WIC Wagon!

Today, Danzo and I went over to our local WIC office to once again sign up for this great program. I can't say enough good things about it. Its a program that provides nutritional assistance and support for women, infants, and children. If you financially qualify, you get a plethora of free healthy food. If you feel like you could use some help with the grocery bill and are pregnant and/or have a little one under the age of five, its worth checking out. Just look at what I get each month.

For me:

Up to 36 oz of breakfast cereal (about 2 boxes)
1 lb cheese
2 containers 100% juice (64 oz each) or 3 containers frozen juice
18 oz peanut butter
9 half-gallons 8th Continent soy milk
1 lb dry beans/peas/lentils or up to 64 oz canned beans
1 dozen fresh eggs
1 package (up to 16 oz) bread, brown rice, or whole wheat/corn tortillas
$10.00 worth of any combination fruits/vegetables (fresh, frozen and/or canned)

For Danzo:

Up to 36 oz of breakfast cereal (about 2 boxes)
1 lb cheese
2 containers 100% juice (64 oz each) or 2 containers frozen juice
18 oz peanut butter
3 gallons fat free/skim/nonfat/low fat milk
1 lb dry beans/peas/lentils or up to 64 oz canned beans
1 dozen fresh eggs
2 packages (up to oz) bread, brown rice, or whole wheat/corn tortillas
$6.00 worth of any combination fruits/vegetables (fresh, frozen and/or canned)

They also check your iron levels, which is a bonus in my opinion. I'll take all the information I can get. Happily, Danzo's iron count was around 13 and so was mine. Both very good levels. Also, after the baby is born, they provide information and support for breast feeding. Then after a few months when they're ready for solid food, you get a ton of infant cereal and baby food.

The first time you go in, you just answer some questions about your current nutrition and listen to a few tips and pointers of how you can do better. We just walked right in without an appointment and only stayed less than two hours. By the end, we received our checks for three months worth of free food. Our next follow-up appointment isn't until May and will be significantly shorter.

Since I'm a stay at home mom, I like to be able to contribute to the income by saving money any way I can. I clip coupons and look for sales all the time. If you're like me, a program like this makes you feel even further empowered to financially contribute to your family's income by getting so much free food! If you can get all this free food and assistance for such minimal effort, why wouldn't you hop on the WIC wagon too?

For more information and to see if you qualify, check out this website: http://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/

Midwife AND Doula!

Just when I felt like life was being particularly unkind to me in my search for people to help me achieve the birth experience I want, I persevered and found not only a midwife, but a doula too! Its just like everyone has been saying, "Things happen for a reason." When I thought I had lost contact with the midwife, I searched even deeper for someone... anyone to help.

That's when I came across a doula in the neighboring town of Eager. We got together today at a coffee shop and talked for hours. We came to discover that our views on birthing are very similar, which made us both feel empowered and motivated to create this experience together. We both felt relieved to find each other especially in a rural area where most people resign to having repeated c-sections without much other thought. So in the end, I probably would have never met this doula if it wasn't for my temporary loss of contact with the midwife.

Speaking of the midwife. I met with her yesterday and she is absolutely beyond great. She came to my house and as soon as I saw her, I knew she is definitely a kindred spirit of mine. There was an immediate connection between her and everyone in the house. She greeted Danzo with kindness and he felt comfortable enough to talk to her about things around the house. He introduced her to our rat, Benji and in a gesture of kindness picked him up and handed him to her. She took Benji in her hands without hesitation and cuddled him as she thanked Danzo for sharing.

This alone is enough to melt my heart. I know things are going to be okay when someone loves my child and animals from the start. I showed her around the rest of the house and we chatted about the movement to further home birth rights. She told me of some other women in the neighboring towns who have similar views on birth as I do. She shared that she wants to introduce everyone so we can all feel empowered by each other. I'm all for that. There's not much worse than believing in something without an expanded support system. How are things going to change if we don't all unite?

She took my temp and blood pressure and recorded my medical history as we discussed things like books I can read and movies I can watch to learn even more about the birthing process. We went over my diet and supplements I'm taking and a few things that I should add. I shared my experience of having a miscarriage and as I was talking, she rubbed my feet and I felt like all my tension escaped right out my soles. It was amazing. The simple act of empathetic touch can really open a channel for negative energy to escape out of the body, which is something to be utilized during labor, for sure.

I learned about her core beliefs and history in experience both professionally and personally. First of all, and most importantly, she believes that being pregnant is a totally natural and healthy experience and all women are capable of achieving empowerment through the birth process. She has 27 years nursing experience and is a mother of 4 and a grandmother of 1. She is a certified birth and postpartum doula, lactation consultant, and direct-entry midwife. She offers childbirth preparation classes, hypnobirthing techniques, lotus birth, and herbal remedies. She grows and cultivates many herbs in her personal garden at home. In summary, she is works with wise women ways, which is definitely up my alley! Just the kind of person I wanted. 

The best part of the visit came when she got the doppler out and attempted to hear a heartbeat. She tried for about ten minutes the first time, then we took a break for a little while. The second time she tried, she laid her hands on my belly and talked to my baby and asked that she allow us to listen to her heart even if just for a few seconds. The doppler came on again and after about another ten minutes, there is was! Clear as anything. My baby's heart beat. Beating at a rate of about 130 - 140. I think I had a smile on my face for the next few hours just thinking about that wonderful sound. Its one thing to see the heartbeat, but quite another to hear it! A thrilling event in such a relaxed atmosphere too. Without the pressure of time, she found it! Our appointment lasted for a little over two hours!

I was able to talk to both the midwife and doula about each other. They have never met before and we're all excited about getting together for our next visit in March. I'll have a dream team of people working together to increase my chances of having the birth I want. I get to reach out and network with other women with similar beliefs.  I am feeling more motivated than ever to do my homework to make this happen. Best of all, my husband and son will be able to be active participants in the process. Also, I will have advocates on my side if I need to go to the hospital.

I think the most recurring word throughout this post is the best way to describe how I feel from the experiences I've had over the past couple days.... EMPOWERED!!! Everything is falling into place and if I could take a picture of my feelings right now I would. Happiness abounds!

Heartbeat?

On Monday, I was feeling pretty defeated, thinking that I'd never hear from the midwife again. It turns out, she finally got hold of me on Monday night! The first time I had talked to her, she was driving and talking to me at the same time so she never got my phone number. She called the other midwife who referred me to her and got a number to call me, but it was the wrong number. She had been leaving messages for me on someone else's voice mail. To top it off, she didn't get my message because she was in the middle of changing cell phone providers. She finally checked her email and got my correct number and got in touch with me soon after. Whew! What a relief! So we set up an appointment for Thursday (today).

I'll tell more about my appointment with the midwife after I've had a chance to digest it a little more. Maybe tomorrow. For now, I want to share my experience with the gynecologist. I still went ahead with my appointment I had with her yesterday. There are three reasons for this:

1) I wanted to hear a heartbeat as soon as possible.

2) Any lab work I want to get done will be covered by my insurance.

3) God forbid, in case anything happens where I need to go to the hospital I'll have a medical history on file with a doctor, which will make it a little faster to get the care I need in an emergency. Sort of a back-up plan if you will.

My appointment was at 9:00 am and since I've never been there before, they asked me to show up a half-hour early to fill out paperwork. So I got poor Danzo out of bed at 6:30 and we were out the door by 7:30 to make it there on time. As I was pulling into the parking lot at 8:30, my phone rang, but I couldn't answer it because I was driving. Once I parked, I listened to the message. It was the receptionist from the doctor's office, "Hi Tami, if you haven't left yet, please give us a call."

When I heard the message, I knew there must've been a scheduling conflict. I walked in the office and they told me that the gal who scheduled me for 9 am didn't take into account that the doctor would be in a meeting over at the hospital until 9:00 and wouldn't get back to the office until 9:30 at the earliest. They told me I was welcome to wait or, even better, come back at 11:30. I told them that we would go run some errands and come back at 11:30 since that seemed to be easier for them. They looked relieved and thanked me.

Danzo was an absolute trooper as I dragged him along to Wal Mart, Big Lots, and Pet Sense. You see, when you live about an hour or so away from stores, you've gotta get as much shopping done in a day as you can. We do as much shopping in a day now as I used to do in a week when we lived in the "city." Its a big headache for me, but I'm sure even more so for Danzo, but like I said, he did great. I gave him a few snacks here and there and he was happy. No melt-downs.

We got back to the doctor's office a little after 11:00 on the off-chance they might take us in a little early. No such luck. They took us back around 11:30 and had me strip down and get into the ever-dreaded gown that opens in the back and lay a drape over my lap. I sat there for an entire hour trying to keep Danzo entertained in a stuffy, sterile exam room. Again, he was still doing good. He had his new car I just bought him at Wal Mart and he was happy enough. By now, after all this waiting I knew a melt-down was just around the corner. He had a few snacks, but it was well past lunch time and even I was feeling a little woozy from no real food.

Finally, the doctor came in with her prestigious white coat on. She shook my hand then shot a nasty glance over at Danzo as I introduced him to her. It was obvious he wasn't welcome there especially since the paperwork I filled out just before the appointment asks that patients not bring their children to the office with them. The doctor sat down and looked at my chart. Instead of having a conversation with me, she shot question after question at me like I was in an interrogation.

Then, like most doctors do, she assumed that she had a full say over the medical procedures to be performed. She listed off all the things she wanted to do. She wanted to give me a flu shot. When I declined, she tried to scare me by saying a pregnant woman's chances of dying from the flu are double than that of a non-pregnant woman. I still declined since I'm not really convinced that's the truth. I was also pressured to get a Tetanus-Diphtheria-Wooping Cough vaccine. I declined that too. When she got to the mention of a pap smear, I told her a pelvic exam was fine, but I wanted to pass on a pap for now. She looked at me with squinted eyes and said in a piercing tone, "Why?"
Then I started to stumble over my words a little as I explained that I didn't want any more scraping around than necessary. She shrugged and shook her head then said, "Alright, no pap."

I was feeling flustered for even having to explain myself especially since I felt like she didn't really want to know why I didn't want a pap smear. She just wanted to hear how stupid my answer sounded to her. Its like she was pulling rank on me instead of trying to understand me. She probably also didn't like the fact that I kept declining all the things she could do to me to get some quick money from my insurance company.

It was time for me to be examined. Poor Danzo had been so good up until this point. He was at my feet while I was sitting on the exam table.
I said to him, "Okay Danzo, I need you to go sit in the chair now."
He replied as most 2-year-olds do if they don't quite like a situation. He yelled "NO!" and didn't budge from his spot.

Of course he was right in the doctor's way. Then he decided to start messing with that little rolling retractable step at the bottom of the exam table. The doctor was not having that at all. She got flustered and said in a stern voice, "Denzel, that's mine. I need that and I need this space."
He still didn't move and wasn't going to, so with the doctor and assistant standing there glaring at me and me with my naked but hanging out the back of the gown, I got up and physically moved him to a chair.

I laid down and the doctor got the doppler out to hear the heartbeat. She tried for maybe 2-3 minutes then told me she couldn't find anything and she was sending me to the hospital for an ultrasound in an attempt to see a heart beat. After she said that, I don't think I really heard anything else she said. I went into sort of a daze and started to have flashbacks to my first pregnancy that ended in miscarriage. My mind began to work overtime to think of ways to cope with loosing another baby as she proceeded with the roughest, most uncomfortable pelvic exam I've had in my life.

After interrogating and pressuring me, scaring the crap out of me by not finding a heartbeat, then molesting me, the doctor sent me on my way and I was told to schedule my next appointment on my way out. Yeah right. Like I want to come back in two weeks. No thank you. My appointment only ended up being about 30 minutes. The amount of time we had to kill and wait for the appointment was 7 times longer than the appointment itself. Not something I want to experience again anytime soon. 

Besides, I had to get to the hospital asap. I contacted  grandma Cindy to see if she could watch Danzo while I went to get an ultrasound. She was so on-the-ball that she got to the hospital before we did. Danzo got to spend time with his grandma while I went inside to discover the fate of this pregnancy. The hospital staff was very friendly. The ultrasound technician thankfully had a great sense of humor that helped get me get a little bit out of my shell of frazzlement. He got some images on the screen and quickly found a heartbeat! He took some measurements and said that the baby looks completely healthy. I even got to keep a couple images. Unfortunately, they got crumpled by somebody's tiny hands, but you get the idea:

Maybe its just not meant to be...

I was so excited after talking with the lay midwife on the phone. Our conversation ended with her saying that she'd look at her schedule and get back to me about setting up our first appointment. It is now two weeks later. I've called her twice, left a message, and sent an email since we last talked. She has not called me as promised. I know I told her I wasn't in too much of a hurry, but I thought for sure I'd hear back before two weeks and multiple contact attempts.

This Thursday, I will be 12 weeks along and have yet to have any prenatal care or hear a heartbeat. As I've said before, I really don't feel totally pregnant until I hear a heartbeat. Needless to say, I want some sort of progress to happen. I am so tired of going around in circles and trying to beat the system somehow. It just feels entirely too big for me. Everywhere I go, I come across a roadblock. Something tells me, this home birth thing just isn't going to happen. I am starting to resign to the idea that I'm just going to have to get sliced open again.

On the other hand, I guess there's still a lot of time before I go into labor. Maybe by then, I'll have something better figured out, but for now, I've made an appointment with an OB/GYN affiliated with the hospital in Show Low. They are the only hospital in the area that delivers babies and unfortunately, they have a ban on planned VBACs. My appointment is for the day after tomorrow, so at least I'll be able to hear the heartbeat and get some sort of check up. I don't want to get too stressed by all this so I'm going to try and focus on the little bits and pieces I can accomplish rather than feeling defeated.

Things Are Looking UP!!!

Over the past week, I have come to discover that there are a few brave souls out there willing to take a risk in helping me have the birth I want. The risk is not all in the birth itself, but in how the insurance companies have influenced the laws in making it illegal for a certified midwife to attend a VBAC home birth. I am disgusted with how difficult it is for me to make my own choices in this process. I am willing to take the minimal risks involved with having a VBAC at home.

With that said, shouldn't that be enough to choose the certified midwife I want? Isn't there some sort of waiver I can sign saying that I take responsibility for such risks? Well, the answer to both questions is, "no." If a certified midwife took me on as a client, they would subsequently loose their license, which means I'm forced to either go through the traditional hospital system, find a midwife or doula who is not certified or, take things into my own hands and perform an unassisted birth. The second option is, by far, the most realistic and comfortable one for me.

After some more research and a few phone calls, I have found someone who is willing to work with me. She has a lot of experience. We discussed all my basic concerns. She told me that I might need to be transferred to the hospital if complications arise, but she'll do everything in her power to work with me through knowledge and prayer to help me have the birth I want. I am on board with whatever I need to do to make this happen my way. My vision of an ideal birth that I thought was shattered last week is now starting to come back together. I am once again filled with great hope and joy!