Today has been kind of a rough day. It's been a rough last few days, actually - eating-wise, anyway. DH has been out of town so it's just been the kiddos & me - which actually has gone really smoothly. I look forward to the evenings when they are all in bed (everyone except for DD 8 by 8pm) and things are quiet and I can have a relaxing night. I've been lighting my vanilla-scented candles, the house has been kept clean for the most part, and then I either watch the current TV series I'm on (Prison Break right now), do the computer, and/or listen to my hypnotherapy CD.
I love listening to that CD - it's so relaxing and it walks me through the baby's birth and how I will be feeling.....how to handle the contractions. It has me visualizing myself on a private island lying in the sun on the white sand. I LOVE LOVE LOVE laying in the sun, I shiver as I bask in the warmth of the sun, it feels so good. So this is the place I take myself to as I'm lying there imagining the contractions. One thing that I think is going to make a HUGE difference for me is not being afraid. Afraid of the pain, of the unknown - I have 100% confidence in my body now, from what I've read and heard about giving birth. I have no idea why it never really occured to me to look into it before - I guess because I always just relied in the epidural and didn't really have a need or drive to.
After reading the book, "Birthing From Within" it pretty much changed my enter perspective on how I look at things. It's a little bit funky, she gets into some kind of weird stuff - but it really made me see that giving birth is something so natural, it's as normal as going to the bathroom. IF I let my body do it's thing, with no interference and most importantly, no fear so that I am able to relax. I'm hoping that the CD and what I'm learning about hypnotherapy as well as the water birth combined will really make it a wonderful memory for me.
I plan to have the children all go to different homes for five nights after I give birth. I'm not exactly sure how THAT is going to work but usually, I can tell when my contractions are headed towards the real thing - and I hang out at home for a good 8 hours or so during the beginning stages. I'm hoping that during that time, I'll be able to finish up with packing the things that couldn't be previously packed (blankets, toothbrushes, diapers, etc) and then hopefully DH will be able to drive them all to their destinations. The tricky part is going to be making SURE that it IS in fact the real thing because - it's not going to be that easy to pull them all from their homes and say um, never mind. LOL! So far I've got four of the five children for sure taken care of - my friends & family have been so sweet. The one who is taking care of my baby, was really excited to hear that she'd have her for five nights. It's so nice to have people that excited about taking your children!!
But anyway, it's been hard because I'm starting to feel slightly miserable as far as physically goes - the baby is up in my ribs all the time and I am getting alot of harder contractions. The kind that make it painful to bend over, like my entire stomach is encased in a concrete cast. But I honestly can't complain - I remember way back when, previous pregnancies, where my feet would be so tired by the end of the day. They rarely ever get that way, and I am doing all the housework & taking care of the kids myself (no househelp I mean). So I'm not resting as much by far. My back rarely aches, I don't have ANY heartburn, and each step is not heavy - my steps are quick and light. It's awesome not to have the extra 30lbs on me!
Eating wise though, I've been doing awful! And the scale sure shows it. =( I weighed in at 155lbs this morning!! I had pizza and chocolate last night - yuck, I know! It wasn't even good pizza, it was this really crappy stuff for $6.99 at the grocery store. Bleh. I was just hungry and not for raw food so I kind of grabbed whatever would be filling. I paid for it that night though, I felt miserable and I just wanted to get the kids in bed as fast as I could, so they wouldn't have to experience a moody mommy.
So I emailed my friend who has been raw with me (now is fasting on the MC & water) since June and asked if she would hold me accountable for being 100% raw from now through the 1st of the year. That's basically 60 days, and the last time I was raw for a long period of time it was for 45 days. I know I can totally do it, it's just a matter of getting my head set square in the middle of my shoulders and knowing, without a doubt, that eating anything cooked is just not an option. Today so far I have been 100% raw and have been busy making pumpkin bread, flax seed crackers, and herb & spinach crackers...oh, and orange chocolate fudge. That keeps my taste buds more than satisfied and I love being raw when I have so many delicious things to eat.
The kids & I went to Walmart & The Dollar Tree today, both of which are right by Burger King. I started to get hungry towards the end and was strongly craving Burger King's fish sandwich - but I made the firm decision to turn the car the OTHER way around and drive away from it. I also remember the last time I got it, it really wasn't all that great....something about the fish & tarter sauce is what I was craving, and theirs isn't exactly like McGrath's. LOL.
I really feel a pull and urgency to get on the right track now, before the baby comes. I would love to have a good four weeks of solid 100% raw under my belt so that when I do deliver, my body is not dealing with digesting crappy food while at the same time trying to spare energy to give birth. And most of all, the healing afterwards. That is going to be the crucial time - so much is riding on my eating well. I need my milk to come in strong and rich so that we can get off to a good start and this baby can thrive on my milk, instead of being dissatisfied and lose weight like my other babies.
I'm also really excited to see how things go weight-loss wise. I figure that if I weigh 160 when the baby is born (total of 25lb weight gain), I'll most likely lose a minimum of 10lbs from normal baby loss (I'm hoping to lose more, but this way I won't be disappointed) and will be at 150 from the get-go, from the start of my working to lose the post-partum baby gain. The most awesome thing is that usually when I have a baby, I weigh in at around 190-200lbs just before birth. I usually can't even fathom working out or dieting for the first three months, it's just too much for me to handle. This time my raw food is a lifestyle so I'm used to it, normally I eat like crap all pregnancy long and that cycle is very hard to break once I have the baby. Then I get all fired up to lose the remaining weight, as I stabilize at about 180lbs just from having the baby, and I work like the dickens to get it off for about 8 months. FINALLY I reach the 150lbs mark, and then as the cycle goes....I get pregnant again and gain it all back.
This time I will be breaking that whole cycle and starting out at a very different place. My hope is to be down to my pre-pregnancy weight of 134 by 3 months post-partum, then gradually get to my normal and balanced weight of 120lbs. We'll see!
3 comments:
"giving birth is something so natural, it's as normal as going to the bathroom."
YEAH! I had this insight the other day: You don't have to practice to go to the bathroom, you don't have to educate yourself, you don't take pain-relievers, you don't do certain breathing patterns, you don't fear it, you don't THINK ABOUT IT! You just ALLOW it to happen. Same with birth! Turn off your brain and just allow your body to do what it knows how to!
Having said that, in both cases eating right and exercising certainly makes it EASIER. You still don't have to think about it, but it's easier!
I disagree with that comment. Breathing ac ertain way and relaxing PURPOSELY rather than "not thinking about it" is crucial to an unmedicated birth. Know from experience many times over:)
I think the main thing that comes to mind when I think of giving birth naturally is that normally I really stress about it. What is my body doing, why is it doing that, shouldn't it be doing something else??? WHY is it hurting so much...is something wrong??
It's the unknown that has really freaked me out, tensed me up, and I try to breath but the fear is still there. So the way I am not going to "think about it" is by letting my body's contractions come as they please, without trying to fight against them or the pain, to breath rythmically and deeply. Understanding that my body does know how to birth the baby on it's own, and if I feel my body telling me to squat, to roll my hips, to push, whatever - I'll do it. But not if my body isn't telling me to.
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