When they hear that I’ve been going to college again (“going” being a bit of a misnomer; it’s all online), people often ask me, “How do you do it all?”  The answer is, “I don’t.”

When I’m on top of things I can sort of rotate what gets taken off my plate.  (I imagine this is why people think I “do it all” — I do a lot of different things.  Just not all at the same time!)  But sometimes life happens, and things come crashing to the ground instead.  Like this spring, when things got crazy and this blog tumbled right off.  Have you ever been cutting something up at the dinner table, when the knife or fork slips and the piece of steak (or whatever) that you’ve just been cutting goes sailing across the way?  Well, consider that this blog — it just kind of got away from me.

The Pregnancy Announcement I’m Pretty Sure I Forgot to Make

Shortly after the Expo last year, we learned we were expecting #5.  (Side effect: the cool aromatherapy and similar products I brought back from Expo East to review haven’t been put to the test yet, ’cause…pregnancy safety.)  I was still plugging away okay, though, until this spring, when I just could not seem to not have a cold or flu.  Pregnant, wiped out from those ridiculous colds, and trying to keep up with school, I couldn’t handle one more thing…and writing fell away.

Fortunately, by summer I was feeling better, but third trimester means greatly-increased midwife visits, and more to do in preparation for baby. We had to do some serious rearranging to make a space for baby.

Baby, School, and More School

And then of course there was her arrival.  (Back to that in a moment, since that’s the fun part.)  Two weeks after she was born, the baby ran a fever.  Thankfully, it doesn’t seem to have been anything major, but a fever in such a tiny baby meant a trip to the ER and an overnight hospital stay.  Two weeks later I had the final, final exams for my AAS.  (I now have an AAS in Alternative/Complementary Medicine with an Aromatherapy concentration, although graduation won’t be officially processed ’til October.)  That same week, we also started school for the year.  (I don’t know what I was thinking scheduling the kids’ first week of school for my finals week!)

Hopefully things will calm down a little bit, as I’m working on knocking out some general ed classes on my own time (no assignment deadlines!) before heading back for a BA in Complementary and Alternative Health.

Back to that Baby

I’m guessing all you probably really care about in all of that is the baby, so getting back to her…

The short version is that Shoshannah was born at home on July 27th at about 2:30 a.m., weighing 6 lbs, 3 oz.  Although it isn’t our best photo, in terms of showing off what she looks like, this is my personal favorite:

The Longer Version

…for those of you who like birth stories.

This was, in a manner of speaking, longer than my other girls’ births, and yet, in a way, not really any slower.  I went into labor at around 7 on the morning of Wednesday, the 26th.  Contractions were, at that point, intense enough that I could feel that they were doing something, but not regular or super-intense.  We called the midwife to give her a heads-up (given how quickly my previous births have gone, we had agreed that she needed fair warning to not go out of town or something!), but I just hung out at home and had a sort-of normal day.

Throughout the day, contractions were distracting enough that I couldn’t really do anything that involved deep focus, but they weren’t particularly interrupting me, either, so I spent a good portion of the day playing computer games with the kids.  I was also trying to snack frequently.  Not knowing how things were going to progress, I didn’t want to get too little to eat and end up exhausted, but I didn’t want to eat a huge meal right before things really kicked into gear, either.

At around 12:30 (I think), I decided to settle on the couch and try to get some sleep.  Of course I’d hardly gotten settled when contractions decided to really kick up.  After three intense contractions ten minutes apart, I let my husband know that things seemed to be picking up.  After a fourth, I texted the midwife to let her know things had picked up pace.  When she called me back a few minutes later to confirm that we were ready for her and her assistant to come, the gap had shortened to five minutes…and was down to two minutes by the time I hung up the phone with her.

Given that, from this point, contractions were never more than two minutes apart, things start to blur a little after that.  I asked Michael to fill up the tub, and as soon as it was ready I got in.  I have trouble remembering anything else in its proper order, though.  I know that my labor began to progress very quickly and it was only a few contractions before I didn’t want Michael to leave me.  (I tend to just kind of do my own thing until about transition, and then he’s a major anchor for me.)  At some point after filling the tub he also made sure the birth supplies were ready, the door was unlocked, and the kids were aware of what was happening, but I was not particularly cognizant of any of this.

I do recall suggesting that he have one of the kids call my mom and give her a heads-up, since she was our back-up plan if one of the younger children freaked out.  (They didn’t.)  I found out later that Sophia told Mom that I sounded “like a dying cow.”  haha  I was clearly well into labor by that point!  This was very shortly before the midwife arrived.  Somewhere in here, just before the midwife arrived, I believe my water also broke, but it was much gentler than in my previous births (where it has tended to sort of “explode”).

When the midwife got there, she used an underwater doppler to listen to the baby’s heart through one contraction, noting that baby sounded good.  After that, she just backed off.  I was vaguely aware that she’d step into the bathroom as each contraction wrapped up and say, “good,” or something along those lines, to indicate that she was noting my progression, but then she’d simply step back out during contractions.  She was very present, but not at all obtrusive.  It’s a little hard to put this into words, but essentially she ensured I was always just aware of her on the periphery but she wasn’t in my space.

And then the baby was crowning.  Only at this point did the midwife move in.  She and Michael watched together as the baby’s head emerged.  By this point, the contractions had been so unrelenting for the last little while that I was exhausted.  I wasn’t sure I had it in me to push that one last time, but knew I had to.  At this point, I remember droopily saying, “O God, please…”  The unspoken ending to that prayer was, “give me strength.”  I was blessed with a (very) brief pause here so I could catch my breath before that one last push.

Michael caught the baby and, unlike with the past few babies, lifted her up out of the water in front of me.  “Boy or girl?” he asked (the ultrasound indicated she was probably a girl, but birth is the only sure thing!), and as I started to answer that I couldn’t see because the cord was in the way, my eyes were tracking it up and I realized the cord was also wrapped around her neck.  This was all quicker in real life than it takes to type (or read), and the midwife was realizing this at the same time and pointing it out.

For those unfamiliar with waterbirth, the baby being born into the water is no big deal.  The baby is accustomed to being surrounded by fluid and won’t attempt to breathe until lifted from the water (unless you delay for an unreasonably long time).  But once baby’s face has hit the air, s/he begins to breathe, so it’s important to not move baby through the air and back under the water.

What this meant for us was that we needed to get Shoshannah further from the surface of the water in the bathtub before we rolled her over to unwrap the cord.  Which was a little awkward, what with me kneeling in the tub and her still attached to me.  So I levered myself up onto my feet while Michael and the midwife lifted the baby and then rolled her around to unwrap her.  Michael helped me out of the tub, then, and the placenta delivered almost immediately.  About this time, the midwife’s assistant (who lives farther away) arrived.

All that was left at that point was the aftermath — cleaning up, getting us settled, weighing and measuring the baby, etc.  Oh, and convincing the other kids that yes, they really do need to go back to bed for a while tonight.

Her first name, Shoshannah (the first “a” is pronounced like in “father”), is Hebrew, and literally means “lily.”  Its meaning also figuratively extends to trumpet (because of the shape of a lily), white, and/or springtime.  Her first middle name is Anastasia (the a’s also pronounced like in “father”), which is the Greek word translated in the New Testament as “resurrection” or “rise again.”  (Well, technically, the Greek word is transliterated anastasi, but close enough.)  She also has a second middle name that’s a family surname to honor a couple of grandfathers.