The holidays this year were the more challenging of my life but it was also the most meaningful of my life. It was hard to hang up Wyatt's stocking or answer my daughter's questions on Christmas morning as to why Santa forgot Wyatt. I wish my son had been here for Christmas. I wish I still wasn't in so much pain that it was hard to eat Christmas dinner. It hardly seems fair that 5 months later we are still dealing with the fall-out of major surgery. My 6 year-old told me she didn't want kids because of the cut I had and they way "they" take babies out. I ended up revealing God's way of having babies be born and she seemed much more ok with that.
This year, however, I can easily say is the first year that I "got it". My entire life I've known why we have Christmas. I've preached that it's not about the presents, it's about Jesus. But really it was still about the presents. And the lights on the house. And the music. And the cool wrapping paper. And the snacks I could bake and feed everyone. And the friends I could impress. I even said "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays" and was relieved that my children were still allowed to have "Christmas" parties at school. I passed along those emails preaching to other people about the true meaning of Christmas. I've been a Christian my whole life and I didn't even get it enough to know that I didn't get it.
And then I lost my son.And then a few weeks ago my family sat down to watch the "Nativity Story" on dvd so that I could try and show my kids the true meaning of Christmas. I realized how far off the mark we were when I explained to her that it was only about Jesus and she replied "Then what are all the presents for?" I wanted to answer that it was because the wisemen gave Jesus gifts, but seriously, who are we trying to kid? How far from the wisemen's gifts have we come? For the past two weeks it's taken me 45 minutes to get two blocks down the road because of the shopping traffic. So as we watched the movie I thought of what it really would have been like for Mary. How a mother feels when she is pregnant. She seemed obliging to God for whatever His plan was but certainly she had to love her baby like the rest of us love ours. Hindsight is 20/20 and we all know the details of why Jesus came and what he went through. But take that away for a moment. Try and know only what Mary would have known. God sent His son. He had a plan. He was going to be a king and savior. Did she know he had to die to save all of us from the crap that we do? Would she have been so obliging to that? I know that God is God, but when I look at my children's faces I cannot fathom them being tortured and killed to save everyone on this planet from sin. It might sound terrible but I don't care about anyone else that much. Those are my babies. If people want to make bad choices then that's their own problem. I watched the scene of Mary and Joseph holding their baby in a new way, with a new mind. I started crying looking at the face of the baby and thinking of the scenes in the Passion of the Christ where Jesus is ridiculed and tortured. That poor baby! That poor man! I will never be able to fathom what the weight of the world felt like on his shoulders. Jesus seemed to be obliging to God's plan as well but I'm sure he wasn't thrilled about it. I started thinking about everything bad I've done in my life. From the small things, like tiny lies or being disgruntle with the kids when there was no cause, to the larger things, like less than appropriate behavior, a divorce etc. So much of life was spent thinking certain things were important. Things that I thought were important. But they weren't really. They weren't at all. Everything I've ever thought was important, from my looks to things that I own, are not important at all. I couldn't be a good person if I tried. Not the kind of person God and Jesus want us to be. I could never avoid a snicker here and there at someone's expense. I can't be a perfect mother, although I try so hard. I was a pain in the ass daughter and I'm sure I'm the same kind of wife at times. I can't save myself from the bad things I do. But Jesus did. He did that for people he didn't even know. He did that, literally, for the people who killed him. I can't imagine Mary's pain, watching her son fullfill God's plan. When Wyatt passed away I was mad at God for so long. He and I still have some business to work out. I couldn't believe that was part of His plan. There had to be a better plan. I think Mary thought the same thing- there could've been a better, less painful way. I know that Jesus was part of a plan. I am not sure if Wyatt was, but I can't help but think of similarities in the way a mother feels about their baby. I think a lot of us just assume we going to heaven while we sit down and enjoy our lives in whatever way pleases us. I want to go to heaven. I have a son I need to go meet. And I'm finally learning that earth is not all it's cracked up to be. We get one body and mine is having trouble working right now. Thank God there is more than this life. THANK GOD there is something way better because this place sucks.
So this Christmas I sang the Christmas carols in a different way. I'm much more grateful that Jesus was born. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you for being born. Thank you God for saving me from myself. Thank you for allowing me to go to a better place than earth! I watched the Polar Express with my kids feeling all the magic and wonder of that movie, wishing there really was a Santa Claus. But this year I feel like there is something just as amazing. The story of Jesus being born. Merry Christmas!
Saturday, December 25, 2010
Friday, December 17, 2010
Free-thinkers, Society, and Birth
Several weeks ago my husband came home with a story of a fellow co-worker who was almost do for their first baby. "She's sick of being pregnant", "Just wants the baby out", and "The doctor says they'll induce her" were some of the things that were said. Both of us were immediately concerned and confused as to why someone would simply let a doctor interfere with the natural birth process if nothing were wrong. I grabbed one of my resources and started researching induction. The statistics are terrible. Basically, if you don't want surgery, don't let the doctors do ANYTHING! First time pregnancies go an average of 42 weeks. At 40 weeks you haven't even reached full gestation. Babies come when they are ready. Doctors induce at 40 weeks, labor rarely kicks in (unless the baby was about to come anyway) which leads to a c-section since the doctors have now messed with things. When labor does kick in during an induction the contractions are so abnormally strong that the baby often goes into distress therefore creating a need for a c-section. It's most often a one-way road to not a bad birth experience. The following week my husband reported that instead of induction the doctors had decided to simply "strip her membranes". This made my heart drop more. A few weeks prior I had connected with a women who's doctor had done the same procedure. This is essentially when the doctor pushes the bag of waters away from the cervix making it weaker in hopes of inducing labor. This women that I met went home that night and started labor but also developed severe pain, chills, and a high fever. They called the hospital several times and the hospital said that women always have chilld in labor. This is not only not true but usually happens around the time of transition. This women waited at home until her gut feeling drove her and her husband to go in. When they got there someone finally realized that something was very terribly wrong. She ended up having an emergency c-section and treated for a massive internal staph infection. The baby died shortly after birth because it was so severely infected. This had happened because her doctor stripped her membranes. Staph infections come from the outside and wouldn't find their way up the birth canal unless it was brought there by another source, like a doctors hand. The infection was also SO strong that it spread that fast and killed her baby. Virulent infections such as that are only found in hospitals and medical facilities. There was no need for her doctor to have taken any action at all. Our bodies are perfect and know what they are doing, much more so than doctors. This lady, like myself, found herself recoverying from massive surgery and grieving a baby.
My husband and I talked about mentioning the risks to this coworker but decided they weren't close enough and the work environment was conducive enough. Yesterday we heard the baby was born.....via c-section, and mom's "in some pain". Really? No kidding. I started crying when Tyler told me that. Her first baby. Her first birth experience. And she has to spend the next year recovering instead of walking around holding and smiling with her baby. She'll have to fight hospitals tooth and nail to try a vbac, if she even decides to try that route. If not she'll undergo more cesareans only to double and triple her scar tissue, adhesions, recovery time and increase her chances every single time of a twisted bowel, ruptured uterus, blood transfusion, cutting the baby and the list goes on and on. Why would someone simply follow what a doctor wanted without asking questions? Why do any of us do that? Isn't there any intuition left for any of us to follow?
It was very clear to me today in my daughter's first grade classroom. I don't honestly think there is much intuition left or that we allow ourselves to hear it. I think it comes from the society that we are living in. We breed our independ thoughts out of people at an early age. Let's face it, only a nation of followers and not independent thinkers would have voted in the current administration. The less people think, they more they accept. Today was my daughter's Christmas party in her classroom. I volunteered to go in and make Gingerbread houses with the kids. I sat there as the teacher explained the directions. They were very simple: use the frosting as glue, use the graham crackers as sides of the house, use the candy to decorate. The instructions lasted ten seconds but the questions the kids had lasted ten minutes. "Can we make a door?" "Do we need windows?" "Can I make a roof?" "Does the roof have to be pointed?" "Do the colors have to match?" and it went on and on. These kids are so used to following directions to a 'T' that they couldn't understand when the teacher told them "There are no rules. Just have fun". Even after she added that line the questions still came. This was a room full of 6 and 7 year olds and they couldn't even feel free enough to just build a house however they wanted to. It took a long time but it seemed like they were unable to think on their own....already! I'm even guilty of teaching my kids to "read the instructions", and "follow the directions". Unfortunately my son has a teacher who is often wrong and he never stands up for himself. I have a folder of papers that she's mispelled, marked wrong when they are right or marked right when they are wrong. He comes and tells me "but mommy she was wrong" but he doesn't feel like he can say that to her, even when I tell him to. Why? Because she's the teacher. Just like we act around doctors. We're all so good at following directions instead of following common sense. Our doctors tell us "you'll need a c-section" and we nod our heads and go "okay" because they're the doctors and surely they know best. They say we need to be induced and even if their is a voice in our heads that says "my baby's just fine" we nod our heads because that is the almighty doctor. We need to value our own wisdom more. We're smart people and we don't give ourselves enough credit. Question authority. Figure out your feelings. Make decisions for yourself. Teachers are just waiting to retire. Doctors are just avoiding lawsuits and want to make it home for dinner. Take care of you and your family because nobody else is going to.
It's been four and a half months since my cesarean and I was up all last night in extreme pain. I had to crawl my way out of the bedroom so that I wouldn't wake up my husband. To make matters worse I've shown my records to a list of doctors in several states. The morning my son was born we had an ultrasound that showed things were getting worse. The doctor said "we need to take him now". Other doctors since then have said that according to everything that was happening on the ultrasounds, it was obvious my son was dying and would not just be fine the minute he was born. So my doctor had one of two motivations. Do a c-section to show that you "tried" to save the baby so that I can't turn around and sue her. Or collect the 40k in insurance money that a cesarean costs before you send me home. Doctors are not honest and they very rarely care about you. God did not intend babies to be born in such a way. Surgeries are good when what the doctors will do to you is better than what is happening to you. Unfortunately this is not always the case. Research. Read. Ask questions. Get empowered. Or you'll fall inline like cattle and not be in control of your own life.
My husband and I talked about mentioning the risks to this coworker but decided they weren't close enough and the work environment was conducive enough. Yesterday we heard the baby was born.....via c-section, and mom's "in some pain". Really? No kidding. I started crying when Tyler told me that. Her first baby. Her first birth experience. And she has to spend the next year recovering instead of walking around holding and smiling with her baby. She'll have to fight hospitals tooth and nail to try a vbac, if she even decides to try that route. If not she'll undergo more cesareans only to double and triple her scar tissue, adhesions, recovery time and increase her chances every single time of a twisted bowel, ruptured uterus, blood transfusion, cutting the baby and the list goes on and on. Why would someone simply follow what a doctor wanted without asking questions? Why do any of us do that? Isn't there any intuition left for any of us to follow?
It was very clear to me today in my daughter's first grade classroom. I don't honestly think there is much intuition left or that we allow ourselves to hear it. I think it comes from the society that we are living in. We breed our independ thoughts out of people at an early age. Let's face it, only a nation of followers and not independent thinkers would have voted in the current administration. The less people think, they more they accept. Today was my daughter's Christmas party in her classroom. I volunteered to go in and make Gingerbread houses with the kids. I sat there as the teacher explained the directions. They were very simple: use the frosting as glue, use the graham crackers as sides of the house, use the candy to decorate. The instructions lasted ten seconds but the questions the kids had lasted ten minutes. "Can we make a door?" "Do we need windows?" "Can I make a roof?" "Does the roof have to be pointed?" "Do the colors have to match?" and it went on and on. These kids are so used to following directions to a 'T' that they couldn't understand when the teacher told them "There are no rules. Just have fun". Even after she added that line the questions still came. This was a room full of 6 and 7 year olds and they couldn't even feel free enough to just build a house however they wanted to. It took a long time but it seemed like they were unable to think on their own....already! I'm even guilty of teaching my kids to "read the instructions", and "follow the directions". Unfortunately my son has a teacher who is often wrong and he never stands up for himself. I have a folder of papers that she's mispelled, marked wrong when they are right or marked right when they are wrong. He comes and tells me "but mommy she was wrong" but he doesn't feel like he can say that to her, even when I tell him to. Why? Because she's the teacher. Just like we act around doctors. We're all so good at following directions instead of following common sense. Our doctors tell us "you'll need a c-section" and we nod our heads and go "okay" because they're the doctors and surely they know best. They say we need to be induced and even if their is a voice in our heads that says "my baby's just fine" we nod our heads because that is the almighty doctor. We need to value our own wisdom more. We're smart people and we don't give ourselves enough credit. Question authority. Figure out your feelings. Make decisions for yourself. Teachers are just waiting to retire. Doctors are just avoiding lawsuits and want to make it home for dinner. Take care of you and your family because nobody else is going to.
It's been four and a half months since my cesarean and I was up all last night in extreme pain. I had to crawl my way out of the bedroom so that I wouldn't wake up my husband. To make matters worse I've shown my records to a list of doctors in several states. The morning my son was born we had an ultrasound that showed things were getting worse. The doctor said "we need to take him now". Other doctors since then have said that according to everything that was happening on the ultrasounds, it was obvious my son was dying and would not just be fine the minute he was born. So my doctor had one of two motivations. Do a c-section to show that you "tried" to save the baby so that I can't turn around and sue her. Or collect the 40k in insurance money that a cesarean costs before you send me home. Doctors are not honest and they very rarely care about you. God did not intend babies to be born in such a way. Surgeries are good when what the doctors will do to you is better than what is happening to you. Unfortunately this is not always the case. Research. Read. Ask questions. Get empowered. Or you'll fall inline like cattle and not be in control of your own life.
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