My Birth Story

I've had several people ask about my birth story and tell me they are eagerly waiting to hear how my precious Rahziel (AKA Rahzi) came into the world. I think the sooner I can get it out on paper (or computer) the better, because like a dream, the details are fading rather quickly. I can't possibly give an accurate play by play of my 21 hours I spent in labor, but I will do my best. The times aren't exact, and there are some details that only my partner and midwives remember, but I'll give you the good good. Hey, I'll even throw in a graphic pic that feels pretty vulnerable, but hey, it's real. Oh, and I am going to give details, so if you're not into all that, consider this your warning.

I'll start by saying that this isn't going to be the blissy blissful home birth story that you might be hoping for. Don't get me wrong, it was that at times...mostly at the end and when it was over, but for the most part it was hard work. Very. Hard. Work. And that's okay, too. After telling some people about the experience, I've been asked if I would have a natural home birth again, given what I know now, and my answer is absolutely yes, hands down. Considering some of the things that happened in my personal experience, I am so glad I was at home. I also am so grateful that I got to feel every bit of the birthing experience and know what it's like. It has forever changed me, in the best way.

So, let's back up about a week before I go into labor. My voodoo witchy sissy tells me that she thinks I am going to go into labor on the morning of October 27th (My EDD is Nov. 2). Ya, ya, whatever, what does she know? Well apparently she knows a lot and sits in her closet with her Chantel voodoo doll and a needle. At 10:30am on October 27th I get out of bed to go to the bathroom and fluid starts running down my legs. After I pee I wipe myself and I see that I have bloody show. I instantly knew that this was it, I am in fact in labor and for like a split second I started to panic. It was REALLY happening, I REALLY have to go through with this and push a baby out of my little vagina and I have to do it like, really soon. But the panic was only there for a very short while and then I started to get in the zone and do all the things I knew I should...and something I probably shouldn't. I laid down to rest, text my midwife, and Mariano went to the store to get some groceries. I relaxed and decided to tell my sister that she is weird and that I am now in labor exactly when she said I would be. Well, I told her not to tell my mom because I wanted to tell my mom, and silly me, I thought I would be able to think later on in the midst of labor, let alone send out a text message or make a phone call. Anyway, despite my request, my sister immediately told my mom. Shortly after, I completely forgot about my mom, and everything else in the universe for that matter.

I actually thought it was pretty intense at this point. Ha, I had no idea...

I started feeling contractions almost immediately. They were only what I would describe as mild for a little while. Honestly, I don't remember hardly anything in the beginning of my labor, but I'm pretty sure I just laid in bed with Mariano, had a little make out sesh, and rested until the midwives came over. I think I finally called them to come around 3pm when my contraction were obviously closer together. I just wanted that tub so bad, and I thought my water had broken so I couldn't get in my bathtub. When they (there were 2 midwives and an assistant midwife) arrived they started setting up the tub, checking my vitals, listening to my baby's heart beat, and then just let me be. By this time things were really getting intense and the hot water felt soooooooo good...but not for long. I labored in the tub for a while and it wasn't long before I started getting really loud and vocal and maybe even crying, I don't remember, during my contractions. It was getting to be night time and I thought for sure it was almost time for me to push this baby out. I was having the most intense back labor. I felt it all in my back, like it was on fire times a million. When I told my midwife she said that usually indicates the baby is stuck in a less than optimal position. When she checked me, she looks up and says very calmly, "Well, you're about 4cm dilated." My heart dropped. You have got to be kidding me, I thought. It had already been about 7 or 8 hours and there was NO WAY I could go on much longer. I still had 6cm to go. Because of my back labor, my amazing midwife calls a chiropractor she knows well who practices in the shopping center right next to my house. She agrees to see me and give me an adjustment that will hopefully loosen up my pelvis enough to move things along. I've known I've had a tight/tilted pelvis for a while now. I was told by another chiropractor about 3 years ago. We think it got shifted when I was in a bad car wreck as a teenager. Anyway, in the middle of my oh so intense labor, we all pile up into my midwifes car and go to the chiropractor. By now it feels like I am on a low dose of  narcotics, even though I didn't take anything. When I think back on this whole experience, it's like recalling a memory when I was on Xanax as a teenager. When we get to the chiro she does different things to adjust me and shows the midwives and Mariano what they can do for me during labor. Almost immediately I feel the contractions shift from my back to my lower abdomen and all down the front of my legs. When I say that I feel the pain shift from back to front, my midwife says that it's a good sign. Then we go back home and I labor longer. At one point I decide to lay down and see what it would be like to surrender to the sensation of the contractions. Up until this point I had been loud, vocal, and sort of fighting them. Mariano and I lay down in bed and I tell myself to melt into the mattress and relax my body completely, and don't tense up when the contraction comes. So for about an hour or more, I did just that. And here's what happened:

As a contraction came on I could feel precisely when it would "peak" or be at it's highest level of intensity. Instead of feeling it in one area, my back, or lower abdomen, or legs, I felt it in my entire body, and my entire body felt the size of the universe. It was as if I had lost my physical form and was pure consciousness that was everything, and everything was pain. As they would peak, I would tremble and it felt like an earthquake inside my body. But on the outside I was dead silent, and the house was dead silent. Mariano laid behind me, holding me, and the midwives laid resting in my living room. After a while, my midwife came into the room, and because I had suddenly gone silent and seemingly calm she says, "It seems as if things have petered out?" I replied with a very convincing NO. I explained things had definitely not slowed down and in fact were only getting more intense. "Oh good," she says. I then labored more. In the shower, in the bed, in the tub, hanging on people, etc. Thank God I could move around. Not that it took my pain away but I was able to manage it better and that's just what I naturally wanted to do was move. Laboring was very natural and intuitive for me. No one had to really tell me what to do. I was just doing whatever felt right in the moment. Noises, movement, squatting, eye contact, breathing, etc... The freedom was so vital and I don't know how I would have done it if I felt constricted in any way.

At the Chiropractor in the middle of labor. She was showing Mariano and my midwife
how they could help with my pelvis as labor progressed.

Fast forward and it's midnight, maybe 1am. My midwife checks me again and I am 6cm. Dear effing God, this is never going to end, were my thoughts. Then I get thrown another curve ball. She looks up and again, calmly asks, "Have you ever had surgery or anything on your cervix?" I tell her no, not that I know of, and she continues to tell me that I have a cervical lip covering the baby's head and that he (or she) couldn't come down with it in the way. Oh, and it was one of the bigger ones she had ever seen...about the size of a golf ball. She has me doing cat cow position, getting in the shower, and other things in hopes that it would go away on its own. Well....it didn't, so she now wants to push the lip back, over the baby's head. She tries and it was so painful I have to tell her to stop. She respects my wishes and I labor more, still trying things that might have the lip go away by the time I am fully dilated. By about 5:30am, I am squatting in the shower and feeling more pressure in my rectum when I am contracting and sort of feeling the urge to push. During one contraction I start to push a little and feel a big POP. I yell, "I just felt something pop!" and the midwives say, "oh it sounds like your water!" I thought my water had broken already, but turns out I was just leaking a little.

My midwife checks me and says I am about 9 1/2cm and she needs to go ahead and push the lip back so that I can start pushing. She says it will hurt but once it's done my baby will soon be here and I will feel so much better. Just the fact that I was 9 1/2 was a huge relief. She puts her fingers in me and tells me on my next contraction to push against her fingers. So I do, and Mariano says I let out the loudest scream he has ever heard, and the lip goes back. The energy in the room instantly felt better and the midwives tell me I can start pushing now if/when I felt the urge to.

I couldn't believe it, we were finally here. The room was dark and the sun was about to come up. Everything felt so beautiful and surreal. They set up the birthing chair for me to sit on (basically just a chair with the middle cut out). I sit on it and immediately with my next contraction feel like pushing. I push with every contraction in the chair for I dunno...30 minutes to an hour? I was making progress, slowly but surely, and I was getting verrrrryyyy exhausted. They asked me if I wanted to see my baby's head and I said yes. I remember looking at the head and saying, "It doesn't have any hair. I thought it would have more hair."

Then they suggested I lay on my side on the bed. That felt really good, like I got good leverage when I was pushing. I pushed like this until he had just about crowned, and then rolled over onto my back and pushed out the rest of him.

I remember feeling his entire head come out, and with it I felt a huge relief and couldn't believe we were already here. It was almost over. My eyes were closed but I could hear everything and feel his body, turning, then shoulder by shoulder make his way out. It was so surreal. Mariano is sobbing and I can't stop saying, "My baby. You're my baby!" I wish I could relive that moment over and over again. It was so sweet. So perfect. Like time had stopped and everything in existence was in that moment. Well, for me, it was.

After a few minutes of saying, "My baby, my baby," I realized that I still didn't know what my baby was. A boy or a girl? I actually assumed it was a boy, but I told Mariano to check. "It's a boy!" he says.

After that, I hold him as they do their midwife things and wait for the placenta. Once the placenta comes out I actually lose quite a bit of blood. It wasn't an emergency, just "more than I like to see," my midwife says. I start to feel dizzy and a bit loopy, so Mariano holds the baby for some time. I actually had a pretty rough day following the birth. I was up all night, lost blood, hadn't eaten and my appetite was shot...oh, and I like, birthed a baby....so I was pretty wonky to say the least. I couldn't even sit up without feeling like I would pass out and I wasn't really able to eat or hold food down. I kept asking the same questions over and over, and had to pee on myself because I couldn't get up. Ya, it was rough. The only thing that really helped was laying down with my baby right by my side. Seriously, it put me at ease. The midwives gave me some meds for the bleeding, and put me on a bag of IV fluids and I started to feel better. Everyday that goes by I feel better and better and more like my normal self. Well, my new normal self. I don't think I will ever feel like the old me again, in a good way. I even like my body more now than I did pre-pregnancy. That was a relief. I feel healthier, sexier, more turned on, and more mature since giving birth. I feel more excited about myself, my relationship, and all the possibilities in life. After giving birth, I simultaneously realized why women do it, and why some women don't do it.

Oh ya, remember how I mentioned my sister told my mom I was in labor at the beginning of this story? Well, I never got around to telling my mom myself, and she was also up for 24+ hours wondering what the heck was going on and worrying since it had been over 20 hours and she couldn't get a hold of us. The thought of my phone during labor was...non existent. I felt so bad when she burst through my door at 9am with this look of relief. I didn't realize that she had been up and trying to contact us. It was actually perfect timing, as Rahzi was just born about an hour and a half before.
Anyway....

There have been a few questions that often get asked that I'll go ahead and answer here:

Where did you get his name? 
We didn't name Rahzi until he was several days old, and I'm surprised it only took that long. When I was pregnant, the name Rossi came to me (but still pronounced with a 'Z' sound like Rahzi). When we didn't have a name by like day 3 or 4, I threw that name out there again. We told a friend that we were gonna try that name out on him for a few days to see how it felt. Later that night she text us and when mentioning him, she spelled his name like Razi. We really liked that, and so I looked it up to see if it had any meaning that resonated. Well I found that Razi is short for the Hebrew archangel, Raziel. You can read all about Raziel here and here. 

It felt really good. Then, without knowing about the Archangel, Raziel, our same friend had a dream that our baby was speaking universal wisdom and then going back to being a baby. This pretty much sealed the deal. So Raziel it was. Except then Mariano said Razi looks too much like Nazi, so we changed the spelling a bit. Rahziel, AKA Rahzi :)

And because neither Mariano or myself aren't too fond of our last names, we gave Rahzi the last name Requena. This is Mariano's moms last name.

What were his stats? 
He was born at 7:41am on October 28th. He was 8lbs, 7oz, and 20 inches long. Yes, we were very surprised by how much he weighed. I'm just glad I didn't know his weight before he came out of me ;)

How is breastfeeding going? 
Pretty damn good. I couldn't ask for it to be going much better. He's a nursing champ and latched on almost right away. We had a little trouble for the first few days. My nips got terribly sore and raw and I was basically crying through feedings. We discovered he had a bad latch and from the help of my midwife, a lactation consultant, and this awesome video, we corrected it right away and the soreness was gone in just a few days. I've heard so many women say that it just hurts the first 4-6 weeks and you just have to nurse through the pain. I've learned that it's not supposed to hurt. Pain is a sign that something is not right and you don't have to cry and cringe through feedings. Great news, huh?! I'm really thankful that I had these troubles in the beginning because I got to learn a lot more that I didn't know about breastfeeding (yay, knowledge).The only complaint I might have is that I often wake up in puddles of breast milk, but I'm actually not complaining. Just really thankful when I think about it.

Did it hurt?
Ha, uhhh ya. Like effing hell. AND, I would do it again. But not now or anytime soon, or maybe never, I dunno I haven't decided. I can't imagine having an experience as profound as birth and not be able to feel every bit of it. It was very empowering on so many levels.

And so, there you have it. That's how Rahzi came into the world and that's why we are so in love now.  K, Thanks, bye :) <3

UPDATE and Addressing Common Concerns

They say the first trimester can be hard, but I never heard anyone say it would be like....wanting to die. At least that's how it was for me, and that's why I haven't posted anything in a couple of months. So yes, good for you to all the women who didn't have any symptoms the first trimester. I, on the other hand, spent 7-8 weeks nauseous, in bed, and avoiding anything that had a smell at all costs. There were certainly things that helped temporarily, and I used them as much as I could. Of course, all women are different, but if you're having a rough first trimester, here are some things that helped me that might help you as well:


-Walking and not being in a car as often as possible
-Eating a piece of toast or cereal before getting out of bed
-Sex (I know some people completely lose their libido during pregnancy, but not me. Ask me about Orgasmic Meditation, too).
-Not being on the phone/computer
-Peppermint and ginger tea
-More dense foods like grains and nuts
-Sleep, sleep, sleep
-Hot baths (but not too hot, of course).


Now I am in my 14th week and those days seem to be behind me for the most part. I still feel slightly nauseous between meals and at night, but it's bearable. My aversion to salads is no longer, thank GODDESS. The thought alone of spinach would send me to the toilet at one point. Last week I chose my midwifery team here in Austin and had my first prenatal appointment yesterday where I heard my baby's heartbeat for the very first time. Just thinking about it again gets me choked up. What an amazing feeling. I am very happy and confident with the team I chose and look forward to growing a relationship with these women at Honeydue Homebirth. 

So that's that....

Feel free to ask me any other questions about my first trimester experience.

What I wanted to talk about in this blog is two of the more common things I hear when people find out I am birthing at home. Well, for the most part, people are really supportive. Here in Austin it's not unusual to have a homebirth. But where I am from, people don't have homebirths or birth at birthing centers. I have family and people I grew up around that are mostly supportive, but raise questions, as they probably should. The ones who make these remarks are actually those who are more open to the idea of natural childbirth. The ones who aren't usually don't say anything at all. The two most common statements I hear from people in some form or fashion is, "I would love to birth at home but I can't afford it and insurance (or medicaid) pays for a hospital birth," and "I couldn't birth at home because I'm not good with pain. I need meds."

I'll start with, "I would love to birth at home but I can't afford it and insurance (or medicaid) pays for a hospital birth."

Let me just start off by saying, yes, the maternal care (well, all health care for that matter) really sucks here in the U.S. In other places such as Canada and Europe, women don't have to worry about how they are going to pay to give life. Midwives are paid for by the government and so is postpartum care. They also get longer PAID maternity leave which is nothing but most beneficial to mother and baby on so many levels. I get it. It's not fair. Who wants to have a possible financial burden when they should be enjoying the best time in their life? Ya, it's a drag, but here is my response given our current system.

Interestingly, the few people I have heard this from without a shadow of a doubt are financially better off than my partner and I. When people say this, I'm thinking "uh ya, like I have so much extra money lying around to pay for my homebirth....not." Of course, I don't say it like that to them, but seriously I am not having a homebirth because I have more money than you. I am having a homebirth because it is a priority. Birthing in a hospital is not seen as an option unless of an emergency, therefore a homebirth has to happen. It's sort of like this: The majority of people you know probably own a car and went to college, right? Let's face it, most people don't have that kind of money to put down in full for cars and school. So what do they do? They borrow money, they get grants and scholarships, they take out loans, they pay in payments, they get an extra job. They do whatever they can because to them they HAVE to go to college, or they HAVE to have a car, and usually it's both. There is just no other option so they make it happen and they make it work. That's how birthing at home is for me. I could easily go get medicaid (which I am anyway in case of emergency) and have an absolutely free birth in a hospital. But several thousand dollars is more than worth it to me. I am paying to have the experience I want. I am paying for what I believe to be the best and most healthiest thing for my baby. I am paying to be able to move around, and eat during labor, and have one hour long personal prenatal visits. This is my child, this is my body and there is no amount of money that would steer me into having a free hospital birth. So that's my answer. If you believe in benefit of birthing at home, and fear the risks of hospital intervention such as I do, then it becomes a priority. I don't live with cable tv, I pay low rent, I don't have car payments, I don't buy brand new clothing. I have other priorities such as healthy, organic food...and homebirthing :) Feeling the whole process of birthing my child, and the experience being MINE, not something taken over or seen as something to be intervened by the medical establishment, is invaluable to me. And very empowering. Midwives are very flexible with payments because they want everyone to be able to have an empowering homebirth. I still don't know exactly how or when it will all get paid for, but I'm not worried about it. If it's not a priority to you, then it will be easy to use money as the reason why you choose not to, like anything in life.


What about, "I couldn't birth at home because I'm not good with pain. I need meds."

Most (if not all) of the women who say this are speaking from their experience of their first birth. They might be thinking, "Pshh, ya you just wait and see how painful it is." First of all, I am not here to claim that birth isn't painful. I imagine it is, and I imagine it is more so for women who are having hospital births and here is why I imagine that. Let's take my little sister for example, who gave birth to my precious nephew 6 months ago. She was someone who told me how painful it was. She had a planned hospital birth (meaning she planned to have her baby at the hospital), and when she went into labor, all she could do was hurry up and frantically get in the car and be driven for 20-30 minutes until she got to the hospital. If she were having a planned homebirth, it might have looked something more like this: She could have had the peace of mind knowing that she didn't have to get anywhere and been in the comfort of her own home, while she used the techniques that she learned in her natural childbirth classes (such as hypnobirthing), and waited for her doula to get there who is trained in assisting in natural pain relief methods during labor. She could have labored in a warm tub, and moved around (which helps greatly with pain) as opposed to being confined to a bed. Am I saying this would have ensured my sister had a pain free labor? No, but her ideas of pain would have been different, she would have the tools to manage it better, there would have been more support around her, and she would be in a more comfortable environment. My point is, if you plan to have a natural birth, there is much more preparation around things like pain. Things that also help with pain are your diet and exercise. The healthier you are, the better things will flow, open, and stretch.

Also, this is again about priorities. Personally, I would rather experience temporary pain (yes, even if it feels like my hips are going to explode) if that means lowering my risk of unnecessary hospital intervention. To know what I mean, check out the statistics of hospital birth interventions compared to homebirth. Did you know that women giving birth in a hospital are 4-5 times more likely to have a c-section than women who birth at home or in a free standing birthing center? That alone is enough to keep me birthing at home. Not to mention women birthing at home are less likely to ask for pain meds, less likely to receive an episiotomy, less likely to have a forceps or vacuum delivery, and they are more successful with breastfeeding.

If you aren't familiar with birthing naturally, it's really something worth looking into for all women. We were made to be able to do it, and quite frankly, what's happening inside our maternity wards is scary. Fortunately, some establishments are catching on and adopting methods that benefit mother and baby. I imagine it will only get better from here. Ladies, you can do it. You can give birth as you were intended to, and if you want a natural birth experience, you can have it.

Reading Material

Since the news of my pregnancy I have been doing more reading and writing. I know I have plenty of time, but all I find myself wanting to do it scour through the reading material that has been sitting on my shelves for a couple years. As a birth doula in training and someone who has a passion for natural childbirth anyway, I already have quite the collection. These are some of my absolute favorite recommended reads during pregnancy. You won't see this mama reading "What to Expect When You're Expecting," or "Babywise."

Stories of birth on The Farm in Tennessee with Ina May Gaskin

"Because a child’s trust and feelings of security are directly linked with his or her physiological well-being, I also talk about the great value of following the mental and emotional needs of the young baby and child throughout the growing years. When a baby is born into this totally new and unfamiliar world, we need to take heed of his or her cues indicating a need for security and comfort, by: carrying the baby constantly, sleeping with the baby, holding the baby skin-to-skin, and following the baby’s continued needs as he or she grows." -Karen Ranzi

"In order for these doctors to make what they consider an adequate income, the hospital has to maintain something like an 80 percent epidural rate. Given this, how strongly do you think medical staff would resist the notion that epidurals are not always a good thing and most women can cope without them?” 
― Henci Goer

"A complete guide to childbirth for Dads, Doulas, and other labor companions."

According to Jean Liedloff, the continuum concept is the idea that in order to achieve optimal physical, mental and emotional development, human beings — especially babies — require the kind of experience to which our species adapted during the long process of our evolution.  Infants whose continuum needs are fulfilled during the early, in-arms phase grow up to have greater self-esteem and become more independent than those whose cries go unanswered for fear of "spoiling" them or making them too dependent.

"Here is a holistic approach to childbirth that examines this profound rite-of-passage not as a medical event but as an act of self-discovery. "

“Remember this, for it is as true and true gets: Your body is not a lemon. You are not a machine. The Creator is not a careless mechanic. Human female bodies have the same potential to give birth well as aardvarks, lions, rhinoceri, elephants, moose, and water buffalo. Even if it has not been your habit throughout your life so far, I recommend that you learn to think positively about your body.” 






If you have any other books to recommend I would love suggestions :)

I'm Pregnant!

For as long as I could remember I have imagined this time in my life. So much so that I actually started to think that it would never happen to me. At 26 years old I even started to think (but not seriously) that my time was running out, and maybe I was meant for something else. The idea of having a child sat in the background of my mind and I questioned whether I actually desired to be a mother, or if it was some compensatory desire I had to fulfill some void part in myself. I questioned my reasons for wanting a child and if they were good enough. I felt a biological urge to procreate and a rational resistance that judged myself for wanting children. Maybe I just had to realize that I don't actually want children and begin to mourn the attachment and identity I had created for myself around it. Then...it happened, completely unexpectedly, the way I always knew it would happen.

One morning I went to a coffee shop and while I was there I went to the bathroom. When I sat down I noticed my ovulation mucous in my underwear. Sometimes I see it, but mostly I don't, so it was fun to know without a shadow of a doubt that I was ovulating. After the coffee shop I came home and my partner almost immediately jumped me and we started having sex. I didn't tell him I was ovulating because I never tell him when I am ovulating. The form of birth control we have always used is the rhythm method, but mostly he just doesn't ejaculate at all, or he practices non-ejaculatory orgasms. We have sex everyday, and if he were to ejaculate every time.....well, then we wouldn't be having sex everyday. It keeps his energy flowing, and has him feeling more turned on. In a months time he probably ejaculates 5 times on average. Anyway, for some reason this time was different. Almost immediately after we get going, he releases himself, without notice, inside of me. I asked him if he just came in me and he kind of chuckled and said yes. I told him I was fertile and he said he thought it was too early for me to be. We briefly talked about me taking the morning after pill, but then just sort of went about our day.

The next day, he does it AGAIN. The exact same thing. At this point I was convinced his biological drive and subconscious were trying to get me pregnant. A part of him wanted this. Then, we seriously talked about taking the morning after pill, but I was hesitant. I won't even take over the counter pain relievers or any type of synthetic drug for that matter, much less a high dose of artificial progesterone hormone. Truly, the issue for me wasn't whether or not I wanted a baby so much as it was my fear of how this drug will have an effect on my body. In the end, I decided that taking this pill would be better than the potential of being faced with a possible pregnancy in a couple weeks. You're supposed to take the pill no more than 72 hours after intercourse. At about 68 hours after he first came in me, I took the pill. And I literally felt zero side effects. I was so relieved.

Then, I was a day late with my cycle. I had read that the morning after pill could possibly throw off your cycle the month that you take it, making it a bit earlier or later, so I thought that was probably why, but just to confirm I wasn't pregnant I bought a dollar tree test to find out. To my complete surprise it immediately popped up with a big fat POSITIVE.

Reality started to twist and get hazy. My heart was pounding. This can't be real. I'm dreaming. I'm shaking as I call my boyfriend. He answers and I try to act calm. We talk about what he's eating for a second before I break down and tell him. I go on and on, crying and confused, then when I finally slow down and take a breath I ask him how he feels. "I feel good," he says. That's a relief. He's a big believer in signs and started talking about the way it happened and how he just came in me twice without telling me, and how Plan B didn't work, and how he had just built a huge California king size bed. It was in the cards, and that's how I felt too. It was time. Not totally convenient, but if you know us, that's not really our style. Once the shock wore off and the reality settled in (although, I am not sure the reality of it has totally settled in yet) I had room for excitement about it. Fears come up for us both and that's natural. It's a completely new experience and unknown territory we are stepping into. Our lives as we know it are changing. We deal with our fears as best as we can and allow them to come up and be heard and expressed. Even really really taboo ones that most people probably don't say to each other.

Because I did take the morning after pill, I was concerned about how it would effect the baby. I did a lot of google searches and read a lot about it (apparently I'm not the only one who had Plan B not "work") and I found nothing that proved that this pill causes adverse side affects or abnormalities in babies. Plus, I am really healthy and confident that my body and lifestyle will lead to a healthy birth and a healthy child.

The energetics of the situation had me worried as well. Given that I tried to prevent this pregnancy and it happened anyway, I was concerned that on some fundamental level my child would feel not wanted. I'm a big believer in how children are effected energetically inside the womb (and outside, too, of course). Since I have found out I am pregnant I have sat quietly and spoken to my child and reassured him/her that they are in fact loved and a blessing to me, and that I trusted their process and knew they were coming to me for the right reasons and had their own path to follow.

This blog will follow my journey through this pregnancy, and into parenting. I am training to be a birth doula and have been researching the area of evidence based pregnancy and parenting for several years. I believe in full term breastfeeding, and I am of the attachment parenting philosophy. My child will be born at home and will not receive vaccines, or be circumcised. My partner and I eat a plant based diet and so will our child. If you resonate with any of these methods of conscious/primitive/crunchy parenting, this blog is for you and for everyone else who wants to learn about a more compassionate, healthy, back to basics birth and parenting approach. And of course for anyone who wants to follow my journey through pregnancy :)