How dare they wash the baby off at the hospital the way they do. They scrape your precious Earth-angel with a dry washcloth and soap. Then they do not even rinse them off and bam, your Johnson+Johnson TV money shot of motherhood, that BabiesRUS moment, is all ready and powderery enough to now be fresh enough to deserve love. Get that nasty human smell off of him, the sooner the better. Get him off that boob and into some scratchy hospital whites, STAT. Enough of that unseemly sniffin and bondin, the photo lady is here!
God, you know, it is not like I am even talking lotus birth or anything, which in theory seems really cool, I simply want to not have my childs first moments on this Earth be disrupted by Nurse Cratchet's scrub-brush, Proplyparaben, and Red number 5.
With baby Charlie, who was the planned homebirth ending up in c-section...MAN was I aware of just how un-homebirthy C-sections and hospitals are when it came to two key things: Cutting that cord and scrubbin that baby dry. (Ok, literally, probably a hundred or more things but another entry for all that)
You see, in all homebirths, you have to "prepare" for a hospital transport. But the circumstances of this last baby and the transport being of a vaguely non-emergency nature, it is extremely hard to discern what I needed to "Stick up for", to "fight for", etc. I was in pretty hard labor by the time we showed up, and the path ahead was so familiar, yet so so uncharted...what in the hell was I doing here? On my own free will! Fight-or-flight alarms going off in my head like a million tympani drums! Why! Why! I dont know!
How dare they chop the umbilical cord the way they do. How dare they dig up your private privacy with some sick crotchet hook and BREAK (their word) an amniotic sac! A baby's most sacred protective layer! I refused them breaking my water, which they were really really curious about, but they repsected my wishes. I couldnt believe that these intelligent seeming nurses and doctors had never considered NOT doing something so invasive, so infectious, so unnecessary and unhygenic and unnatural!
I wanted, in our homebirth, to leave the baby attached to its placenta until all of the oxygen and hormone-laden blood had stopped pulsing through the cord. A rudimentary "google" search on this subject matter will find anyone astonished and horrified at the obstetrical practice of immediate cord clamping/cutting---but at the c-section, BAM, it was like INSTANTLY! Poor Charlie, Mickey, and Greta. At least Greta got to lay on my tummy for 30 seconds before CUT THE CORD DAD, DAD, DIDJA WANNA CUT THE CORD,DAD? (the insideous nature of being called "dad" by leering, sneering strangers in the first minute of fatherhood must be so degrading to men) BAM PAM you're on your own, now, hope ya can breathe, but if not we gotta big tube we can jam in ya to help out....into your plastic baby-bed, its just down the hall...no, mom can't come with you...
The delicate, incredible dance that goes on between baby and placenta during the first moments following birth are mind-boggling. The entire 9 (10) months that your baby has been "breathing" without using the mouth/lungs are about to change, but this can take precious minutes, and it is all okay, IF the placenta is still pumping oxygen through and to your baby. To CHOP and sever this immediately is so so so so so so stupid, foolish, unsound, unsanitary, ....like just about everything else they do. Let the frickin baby adjust a minute! Why is it knives, knives, scissors and knives all the time with these people? How OPPOSITE of knife is birth.
I do believe I am going to say that again.
HOW OPPOSITE OF KNIFE, IS BIRTH.
HOW OPPOSITE OF DESTRUCTION, IS CREATION.
HOW OPPOSITE OF INTERFERENCE, IS LETTING-BE.
HOW OPPOSITE OF NEW WARM FLESH IS OLD COLD METAL.
HOW OPPOSITE OF INTUITION, IS DOUBT.
HOW OPPOSITE OF WISDOM, IS IGNORANCE.
HOW OPPOSITE OF BIRTH, IS KNIFE.
God, you know, it is not like I am even talking lotus birth or anything, which in theory seems really cool, I simply want to not have my childs first moments on this Earth be disrupted by Nurse Cratchet's scrub-brush, Proplyparaben, and Red number 5.
With baby Charlie, who was the planned homebirth ending up in c-section...MAN was I aware of just how un-homebirthy C-sections and hospitals are when it came to two key things: Cutting that cord and scrubbin that baby dry. (Ok, literally, probably a hundred or more things but another entry for all that)
You see, in all homebirths, you have to "prepare" for a hospital transport. But the circumstances of this last baby and the transport being of a vaguely non-emergency nature, it is extremely hard to discern what I needed to "Stick up for", to "fight for", etc. I was in pretty hard labor by the time we showed up, and the path ahead was so familiar, yet so so uncharted...what in the hell was I doing here? On my own free will! Fight-or-flight alarms going off in my head like a million tympani drums! Why! Why! I dont know!
How dare they chop the umbilical cord the way they do. How dare they dig up your private privacy with some sick crotchet hook and BREAK (their word) an amniotic sac! A baby's most sacred protective layer! I refused them breaking my water, which they were really really curious about, but they repsected my wishes. I couldnt believe that these intelligent seeming nurses and doctors had never considered NOT doing something so invasive, so infectious, so unnecessary and unhygenic and unnatural!
I wanted, in our homebirth, to leave the baby attached to its placenta until all of the oxygen and hormone-laden blood had stopped pulsing through the cord. A rudimentary "google" search on this subject matter will find anyone astonished and horrified at the obstetrical practice of immediate cord clamping/cutting---but at the c-section, BAM, it was like INSTANTLY! Poor Charlie, Mickey, and Greta. At least Greta got to lay on my tummy for 30 seconds before CUT THE CORD DAD, DAD, DIDJA WANNA CUT THE CORD,DAD? (the insideous nature of being called "dad" by leering, sneering strangers in the first minute of fatherhood must be so degrading to men) BAM PAM you're on your own, now, hope ya can breathe, but if not we gotta big tube we can jam in ya to help out....into your plastic baby-bed, its just down the hall...no, mom can't come with you...
The delicate, incredible dance that goes on between baby and placenta during the first moments following birth are mind-boggling. The entire 9 (10) months that your baby has been "breathing" without using the mouth/lungs are about to change, but this can take precious minutes, and it is all okay, IF the placenta is still pumping oxygen through and to your baby. To CHOP and sever this immediately is so so so so so so stupid, foolish, unsound, unsanitary, ....like just about everything else they do. Let the frickin baby adjust a minute! Why is it knives, knives, scissors and knives all the time with these people? How OPPOSITE of knife is birth.
I do believe I am going to say that again.
HOW OPPOSITE OF KNIFE, IS BIRTH.
HOW OPPOSITE OF DESTRUCTION, IS CREATION.
HOW OPPOSITE OF INTERFERENCE, IS LETTING-BE.
HOW OPPOSITE OF NEW WARM FLESH IS OLD COLD METAL.
HOW OPPOSITE OF INTUITION, IS DOUBT.
HOW OPPOSITE OF WISDOM, IS IGNORANCE.
HOW OPPOSITE OF BIRTH, IS KNIFE.
1 comment:
This is beautiful! I agree wholeheartedly. You are beautiful! Your babies are beautiful. Amazing.
Post a Comment