How Our Homebirth Saved Christmas

Growing up, Christmas was my favorite holiday. My family, thankfully, never emphasized the commercial aspect. We simply enjoyed spending time together and exchanging heartfelt gifts. Since I got married, the holidays have been increasingly stressful. With double the family, our time is spent rushing hurriedly from one gathering to another, staying for long enough to make an appearance. Adding kids to the mix made it increasingly difficult. The stress was hard on the kids, and I felt guilty for putting them through the ringer each year. I had come to dread the entire month of December. This year, I received a special gift--one that caused me to slow down and reconsider what's really important.

On Christmas day, I was 36 weeks, 5 days pregnant. I woke up feeling a little pressure down low, but didn't think anything of it. I am a firm believer in letting a baby come when he's ready, and had bookmarked a link about why at least 39 weeks of pregnancy is better for baby. I planned to share it when people started asking, "Have you had that baby yet?!" By about 10 that morning, I knew that I would have no need to share it. It took a few more hours to convince myself and my labor support that this was the real deal.

By 10, I was having regular contractions--about 3-5 minutes apart--but I could talk through them. I have had pretty regular Braxton-Hicks contractions in the past, and I certainly didn't want to birth my baby so early. Plus, I didn't want to disrupt anyone's Christmas unless I was completely sure. We decided that I would rest on my side for a while and see if things continued to progress. My husband took the kids out visiting. This slowed my contractions to between 5 and 7 minutes apart. They stayed that way as long as I didn't get up. By around 6 in the evening, the family had finished their visiting and my parents were free to take our three older kids to their house.

That's when I got vertical. Anyone who tries to tell you that position is not important during labor is wrong! Assisted by gravity, my contractions went from somewhat painful and 3 or 4 minutes apart to almost unbearable and 2 minutes apart. I slumped over the birthing ball some, sat on it some, swayed and rocked a lot, and paced back and forth to the toilet over and over again. Nothing seemed to work for comfort. I decided to soak in the tub for a while to help relieve the pain. It slowed things down again, but they soon picked back up and then, whoah, did they pick up! After a day of questioning myself, I finally felt sure that I was in active labor. We called our midwife and asked her to come.

Our midwife arrived around 7:30 and determined that I was 4-5 centimeters dilated. She gave me about 30 minutes alone with my husband to work through labor, but by that point, I did not feel there was any working through it. I did not want him to touch me, and I could not hold still. Then again, it hurt too much to move. I had been through transition before, and this was it. How did I ever go through this lying in bed or strapped into a car seat? After 45 minutes or less, I was pretty sure I felt ready to push, and asked him bring the midwife into the bathroom. "Are you sure?" he asked. That's when I yelled at him (sorry, babe!). After a long day of self-doubt, I was over being questioned. I was ready!

After hearing me yell, the midwife was as sure as I was. She went straight to our bedroom and prepared for the delivery. I wanted to try squatting on a birthing stool, but it hurt too much, and I ended up lying on my side instead. I decided to try a push or two, after which my water broke. Suddenly, the pain subsided and my body could do nothing but push. It was beyond my conscious control. As our midwife turned around to ready her supplies, my husband saw our baby's head emerge and jumped quickly to catch it. Two pushes later, my youngest son was born into my husband's hands on Christmas night, right there in our own bedroom. Shortly after, we were cleaned up and snuggled into our own cozy bed.

I truly believe that our homebirth made a positive difference. The whole birth experience was so peaceful and free from drama. So far, I have seen this reflected in my little guy's calm demeanor and in my own easy recovery. It even seems to have cast a peace over the household. Best of all, my Christmas baby has turned the holiday around for me. From now on, the stress of the holidays will be overshadowed by the memory of this special Christmas night. I will remember cuddling my 8-pound bundle of hope and looking forward to the promise that his new life represents. He reminds me that what is at the very heart of Christmas--and of life itself--is love. When a child is welcomed into the world surrounded by love, he can grow to spread that love to family, friends, and maybe even to all mankind. I can't think of a better way to give him that start.

Savoring the Undone

As a parent, I learn over and over again to give up my expectations and mostly my expectations of myself or events and holidays. I am reminded frequently, that even with organization and planning and being prepared (and the kind of prepared that comes from being raised by an Eagle Scout and then marrying one), things still don’t go as expected.

On Christmas Eve morning, my husband took my son to the Farmer’s Market and playground, so I could have some “alone” time for writing and blog posting. “Alone” these days means me with a nursing baby who ideally will nurse to sleep and will stay asleep while I work on my laptop next to her on the bed. Except my baby has an intense Mommy radar and knows instantly if I have moved farther than 3 feet away or if I have turned my attention to something other than her. This can be frustrating at times when I want to get something done, but really, I don’t mind all that much. She loves me more than any other human being ever has. I’m sure of it. I can see it on her face when she sees me. It can be easy to just sit play, talk and look at her rather than do anything else. When my husband works from home, I’m constantly distracting him with the baby, because I can’t simply believe he just doesn’t want to look at her all the time.

Other people don’t get anything done with a baby in the house because they’re going without sleep. Sleep has never been an issue in our family (thank heavens). The four of us could medal in napping if the Olympics ever decided to officially make it a sport (which it is just in case you didn’t know). But we don’t get anything done in our house, because we’re playing and flirting with our children. (This is kind of why my blog posts are always late these days).

Back to the writing time I was supposed to get that I actually spent nursing and trying to put my baby to sleep while reading Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield, my son and husband didn’t stay out that long. It was too cold for the playground. (In the beginning of Winter, 45 degrees is too cold for the playground; by the end of Winter, 25 degrees is acceptable playground weather.) My son has had a cough and cold the last couple of days. He’s been in that in between sick phase, where at home he thinks he feels better enough to go out and play, and then he gets out and realizes it’s better to just rest in the stroller.

I thought we’d spend Christmas Eve making more Christmas cookies. My husband and I have gotten addicted to having gingerbread cookies with our bedtime cup of tea, and we’ve already eaten the cookies we made. My son didn’t want to do anything baking related. He wanted to play planes. My daughter wanted to play with the wrapping paper left out. We let her do this because watching a 5 month old play with paper and ribbon is as hilarious as watching a kitten play with a paper bag. It’s endless fun honestly. But I suddenly remembered that I had to make my husband’s favorite Christmas treat: pumpkin roll cake with cream cheese frosting. I managed to make this cake, though now as I’m writing this I am remembering I still have to frost it and after the late night Christmas Eve wrapping that happened on the kitchen table, I realize now I don’t actually know where that cake is. Crap.

My son, thanks to not feeling well, ended up taking a three-hour nap. During his nap, I was able to finish wrapping his stocking gifts. I knew I had to, that even with not feeling well, his nap meant he’d be up until close to midnight. I was right about this. After dinner, instead of a bath, he played some more. We decided we could finally assemble the gingerbread house we had baked the weekend before. We made the royal icing to glue the house together. My husband and I had made up our own gingerbread house pattern. We had wanted to make a gingerbread Eames-like house. Once my husband figured out how to get the right consistency of icing and got our house iced together, our house looked more like a Flintstones house than an Eames house.

At 9:30 pm, my son showed no signs of slowing down. We decided to watch A Miracle on 34^th Street. When my son finally did get tired, he refused to go to sleep until he had seen the end of the movie. My daughter had nursed herself to sleep in my arms. As predicted after naptime, my son was up until 11:30 pm. He finally fell asleep as my husband read him The Polar Express, while I filled his stocking downstairs. I was about to head to bed with the baby, when I remembered we still had our son’s Santa gift in the upstairs closet. Luckily for me, my husband took care of it.

As I fell asleep, I thought of the things I had hoped to get done. I’ve always hoped to be one of those people who has dozens of gingerbread, sugar and shortbread cookies laying around the house. Toffee seems easy enough to make, but I have yet to master it. The only way I can think of to save this year’s batch is to take a hammer to it and crunch it up to make ice cream with it. I’d like to have the house cleaned with all the laundry done before going to bed Christmas Eve, yet this year just getting the living room and kitchen cleaned up was enough.

I don’t feel like I’m one of those people who wants perfection. I feel more like the mom who’s barely keeping it together – with a son who at three has already pointed out that Santa coming into our house while we’re sleeping will probably wake the dog and is slightly invasive, not to mention that presents actually come from the post office. Oh yes, and my husband’s favorite pumpkin roll cake is still lost somewhere in my kitchen.

Recently, an older mother said to me, “You can have everything, dear, but you just can’t DO everything.” Wise words. I have a lot to be thankful for this holiday. The things that didn’t get done? Kind of defeats the point of the holiday to beat myself up over those.

Tis The Season For Santa

When my son was six weeks old, my mother-in-law visited and my husband thought it would be fun for her if we took our newborn to see Santa Claus. Indeed, seeing a grandchild visit Santa and having an opportunity to take as many pictures as possible is the kind of thing that is right up my mother-in-law’s alley. She loved it.

I, however, did not. Santa Claus, when he doesn’t live at the North Pole, happens to live at the mall. He also brings lots of elves with him that shake jingle bells in your face. The mall provides him with loud piped in Christmas music and quartets of percussion playing carolers throughout his line. The line to see Santa Claus is full of overdressed children and parents all making their lists of what they really want (American Girl dolls, quiet non-whiny children, just one good picture before they can get out of there.). It was too much. Between all the people, various forms of music, overdressed children and elves shaking jingle bells in my face, I got overwhelmed. I haven’t taken my son to see Santa since.

But this year, my son is three. He loves looking at Christmas trees. He loved decorating our tree. He’s already seen the Christmas exhibit of trains in Grand Central station three times. We started talking about Christmas and what we would eat and do what we wanted. I asked him what he wanted.

“A basketball, Mommy,” he said. “Not two, just one. And a taxi car.”

My husband and I started talking about what we would tell him about Santa. We were clear that Santa is a fun idea that lots of people participate in. While neither of us fully believed in Santa as children, we both loved the magic of Santa. We loved those childhood Christmas mornings when we woke up early and walked into the living room with the tree lit, Christmas music softly playing, and our overfull stockings laid out next to our Santa gift. We loved waking up those Christmas mornings and finding a Christmas tree lit transformation in the living room. I still love Christmas because of the Santa Claus inspired magic.

But I don’t have a problem with Santa. What I hate about the whole Santa myth is the socially accepted form of manipulation that gets used on children. I cringe when I hear people ask children if they’ve been “good” this year. I cringe even more when I hear parents or adults tell children that if they’re good (and don’t argue with their brother, or do as mommy asks, or make their bed in the morning or whatever it is that the parent wants) Santa will come and bring them what they want. Occasionally, I hear older generations throw in that if they’re not, they’ll get a lump of coal. I’ve never actually heard of a child getting a lump of coal on Christmas, which to me, makes it the worse kind of manipulation, as it’s the kind where parents don’t actually follow through. The parent’s word is meaningless; whether the child is good or not, Santa comes and leaves behind a full stocking and gifts.

No wonder children don’t trust adults. The adults lie to get what they want in the short term just as much as children do. And some parents swear by it for younger children, which, for me, is exactly the problem with the whole mess to begin with: it’s not sustainable parenting. It’s trick parenting that makes the parent-child relationship a power struggle and whoever has the better trick wins. Rather than offering children meaningful and authentic guidance for living life and getting along with others, parents instead are always looking for the next manipulation scheme to give them the upper hand in the relationship.

Except the use of Santa is not just between parent and child, it’s society wide. The carolers stand outside of Macy’s and sing “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” and “to be good for goodness sake.” I get emails from various Moms groups or event notifications telling me about the Santa hours around town and all of them ask if my child has been “good” and knows what he wants Santa to bring him.

Needless to say, while I love the magic of Santa, it’s another year where I can’t bring myself to dress my son up and take him to see Santa. I tell him that Santa is coming to him, that he doesn't have to be good. He can just be himself.