You're pregnant!

With, like....a BABY! Congratulations! Maybe you've planned and dreamed of this child, or maybe it was a surprise that this human soul chose you. Either way you are POSH, even though I know you might be struggling not to puke. Who decided to call it 'morning sickness' anyway? It can hit at anytime and for some women (like me) can last all day long. To deal, eat what sounds palatable even if that means nothing but hangover food or bland oatmeal. Don't stress too much about your diet right now, after the early nausea fades you might be surprised at how you suddenly crave everything fresh and green and will more than make up for these days of no calories at worst or greasy carb cals at best. Mint or ginger tea, ginger ale, snacking on crackers first thing in the morning and through the day, wearing accupressure bands, taking naps and forcing yourself get a little exercise are some other ways to make it through. Hang in there!

The early weeks and months of a new pregnancy can bring so much emotion, a feeling of disbelief and a compulsion to stare at those two pink lines on the pee stick, asking yourself 'Is this really real?' Wondering if this baby will stick, being so afraid to lose what you just found out you have. Looking in the mirror and searching to see in the reflection of the young woman looking back at you... a mother.

Getting used to the idea of being pregnant and becoming a mother can be overwhelming enough, those conflicting feelings of fear and excitement along with stress and confusion make it very attractive to put all your faith and trust in an authority figure who tells you exactly what to do and simply does it to you. Especially for a woman in a patriarchal culture where her compliance and submission is expected the thought of questioning the orders of a highly educated and skilled professional who has seen hundreds of babies born can seem simply foolish.

I am here to let you know that you know more than you think, and to assure you that you are already a super-posh mom! And to implore you to educate yourself so you can be truly confident in agreeing to any treatment or intervention through your pregnancy and birth, and just as confident in declining them. The world wide web has a plethora of information and mis-information to offer, inspiring and frightening stories alike. It can be easy to lose yourself in a pit of despair after reading upsetting things and decide to simply close yourself off from information entirely, especially when friends advise you to do so. Good intentions of course are behind such advice, coming from friends and family is one thing but coming from your care provider is another. It gives me chills when I hear women say their doctors discouraged them from googling, a care provider who truly is objective and has you and your baby's best interests at heart will always encourage your education, awareness and informed involvement.

Whenever a diagnosis is given, a treatment or intervention recommended please google your lovely pregnant fingers off! My personal criteria when looking for information on an issue is at the very least to read from two obstetrical/mainstream sources, two midwifery/holistic sources and at least one personal story. Some might strike fear into my heart, yes. And I might find myself more confused than I was before. But after giving myself some time to reflect and apply reason to the information I've digested has always led me to an answer and/or a list of questions to find answers to which lead me to my ultimate answer. The one that is right for ME. What's right for YOU will be different.

Each woman is on her own journey, it takes a lifetime of triumphs and mistakes. Mistakes that are perfectly fine to make, we do the best we can with the information we have in the moment. It is so easy to look back with regret, and say 'I should have been more prepared, I should have tried harder, I should have could have....why didn't I???' Give yourself grace, recognize appropriate guilt and learn from it and throw unnecessary guilt straight out the window as hard as you can, you are way too posh for that.

Life tends to get pretty real pretty quickly once you are responsible for a new human life, and when things get real eliminating the superflous, especially that which causes undue stress and worry is something you might want to think about. Which brings me to early prenatal testing, the first intervention to your pregnancy you will offered or pressured into.

I don't know what the statistics say, but anecdotally in my experience with personal friends and family early ultrasound scans too often result in misdiagnosis of fetal development problems which can immediately place you in a high-risk category. Even if further testing confirms no problems at all, the stage is set for your pregnancy and your care provider may still classify you as high risk and you may carry that fear through pregnancy and birth and beyond. Those tears you cry at your baby's birth should be primarily of pride and overwhelming joy, not simply relief that your baby is alive with all limbs.

So what is the point of early prenatal testing? Screening for chromosomal abnormalities can put parents minds at ease, having evidence your baby is perfectly healthy is so reassuring and if you get news that your child is missing a genetic marker it can be comforting to have that information to emotionally prepare yourself for a child with special needs. However, parental peace of mind is a by-product of these test results and not the true purpose - which is to limit the care providers liability. Over 90% of parents choose not prepare for a child with special needs, usually the decision to terminate is made and the earlier an abortion the less complicated it is which is the reason behind the rush for further testing when there are worrisome spots seen on a fetal brains. Doctors get sued big-time for failing to give parents this information and option.

Yep, told you things got really real real fast didn't I? The question of terminating a pregnancy in light of evidence of fetal development abnormalities is a reality you'll need to think about and decide where you stand. Along with assessing risk factors reflecting on your personal beliefs regarding human right to life, awareness of people with special needs and the support your community offers along with personal resources available to you will be your best guide in deciding whether to have these tests at all and if you do, determining your action in the case of positive results.

Ultrasound - It's quite the cultural phenomenon that today we are so used to watching life on screen that the images we see visually translate to reality more than the flutters we feel internally inches underneath our own skin. Ultrasound can bring tremendous joy and relief, seeing the pulse of your baby's heartbeat and the shape of a large head and developing body can be so exciting, RadiologyInfo.org offers a basic explanation description of fetal ultrasound and under the category of 'Risk' declares there are no known harmful effect on humans, while under the category of 'Limitations' admits that ultrasound cannot identify all fetal abnormalities and under suspicions of such a pregnant woman may be advised to to undergo more invasive testing such as amniocentesis. The abstract of a study at NCBI also describes ultrasound technology as regarded to be safe to the fetus, while with the same breath says the safety is unknown with the increasing use of the Doppler and modern 3-D and 4-D machines. Another study with the goal of determining practitioner knowledge of the safety of diagnostic ultrasound concluded that the majority were poorly informed. A big fat IDK from me....I feel like ultrasounds are so minimally invasive and carry quite a low risk overall, but concerns about early miscarriage and suspected links to autism made me cautious enough to wait until 20 weeks into my last pregnancy to have an ultrasound scan, knowing my baby (surprise...babies!) was mine to show what it meant to be loved as long as I could no matter what. There is a difference between correlation and causation, keep your eye on continuing research and consider being conservative in what you expose your baby to, an article at Health Gather presents a host of informative links on the risks.

CVS (Choronic Villius Sampling) - the next test to be offered or scheduled after a first early ultrasound that may or may not show something to be concerned about, American Pregnancy describes the nature of this diagnostic test which uses a needle to remove cells from the placenta at 10-13 weeks along in pregnancy. Looking for chromosomal abnormalities and genetic disorders, American Pregnancy claims high levels of accuracy without a measure of severity. Miscarriage is the greatest risk involved with this procedure occurring in 1 out of every hundred tests with a 1% chance of a false positive.

Amniocentesis - Described at WebMD as a test where a needle is inserted through the mother's abdomen into the uterus, taking a sample of amniotic fluid to test for birth defects. This test carries risks of miscarriage, injury to both mother and baby, infection and preterm labor. Dr. Kenneth F. Trofatter explores these risks at Healthline.com.

It's up to you to decide if these tests are worth it, and what you will do with the resulting information. Personal stories have always been the most persuasive to me, and the ones involving the intended birth of a child with health challenges and disabilities are especially moving.

Please search for information, and search your heart. If you feel that burning desire to be a parent...what is at the core of your passion? Is it personal growth that comes with working through the challenges of your life? Exploring your capacity to serve? Finding the ever-expanding boundaries of your giving heart and the depths of which you are willing to learn, being humbled giving your all to another? This is what true parenting is. Your life is REAL. So is the gift of that heart beating in your belly. And most likely it belongs to a perfectly healthy and perfectly beautiful child who is yours to love and care for. Protect them and realistically expect the best!

Other general advice for this time.....it's never too early to start prepping your skin for the impending stretch with natural oils, and since you're probably taking a nosedive on nutrition, drink up as many vitamins as you can in the form of infused teas of nettles and red raspberry leaf.

And take a nap, you're exhausted mama.

The Posh Thing About Pushing

Is that you don't even have to. You have a uterus just dying to push for you, and if you just shhhhhhhush. Shhhuuushhh your busy worried over-thinking brain. Be calm and allow your mind to work with the incredible uterine pressure it will push your baby all the way to their first breath, while you slowly exhale your own.

"The birth process need not be a pushing affair. It can be a gentle unfolding in harmony with the natural rhythms of life." ~ Nancy Tatje-Broussard

We are not suddenly abandoned at the end of our pregnancy. There is literally a birth "response" that propels our babies from womb to world with very little conscious effort on our part. The problem is, there is something even more powerful than the birth response, something that can override it entirely. That something is known as the fight/flight response. ~ Laura Shanley

What would your body do if your mind wasn't even there, if it totally checked out?

IT COULD ALLOW YOUR UTERUS TO PUSH YOUR BABY OUT PAINLESSLY. ummm.....POSH.

Comatose pregnant women have spontaneously give birth to healthy live infants! Epileptic pregnant women have woken to find they have given birth! Some women even report birth to be pleasurable to the point of orgasm!

No need to try to be some warrior woman proving her power, or suffer in self-hate to follow Biblical command.
Just be soft, gentle, calm and allow your body to work. You may or may not have an orgasm but you will find yourself in a pretty great state of mind for successfully caring for a newborn. Nice coincidence!

What one woman can do, why can't another?

I really had to hold back laughter when I was told 'Birthing a breech baby vaginally without manual extraction by an obstetrician is impossible, at least...it's never been done in Austin.' LOL I mean, seriously??? Not only has it been done in Austin by mothers before me, it has been done in Utah, Australia, Georgia and the United Kingdom. All over the world. Yes only 3-4% of full-term babies are in a breech position at full term so while it's not common, it's still normal. And since plenty bottom-first babies have been born live and healthy throughout human history (was there even life before Google???) it's more than possible, it's probable.

There's a LOT that's possible and probable in birth, with a strong uterus in your corner you're most likely set for success! Here's how to aid your uterus' strength and give your body support:

*The basics, the obvious of being healthy. Eat most of what grows organically in the ground, less of what's synthetically derived and injected into slaughtered creatures and genetically altered plants. Move your body, sweat, take in sunshine and fresh air and get good sleep.

*Drink Red Raspberry Leaf Tea before conception, through pregnancy, especially during the weeks leading to birth, in labor and through postpartum. And during that menstruating time of the month . Just keep RRL permanently on your favorite Herb Bar shopping list.

*Take the herbal blend 5W five weeks prior to your estimated due date. I'm no herbalist, midwife or doctor but I have a group of posh girlfriends who have taken 5W after having it approved by their midwives and OB's and gone on to have productive, quick, successful and manageable labors(some with epidurals) and feel the 5W played a role. I agree and would not have a baby without it! Ask your birth attendant about it and own thinking before taking it yourself.

*Learn about your body, the role your uterus plays in the birth process and how the rest of yourself works naturally with it. The release of hormones, dilation of the cervix, and most importantly your willing heart and mind.

*Use your imagination to influence reality. In pregnancy, imagine your body opening effortlessly and with ease to make the perfect path for your baby. Call on that visual again in birth. We take it for granted that men's bodies can drastically change size and shape with desire, ours does the same.

*When those waves of increasing intensity start to roll over you and you realize you're baby's about to be born, roll with it. Just let it be there. Let yourself be overwhelmed and amazed at the strength within, and react softly to it.
"The contractions cannot be stronger than me....because it IS me." -SageKelli from the Unassisted Birth Forums.

*Listen to your birth attendants when they say things like 'Breathe your baby down, down down down.' And conversely, if they are telling you to push and you don't feel it, tune them out and turn up the volume on the voice in your head. Every mother and every birth is different but usually it's only in those last few moments when a mother feels an urge to apply her own efforts to bear down and her baby is born. The only person who should tell you to push, is you.

*Realize there is another person on your team, a very tiny one with a heart, body and mind all their own but shares your same goal. Your body wants to birth and your baby wants to be born! They are not unconscious passengers and if they are unmedicated, unforced and unhindered they will be able to most effectively do their job of rotating down and out.

Love and learn your body! Birth doesn't have to hurt!