Motherhood vs. Career: An Epic Battle

I got some news yesterday that really upset me. It shook me to the core. The news was about a possibility of a job. No one died. No one has cancer. Why was I so upset? The job opportunity is a clinical informatics role in chronic disease management. It's the role that I have been told I would be perfect for, for the last 2 years. It merges both my loves the clinical and the technical world. Sounds perfect right? Sure… Except, it is being posted next month. What else is happening in a month? Oh right! We're having a baby. So this means applications would be due right around when I am giving birth. Interviews due when I am about 2 weeks postpartum and still bleeding, raw, emotional and leaking milk. Nothing makes a women more confident in front of an interview panel like wearing crotch and breast pads, am I right? Then, there's the logistics. It's a union excluded job with no job security and no guarantee it will continue to be funded AND it starts right away. Family and friends say apply if it is what I want and they will support me. If it was as simple as that I would. However the logistics while part of the problem are not the real issue at hand. It comes down to question of whether or not I can have both: career and kids.

In reality if I am being honest with myself the reason I am so upset is the realization that I do have to choose between my family and a demanding career. If I was to get the job choosing either way inevitably means sacrifice. This wouldn't be a regular staff nurse job where I can go home at the end of the day and be done. Work would come home. I know this because I know the work environment and the demands of the job. I also know that the first 2 years of a child's life while magical are truly exhausting for all involved. I guess what I was experiencing was grief over the career I thought I would have at this stage in the game when I embarked on this journey of a double master's. I was a sobbing bawling mess yesterday with the news. I was railing at the Universe and It's shitty timing last night.

You know what snapped me out of it? My child screaming in fear and pain. She got knocked over by the dog and smashed her ear on the concrete step. I didn't see it but I could hear the pain and terror in her shriek and the panic in my husband's voice. In that instant I was over it. Even after she was fixed up and in bed I was over the grief stricken sobbing. I've already made my choice. My career will come... later. I need to learn to be content in the now. This last pregnancy, this last baby will not happen again. Jobs will come and go. This is not to say that I won't work out of the home. I need to do that to feel settled. I just can't take on an all consuming position that may or may not exist in a year and give up the time with this baby. I still feel a little tug of shame like somehow I am not good enough if I don't apply. I still feel a slight internal war between desire for the satisfaction I get from my job and my little ones. I think this will ease. The nerves are still raw from grief.

VBA2C Internal Conflict As the End is Near.

I am 36 weeks tomorrow. In my my mind thus begins the 'waiting game'. I already have all the prodromal signs of labour. I have had them for weeks. So I'm not expecting anything to alert me that my body is gearing up for labour. Actually I've never gone into labour on my own. With my first I had the cocktail and labour tea which brought on early labour. I never got into the active labour part according to dilation (3cm was all I 'achieved'). With my second I had an NST and an emergency c-section so no actual labour. I have no idea if my cervix remembers anything. It seems as if my body likes to stay pregnant. Or maybe it's just that the baby has control over labour and neither one felt safe triggering it due to their cord issues. If this is the case I'm scared to induce even when overdue. To me overdue means something is wrong. But..... then I will worry that my fears will prevent labour. It's a vicious cycle. I feel a desire to start things in motion such as EPO, acupuncture, sex etc to see if I can prep my body. Yet I feel like I shouldn't try to force or push anything into motion. I'm so conflicted.

Things are different with this baby. I have a different birth team. A different midwife (I loved my previous one), a very experienced doula, and a more supportive husband (same guy just better relationship). I am a stronger person. I know I am capable of overcoming obstacles. I completed 2 years of my masters education while working 3/4 time with two small children. No small feat I tell you. I learned to run. I trained and finished a major fitness event (Tough Mudder). I am proud of myself and who I am both as a mother and as a woman. I just want this one thing, this vaginal birth, to feel healed and complete. Yet, I am scared to hope it will happen only to be disappointed, yet again. Two failed homebirths will do that to a girl I suppose. I hate that term 'failed homebirth'. I didn't even get to try with my second. I am hoping that the differences with my support team, with me, with my birth location, with my body will help me get a different outcome, but scared to hope. Again conflicted.

I am letting myself feel this fear trying to process. Yet I am taking steps to overcome/accept it. I am going to do a fear release hypnosis session with my doula. I am also going to go to the L&D ward to sit and process. My first reaction when my doula suggested this trip was an immediate "No! I don't need that!" Yet after some reflection I think I do. I think my reaction is just my conscious mind saying that it really doesn't want to go back there. I need to deal with whatever is going to crop up going there. It feels a little silly since I work in the same hospital, have gone there to meet babies of friends and family. However this was all in a different capacity. I was safe in those instances, not wearing the labouring or pregnant mother hat. This time I will be vulnerable. I despise feeling vulnerable. That's why I wanted the homebirths before. I wanted the control over my environment and people involved in my birth. That's not an option this time so I am preparing and trying to eliminate as many possible conflicts as I can with this hospital birth.

Part of that process is packing for the hospital. I am going to pack my bags this weekend. This will require me to imagine what will happen and what I will need. The crib is going up today. The carseat is in the car. Once I put the bags in the car we have the essentials ready. One more week of work and then I need to find a new distraction from the waiting game. Any suggestions?

Chronic Injury: Reflections from a Pregnant Wife

I guess I can call it a chronic injury now. It has been 14 months since the car accident in which my husband sustained a back/neck shoulder injury. The first few months were the worst with him having to lie down or sleep most of the time. Dealing with the injury was one thing but dealing with the torrent of emotions was much worse. I felt resentful doing it all. Then I felt guilty for feeling resentful. I felt irritated with him for being so angry and snappish. I felt sad that my needs weren't being met physically or emotionally. I felt scared. What if he never recovered? I feel proud of him for moving through it and making an effort to get better. However, when he has a flareup I feel a rush of unpleasant emotions… like PTSD I suppose. I guess it doesn't help that I'm 31 weeks pregnant and in constant pain of my own.

I think some of the anxiety and fear I am feeling links back to the early months after D's birth. Husband had a mother of a kidney stone. It was his first of many. We made a trip to the ER thinking he had an obstructed bowel or something. He came home on meds which his body didn't tolerate very well and it took over a week  to pass it. He laid around and took meds and worked from the bedroom. I remember trying to get him to watch D while I went out for something and he said he couldn't because what if the pain hit him. I remember being so incredibly angry. Why does he get to retire to the bedroom when he's not well and I do not?

I guess some of the resentment stems from the fact that when he is down for the count I feel abandoned. Also I feel like I do a lot of research and try things to make him better. I cannot say he has done that in any of the difficult pregnancies or c-section recoveries I have had. Don't get me wrong he is an incredible man who cooks, cleans, shops, chauffeurs, parents and loves both me and the kids whole heartedly. I cannot ask for a more hard working or involved partner. Maybe he just doesn't know that I need or rather want that. I am the one with the medical background. I am the one that does the research on anything involving health. It really is my role.

I am likely just feeling overwhelmed as the house is dirty, I am exhausted and we did takeout last night so something must be cooked. All I want is a nap and a hamburger. How do I let go of/process the emotions? I don't want to feel the resentment, fear, guilt, anxiety, irritation etc.

Getting Over Birth Trauma

I had a coworker unsuspectingly say something that made me cringe. She said "I just don't get women who get all worked up over having a c-section. Isn't the outcome supposed to be a healthy baby and a healthy mom?" Since I have realized that I found my cesarean births very traumatic and have recently given myself permission to feel sad and angry at my loss of a natural and empowered birth I wanted to contradict her. But I didn't…. Perhaps because we were at a table with several others, perhaps because of the stigma around feeling bad about having a healthy baby. I am still not quite sure. Yes I feel traumatized by my births. I was not expecting to be giving birth again so I thought it really did not matter if I got over it. Well here we go again. I'm not going to 'get over it'. I'm going to embrace the trauma and the fear and do it anyway. Isn't that what bravery is?

I completed the Tough Mudder this summer and this was all about overcoming fears. What's the correlation? I figure if I can run 13 miles, jump in ice baths, dive off 15 foot planks, walk through fire, and face electrocution I can embrace another cesarean if that is what the universe hands me or a vaginal birth which may be equally as traumatizing. Another cesarean is terrifying for certain known reasons. A vaginal birth is terrifying and exciting for completely unknown reasons.

Let me tell you if you have never had a c-section the recovery is akin to having major abdominal surgery. It is major abdominal surgery with all the risks and recovery. You have to cough or laugh with a pillow to your belly or feel like your guts are going to explode all over the room. You can't lift anything more than 10lbs. This means your baby + carseat is a no go. If they trap air inside you like they did to me you feel like a hot poker is being stabbed out of your shoulder and NOTHING relieves it. Anything pushing or touching the incision is aggravating and painful this includes underwear and pants. Stairs like the ones to the laundry room or your baby's room are excruciating. One tip is walking up backwards. Someone please let me know how one does that safely? with an infant? Please don't make light of this if you or anyone you know has a cesarean. They've had major abdominal surgery, plus a tiny human to care for, if not many tiny humans.

There's also a huge emotional component to having a surgical birth. Everyone feels and reacts differently and this often depends on the circumstances surrounding the birth. Women can feel like birth has been stolen from them. They can have trouble bonding with their infants because they feel like they did not 'birth' that baby. I myself felt shafted by the universe. My second birth I was tied to the table crying my eyes out because I didn't get to try. I think both times the part that hurt me the most was the nursing/medical staff that were supposed to care for me through this process. I am a nurse. I strive every day to ensure that my patients never leave me feeling like I felt during both births. I was hugely disappointed in the team that I am supposed to work for.

So here we go again. What can I control? Not much... However, I can control my reactions and my outlook on this process. No homebirth preparation this time. I pack a bag fully prepared for both a c-section and a vaginal. I may ask for some things outside of the norm such as breastfeeding in the OR and delayed cord clamping. If I get told no I will not despair I will write action letters to the executive leads of maternity services. I am a STRONG person full of grit and determination. I can overcome fear. I can even enjoy myself while scared. I will prepare mentally, physically and emotionally for the birth of my daughter however it may come about. Everything is different this time. Not necessarily better but different. New midwife, new doula, planned hospital vbac instead of hbac, and me.... I have learned to step up and ask for what I want and need and to surrender to the experience when necessary. This is HUGE!

Pregnant again sigh....

I know in my heart it should be "Pregnant again Yay!" I am having trouble with the Yay part of it all. I don't remember feeling this blase` about my previous pregnancies. This one was unplanned but it is definitely not unwanted. I want this little being. I am just having a difficult time getting excited about getting fat, feeling awful, having a c-section, bleeding for 8 weeks, intense after pains, no sleep until I am pretty much dead etc. I am wondering if I am supposed to analyze this or if I should just let it be. I know I will love this child when it's out free ranging in the world. I know my thoughts and feelings cannot harm this baby. I thought when I started to feel better I would feel excited but I'm still ambivalent. Cranky and ambivalent. I am usually such a go with the flow type person not worrying just accepting that it will all fall into place. However right now I am worried about EVERYTHING: money, school, daycare, space, our vehicle etc. The ONLY thing that is exciting right now is making maternity clothes and that is about not wanting to spend any money and enjoying the challenge. Perhaps I need to add more challenges. I start a new job on the 18th so hopefully that will take my mind off of things until the ultrasound and feeling the baby dance on my bladder. Those should still be exciting right? Even though the heartbeat wasn't? Right?