A Hand Full of Hope

I haven't posted in a while so I figured I should catch up! My job with the new bank is still here and I am fine with everything. I have officially started my doula and childbirth educator training which is REALLY wonderful.. Soooo much work but very exciting. Things work out so strangely though.. I had a partner that I was going to go into business with but it ended up that she is moving back to Seattle so I am going through all of this on my own as of right now. The interesting thing though, is that as I was getting news of my partner (and good friend) moving, I received an email from a girl in my doula training course that is actually living in Napa.. how interesting right? Out of the 600 people enrolled from all around the world, there is a girl in Napa? We'll see where that goes. I am really bummed that my friend is moving up to Seattle, she's the first person that I have found to really connect with out here.. but things always happen as they should :) There are other things that I am working on that I am very excited about!! I am at some point over the summer going to put together a business plan for a women's center in Napa for new and pregnant mothers.. a cafe/store/exercise/resource/and childbirth education center.. The only place to buy baby stuff in town is Target, and there are a bunch of rich women out here with large disposable allowance. There is also no place in town for pregnant women and new moms to network and have a common place. I think that if I am able to get this going, that I will not only have a successful business but I am aiming to reduce things like postpartum depression because hopefully women would have some sort of companionship, I would increase the awareness for doulas, and also increase the amount of awareness and resources for informed birth choices.. Tell me what you think about it, but no stealing my ideas..

About 3 weeks ago, we (the people I work with and I) found out that the bank we work for is being sold to a bank based out of Oregon called Umpqua. Now at first I thought this was great because the bank sort of needs a fresh new face and Umpqua is a pretty cool company to work for. Welp that was until I found out that my position was being eliminated. That is all well and god because I have a bunch of other training in different areas of the bank, so I can go pretty much anywhere but the suspense is killing me!! I can't leave the call center because I would leave my 2 other co-workers high and dry while the merger closes for the next 2 months, and I don't want to take another position that I am not sure that I am going to like. So I am just sitting around waiting to see what is going to happen ahH! I had my interview yesterday with this really nice lady to determine what I would want to do with Umpqua and that went extremely well it was supposed to be only a 15 minute interview that last 45 minutes because we got along so well.. but that doesn't mean that they will keep me. I just keep telling myself that the worst that will happen is that I will get laid off, get a severence package and be able to go to school and get unemployment.. but that seems like such a low thing to do.. to just sit there and collect.. eghh I guess whatever happens is supposed to! I jsut wish I could find out sooner so that I can plan..

When I was in Midwifery class, Elizabeth said not to work with someone if you had any doubts. What if it is a friend that you are having doubts about working with? I am really concerned because my friend wants me to be her doula but it seems like everything I am telling her just isn't connecting. She has absolutely no faith in herself and just assumes that things like having an epidural or induction are how you have your baby. I keep trying to educate her a little bit about how you don't necessarily need that stuff and she just responds like yeah right like I'll be able to take that pain. I mean if you want my help the least you could do is listen. I gave her 2 pregnancy books to read that are unbiased, and purely informational, but I don't even know if she is reading them.
The worst thing I have ever heard come out of her mouth is "Well I am just going to have to get use to the fact that I am going to be violated the whole time" When is feeling like that something you just need to get use to? And more importantly do all women that go to see their doctors feel this way? What is the world coming to if women think having a baby includes being violated? And since when is this ok to just accept? If you are uncomfortable with the doctor is doing speak the hell up!! I have this birth video about waterbirth and the natural beautiful process that a woman goes through. She was so amazed that the women in the video gave birth pretty much by themselves and that they didn't need a doctor and that they just did it. I looked at her and said well.. doctors have only been around for childbirth for about a hundred years now, and women have been giving birth for thousands. It's not like our bodies have forgotten how to do it. Just because something goes wrong 2% of the time doesn't mean you need all this crap in your pregnancy all the time. How do you talk against all this cultural programming without losing the woman's interest? Midwives struggle with the fact that the common person's view of birth is sooo warped that it takes a huge effort and careful planning to restore it. How do I do it on my first try? I have to admit that it is great experience trying to restore an image without trampling everything and finding a happy medium but it is just so damn frustrating to me when I feel like it is falling on deaf ears.

I think that it is fairly disgusting that we are going to hang people. How fucking barbaric. What a way to make a statement to the world that we are stuck in the stone age, and we support disgusting things. I don't care what anyone does, we are not God and we shouldn't decide who dies and who doesn't. If that is the case than not only should Saddam Hussein die, but Bush should be hung right next to him for all of the innocent people that have been killed because of his "bringing democracy to the middle east". How is this a democracy if you force it on people? How can you bring democracy with war? It doesn't make any sense. Killing Saddam isn't going to make the world a better place.. how can we think that a law (an eye for an eye) can still be relevant and right 4000 years later? When will humans be developed enough to know that killing, no matter what kind is wrong?
Not to mention that we as Americans are fucking blind and misinformed. The people Saddam is charged for killing we people who tried to commit a terrorist attack and assassinate him.. If that had been done to our president, out wonderful legal system would probably do the same thing. Also Saddam modernized Iraq and the only reason we went to war with him in the first place is because the president was worried that he was going to take over our oil supply. (also there was an alleged assassination attempt on GWBush) It drives me nuts that people who assume that muslims and terrorists are the same thing.. and it drives me nuts that people make bold statement about shit they don't know about. Condemning someone to death without taking into consideration the whole story and making stupid judgments is irresponsible and ignorant.
Obviously, you can tell that someone said something to me about the whole situation and pissed me right the fuck off.. This is why every other country in the world hates us. We consistantly make statements to the world that we are ruthless, we do whatever we want, and we're greedy. Over the last couple of days I have been learning about validation of human desyne and development. Sometime I just don't see much of it in people. I wonder where this validation is? I know that the changes are happening, but I just can't wait for a new reality.

So I had a memory surface a few minutes ago.. when I went home for the first time my family and I went to a restaurant and my mom mis pronounced a word and I held her on the back and said we have elmer fudd here! I am such an asshole. I can't believe that I did that. it doesn't even hit me until 2 years later that it could have been hurtful to here.. what an idiot I am. SUCH AN IDIOT. I'm going to email her and apologize because I feel terrible.

A Hand Full of Hope
If we hope to create
a non-violent world
where respect and kindness
replace fear and hatred

We must begin
with how we treat each other
at the beginning of life.

For that is where
our deepest patterns are set.

From these roots
grow fear and alienation
~or love and trust.
~ Suzanne Arms



I went to a Doula gathering with Suzanne Arms in the city on Sunday, and it just so happened that she needed a ride to the event, so Melissa and I volunteered to pick her up.. what a great time! At the talk she advised us as Doulas to look into our own lives and trace out own births back to link it to cycles that repeat in your life time.. For instance she was taken out of her mother by forecep, without getting to finish her own birth process... and now 50 years later, she has hardly ever finishes a project that she started.

I was thinking about that.. and after I found out about my own birth a few months ago.. this makes sense... I was taken from my mother the second I was born to be put in an incubator, adn didn't bond with anyone for the first 24 hours of my life and those are the hours that are most crucial.. this could be the reason why number one I have barely any trust in anyone, and I have a really hard time actually making a connection with people. Sometimes I even avoid looking at people in the face as a form of bonding..

Brain research shows that things like this with infants prove true later on in our lives.. that our birth is a developmental feat and that we need to go through it to prove to ourselves that we can survive.

Imagine what a feeling of accomplishment the baby has once it has maunevered its head.. and twisted its body and made it our of it's mother's body without and drugs, or help by being torn out by foreceps or vaccuum.. I think that people think too much about the mother's work in Labor.. I think that they do work alot and it is a trying time for mothers, but more people need to think and pay attention to the amazing journey that a baby makes to join us.

Babies born to mother's that have not taken drugs during their labor have amazing survival instincts.. If a newborn is placed on its mother's abdomin, within the first hour of birth it actually has the stregth and knowledge to be able to crawl up the mother's stomach anf self attach to the mother's breast.. That is why a woman's ariola get so dark when they are pregnant.. so that the baby can see them clearly..

I had a dream last night that was really great in the beginning.. I was pregnant and I was having my baby but I wasn't assisted by a midwife.. I was alone.. I wasn't really having very strong contractions then All of a sudden the baby's head appeared between my legs and slid back in.. I quickly realized that it was shoulder dystocia, rolled over on my knees and did the finger sweep that I learned how to do in the midwifery class to bring one of the babies arms out and a beautiful baby girl slid out of me. Her face was full of light and she was just perfect.. because my mom always tells me that some women in the family including her couldn't breast feed I am always nervous about it in real life because I don't want to start my child off with canned milk with a bunch of gross shit in it. In my dream she latched onto me and I had plenty of milk and it was the biggest achievement I have ever felt, being able to produce food with my own body for a life that I created and grew in my body :) I named this perfect baby Audrey (my favorite name) and everything was wonderful.. I was thining of all the generations of women that gave birth so beautifully and relly felt that I had a conncetion to them..
It got me thinking this morning about whether or not if by the time I have children, and if I am a midwife.. will I have another midwife there? I wouldn't think that I would, but maybe just as a safety precaution.. Anyways.. it was a beautiful dream and I wanted to share.. Think I'm ovulating this week or what???? lol

SO.. I started a new job at the bank and I have been pretty busy here.. One thing that keep thinking about that I learned in my midwifery class is that when Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, he modeled it after the Iroquois method of governing. The major thing he left out was the grandmother counsel of elders who were above the chiefs.. They decided where to move, if the tribe would go to war, who was going to be chief, and they could also throw a chief out of place if they felt that he wasn't doing good for the people. This is a major thing that he left out.. think about the how different the world would be if we still had a grandmother counsel. There is a missing balance in our world, and I believe that is it. there would be less violence, less war, less greed, less starvation.. there is a reason women ran the world back then.. and it was because it provided balance and wisdom to a world that has become chaos without it. Do you think that Thomas Jefferson would have changed his mind had he known the consequences? I should think so.

I'm going through my midwife journal to see what I want to write about.. but I'm not really thinking of anything else... I learned a lot about how pagans and early religions honored a woman's life phases, and the 3 great blood mysteries (period, birth, and menopause) and the life phases (child, maiden, mother and crone) until christians took over the world... I KNOW I was pagan in another life.. I think that the earth has more spirit than Jesus. I very much feel that these things should be honored. Did you know that the word for Vagina in Latin means sheath? That would be the reason progressive people use yoni, which is much more respectful and spiritual in meaning. We are taught to hate our bodies by the very language we use! What happened to worshiping woman's bodies for the life that they bring? I really great idea that still goes on in many indigenous cultures is a menstrual rite that village women have for girls that have just experienced their first menstruation, a birth rite when they become a mother, and a ceremony for the woman who has finished menopause. Especially important is that of the menstruation, if you get your group of women together with your daughter and even do something so small as a hike together, and welcome her to her womanhood and honor her, it will teach her to love her periods, and experience them without the contempt that most women have for it. It also tells her that she can love her body which in turn, is more respect for it as well. One this I am definately going to practice as a midwife is giving the mothers their blessing way (birth rite) I think it is wayyyy too important to leave out of life.

correction from yesterdays entry.. Henci Goer is the author to a thinking woman's guide to a better birth.. Duh me.