(a response to indigolilybear's hijack 
of the "how unassisted is a UC?" thread)
And now, for my 800th post -- my "ideal picture of freebirth"!
In early labor I am surrounded by nurturing, empathic, fun people. They bring me things and cover me in scented flowers. This is the perfect time to do a quiet, soulful blessingway. Candles lit, blessings. As labor progresses they drift away and my husband and I begin to enjoy each other. We dance, our arms around each other. We laugh. We murmur affection, admiration, adoration to each other.
And then bit by bit I feel my attention begin to be called elsewhere, and so I go off alone to my birthing space, a warm, leafy, shaded grove with sunlight filtering through. I sit on a mattress covered with soft blankets, and meditate. As the contractions come stronger I begin to move, to sway, to moan. I am all this body, this air, this warmth, and the baby is here suddenly, moving through me, stretching, expanding, filling my body, then the air, she is everything. There is nothing to take me out of this as slowly I come back into my surroundings, nothing to distract me as I meet her with all my senses. I am all for her. I look around and see the green light, the leaves moving in the breeze, and everything is so intensely beautiful and timeless. I rest in this timelessness and regard my body, changed yet again -- this amazing, wonderful, sweet body that has just done this miraculous yet completely ordinary thing. And now a feeling of expulsion, and here is the placenta, plump, round, the color of blood, and I look at it and touch it. There is no one to make me feel self-conscious -- every thing I do is utterly unselfconscious and spontaneous, in freedom to just be.
After a while my attention again begins to be called elsewhere, an urge bubbling up to announce my secret, to feel the joy of others when they meet her, to commune with my husband again. And so I gather my robe around me, cradle her in my arms, and make my way back.
of the "how unassisted is a UC?" thread)And now, for my 800th post -- my "ideal picture of freebirth"!
In early labor I am surrounded by nurturing, empathic, fun people. They bring me things and cover me in scented flowers. This is the perfect time to do a quiet, soulful blessingway. Candles lit, blessings. As labor progresses they drift away and my husband and I begin to enjoy each other. We dance, our arms around each other. We laugh. We murmur affection, admiration, adoration to each other.
And then bit by bit I feel my attention begin to be called elsewhere, and so I go off alone to my birthing space, a warm, leafy, shaded grove with sunlight filtering through. I sit on a mattress covered with soft blankets, and meditate. As the contractions come stronger I begin to move, to sway, to moan. I am all this body, this air, this warmth, and the baby is here suddenly, moving through me, stretching, expanding, filling my body, then the air, she is everything. There is nothing to take me out of this as slowly I come back into my surroundings, nothing to distract me as I meet her with all my senses. I am all for her. I look around and see the green light, the leaves moving in the breeze, and everything is so intensely beautiful and timeless. I rest in this timelessness and regard my body, changed yet again -- this amazing, wonderful, sweet body that has just done this miraculous yet completely ordinary thing. And now a feeling of expulsion, and here is the placenta, plump, round, the color of blood, and I look at it and touch it. There is no one to make me feel self-conscious -- every thing I do is utterly unselfconscious and spontaneous, in freedom to just be.
After a while my attention again begins to be called elsewhere, an urge bubbling up to announce my secret, to feel the joy of others when they meet her, to commune with my husband again. And so I gather my robe around me, cradle her in my arms, and make my way back.
