le Grand Secret

This is impossibly fun.
To be amidst a group of people that are not yet privy to a secret that will make them ever so happy...
my husband and I keep winking at each other over everyone else's heads.

It's gloriously excruciating.

And I still cannot seem to stop grinning.

New

We have just discovered that we are five weeks pregnant with our first child.
I am overjoyed, and overwhelmed. So much to do, to read, to prepare!!!
And in the midst of it all, a nervousness, holding hands with a very calm feeling of completeness.


I just can't quit grinning to myself.


It's like an amazing, exciting secret that only I know.


This will be the year of New.

GAHHHHHHHHHHH!

Finals this week.
Grad school is a nasty, nasty homewrecker.

Nitrous Oxide For Childbirth

http://www.scienceandsensibility.org/?p=1129

Fascinating interview with one of the "Giants" of Midwifery, Judith Rooks.

I hate to go all "feminist patriarchy-basher" but as I read the portion about the male OB/GYN that was uncomfortable watching the woman in labor, it definitely occurred to me that if you are uncomfortable with the process, you probably shouldn't be involved.

Watching someone hurt is not a pleasant experience (or not for the psychologically sound, at least), but it is a part of laboring to give birth. It is, for better or worse, a natural part of the process.

As soon as finals are over, I'm considering writing to the director's boards of the hospitals in my hometown to let them know about this.
I may even reactivate my Facebook to get the word out for others to do the same.

Principles Of Pharmacodynamics

Found in my Pharmacology for Nursing Care text, "...it is neither appropriate nor desirable to hunt squirrels with a cannon."

Quite so, you may respond, but what on earth have either squirrels or cannon to do with pharmacology?

In short, nothing and everything, grasshopper.
This is very typical of my particular journey on the path to becoming a midwife.

Some Like It Hot

I Love Natural labor. 

I love how unpredicably predictable it is. 

I love that women go through (almost!) the same pattern for labor and birth.

I love the cheerleading.

I love the nervousness of a first-time Dad. 

I love showing them what to do to help the laboring Mum.

I love the adrenaline of catching.

I love that it's  normal.

I love that it's a connection to all the women who've gone before me,
and all the ones to follow.

I LOVE Natural labor. 

  

Hands To Thyself

The mamas that don't need mothering disconcert me.
I'm unsure of my footing with them.

They are quiet, and hard to draw out.
And not in the "laboring quietly" sort of strong way; it's more of a disdainful sort of laboring.
I can almost always forge a connection with the women I labor.
Almost.
The times that I cannot, though, are the awkward times.
I slip into the old feelings of being too young for midwifery. Too naive.

Even though, I know myself well enough to know that I will be one of those mothers.
The ones that don't really want your coddling.