jen boss talks shit

The Similac recall is really bringing people out of the woodwork on something that is near and dear to my heart. Breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is hard, especially for a country like ours who makes it so easy to not breastfeed.

So many people don't breast feed for some of the following reasons. Some people who want their breast to stay the same their whole life (good luck with that). There are people who need their freedom. There are people who need to work 2 jobs. There are people who have augmentation surgery. People who are suppressed by society and are told that breast are only sexual. But there are also the same people who have all of these roadblocks and still successfully breastfeed.

The formula industry was an industry that was created. Created people! And I don't even want to say "breast is best", cause that is a slogan created by the formula industry. We all know that something that comes from our body is the best. Formula is good enough for so many people. I'm pretty straight forward when someone starts telling me how "they couldn't breastfeed because..." and "I had to go to formula because of that..." I give the same response to each and every one. I say "as long as you gave it your 100% best effort and you did everything in your power," then you claim ownership. Ownership to health issues, obesity, healthcare costs, etc. Most of them can't say it though. There are remarkable stories of trying every hour on the hour for weeks and finally, finally the baby starts doing it right. Mean time they have used syringes and cups and pumps to keep the baby going during these efforts. They are giving it their 100%. To the people who choose not to "go through that" or "not sure if it's worth it," oh, it's worth it, it's worth every last drop. To those people have made their own choices and say to themselves every day - formula is good enough. Own it.

I'm starting from the beginning, cause I'd like it to start here, rather than choose a random spot. So. Andy and I had always had in the back of our head that we might want another baby. Hence him never getting "clipped" after Henry, our second child, was born in 1999. It seemed we were on the same page about it. I was going to be turning 40 in a few years, and we wanted one more before that. So after pretty much a few attempts, it happened. I was immediately sure (hoping) it was a girl.

Now. Being a little overweight and older I thought, I was set on eating very healthy, low carb and high protein. Wanted to gain minimal weight. Into the 2nd month, I started recording my weight in my day planner. The first 4 months I gained 2lbs. Perfect! I was eating nutritious foods and found the right balance. I was feeling great. No more morning sickness. Spring was around the corner, I was getting excited!

On March 9 I had a appointment for my 4 month prenatal, now I was really pumped that I had only gained 2lbs. cause my body could handle it and I didn't need to gain a ton of weight for this to be a healthy pregnancy. I had started seeing the midwives at Park Nicollet, cause that's who I saw in 1998 and 1999 for the boys and I felt very comfortable with them. There are about a dozen midwives in their group so you get to see a variety of them. By the way, none of the original ones were there after 10 years. Today's appointment was the midwife who walked in, looked at my chart and felt around and then left. No small talk, no comments about my weight gain being right on track, nothing positive at all. She didn't even listen to the heartbeat. It was very weird.

Now, when I scheduled my next appointment I specifically asked to see a new person, I thought maybe it was a little personality or style conflict. My next appointment was my 5 month prenatal. This is where you usually have an ultrasound, check out how things are going, maybe see the sex, whatever. But at this appointment I had told the midwife that I really wanted to try to avoid ultrasounds this pregnancy if I could. It's funny, cause I ended up having the most with this pregnancy! So. I was at the appointment. This was the first time they were going to "measure" me. They take a measuring tape and measure from the top of your pelvic bone to the top of the fundi or the uterus. This measurement is done by the centimeter and the number usually correlates with the week that you are at in the pregnancy. Usually. But. It can be a really unreliable too. Especially if you've had subsequent babies and/or have belly fat, or even a full bladder. Pretty logical right? Well, this is when it all began. The build up to everyone worrying about me having a huge baby. Well guess what. I WAS going to have a big baby. My one in 1999, Henry, was 9lb 9oz. So logic would tell you that I was going to have a large baby. Again.

I must have went back and forth several phone calls. A remeasure. Back and forth. About this month 5 measurement. I was measuring about 5 weeks (5cm) beyond what my week actually was. I tried pointing out my theories. I told them that I really thought that it was preexisting belly fat, genetics, and that my dates were not off. Nope, they insisted on me having an ultrasound. So, after a few weeks going back and forth I had one on May 15. I was 27 weeks. Confirmed she was indeed a girl and that she was the size of a 33 week old. Well, shit. Yep. I have big babies, I kept telling them.

This is a good time to mention, quickly, how my other babies were born. My first, Willem, born at 36 weeks. Pushed for 2 hours. Weighed in at 7lb 3oz. A peanut. But had I gone full term, probably would have been 2lb more. So. Then with Henry, I pushed for 5 minutes and he was born. 9lb 9oz. So, again, logic would tell you that I was going to have a big baby and probably wouldn't have any trouble getting her out either.

Okay. So by now I'm at 31 weeks. Nearly at the end. I've gained 15lbs. I've been testing my blood sugar 4 times a day. I'm healthy. Baby is healthy. But. I've gotten nothing but grief and negative interactions with my midwives. NEVER a "you're doing great with your weight gain", "we're not worried about your birth, you'll do great", nothing positive. Nothing. So at 31 weeks (2 weeks before the cut off to switch care), I switched to completely different care all together. I was now seeing the midwives at Healtheast Clinics. They birthed at St. Josephs, who had an 11% c-section rate which is remarkable. Most hospitals have anywhere from 20-30% rate. This hospital came highly recommended to everyone I talked to, this was it. A fresh start!

Had my first prenatal at Healtheast at 31 weeks on June 11. I saw the person that had just been hired to head the midwives. Totally old school. Gave me a once over and said everything looked great. Measured me and said. "You're measuring big, but we don't induce or do anything for large baby." Great I thought. Finally some logic. Someone willing to trust my body will do what it needs to do. This is also the time when you start going to prenatal appointments every 2 weeks. I needed to choose someone to kind of be the ONE person I saw from this day forward. I had talked to a few people who had known and liked one of the midwives, Lisa. So that's who I decided to see on June 24th. I didn't have a lot of time to research and interview. I was at 33 weeks.

This was the first in a series of prenatal appointments where I left and proceeded to call Andy from the car and bawl. Pretty much my only stressful times of this pregnancy. Lisa was relentless. I would see her 3 more times and each time it was the same thing. Never mentioning how great I looked and how great Nora looked. Every time. She would say things like "we don't want to let this baby get too big" or "we will give you the option of a c-section." A C-SECTION! ARE YOU KIDDING ME! I thought. I've had 2 other babies. Vaginally. Seriously. We continued to think positive. Cooking amazing meals every other night. Spending time with the boys and each other.

Here's where I tell you that at around 38 weeks I was squatting looking for container for leftovers and I felt a pop. No fluid. Well maybe a little. But a very distinctive pop. I instantly thought that my membranes had broke. I called Andy, the hospital, they said to come in. I had gotten beautiful henna done on my belly that day. I remember washing it off prematurely, so I could go to the hospital.This was in the evening. Got to the hospital and they did a fluid test to make sure it was amniotic fluid. The nurse came back and she said they were admitting me because it was positive. Scary, exciting, sort of happy cause then the whole size thing would be moot. The next morning the midwife came in and examined me and said she wanted to check again, do another strip fluid test. It came back negative. Here began the emotional roller coaster. Are you kidding me! So. We packed our bags and went home.

At 38 1/2 weeks. Lisa stripped my membranes. This was one of the most painful experiences of my life. So invasive. But I was willing to do whatever it took for her to stop hounding me and to stop focusing on my baby's size. At this point I was taking several Evening Primrose Oil capsules a day internally and externally. This was supposed to get the cervix to start ripening and get things going. A few days after this appointment Lisa called me and said that she'd like to induce at 39 weeks. Induction. Hmm. It didn't sound that unreasonable. I had been induced with my first 2. One, because my water broke at 35 weeks and I never had contractions start for a whole week. And for my second, it was because I was 41 weeks and I knew he was big, bigger than my first and I was done at that point. With that. At 39 weeks we prepared for induction. We packed. Got the boys situated and went off to have a baby. The way I had the other 2. Pitocin. Went to the hospital on a Saturday night, had the Prostaglandin Gel on that night and at 8am the next day, they started the drip. Then I got a visit from the midwife on call, Beth. Beth was older than the other midwives, I want to say, 50's, when the others were 30's and 40's. The first thing she said to me is, "why are we inducing you today." Ummm. So then I explained the other midwifes concern about big baby, yada yada yada. She was confused. She said she "would never have done that, but we'll give it a try, and that it might not work." This is coming from a midwife in the SAME group as Lisa. The one that had been freaking me out about size for the last 6 weeks. And it MIGHT NOT WORK! I've never heard of Pitocin not working. We went the entire day on Pitocin. But I knew it wasn't doing a thing. NOTHING! Now I finally knew who I was dealing with. Nora was completely comfortable where she was. Every stress test, ultrasound, she was "happy as a clam" they'd say. So, from this day forward I decided I was going to do this thing the way it should have been from the beginning. Beth told me to come to the Healtheast office that she worked out of. That they were "older, more old school" I told her I would. I would wait it out and let Nora do her thing when she was ready! We went home. Actually. We stopped, with my sister who was with us the whole day and I had a huge burger, with the bun AND a bunch of fries. I even think I had a Coke.

I almost forgot. Lisa called me after the induction. Tried to see how it went. Plan the "next course of action." It was all I could do to not tell her to eff off. I didn't I just said. "I'm going to see the midwives at the other location and let my baby come when it wants to, and I have permission to do this from Beth." She said, "okay," and that was it. Buh Bye!

We continued to try to be patient. Our neighbors next door had their sweet baby Sophie, on Nora's due date no less. That was fun! We continued to eat wonderful meals of tomatoes, CSA veggies, Chef Shack on the weekends. The last Chef Shack I had was at week 41 1/2, it was the awesome fried green tomatoes on Sunday at the Kingfield Farmers Market. The next day I went in for another flying colors non-stress test. Had a little more Prostaglandin Gel put on and went home. This was Monday. I had until Wednesday until it would be exactly 2 weeks late, and at that point would try Pitocin induction again.

I was alone at the house. On my exercise ball, concentrating on opening the cervix and letting everything do it's work and then it happened. My water broke. For real though. All over the ball and all over the place. I called Andy. He got home and we started to get excited knowing that FINALLY, this would be it. Contractions started. I was timing them on my iPhone, just like I had planned. I actually went back and looked at it weeks after Nora's birth, to delete the app. Noticed I stopped timing them when they were something like 2 minutes apart and I was moaning and in full labor. Andy proceeded to slowly move through the house, putting groceries away, gathering things, slowly. Finally I said. We need to go NOW! He had some romantic notion of laboring at home for a while. But I couldn't wait, I was afraid and I wanted to be at the hospital. So in cinematic fashion, we drove to St. Paul fast, me groaning and calling the hospital to tell them that they HAD to have a wheelchair at the door, cause I couldn't walk anymore. I got pushed through the halls that I knew by heart from all of our trips, but it was still blurry, my eyes were beginning be more shut than open. Like all my other labors. We got to our room and the midwife on call was someone we had never met, Jess, she was a pup. She checked me, I was at 5cm. This was great cause I had been at 3cm for almost a month. I proceeded to stand next to the bed and drain Nora's Amniotic fluid for the next 3 hours. Apparently I announced EVERY contraction with, "I gonna have another", for an entire 3 hours. My sister was there, Andy was there and Jess the super young midwife was there. She was awesome by the way! I started making that change from "I'm in pain groan" to the "I need to push now" groan. I hopped up on the table, crooked. Jess asked me if I could straighten my body, to be inline with the table better. I said no. I pushed 2 times and there was Nora June. 9lbs 10oz. bigger and faster than the last.

The next day, the next midwife on call came in and talked to us. She said "I heard you were awesome", "she's beautiful", and she was "so, so sorry" about everything that had happened. There had been a few other cases of babies measuring big and there were even some who had elective c-sections and they ended up being 2lbs smaller than the ultrasound tech had predicted. Horrifying. Simply horrifying. They asked if and when I was ready, if I would write things down and turn them in, that my case and others were in review. This was becoming a problem. They were predicting these enormous babies and they were very off in their guess of the in utero weight. They had predicted that Nora would be close to 11.5lb.

She out weighed her brother Henry by 1 oz at 9lbs 10oz. She came at a perfect time. I just wish everyone would have trusted her when to make her appearance! I have such fond memories of that summer. The panna cotta obsession. Homemade sorbet. Walks along the creek. Henna. Supportive friends. Birthday dinners. It was so worth it. Happy birthday Nora June. August 24 a year later.