Blessingway beads

The two beads I ordered for my birthing necklace arrived today!

They are even more beautiful than I imagined. Such intricate detailing and just perfect for what I was looking for. Hopefully I will gather a collection of beads to make a very special and symbolic neckalce to wear during my labour.

I plan on having a mini blessingway in early september so I will make it then with some friends.

You can buy these beads and other fabulous handmade beads from Blessingway Beads on Etsy.

http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5626191

Normal birth in hospital?

How do we expect to acheive normal birth when this is how the 'professionals' are being taught that birth occurs?

So many hands and people and wires and intervention. This is not birth even if they are robots. These images are disturbing to me yet for so many women and men in our society this is completely normal.

Birth is seen as a dangerous and risky event and not a normal bodily function of a woman.

Hand over the responsibility of your birth experience to medical professionals and surgeons and expect nothing less than it to be a medical event and drama. Saving the woman from the hazards of childbirth.

Gloves, epidurals, suction, scalpels and machines that go 'ping'. Expect nothing less.

Not the candles, essential oils, dolphin music you had thoroughly noted in your birth plan.

First do no harm. What does this mean for those entering into the profession?

Of course I forget these people so intent on putting their hands into women's vaginas and pulling babies out or worse lying to women and raping them of their births and surgically removing their babies are infact saving women and their babies! Silly me. How naive I must be. Women are faulty and could not possibly give birth without assistance, could we?

Homebirth with style

We have various friends of the forest/wild visit us at our home but this one took the cake.

It was amazing to watch the cycle of life for these little birds. Yellow bellied sun birds, I think they are called.

The days and days of building and crafting the beautiful nest with an amazing crystal in the roof.

Then the pink feathers that appeared as matching decor for the mama bird to hatch her babies in.

We watched as the birds nested and awaited the arrival of their babies.

Then one morning we awoke to the teeny tiny chirps of two baby birds.

Beautiful!

Now thats a homebirth with style!

I'm a terrible blogger!

My last entry was over 12 weeks ago! I'm a terrible blogger!

I was about 16 weeks before all the nausea and migranes ceased and I could function again. It was not a nice feeling to be so ill all the time. It's so much easier with a bug because you know it will end at some point. Pregnancy is such uncharted territory!

I've quit my job becuase it was causing far too much emotional stress to be worth it. There were so many triggers there and putting myself in a situation where my trauma was resurfacing was not pleasant in the slightest. Watching women being raped of their births, being lied to and not to mention just seeing women attempt birth in a hospital was enough to send anyone over the edge.

So I'm much happier at home with my kidlets.

I'm now almost 23 weeks and it seems like the time is just passing me by. I've got no-one to see for 'routine appointments' and no tests to take. It's all so free of stress and worry. I'm just happily gestating!

I've been doing little bits of reading here and there, I don't seem to get the time to sit down and read a book. Maybe I should set aside some time to do that with a hot chocolate.

Reading lots of Henci Goer, she's great! Also doing some research on which Australian Bush Flower Essences I'd like to have on hand for the birth and post-partum.

This belly babe is moving and wriggling lots to say hello which is really nice. I love that time. It's so unique and special, something a mother and her unborn child can only experience. *sigh*

I've made a birth box design and I'm going to get my dad to help me construct a wooden box to put all the birth supplies in. I'm going to get arty farty and paint it with beautiful pictures.

I'm an organisational freak. I like lists and I have to be organised. I'm not sure whether it's a good or bad thing yet.

On the other hand I'm much more relaxed at this stage of my pregnancy. I seem to be just letting it all go. Embracing life I suppose. I guess that comes with having a 14 month old to learn from. ;)

I promise I'll be back on a more regular basis with updates and photos of my crafty ambitions.

Improvements

I'm feeling better. It's been a couple of days since my last migrane and the 'sick' feeling is almost gone. Hooray! I dont know I would have coped for weeks of it on end.
I was thinking though, that those sort of physical symptoms have a lot to do with our emotional state of mind too. I know I was still sort of coming to terms with the fact that I'm pregnant and also having major anxiety attacks over the fact that I need to emotionally prepare for birth at home and facing those fears.

So I've been sent a heap of vbac and vba multi c/s research papers and case studies to read over and I have to say I'm in a much better frame of mind. I've splurged and ordered quite a few books from Amazon. It also helps being a part of the Joyous Birth community, where I'm exposed to such inspiring women and their amazing birthing journey's. I'll be one of them too!

My boss has taken a great interest in my birth plans. She knows my history in relation to birth experiences. I'm sort of annoyed that she's going to be so curious. She's already asked me about my plans for this birth and who I'll have there. I said in short that I'll be at home with my fiancee and most likely two Doula's. I said I'd only be going to hospital in an emergency situation. I could see her fidgeting and really holding back. She really wanted to say something. I could see she really wanted to say more.
She has suggested I look into Hypnosis in order to overcome some fears and trauma related to my past birth experiences. She believes it has quite positive and effective results. I'm not so sure. I will look into it though. After asking me about my plans for this birth she has asked me to consider having a midwife. I really wish I asked her why. I wonder what sort of response she would have come up with.

I'm feeling so much more positive about being pregnant and birthing at the moment. I'm sure there will be good days and bad ones too but as long as we can recover from them and continue on our journey it's all ok.

I dont like this...

I had such fantastic plans to enjoy blogging and sharing my pregnancy. I did not want this to turn into a whinge session. But this is how I'm feeling, so that's what I'll say.

After overcoming the suprise news we were indeed thrilled and a little overwhelmed that I am carrying another child and will be birthing again, albeit a wee bit sooner than expected!

I've been so ill and spent most of the weekend in bed with a migrane. It was Alexander's Birthday weekend too so I felt like an awful cranky and sick mama. I've never in my life experienced this sort of nausea and on/off migrane. The nasuea lasts all day and night, no not just "mornings" It's so foul and plain yuck. I feel like I need a good vomit and it will all go away. You know how you always feel a million times better after a good vomit!

It was so bad I had to make an emergency trip to a GP I'd never been to before. Panadol wasn't even touching the sides. I really didn't want to see a GP. I had plans of just continuing on as normal with this pergnancy, no tests, scans or doctors visits etc. My homoepathic nausea spray wasn't working either. So off to the GP I went.
As I'd never been to this doctor she had to get a little history. Things like allergies, previous pregnancies and the births etc.

At this moment I really wished DP was there to argue for me. I was too ill to do anything but nod and mumble the answers for her.

She asked me all the "routine" questions about LMP and my cycle etc then proceeds to print off blood forms and a dating scan form and says "I know you've done this before, it's all routine stuff." Arrgh all I wanted was some form of pain relief for the migrane!

She then feels the need to inform me that when I've had the "routine" tests to come back and she'll kindly refer me to the hospital for my ante-natal care and did I know that they wont let me even try this time, I'll be booked for a c/section straight away!?

I just couldn't put the words together. I was too ill to speak. I smiled and nodded.
So she wrote me a script for maxalon and told me to take some panadeine, go home and sleep.
I wont be seeing her again.
I'm actually glad that I didnt have to go to my regular GP because I want to be prepared when I tell them all where to go when it comes to MY birth!

On a more bizarre note, I keep having this dream where I decide that I have another c/s. It is so real and awful and scary. Then my braingoes into overdrive and I question my reasoning behind wanting to birth. I think to myself why do some women choose another c/s? Why is it ok with them?
I hate how I question myself. It just gets me more confusing. I do see it's obviously a deep fear or some form of subconsious issue there...

Run out of time...
Back later:)

So it begins...

I've reached a new leg of this already lengthy journey and feel it's time to move onwards and upwards to a better place. I've no intention of forgetting the past, these things make me who I am today. I've learnt and grown, made mistakes and owned up to them. I am on a quest to rediscover my self and the wild woman within!

It is here I am going to release my intentions, fears, questions and share with those who are watching from the side my third but first unassisted pregnancy and path to the freebirth of my third child.

I've got a lot of healing to do yet from my first two births before I can birth the way I want/need and deserve to birth my next child. My first birth resulted in unnecessary surgery and the second was a "failed vbac" so also ended in unnecessary surgery.

I have learnt from my mistakes and although parts of me own those feelings there is a mass industry in childbirth that has a lot to answer for. The way women are undermined and undervalued, their pregnancies and births are taken from them.

So it's for many complex reasons that I've made a conscious and valid decision to treat my pregnancy and birth as it should be treated. In fact I don't like that word 'treated'. My pregnancy will progress as it should. My body knows how to grow my baby perfectly. No one needs to examine me or measure me, or look at my unborn baby.

As written in 'Women Who Run With The Wolves' by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

"With wild woman as ally, as leader, model, teacher, we see, not through two eyes, but through the eyes of intuition which is many eyed. When we assert intuition we are therefore like the starry night: we gaze at the world through a thousand eyes."

I am a woman and I will unearth the wild woman within me as I grow and learn.