introspective periscope : peeking inside since Y2K

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some thinking & a poem.

cold sunday - 1 february 2o15

"this scar is a fleck on my porcelain skin."~stars

the winds last night blew the last of the clouds out and the sky is a bright frozen blue against all this snow. the sun plays tricks, beckoning me outside with false promises of warmth and the glittery reflection on every frozen thing. even the crows are puffed up, more like chickens than usual. they keep close to the house. i throw them the ends of my bread out of sympathy for their situation.

my baby lays wrapped in a blanket next to me while i write, sometimes gently kicking away the blanket over his little feet. i cover him up again. we're getting on so well now, settled into a routine...i'd say i can't remember life without him and but that would only be partly true.

after his overdue birth, my midwife, laura, left the next morning for her family's three week trip to nicaragua. in her place, our second midwife, danielle, took over. she came for the post-natal visits, assisted with suggestions when he wasn't gaining weight, met my family at the hospital to take away and encapsulate the baby's placenta. it was danielle who brought the oil to massage into my skin...

"to help with the scar," she said. another mom of hers had blended the oils "and you can't even see her scar." i had my doubts but i tried it. it might not have done much for the scar (how can i even measure?) but the scent of the oils was calming enough. it was a friendly step in the whole otherwise painful ritual of wound care and healing.

both of these women were so intrinsically linked to my birthing experience that i feel as though they will always be connected to my son's life and my own in some way.

a few days after i returned to bangor, truly on my own with my son for the first time, laura came to visit. she weighed him. we talked about my usual concerns about breastfeeding, this whole tangle with breast pumps and parts, finally figuring out the right mouse trap to make it work...the stuff i expected to talk about.

"how do you feel about your birth?" she asked, her charts set aside now, all the boxes finally checked off, the job complete and contract fulfilled. i felt as comfortable as i did the night she climbed into that hospital bed with me. she must've known i was starting to feel really nervous and alone. she curled up with me and we watched some comedian her family enjoys on youtube on her little phone and i laughed a genuine laugh for the first time in a lot of days. i know now how much i needed that. i was being brave because i had to be but i was probably more lonely than i've ever been in my entire life, too. how do i feel about my birth? nobody really asked me that except for maybe jennjenn...so i wasn't sure i was supposed to talk about it. i tried to explain it to my mother once but i didn't have the right words and i knew she couldn't begin to understand what i couldn't explain. she responded as she does with most things...be thankful it isn't worse. be thankful he's healthy. be thankful. be thankful. i am nothing but thankful that i have a healthy beautiful baby boy. that isn't what this is about.

i took a while to answer....i suppose i probably started crying before i even started speaking. the only other time i've cried about it and called it what it was was that morning we left for the hospital. she'd told me not to dawdle and to be at the hospital in two hours. i packed my bag, slowly realizing i wasn't coming home without a baby. i hurried and got a shower and took about ten minutes to sit down and realize that we were on to plan b already...that my home birth plans were scrapped for the next best thing. i'd sworn to myself i'd be flexible and i was...but flexibility takes a little time and we didn't have any more time. ten minutes to let it sink in that the modicum of control i had over my birth plan was already gone. we were out of time.

laura was the first person to point out that it is probably going to take awhile to process everything that happened and that i ought not be surprised if i'm sad or angry about it, assuring me that it's normal to feel this way. i'd been feeling so guilty for feeling so sad about my birth experience. to be clear, i am joyful for my son. he is everything to me and i love him more than i thought i could love a person. all the same stuff they tell you you're gonna feel. all of it. i am consumed with love....which is why it feels so guilty and selfish to grieve the birth, too...well, not the birth but most specifically, the birthing process.

when she left, i couldn't stop thinking. i've wrestled with it a little and i feel like i'm getting there. i read through some of my old textbooks here and there this week. all those religious studies classes that got so deep into my brain. all those talks about the ritual of giving birth, the woman's body, the magic, the myths surrounding birth in general...this was something that was incredibly special to me and i don't think that is something i expressed very openly. you traded pain and blood for a baby...there was power in that. in the hospital, i was told more than a few times that it was amazing that i'd gotten pregnant at all and so perhaps there is still a little magic there...the same reason it was so complicated that i'd conceived was the same reason i probably never went into labor even three weeks overdue. carefully planned, so many details that i'd considered carefully. where. when. how. the music. the people. the perfect setting for being born. all those miles of walks when i thought most about it, my belly growing each day, the feel of my hips swaying differently over the course of a summer. i was so much more invested emotionally than i think i ever realized.

anyway, there's that. i'm not going to go on and on about it....it was just a thing that i think i needed to write down. and here's something i never do anymore.

xo,
jones

***
death of a birth-plan
(or how i managed to get a hospital to
bill an insurance company
36,000 dollars)
***

spent summer wondering
where would it be--
in the bedroom,
in the bed
where i learned to
sleep alone again
nested
in pillows and cotton and down?
or would it be the living room
among my grandmother's vintage couches
and my hand-me-down antiques,
in a warm tub of water or
squatting between
the stairs and the stove?
would it be just outside the door,
stepping outside for
a breath of
cold winter's dry air in
my heaving hot lungs,
resting a moment,
breathless
in the ring of fire,
there,
bloodying the
clean fresh fallen snow?
or would it be
as my midwife suspected
the smallest room in the house?
huddled in the tub
on my own because
that's how it had to be--
only the two of us
working in symphony
laboring
to bring him in
finally reclaiming my body
for only myself?

i spent the early autumn
wondering when--
in the stunning sunrise light?
i'd spent two seasons
getting up early,
so close
to the
atlantic time zone,
groggy,
no coffee,
grabbing my keys,
leashing my hound,
heading out the door
to do my waking up
walking in the woods.
or would it be in the night--
all those witching hours
watching stars,
writing,
listening to records
deliberately,
choosing music i
wanted him to hear,
to recognize...
those nights
my brain entertained
thoughts of us stargazing,
of singing songs
on our way to the shore
but i always circled back,
carefully planning how,
and wondering
where?
when?
and i waited.

in the end it was none of them...
true,
it was winter,
a storm
blowing through town
checked into the hospital a week,
my carefully planned
emergency.
'you'd both
be dead in
a different time,' she said
as though i should
be comforted.
a nurse,
resting her
forehead against mine
as he slipped the needle
deep into my spine and
we both exhaled together.
i was there,
present,
'in times like this,'
she said,
'you do
what needs to be done...
it is a labor of it's own.'
after that,
my midwife
was welcomed in
and she held my hand
and announced to me assuringly
the afflictions
being dealt to my body
cut in half with a curtain
like a lady
in a magician's trick
about to be
sawed in half
only here,
the blades were real.
a body that
has never been broken,
a body that has never
been cut open,
damages so deep that
i couldn't stand
on my own
for two days.
it was in a cold room with
not so much as
a single contraction.
no,
they stole my pain,
stole my labor,
and handed me a son.

my mother says
be thankful and
my mother says
you didn't die
but my mother
lived through three births
each unique,
trading labor for crying infants.
when i was ready,
when i was finally ready,
when i was most ready
for the first time in my life,
i was denied
my only opportunity
to trade blood
for life,
denied my sacrifice.

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.what came before. - .what happened next.

a diamond at the bottom of the drain - 20 october 2017
baseball season to football season, abbreviated - 25 september 2017
the doodles - 11 july 2017
at arm's length - 4 july 2017
like a sea-mammal needs a bicycle - 30 may 2017