Peek-A-Boo!

Apparently The Littlest Wilson has figured out this whole ultrasound thing and has decided that he'd rather not have his picture taken. He may feel somewhat exposed after I plastered that perfect head-on shot we got at 20 weeks all the hell over the place. I should have asked his permission. In any case, he was definitely not in the mood to smile for the 3D wand this time around, preferring to keep his tight little fists where they usually are: directly in front of his face. The only trouble is, he's getting so big these days that it's harder and harder to sneak a peek around his hands and arms. The tech did her best, but this 2D profile was about as good as it got. It's not a very accurate profile in my opinion either, as he had just finished doing what could only be described as the yogic Lion's Pose, chin to chest, tongue out and all. So either he's got the lips all Sean's doctor's patients are after, or he's making a kissy-face.

I guess seeing this picture is a different experience for me having watched the live images on the screen. It was immediately apparent which gray fuzzy thing was what body part. But after seeing the reaction of several people to whom I showed the picture, I'm beginning to understand that this one is more like one of those Magic Eye images--no one has any idea what they're seeing at first glance. I think it's mostly because he is so much bigger than the last time, and his head and chest now fills up the entire screen, where the last picture showed all the way down to his little knees. What you are seeing is his profile. He's lying on his back, face up, head on the right side. His forehead and eye are somewhat in the shadows, but the bright area in the center is (from right to left) his nose, lips, chin, and the sharp dark pie-shape is the negative space between his chin and chest. The sort-of ball like shape just to the left of center near the top is his right fist and the shape all the way at the left edge of the image is his left arm and fist. We did confirm that he is currently in a transverse position with his butt and feet at the top right of my belly, and his head resting snugly (and I mean SNUGLY) between my hip bone and my bladder. There is a direct correlation between this and the facts that 1) I have a lopsided belly, and 2) I take no fewer than four trips to the loo a night. I sure hope he's enjoying that little pillow he's found. 

Very Real Birth...

This weekend, Sean and I attended childbirth classes at RealBirth in Chelsea. We were referred to the program by our neighbors James and Elana (parents to Chloe) and we're so glad we went! Of the many benefits of choosing RealBirth was that they offer the six-hours-per-day weekend course, which Sean was better able to fit into his travel-heavy schedule. Normally these classes are one evening per week spread out over several weeks. When able to be digested over that time, I wonder if the experience is a little less...intense? Too late now--we went the extreme route.

Two straight days of birthing education was somewhat daunting. There was a ton of priceless information. Almost everything our teacher Meredith said was noteworthy. But shockingly, I was the only person in the class with a notebook and pen so I self consciously kept my note taking to a minimum, thereby ending up with one page of short phrases double and triple underlined and employing the maximum amount of exclamation points. And despite our teacher's warning that we were likely to forget 99% of what she taught us, I am pretty certain that I committed the majority of the syllabus to memory verbatim. Trauma has that effect on me.

There were a few points at which I began to feel so incredibly overwhelmed and anxious at the prospect of the impending birth, which Meredith kept insisting we were all too committed at this point to avoid, that my palms started to sweat and tears welled up in my eyes. Sean noted that I kept turning to him and saying,"I love you," which he took to mean "don't leave me now, you bastard!" And poor Sean...until the first of several explicit videos, he really did think labor was like in the movies: the expectant mother's water breaks in the middle of dinner at a fancy restaurant, thence commences copious amounts of comical huffing and puffing during the madcap taxi ride, she is wheeled into the hospital where hilarity ensues until a free room is located and she is strapped into a bed at the very moment the baby is crowing, and with a couple of red-faced pushes and expletives, the baby is born. Instead we were informed that, unless the labor is yours, the process is long and boring enough to drive a person mad. I think it was a rude awakening, but he handled it well.

Did I mention that the title of our class was "Childbirth with Epidural?" Sean and I had no illusions going into this thing that medication would be entirely avoidable and wanted to know all options available to us. Another of the benefits to attending RealBirth as opposed to the classes offered by our hospital is that we were made aware of the instances when hospital policy might be cloaked as either the rule of the law or medical necessity. This will equip us to make informed decisions about our care while we're there, and to remain as much in control of the birthing process as we'd like. A good example of this is that, as it turns out, it is never too late to receive an epidural--a fact that screenplay writers everywhere completely ignore, much like the fact that the breaking of the waters occurs first in only a small percentage of births. Who knew? Much less dramatic, I suppose, and it would require searching out another comic device when most people are none the wiser. 

Aside from the specifics that we took away from the class, I think I can identify the two most important things that I learned. First, just having a rudimentary understanding of the physiology of birth will be invaluable in understanding what we are experiencing while in the moment, and opens up a whole variety of options to us for assisting the process and coping with the pain--be it with or without medication. The second, and probably most important, is that birthing is a natural process and, as Meredith really burned into my memory, one that works extremely safely and well in the vast majority of cases. 

It's so helpful to know which parts of the average birthing experience have been born of the institutionalization and sterilization of the process in our culture, and which we can choose to go with or reject. At this time when so much of our lives is up in the air, having a sense that the birth will be what we want it to be--however much of an illusion that is--gives us both great comfort and relief. But, lest you should be at all concerned, please know that we foster no illusions that anything will be in our control once the Littlest has arrived...

Great Brown Bob

The Littlest Wilson lost a great grandpa on Monday night.

We were so lucky to get back to Ohio for Thanksgiving while Bob was still able to spend time awake and talking. I wish he could have stuck around till the little guy came, but thankfully his battle was relatively short. 

Bob will be missed terribly by his colleagues and students at Case, his fellow sailors at Edgewater, his family and friends, and by my Grandma, his wife and companion of thirty years. 

He was a part of my life as far back as I can remember. I was always Missica to him, and he'll always be Brown Bob to me. To The Littlest, he'll be Great Brown Bob.