into my pregnancy and birth preferences.

i thought i was huge then... elle oh elle.

MANIFESTA:

to sum it all up:

1. all women have the right to sacred, fantastic, profound and loving birth experiences. childbirth must never be viewed by birth attendants as routine, cumbersome or insignificant.

2.childbirth must happen in physical and emotional privacy. women's vaginas in birth are as sacrosanct as they are at any other time; routinely penetrating them with fingers, forceps, scissors or hooks is a severe violation against the most fundamental rights women have to privacy and protection of the self (amen)...women's bodies are never to be regarded as learning aids. no institution has the right to impose spectators on any woman's birth.

3. it must be recognized as a criminal act to mutilate women's bodies in childbirth.

4. all women must have easy, free access to information that illuminates the natural childbirth process for them, and helps them prepare for their births, and assists them in preparation for care of their newborns. this information must be given in a way that does not view birth as a dangerous, biological anomaly, but as a natural, joyous rite/right of passage.
(numbered points courtesy of leilah mccracken, birthlove)

deborah the midwife let us borrow a fetoscope. this is what a midwife appointment is like. simple, easy, with plenty of time to ask questions and learn. at the moment she's loaned me bunches of material on breastfeeding.

this pregnancy has been somewhat of an anthropological study of the american birth culture. deep, i know.whatever.

i find a great feminist debate over this large aspect of reproduction. generally it starts and ends with birth control, let's see it expanded into birth. u.s. women, in a cultural context, are for the most part offered one choice for birth: the hospital. those who seek elsewhere are seen as fringe dwellers by the public majority, not to mention the opposition with insurance and midwives. it is a struggle to pull from the great gravity of the hospital to more natural choices. i decided to go with a midwife at 35 weeks pregnant. for those of you who aren't too familiar with pregnancy that's pretty late in the game.

birth is as old as the earth

it was a good thing. the week after that my ob dropped me like a hot potato. i was non-compliant, meaning i hadn't gone for a long while. i wasn't too hurt, but it confirmed my beliefs that the hospital wasn't there for me, i was there for them. and then the insurance sent us the invoice: $743 for that appointment where i was dropped. but weighed before hand. yes, it seems a little screwy. 


it is my hope that this attitude slowly transforms as more women learn about their choices and rights as a human and as a consumer. birth is a celebration, to be revered, not just a medical conveyor belt.


and that i'll have a safe, happy home birth, of course.
i trust my body. the baby and i swim in the water to stay strong despite the new girth, joining the Aqua Zumba Ladies Who Pact Never to Stop at a Krispy Kream Drive-thru After Class, as well as the rheumatoid folk at aqua nice n' easy. :) i am so grateful that my husband and i are both on the same page, looking forward for this experience, which could be any day now. .... trust me, you'd be excited too.

it looks a little something like this. :)

i am so excited!

celebrating womanhood

some enjoying the bounty of the potluck

 and the ability to create life!


last friday family and friends gathered to eat and connect and ultimately acknowledge my wonderful new hugeness.
there was a new baby in attendance, as well as two other growing glowing ladies! the mood was happy and loving and i am so excited to have shared the evening in such a pleasant, conscious manner. 

ahem, my two true bff's. mackenzie and diana. thank you for being there for me!

the women each took a turn introducing themselves and their woman heritage via tea light. :)

good laughs were shared, women beading the necklace and explaining their thoughts behind the beads they chose.

don't i look so happy?

natalie is an artist

humans of all ages welcome, of course.

i hope patsy doesn't mind me posting this; ladies getting artistic with henna that teddy and i prepared the day before

julia, diana, natalie, grizzly. so glad you were there!

i asked my guests to bring a bead that symbolized their feelings about motherhood/womanhood. i love this necklace. i don't think i could ever find a more beautiful or unique piece of jewelry, as it was composed by many different lovely people.  it's interesting to me that the majority of the beads are blue. it's open to interpretation. :) one even came in the mail from my dear sister in law angie!

having a handful of my sisters there made it all the more wonderful!

i grow strong from these ladies. every human that walks this planet came from a woman, and i like that. motherhood means life. xoxoxo