Birth

What can I say about to welcome our darling little Max? Probably not much that billions of parents haven't already thought or said about their baby. We are now part of a wonderful community of humans who have done the miraculous yet oh so simple act of creating a child.

Also probably not much that won't sound totally hormonal either, right now, but I think that's also the point: its not a rational experience. My whole mind, body and spirit celebrate his arrival. I am totally in love with him and am content to simply gaze at his beautiful self all day. I wish him health and happiness and of course, have the mother tiger instincts kicking in full blast to do everything I can to help that come to pass.

He is a wonderful blank slate, he can live any life he chooses. Yet he is not blank. He chose us as parents and lives in our world now. I hope we can live up to the beauty and promise of his life and be the parents he deserves.

The birthing method we used, hypnobirthing, focuses on 'mother and child working in perfect harmony' and stresses that 'your baby knows exactly what to do' during the birthing process. I'm totally in awe of him. He did an absolutely fabulous job of being born, and really did know exactly what to do. I'm so glad we found something like this method which enabled me to turn the process over to him, because no one could have handled it better. My job was simply to get out of the way, relax and facilitate as needed, and fortunately I was able to do that. For me that was an enormous challenge and, I suspect, only one of the many profound growth experiences Max has in store for his parents.

A lovely aspect of hypnobirthing practice was to 'breathe love to your baby' while practicing the breath exercises. It was such an abstract concept before he was born. Now it's what I simply do with all of my breaths, and its such a powerful force, it overwhelms me sometimes.

Birth Politics

Until Max came along, I was blissfully ignorant of how political birth is in this country. It belongs to the doctors and the hospitals, not the women who are doing it. We are told - programmed actually - in so many ways what a long, painful ordeal it is, but thankfully, we have the doctors to save us from the risk of the event and give us their wonderful drugs so we don't have to suffer the terrible pain. The doctors assure us that these drugs have no side effects - of course.

Well, a bit of research quickly put those myths to rest. Personal experience confirms that programmed outcome is avoidable. Of course, in some cases, doctors and hospitals are lifesaving, but in the general run of things birth is a natural process. Somehow all the beauty and wonder of the vast majority of births gets obliterated, or actually eliminated, by focusing on the few that are not normal. And in that process, the power of it and the women doing it is also obliterated. Chance coincidence? I think not.

Ulan asked me a question when we were at a decision point a while back. He asked me; "Are you going to be ruled by your fears or your hopes?" The decision was whether to switch from an obstetrician to a midwife. My hopes and my head said a midwife looks on this as a healthy, normal process. A doctor (actually, worse, a surgeon because obstetrics is a branch of surgery) look at it as a problem waiting to happen. My fears said the only safe way to do it is with a doctor. This is despite numerous studies that have shown better results for both mothers and babies with midwives than with obstetricians.

Ulan's question, as so often happens, was right on point. This was the time to act on my belief that birth could be better than the nonsense we are sold by our culture, and it was a pivotal decision in making that happen. So in this I made the very difficult choice to emancipate my self, I freed my mind mind and my ass, surely and literally, did follow.

So little Max Marley, I do believe your daddy picked you a wonderful middle name. As thinking people we must always ask that question - are we going to be ruled by our fears or by our hopes? The only possibility of redemption, of improvement and progress, comes through the latter.

It was not an easy choice, but it had its rewards. I was helped along by the fact that I could have the birth supervised by a midwife at a traditional hospital where doctors, drugs and operating rooms stood ready in the horrible event that our fears came to pass. And as it happened, there even was a doctor attending also, but that's a different story! Anyway, we did have the best of both worlds.

I was truly conscious of all that happened to me mentally and physically, and while it was not easy the rewards were well worth it. Of course I got the full blast of feel-good hormones our body sends us. Nature does not intend this to be a miserable experience in the normal run of things, no matter how our culture programs us. She's no fool no matter what the dogma and wouldn't design it that way if she wanted us to keep doing it!

Max was placed on my tummy immediately after he was born. I was fully conscious and aware of the indescribably joy as this wonderful new being unerringly crawled up to my breast. I placed my hand behind his slippery foot to enable him to gain leverage, and it was the most incredible and unforgettable feeling of my life as he pushed against my hand.

Finally, Max was strong an healthy and his facilities were in no way dulled by drugs. With a wonderful start on nursing right there in the delivery room. We have kept on breast feeding with no problems. And there is another spot of politics for you - the amount of anti-breast feeding propaganda. This, despite overwhelming and growing evidence that breast feeding, when possible, is unquestionably the best for mother and child. We received a "breast feeding success kit" in the hospital, compliments of the Enfamil and Fisher/Price (formula and baby products companies). There were four lovely bottles of formula, nipples and coupons - oh so handy to save your baby from surely imminent starvation should you have even the slightest struggle while mastering the art of breast feeding.

So

Margaret McKnight