Glowing Goddess

Since I am planning a homebirth in July, I have been looking alot at online forums looking through the experiences of others'.  I am reading some incredibly inspiring stories and getting some great advice but I am also noticing something that has got me thinking about how much input I give my other half. 

It started with a discussion thread on The Bump in which a Mum-to-Be was inquiring about hospital policy on epidurals during a water birth.  This woman wanted to have a water birth but her HUSBAND insisted that she have an epidural...and this way okay.  Afterall, his job was a physicians assistant so he knew better.  Right??

The more I read, and the more people I talk to the more I realise that there is a huge amount of women who are giving up their birth choices to the one person who should be supporting and empowering them...their partner.  To me, that's very sad.

I never considered giving my partner any input on any of my births...but he never assumed he should give any.  I just always figured giving birth is my experience from by body and thus, the decisions of how and where I would do it was always up to me.  I'd expect that if I decided to birth in the backyard, suspended from a tree in the middle of a drum circle with a voodoo priestess, he would trust that was the best thing and support that.  I would be deeply insulted to have him question my judgement.

Now I am not saying that I don't care about how my partner feels.  If he were uncomfortable with my birth choices, I would gladly supply him with some materials to 'get comfortable' but I definitely would not allow for his insecurities and control issues to stand in the way of me and the birth I wish to have.  Birth is the single most personal and life altering experience in a woman's life, and that should not be taken away from her by her partner.

So I want to know what YOU think?  How much consideration, if any, should a man have in his partners birth choices?

Another week passes and my belly grows larger.  I have completed 17 weeks of this pregnancy and have finally felt my baby move for the first time.  The other night, I was laying on the couch poking my belly when something suddenly pushed against my thumb.  It happened again the next night.  It was such a strong push, so I am confident that my baby is strong and healthy.  For the time being, I have ceased the finger assaults.  I am beginning to wonder if there are more than one in there.  I seems to feel 2 different types of movement in 2 different places.  I feel movement lower in my uterus which seems to be much more relaxed and smooth than the jerky, quick movements I feel under my ribs.  I will find out soon enough, I guess.

Here is my most recent belly shot, taken at 16w3d...still in my regular pants too which makes me happy.  I feel like this is the healthiest pregnancy I have had so far in terms of my own health and activity level.  It feels great (aside from the pain in my pelvis) and I am looking pretty good if I must say so myself.

I baaack...but for how long?  Had to reformat the computer but since then I think the internet connection has been a little more reliable.  I did learn something about iPod that I am not thrilled about in the process.  After reformatting and reinstalling iTunes, I learned that all the music on my iPod is basically lost (thanks unidirectional syncing) and I will have to re upload allll my CD's and rename every damn song AGAIN.  It almost makes me want to get an MP3 player instead.  Almost.

I also tried out the Wii this past week.  I am not a fan of the whole nunchuck controller, but I do like the games available.  We played Ghostbusters, Lego Indiana Jones, Ju-On Haunted House Stimulator, Cars, and some Marvel superhero game that was so unimpressive that I forget the title.  I logged most of my time on the Lego game though.

So onto my big experiment of last week...I decided to take a hiatus from Facebook.  I realised at some point last week that it had been a whole month since I spoke to another adult human (besides SO, of course) and that was depressing.  It's just really strange how Facebook and other sites like it, can connect you people just as much as it can disconnect you with them.  I have friends on Facebook that live literally minutes from my doorstep, but our whole relationship still centres around the internet.  Facebook allows friends to pay lip service to eachother by 'liking' and commenting, without actually putting real effort into a friendship.  My goal was to put real effort ino those real life relationships...but it totally backfired.  Apparently, the reason that no real effort goes into those relationships, is because they really aren't great relationships to begin with.  My new goal: fuck my real life relationships.

In other news, today I hit 16 weeks!  Nearly halfway there.  My belly growth has levelled out in the second trimester so far, and I am feeling far too emotional to function normally.  I cry about everything...and about nothing.  I watched American Idol last week and sobbed the entire time.  I did laugh quite a bit as well as usual.  Auditions really are the only part of the season I enjoy.  I am looking forward to an ultrasound in a few weeks.  I was torn on whether or not I was even going to get one, but in the end decided that it would really help my spirits at this point to be excited about something on the shorter term.  I go February 9.

Until next time :)