BIG NEWS!

Suzy:

So in the top picture you can see the baby's head and jaw outline. In the bottom one you can see the ribs and spine to the right and the head to the left and a tiny hand up top and to the left in front of the face. That's the good news: we got pictures.

Now we all know that with good news comes bad news. We don't know the sex of the baby yet. Baby wasn't laying the right way and the doctor couldn't get a good shot, so we're going back on Friday for an hour long scan from an ultrasound technician. Which is a routine scan, don't worry. Something about doing a bunch of measurements and getting the whole shebang. So, look forward to another post by the time you wake up Friday morning.

(Note: I swear I saw a penis. Greg thinks I'm full of it. We'll see on Friday.) Kisses.

Happy Mother's Day!

Hey all! Just wanted to give a good ol' shout out to all of the mothers in cyber land that is the States. Specifically, my mother and mother-in-law! Because you are all behind the times here, I will explain. Mother's day is May 4th; not May 11th. You guys are so behind the times. I mean, seriously, mullets are back in style here and you all are still making fun of them. Plus, we tuck our jeans into our socks. We're so cool. sidenote: Suzy insisted that I mention that not everyone does this... just a few, really.

We've been slacking on the posting business for a couple of reasons: one, we don't really have anything new to say, and, two, we just got kinda tired of posting. We've been doing the same old, same old: Cabo de Gata, teach, beach-soak, sleep, yell at kids in Spanish, walk, and eat awesome food. It's living la vida loca as my homeboy Ricky Martin would say! Quick shout out to Ricky Martin as he would never forgive me if I didn't... "holla, Ricky!"

Technically, Rob and Stefanie just left this morning for Seville to hook up with Kade and Caitlin for a bit. I barely remember it as it was somewhere around 7:30 and 8 when I stumbled into the living room to wish them a happy traveling and goodbye with hand signals. 7:30 in the morning... I forgot that that existed.

Also, we've been day-dreaming about May 31st and the shin-dig that will be the bee's knees for the neighborhood. Well, we don't really have a neighborhood but I'm sure the cows will be rockin' it. We have a quick request of everyone: we were thinking that cooking for a metric crap ton of people would be pretty demanding for the 'rents and are asking everyone to bring just a tiny bit of food for a side dish (I'm thinking enough to share; ie, bag of chips, plate of cookies, etc.). We'd greatly appreciate it. Please keep passing the word on this; we need to know how many people are coming for food purposes.

Lastly, as Ashlee pointed out yesterday, you all can expect a large bit of news being posted around 1 o'clock your time on Tuesday. We will finally find out the sex of our kid and are both completely psyched! Until then, goodnight and good luck.

Greg

And so it is...

So, what is there to say?

Things have been rather uneventful as of late. Suzy and I made some pretty sweet shirts for each other representing Baby which are really cool, if I do say so myself. Suzy's got a picture of an alien-looking creature attached to an umbilical cord spray painted on her belly while Suzy made me a (albeit much more difficult) stencil of the right and wrong ways to exercise a kid. You can pretty much guess what it looks like but we may have some pics up for you all sometime. Edit: Suzy says that there are pics of her in her t-shirt so... maybe we'll get some of me sometime... maybe.

I've been helping my English teachers out with a program (for both the second graders and fourth or fifth graders) that they've been working on for school next year. Before Jesus fell, he was assigned the task of actually creating a program for the two teachers to use next year. Then, he was given a painful four month delay by el medico and the task was assigned to Judith who was unprepared, to say the least. So, I offered to help her out and create a cake of a story about a dog and cat on Old MacDonald's farm, followed by the English lyrics (they have the song in Spanish, too). Since then, I've helped with a bit of extracurricular editing and such. Cakework, really. Well, until the other day. Judith poured a gigantic package of material needing editing (I spent an hour during class and was just over halfway finished) as well as some translation work. The translation (into English) wasn't nearly as much... it will probably take less than an hour but during my last month or so here, I'm not sure I can muster up any motivation to get anything done. Really, this is way better than any university work, or even work work, but... you know?

And, lastly, I'm getting old. And I miss a good chiropractor. Last night, Suzy graciously spent a good half hour checking out youtube's do-it-yourself back breakage. I'm not sure if it's the bed, the standing a great deal during classes, or just my exercising catching up with me (although I am pretty rigid about form...) but I had apparently misplaced my T6-ish vertebrate as it must have been lodged somewhere between my left shoulder blade and its deltoid muscle. However, after a good romp thrusting and shoving a bit to loosen the body, a touch of whipping (and by "whipping," I mean a series of flying elbow drops from the top rope), and a light sleep, it seems to have gotten at least a little better. I might have to see the traumatologico soon as that is the closest thing to a chiropractor that we have here. Honestly, Dad, why didn't you warn me about all of this a long time ago?! Getting old...

Greg is outski

This reminds us of home

Love you :)

Midwifery in MO

Suzy:

Here's some information on the topic before we begin.
Current legal status in MO and KS
The two main advocacy groups in MO that file lawsuits and "educate" politicians are the MSMA (MO State Medical Association) and several smaller midwifery advocacy groups including this one.

Now for the main arguments: Midwife supporters argue that increased public access to midwife care is a good thing because midwives are well trained and experienced caregivers that specialize in normal pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum care. The opposition argue that not just everyone should be legally allowed to deliver a baby.

And my opinion is: If you read the information, think it's pretty clear that safety is not the real reason why the MSMA opposes midwifery. If safety were a real concern, national groups like the AMA would be advocating on a national scale, and they're not. Also, if you read the data about midwifery in other countries, you'll find that it's very safe and a preferred method in many countries to help keep healthcare costs manageable. So what is the real concern then, if not safety? Why, money of course. If midwives are out there charging only $2500 per full prenatal, delivery, and postpartum care (without going through an insurance company), while just the delivery in a hospital will cost you around $10,000 if you don't have any 'extras' like complications or drugs or a c-section, the MSMA is clearly defending the economic interests of its members and nothing more.

Here's some extra reading for you.
Economics vs Public Safety
Recent coverage of the MO Supreme Court battle
A Blog
Another Blog

By the way, I promise that all of my posts will not be about baby stuff in the future. Don't worry, my life didn't just stop when I got pregnant. I've just been harboring this frustration for a while and feel the need to expel it. And, I hope you think it's as much BS as I do. People, pregnant or not, should have the right to choose what's best for themselves to stay healthy and lead a healthy life. Doctors, nurses, lawyers, and politicians are all pretty educated, but I don't want any of them making my healthcare choices for me. It's as simple as that.

Kisses to everyone. (And please read Greg's post below. I didn't mean to overshadow him. :P )

Twinkie, Deconstructed

Many of you have already heard my emphatic praise for a book I received nearly a year ago called Twinkie, Deconstructed by Steve Ettlinger. The book follows your run-of-the-mill package of everybody's favorite American processed delight, the twinkie. The author breaks the book down so that each chapter focuses on only one of the ingredients beginning with the most prevalent. I found it to be incredibly interesting as the author seems to find every tiny detail about the ingredients and follows them until said ingredient cannot be broken down anymore. He then provides further incite into the actual making of the ingredients (not just where they came from but how they got to the end). Plus, he seems to have my view that the FDA has gotten considerably out of hand allowing some of the crap that gets into our food supply.

Side note: Ashlee, do you still have my book? I keep forgetting to ask you about it because I will definitely have to reread it when we get back.

During my mid-morning internet excavation, I decided to check out Amazon for any other nutritional / agricultural books having just read an article about that very thing and some of the random chemicals that the typical American will eat on an average day in your regular city that is supported by your basic government that is bought by your common big corporation that has your standard (read: large) influence over what you eat.

So, I was checking Amazon out and found that my beloved Twinkie, Deconstructed by Steve Ettlinger was a bargain book for only $5.99 plus s+h and a little bit of leeway with your soul as you will undoubtedly feel both deceived and nauseous when you realize that the fudge round you ate last night gave you cancer.

So, check it out here and your soul will thank you.

This is Greg... out.

Continued (Attempt 2)

Suzy:

That'll teach me to write half a post and leave it on my computer for the next day :(

Chris is visiting and makes a great house guest. We're learning a lot about fine wine and coffee and botany and all kinds of stuff. We just had baby eels on toast with cream cheese after a day at Cabo de Gata. Yum! My skin is oily and salty and hair is tangled... oh, the sea. I love it.

So here's the rant about home births. I'll try to remember it best I can. Grrr.

First, three of my classes asked me this week if I am pregnant. I can't decide if it's because I'm showing or there's a rumor going around. You decide. (16 weeks today)




We decided to have a home birth for a lot of reasons.

1) We don't want to have a c-section, and over 30% of all women in US hospitals (compared to between 10% and 15% in other developed countries according to the World Health Organization) have them for reasons that I don't think are necessary. In case you don't know what that is: "When doing a C-section an ob/gyn doctor first makes sure that the patient has adequate anesthesia. We commonly use epidural anesthesia. On unusual occasions the patient may need to have general anesthesia, which involves going completely to sleep with a tube in the throat and the use of a ventilator device. Once the patient is numb, a cut about the size of the distance from your wrist to the tip of your ring finger is made in to the skin. In most cases, this incision is made from side-to-side, just above the pubic hair line (sometimes called a "bikini cut"), while in some parts of the world, and in some emergency situations, an up-and-down cut is made from below the belly button to the top of the bikini line. (Most doctors prefer bikini cuts because they heal and look better, and cause less pain after leaving the hospital). After cutting through the skin and underlying fat cells, the doctor will make an incision through the remaining tissue, then will enter the abdominal cavity. The bladder, uterus, ovaries, tubes, and intestines are all visible and sometimes have to be moved out of the way before cutting into the uterus (womb). After entering the uterus through a cut a little larger than the baby's head, the baby is carefully grasped, and the surgical assistant pushes on the top of the uterus to deliver the baby through the hole in the uterus. The umbilical cord is clamped and cut, and the baby is handed to the nurses or doctors who care for newborn babies. The ob/gyn will remove the placenta, stitch up the uterus, inspect the ovaries and tubes, then close the different tissue layers and put staples or stitches into the skin." I guess I don't feel like having doctors wiggle around my organs when they don't have to.

2) I don't want to be drugged out. I've discovered that women's bodies are built pretty well to handle labor, funny enough. For example, your brain excretes endorphines during labor to deal with the pain. And the baby twists around to wiggle out just as your body pushes at the right time. With drugs your body and the baby's body's timing gets off and then more drugs are needed to fix that which interfere with other things like endorphines and pain relief and then more drugs are needed... generally not a good thing to start if you can avoid it.

3) I want to be in charge of who comes in and out of my space as well as when I can move around, when I can eat and drink, and what positions I want to try. Being on your back is actually the worst position for labor.

4) People ask if I'm nervous about not being in a hospital and if it's safe to be at home and what if something goes wrong. Read about it yourself cuz I'm feeling too lazy to post links. It's very safe, and I'm not nervous especially with the midwife we found. If something goes wrong there will be a hospital close, but I figger that I'm young and healthy with no risk factors. Also, women have been doing this for a pretty long time. I'm not the first nor the last to give birth.

5) Most of all I believe that pregnancy and childbirth is not a sickness and does not require emergency medical attention. On the contrary, I suspect that having a child will be a spiritual occasion. I don't think there's a better space than home.

Shower time. Next post: Why it's a felony in MO to provide midwifery services.