Guilt-Free Friday

I’ve read other’s blogs and a lot of them have this really cute “theme” idea, where one day they’ll focus on the same topic each week, like a joke on Monday or a recipe on Wednesday, or Confession Friday is one I’ve seen a few times.  All these cute ideas.  I’ve decided to copy off of all of you with your cute ideas and have a theme of my own.  Welcome to Guilt-Free Friday!

This is stemming from my attempted lifestyle conversion.  I just want myself and my family to be healthier, at home first and foremost but eventually even when we’re out and about too.  I’m just tired of living the Standard American Diet.  Or SAD for short, ha ha ha.  All the processed crap, the refined crap, the GMOs, the artificial colors and flavors, the Yellow dye #50 or whatever.  What is all this crap and what is it doing in my food?

It all started at the end of spring this year when Justin and I decided to cut out [bad] carbs for about a month or so.  We were eating meat and veggies and fruits every. single. day.  We threw in some cheese or sour cream or different oils like olive or coconut to mix things up a bit here and there, but other than that it was bye-bye sandwiches, dinner rolls, pizza crusts, crackers, pastas, potatoes, cakes, cookies, etc.  It sounds painful and torturous I’m sure, but it wasn’t too bad, I’ll admit, especially going at it with a buddy.  And Harlee’s fortunately a really good eater, he loves veggies anyway so we didn’t have any trouble with him, he just joined in the fun and didn’t think anything different of it.  We dropped so much weight.  My pre-pregnancy pants were feeling loose!  I felt so GOOD!  I felt clean, healthy, more energetic… But then we went on vacation, and “enjoyed” all the guilty pleasures of before, and blew our diet all to hell.

Now it’s fall and I’m ready for that “season of change” thing.  I joined an exercise program, but diet has SO much to do with it too, and I want the exercise to pay off, so therefore I need to eat better.  Well, I already know what works, for me anyway, so I need to get back on that.  But somehow it’s not as easy as it was before…  I’m finding myself MISSING all those guilty pleasures… I don’t WANT to give up pasta and pizza and biscuits… What if I want pancakes for breakfast?  What about Christmas cookies??  This is too intimidating now!

But being healthy is more important.  Don’t worry, this research-a-holic already looked up why avoiding carbs is so good in the first place.  Allow me to share what I’ve learned!  There are good carbs and bad carbs.  Good ones are found in what Mother Nature provides: fruits, vegetables, brown rice, whole grains, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, beans, seeds and nuts for example.  Bad ones are found in things Man and Technology got their paws on: flour, milled corn or white rice, fruit juices, sugared soft drinks or other beverages with sugar, and processed foods like chips and cookies and white bread, and alcohol (everyone make a sad face with me… *:-(*).  Carbohydrates are the body’s main fuel source for energy.  There are simple carbs and complex carbs.  The complex carbs are made of longer chains of sugar molecules that take the body longer to break down and digest, which gives you a more even amount of energy throughout the day.  Simple carbs are basic sugar molecules that are quick to digest and don’t provide much value to your body.  That’s the basics!  From here on out, when I refer to or mention carbs, you may assume I’m talking about the bad ones – the sugars and white flours and cakes and cookies and whatnot.

Okay, so back to my mission of eating healthier.  I needed to solve my problem of pancakes and pizza and Christmas cookies! :-(  So I’ve started looking for substitutes – sticking with what nature has to offer, avoiding weird additives, steering clear of bad carbs, and still achieving the desired result of yummy “guilty” pleasures.

Last Sunday I shared muffins made of coconut flour, but I’m sure that’s not something everyone has just lying around.  On Guilt-Free Friday I’m going to try to offer recipes with ingredients that everyone should have easy access too, or may already have stocked in their pantries.  Otherwise I’ll try to offer insight on where to find certain ingredients, to help you out.

Today I’m going to feature pasta.  One of my favorite pasta substitutes is the spaghetti squash.  It mimics spaghetti noodles, but it’s a vegetable!  It’s bland in flavor, and works wonderfully with whatever sauce you like!  Ah that thing has been a lifesaver for me…

It’s really simple to prepare, too!  Just cut it in half, scoop out the seeds and gunk inside, place cut-side down in a baking pan filled with about a half inch of water, cover with foil, and bake at 375°F for 20-30 minutes (depending on how al dente you want the “noodles”).

Let them cool a bit, then drag a fork through the meat and be amazed as spaghetti-like strands form before your eyes!

Dump all the noodles into a pot and mix together with your sauce of choice – spaghetti sauce with meatballs, alfredo sauce with chicken and/or broccoli, cheese sauce either by itself or with chili on top, the sky’s the limit!

Can’t beat eating vegetables when it feels like you’re eating pasta!

Guilt-Free Cinnamon Roll Muffins

These are super good... And Harlee ate like 3/4 of a muffin with Mom's approval!  I already ate, like, three muffins myself... But the greatest thing is I don't FEEL like I ate that many, because nothing in these weighs on you heavy and makes you feel like crap!  Yay!

We've been trying to make better eating choices at home lately... Ever since I cut out carbs for about a month and lost quite a bit of weight from it I've been feeling more motivated about making this a lifestyle change.  But it sucks not being able to enjoy all the guilty pleasures my former carb-a-holic lifestyle allowed me to eat like pastas and breads and pastries...

So I started looking into ways to still enjoy these things without "breaking the rules".  I mean, this is just a choice for me, but there are people out there who HAVE to live this way due to health reasons.  I'm sure they don't want to feel restricted, so what do they do?  I discovered the blog Against All Grain which was written by exactly that kind of person - a woman with a health issue who didn't want to feel restricted.  She's got some great recipes!  From there stemmed a search for other recipe sites, and there are tons out there!  Suddenly I'm feeling more ambitious about this - a whole new avenue of cooking/baking has been opened up to me!  I'm experimenting with almond flour and coconut flour, which are great alternatives to wheat flour and they're gluten free (and carb-free :-D) and baking with stevia or other alternatives to refined sugar.  But NOT Splenda or Sweet 'n' Low or Equal or Nutrasweet or whatever.  Those are man-made and not good for you.  Just because they're zero calorie doesn't mean they're not having any affect on your body!  Aspartame is in a lot of those zero calorie sweeteners (and diet soda too).  Here is a great article about the dangers of aspartame and how it damages brain cells and leads to all kinds of problems, the least of which are headaches and migraines.  But anyway, this post isn't about all the scary crap that's in the food we eat, I can save that for another day or two!

This is about some yummy cinnamon roll muffins I made today with coconut flour and butternut squash.  I took the recipe from Paleo in PDX, and here it is:

Topping:

• 2 Tbsp melted butter, ghee or coconut oil (I used coconut oil)
• 2 Tbsp raw honey
• 1 Tbsp cinnamon

Combine all ingredients and set aside.

Muffins:

• 1/2 cup butternut squash puree (fresh or canned, but to make fresh just halve the butternut squash, scoop out the seeds, place cut-side down in a baking pan of 1/2 inch of water and cover with foil, and bake at 375 degrees F until soft, about 30-40 minutes.  Scoop out the "meat" and puree in a blender)
• 1/2 cup coconut flour
• 3 eggs
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp sea salt
• 1/2 cup melted butter, ghee or coconut oil (I used butter)
• 1 Tbsp pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup raw honey
• 1/4 – 1/3 cup raw pecans for topping, optional

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients together — except pecans–in the food processor and process until a smooth, fluffy batter forms. Alternatively, you can mix all the dry ingredients together, whisk the wet ingredients together in a separate bowl, and then whisk the wet ingredients into the dry.
2. Grease muffin cups or line with parchment paper liners. Fill each with approximately 1/4 cup of batter.
3. Spoon cinnamon mixture over each muffin and top with pecans, if using.
4. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the muffins comes out clean.

Enjoy!   Justin suggested I find a recipe for a cream cheese frosting to put on top next time... I think I agree with him!  I think next time I'll also mix cinnamon into the batter as well, so the flavor is more even throughout, though they were pretty yummy already anyway.  And now my house smells yummy too!

Drug Free is the Way to Be!

Perfect timing for this post, since it’s Red Ribbon Week and all!  Today I’ve decided to give you some back story as to why I prefer to do things naturally.  I was raised on homeopathic and naturopathic medicine due to my mom’s interest and accumulated knowledge.  Cold and flu season, we didn’t go running to the nearest pharmacy to get a flu shot, rather Mom gave us immune-boosting supplements such echinacea and vitamin C.  Goldenseal and pau d’arco are good ones too.  Voila, we made it through cold and flu season with nothing more than a bit of congestion, if anything.  What’s interesting to me is that she got a late start in working with natural remedies with my sister and I, but started right off the bat with my brothers.  Guess which kids were the healthiest all throughout their school days?  I’m not saying none of us had our issues, but I can say that hospitals haven’t seen any of us and our doctors had some preeeetttyyyy out-of-date files.  Anyway.  So this was my upbringing.  Then one day when I was I guess 18-19 years old I got sick.  I don’t know what it was, or why I got it, but I suppose it could have been some form of flu.  Throwing up, dizzy, feeling like c.r.a.p.  For the first time I caught something more powerful than whatever naturopathic stuff I had on hand could handle.  I had already missed a week of work and didn’t want to miss any more, so out of desperation I called a doctor.  A real MD.  I hadn’t been to one since my mandatory high school physical.  I was in the waiting room forever, of course, and only in to see him for like 5 minutes.  Of course.  WTH??  You can’t assess something like this in just 5 minutes!!  This was so aggravating.  Obviously he didn’t care that much.  He just scratched out a prescription for penicillin and sent me to the pharmacy.  And out of desperation, I obliged.  About a week later I was no longer throwing up or feeling horrible, so it either ran its course, my naturopathics finally worked, or the penicillin did.  But I’ll tell you what the penicillin also did.  I broke out in the most hideous rash I have ever seen/experienced.  I was covered in little red blotches on every inch of my skin, and every 5-10 minutes a random patch on my arm, or my leg, or my stomach, or wherever would erupt into welts and burn and itch like CRAZY.  Um, bring back my throwing up and nausea, please!  This is WAY worse!!  Everyone who looked at me kept their distance, and then would either tell me to call the doctor or take some benedryl or something.  I tried benedryl.  It put me to sleep.  I woke up to hideous welts and itching.  I searched online, but couldn’t find anything.  And hell no I was not calling a doctor, it was a doctor that got me into this mess in the first place!  I’ve never had this problem with natural medicine!!  I later came to find out I’m allergic to penicillin.  The rash was my body’s way of detoxing itself from the poison, which makes sense, with skin being your body’s largest organ.  The rash finally went away, but I was never the same since.  I developed a respiratory sensitivity – I couldn’t handle smoke as well and I’d wind up wheezing if I did too much physical exercise, and worst of all my pre-existing cat and dog allergies (which were just sneezing and itchy eyes) progressed into my windpipe swelling and constricting and making me feel like I was breathing through a straw and gasping for breath after a short period of time with the animal.  Not good.  I also developed chronic yeast infections.  That’s probably TMI so I’ll stop there, but anyone who’s had one before knows how HORRIBLE they are, and imagine having them at least once a month for YEARS.  Eventually I saw a local massage therapist who did a lot of natural work along with manual therapies, and I explained my problem to her, not even sure if she could help.  She did a lot of really fascinating things involving muscle testing and pressure points, and we learned that I really needed to get some probiotics in my system.  The penicillin killed off any/all of the good bacteria in my system and I was left defenseless, therefore a breeding ground for things like yeast and weakened against things in the environment like smoke and pet dander.  I started taking probiotics.  Slowly but surely my yeast infections dissipated, and my breathing became easier.  Holy crap.  I needed to know more.  And I needed to share this!!

That’s kinda why I’m a massage therapist today.  My main goal in my career is to assist people in making natural, healthy choices for their wellbeing and to avoid drugs and even surgery.  I’m only 3 years in, and I’ve helped a LOT of people in simple ways.  I refer to this career as a diving board – with this license I have access to a WHOLE lot of other avenues in natural healing that I can dive into, and I’m so excited to see where I’ll have gone with it in 5, 10, 20 + years.

After the penicillin incident I vowed never to take a drug again.  It was natural or bust for me.  I know it’s not the doctor’s fault that I’m allergic to the prescription he gave me, and neither one of us knew it when he prescribed it, but I’m sorry, he only spent 5 freaking minutes with me in that office, as crappy as I felt I would have liked a little more care than that!

I became more adamant about living my life naturally after that, learning more about supplements and remedies to ward off different things, but fortunately I never came across anything quite so severe as whatever that bug was that led me to the penicillin ordeal.  My immune system has been compromised ever since then, but I’ve been doing fairly well treating myself naturally when I do catch any bugs, given my circumstances.  Before I ever had kids I knew I’d raise them the same way.  In massage school I became friends with people who lived life similarly, and I learned from their knowledge base and also got support.

In the meantime I looked at a lot of different things like cancer (does anyone other than me feel like chemo just kills you slower than the cancer does??) and how chemo patients suffer so horribly.  And it was definitely an eye-opener when a friend of mine from massage school did some volunteer chair massage for stress relief for cancer patients, and when she asked different doctors if they would administer chemo and radiation to their own loved ones, they said no, they wouldn’t… um, red flag?  Then I watched as a good friend of mine found out her elderly father had lung cancer, he decided he’d rather die of cancer than chemo, and after opting against any western “therapies” she took matters into her own hands and helped him boost his immune system naturally.  About a year and half later he was completely cancer-free.  Yes, I’ve seen some pretty awesome stuff with naturopathic medicine.

Enter pregnancy, and now you can see why I made a lot of the choices I made?  Aaaanddd why I was so disappointed in the birth outcome.  I’ve said before, though, that it was humbling.  I learned a great sense of balance – that maybe being so ANTI-Western medicine isn’t the best way to be.  It has its place, and it’s a good thing when needed.  But I was still going to continue to avoid it.  I reversed a positive Group B Strep test into a negative one by ALL natural ways, and now, after a year of battling some really rough postpartum depression, I’m beating that in natural ways too.  More about that in future posts.

It’s been an interesting learning experience and I’ve really enjoyed it, and so far I’m really impressed with my son’s immune system as he’s growing.  I’ve been doing a LOT of different things to keep him healthy, such as visiting the chiropractor regularly, using essential oils in every day life, adding probiotics to his juice (I’ve told you how gung-ho I am about probiotics, and I intend to tell you more too!), using side-effect-free homeopathics when he does experience any kinds of issues, and trying to keep meals and snacks as healthy as I can.  I’ve been doing the same for Justin and myself, too.  Lots of vitamins, natural supplements, and healthy eating habits as well as my regular use of oils and probiotics, and we visit the chiropractor too.  All these wonderful things to stay well, and with no hideous side effects or harmful toxins that can be detrimental to our lives or lifestyle in the future!  See?  Drug free really IS the way to be!

I’m excited to elaborate on a lot of these choices we’ve made, and educate you to help with decisions you may need to make regarding your own or your family’s health.  I hope you’re as excited as I am!

The Season of Change

Happy Fall everyone!

I've been thinking I need to switch up this blog.  I kept thinking of great posts, and then never got around to writing them.  Yes, I'm busy, so I can use that as an excuse, but times like right now (Harlee is napping, Justin is hunting, the house is actually still clean from yesterday (whoa!!)) do actually happen every great once in awhile, so why am I playing on Pintrest rather than getting my thoughts out there for you all to read?  Okay Pintrest is pretty great too... but not as productive.

After some contemplation I realized it's because the concept of my blog has been waaaay too "run of the mill".  And I'm not a run-of-the-mill kind of person.  I love my little family and what I've got going here, but writing about our day to day happenings just didn't seem that exciting to me.  But, while I was pregnant, I did have a lot of fun sharing all my new findings and thoughts and feelings about natural pregnancy and birth.  But the whole "Once Upon the Papenbergs" title wasn't matching up to that kind of "natural lifestyle" theme.  So today I ditched the old title, even the old domain, and I am now officially converting over to Naturally Jami.  Yay!

I changed the About My Blog tab too, that way you have a little background on what brought about the change.

So.  Continuing on.  I have a napping 15-month-old that has taught me SO MUCH and I've been really excited to share some of my findings and experiences with you.  I have lots of plans for this blog, so hopefully I'll stick with it and get to share everything.  Things like natural ways to help tummy aches (and not just for baby, but for grown-ups too!), relieve sinus congestion or runny noses (currently dealing with that with my little guy...), and I hope to share recipes for healthy snack alternatives as well.  I'm also planning on educating and explaining, too.  This small-town rural southern Illinois family of ours has proven to be pretty unconventional when it comes to the "norm" in child-rearing, and I'd like to use this as an opportunity to explain why we do what we do.

But PLEASE know that I am NOT in any way trying to TELL you what to do.  If I want to tell you what to do, I'll just come right out and say, "You need to do XYZ."  But that won't happen very often unless it's a special circumstance because a) it's annoying and b) it's rude.  Seriously, I only want to share my thoughts and opinions, radical as they may be, simply for education's sake.  I truly believe our differences are what makes the world go round.  If everybody thought like I think and did what I do, life would be pretty boring.  But I wanted to make sure you all know that's how I feel.  Believe it or not, a couple of "friends" actually deleted me from Facebook because of my blog posts about natural pregnancy and birth, I'm guessing because they felt I was being pushy about it?  I have no idea, but it did make me realize that I don't want anyone to think that I'm trying to tell them to be just like me.  I just aim to educate, and then you may do whatever you want with that knowledge.

Alright, I think that about sums it all up.  I'm excited for this change, I hope you enjoy reading, and I hope you learn something too!

An Update on the Papenberg Life

I haven't blogged in awhile, so I thought I'd take advantage of Harlee's nap time to catch up on that.  Hopefully he sleeps long enough!

I've been pretty busy lately (hence the long delay in blogging!).  Some friends and I have successfully pulled off a surprise birthday party bus for Justin and his friend Ryan who are now at the ripe old age of 30 :) and it was a much-needed BLAST.  I've kind of been planning this since Justin turned 29, and then I got Ryan's girlfriend and some other friends in on it shortly thereafter, and we went all out with personalized t-shirts and bus decorations and crazy birthday hats and buttons and sashes that the guys happily wore all night long.  It was awesome!

It was Harlee's first sleepover too... he stayed at my mom and dad's, and mom reported that while he did pretty well with his first overnight trip away from us, my she was a little sleep deprived... Harlee sported his "What Happens at Grandma's Stays at Grandma's" shirt the next day too... I, on the other hand, felt GREAT (and fortunately not hungover).  I love co-sleeping, but it sure was nice to have one little break to sleep all through the night just me and the hubby.

Yes, we're still co-sleeping.  I get asked that a handful of times, along with being told that's going to be a hard habit to break.  I hope not, but I've decided not to worry about it.  We'll cross that bridge when we get there.  It's working for us, as it has been since he was born.  I'm not sleep-deprived (except for those few nights during this teething period that he's gotten up WAY more than I prefer), it's actually much easier having him in bed because when he does wake up wanting to eat I don't actually have to get out of bed to tend to him.  Plus, he's not going to be little forever.  I want to take advantage of having this snuggly little thing next to me as much as I can, because he soon enough he won't be snuggly and little anymore.  The one thing I've heard the most from parents is that time goes by way too fast.  First you've got this tiny newborn in your arms and before you know it they're asking for the car keys.  So many parents are so sad to see their kids grow up so fast, or cry on their first day of school, and I don't want to be like that.  I want to embrace every passing stage and phase that he goes through and build up as many fond memories as I can during each one.  I've had myself braced since the day he was born for time to fly by, and I think it's helped.  He's six months old, and that actually feels about right, rather than "Oh my god where did the time go??"  I don't feel like I missed anything, I don't feel sad that he's growing so fast, I feel like we're just where we need to be.  I was excited when he learned to roll over, I'm excited that he can sit up now, and I'm super excited to start him on solids next week (although I'm not excited about the stinky poop that comes with that...).

Nope, he's still not on solids.  That seems kind of odd, beings most babies are on some sort of solids at three-four months lately, but I guess it's kind of rare that they're breastfed past that time too.  I know everyone's case is different, but I'm beginning to think I'm one of very few moms left still breastfeeding, which is odd because really I'm still in the beginning of it.  That's another thing I get asked a lot - "Are you still breastfeeding?"  Sadly, I've been asked that since he was three months...  Yes, I'm still breastfeeding - I brought him into this world, I should probably keep him fed while he's here, huh?  I hope to still be breastfeeding when he's a year, too.  Just because he's eating big people food doesn't mean he should be done breastfeeding - I've got the best nutrition for him right now, and he needs to be supplemented with that probably for the first two years of his life.  I don't know if I'll nurse that long, though - I figure I'll play it by ear after he's a year.  Breastfeeding can definitely be hard and demanding, like on the party bus this weekend, having to take a break to pump isn't really the most fun, but it's worth it.

I guess sometime soon I need to find an ideal blender, either one specifically for baby food or a regular blender that I can use for baby food as well.  I'm excited to start making my own baby food.  It seems easy enough, and much cheaper!  Plus a lot more trustworthy - I like having complete control over what's in it and what my kid consumes.  I've had my eye on the Baby Bullet, but there's a handful of other blenders out there too.  Any suggestions would be much appreciated!

Speaking of saving money by making our own baby food, oh my goodness do I love cloth diapering!  That's been our biggest money-saver so far!  I'm sooooo glad we switched.  I went on GreenMountainDiapers.com and ordered the Thirsties Duo wrap and I love it - I now have 8 of them and that lasts us for 2-3 days - and I use their Cloth-eez Prefold Diapers inside the Thirsties cover - only folded in thirds too, so I don't need to fumble around with folding and pinning and all that.  You can, but you don't have to.  I got two dozen of those.  I change out the prefold when I change him, and the cover can usually be used about 2-3 times.  No leaks, and best of all no blow-outs (and if anyone follows me on Facebook and remembers my posts from before our cloth diaper days, Harlee had LOTS of blow-outs and that's just a nasty mess that I don't think anyone cares to deal with!).  It's so easy, nothing like what our grandparents messed with when they were using cloth diapers.  Much better for the environment too :).  And they're super cute!

 He's pretty cute, too :)  And laundry isn't bad at all - that seems to be a lot of people's concern.  Since he's not on solids yet I don't have to rinse anything - I just dump them all into the wash, run a rinse cycle on cold to flush them out, and then a full cycle on hot to clean them.  Voila!  When he is on solids, though, I'll be investing in some rice paper liners from Cotton Babies.  They collect the mess, you dump those into the toilet and flush - they're natural and biodegradable so no worries there, and go about washing like usual.

Alright, well, kiddo is awake so I'm going to go play with him.  Here's one more picture of the cutie pie though:

Photos courtesy of Be Lovely Photography, which were taken at our house yesterday.  He did soooooo good, we had such a great time!  JJ makes it a lot of fun anyway, she's become more of a friend than our photographer!

Short and Sweet

Well, I just got done getting all of our current bills taken care of (a great feeling that'll last probably until Monday when a new one arrives in the mail) and I've got an hour to spare before my grandma arrives to sit with Harlee so I can take care of THREE back-to-back clients.  THREE.  It's kinda funny that I'm slightly overwhelmed by this, when a year and half ago I was taking like five or six back to back... But after a pregnancy of reduced work load and then a maternity leave and now easing back into the swing of things, three in a row is a lot!  Especially considering I won't be getting home until after 8...  This momma's gonna need to pump big time!  Well, after snuggles and kisses with little man, first :).  I count my blessings every day I'm at work - I love my job, I love what I do, I love helping people, and I LOVE being my own boss.  Right now that might be the best thing about it (with helping people being a close runner-up).  Being in complete control of my business allows me the liberty to schedule people around my time with Harlee, so I don't have to feel guilty being away from him too much but I can still continue to do what I love work-wise.  It's the best of both worlds and I love it.  Unfortunately I booked myself in so much that I don't know how I'm going to find time to work in baking, and I'm so excited to get on that!  I didn't get to last year as I was pregnant and for some reason the thought of anything sweet made me sick...  Not really a bad problem to have though!  And now that Mr. Harlee is here I'm so in the Christmas spirit I don't know what to do with myself!  I've had the tree up since Thanksgiving, I'm humming Christmas carols, I've got my shopping done (almost)...  Amazing what having a baby in the house can do!  Now I just need cookies to add in and I'm good to go!


Well Harlee woke up so I guess this post will have to be short and sweet.  I was going to share an excerpt from my Massage Magazine about doulas but I'll save it for next time.  Until then... Happy weekend!

Picking up the Pieces

It’s been a long time since I’ve written.  I’ve had a few opportunities to write present themselves through the past four months, and I’ve had plenty of ideas of things I wanted to write about, but I just wind up putting it off.  Probably because I’ve been having such a hard time dealing with Harlee’s birth outcome.  I’ll be honest, because I feel strong enough that I can be now – his birth tore me up.  Physically, obviously, but probably more so mentally.  It’s amazing how many moms I’ve talked to, though, who wholeheartedly know how I feel when I say I feel like I’ve turned into a crazy person.  Baby blues is pretty common, but I think most of us like to try to hide it and put on an appearance of strength that we hope everyone will buy into.  I know I did.  I didn’t want anyone to know how poorly I was handling everything, but the more I hid it, the farther and farther I slipped.  Postpartum depression is a serious thing.  It’s scary, it’s painful, and it’s just plain hard.  When Harlee reached about two months old and I realized I wasn’t getting any better I finally sucked it up and sought counseling, and I went weekly for the past two months trying to figure out how to pull myself together and accept the outcome of Harlee’s birth for what it was, even if I still don’t know the reason for it.  I think I’ve been avoiding blogging because I didn’t want to have to admit that I’ve been going to counseling, but now that I feel so much better from it, and after speaking with other mothers who’ve gone through similar feelings after having their babies (ideally and not ideally)  and realizing I’m really not alone, I’m okay admitting it.  And I think everyone who’s gone through what I’ve gone through emotionally should know that it’s okay to seek help.

It’s still hard to think about how everything turned out.  For the longest time I’d find myself feeling slightly resentful of women who got to have their babies naturally, and even worse I’d get so. ANGRY. when I find out that they’d get an epidural too.  I know most people don’t understand this, but the memory of that epidural keeps me up at night, and sometimes even gives me nightmares.  That was probably one of the worst things that happened in the course of events that took place the night of Harlee’s arrival.  I wanted so badly to feel everything, even though labor hurt like hell, and it was all taken away from me.  Then I hear about other women choosing to get them (and yes, I understand why, because holy moly is labor painful) and I’ve honestly just wanted to shake them and shout, “Do you know how lucky you are!!??  You get to experience the birth of your child first-hand, you get to FEEL his or her arrival into this world, the biggest event in your female life, and you’re NUMBING yourself to it??” and it would just make me so angry because I WANTED to feel it and I didn’t get to.  I know this is an unfair way to think, because like I said, I FELT how painful labor is, and without proper help and coaching, I can certainly see why women just simply can’t take it anymore.  Which is why I’m a huge advocate for doulas now.  Having someone there (other than your husband) who GETS it and knows how to talk you through it makes a HUGE difference.  I went from thinking I was dying before my midwife arrived to feeling in control of the pain and excited and peaceful with every wave when she did arrive (she’s a doula too, by the way).  It was incredible.  Yes, it still hurt, but it was a positive experience.  I was getting that much closer to meeting my baby with every one, and that was so empowering.  Girls, if you ever want to have a natural childbirth, HIRE A DOULA.  I can’t stress that enough.  You don’t need drugs when you have proper support.

Anyway.  I’ve gotten better.  I can now feel happy for women who get to have their babies naturally, and proud of the mommas I know who had successful homebirths, rather than resentful.  Another thing that helps is thinking about how everything happens for a reason.  I truly believe that.  My counselor reminded me that sometimes bad things happen to good people, like car accidents or tornadoes or fires, and these things are just out of our control.  This necessary c-section is in that category.  I couldn’t help that Harlee was asynclitic, and since my water had broken already he just didn’t have the buoyancy to correct himself, and it had been broken for so long we really couldn’t do much more.  His heart rate was dropping dangerously, and I should be grateful we had the means to get him out alive.  And I am.  But it takes two to tango, and while Harlee is fine, I wasn’t.  But as I was saying, my counselor helped me by reminding me too that everything happens for a reason, even if we can’t see those reasons right now.  And after categorizing this turn of events with car accidents and natural disasters, I was reminded of my husband, another case of bad things happening to good people.  His father died when my husband was only 17.  I can’t imagine how hard that must have been for him to deal with, especially at such a pivotal age of self-discovery and growth.  To lose someone that close to you during that time in your life, and really any time in life, can be earth-shattering, and how do you pick up the pieces from that?  But he did.  And I really think that losing his father molded his personality into what it is today – it caused him to make decisions he may not have if that hadn’t happened, and it led him in a direction that I really do believe, ultimately, led to me.  And the way his personality was molded from that event I think is what made us so compatible.  And now he’s happily married with a beautiful baby boy, something he’s always wanted.  So, it took eleven years, but something good came of something tragic.  And that really opened my eyes.  Somehow, this trauma I endured will lead me to something wonderful.  Of course having Harlee here alive and healthy is wonderful in and of itself, don’t get me wrong, but like I said before it takes two to tango.  There’s the “mom” side of me, and the “Jami” side, and while the mom-me is happy with a healthy baby, the Jami-me and is not happy with what happened to her personally and physically.  I don’t know if that makes sense, but I don’t know how else to explain it.

Along with counseling I’ve joined two support groups.  One is ICAN – International Cesarean Awareness Network – which is a wonderful organization that works to educate women on the risks and dangers of cesarean birth and how to avoid unnecessary ones.  I’m really glad I started going there – being around other women who KNOW what I’ve gone through and can relate, plus who have had VBACs as well, gives me strength and a sense of hope.  I’ve also joined a small group for homebirth moms who had to transfer to the hospital, which is a group my doula started.  It’s wonderful, because not many people share the dream I had to birth my baby into the safety and sanctity of our own home, much less understand it.  But these girls do, and also share in my hurt and grief in having to lose that dream.

So, slowly but surely, I’m picking up the pieces of my shattered world and continuing on, and it really has been great.  Harlee is such a wonderful baby, and I count my blessings every day that he’s so healthy, so strong, and so happy.  Breastfeeding is still going well too, and like I said in my last post, I feel good that I’m at least capable of doing SOMEthing my body is designed to do, even if I couldn’t birth him naturally.  He’s learned to roll over, he’s sitting supported really well, he’s laughing, and he’s just so darn cute!  Justin’s been wonderful too.  He’s been so patient with me in my period of grief (and believe me, I haven’t been the nicest person to him sometimes…) and he’s really been an inspiration too, because like I said, he knows what it’s like to lose something so dear to your heart, and he’s had his world shattered, and he’s picked up the pieces and grown from it in a positive way.  And I can too.

 My sweet baby boy :)

Photo taken by Be Lovely Photography