Happy Halloween!

Bad Guys Beware

Our door is locked, bolted, chained and reinforced by an army of paper Gundam dolls. There's no getting in.

Neglect

Last night's dishes are still sitting in the kitchen sink. Our venus fly trap has completely wilted. The fish tank water is taking on a murky shade of green. The mountain of laundry accumulating on the floor is twice as tall as Uta. There is next to nothing to eat in the fridge. There are legos simply everywhere. 

The level of neglect in this house is truly painful to witness.

The baby, however, is thriving!

The Collection

Uta just completed his third Gundam model (purple left). He has become a little obsessed. He woke up early Saturday morning to get started, determined to finish in one day. I thought it would be impossible. These kits are designed for kids fifteen years of age and older. He barely spoke to me, refused to eat, and was finished by noon.

T-shirt

Uta has been making these great T-shirts for Kizuki. There is a pokemon one, a frog one, but the one shown here is my favorite. A T-shirt covered in bugs, front and back.

Pink

I thought that it could be avoided, but apparently the power of pink is far greater than I could ever have imagined. We started off in the clear, or so I thought, with a box full of boy hand me downs. Kizuki has been wearing green and yellow and even the forbidden blue! I thought we had that other color beat. But it was just laying in wait for the perfect opportunity to strike. This weekend the skies opened up, and pink pink PINK fell upon us from every which where. It was an ambush like no other. Kizuki made her debut into the world to visit family and was showered with gifts. Everything we received is wonderful and much needed and, yes, PINK! All of it! Piles of packages, from many well intentioned loved ones, on two different continents, who apparently are all in cahoots. I know when I am beat. I am powerless to pink. Pink reigns on. 

But why? Can anyone explain? I can think of nothing so lovely in nature that is the color pink. Oh sure there must be a few flowers, but what comes to mind first are pigs and raw meat, frozen toes and pimples. Am I missing something obvious? I must be. Don't get me wrong, I like the color, I do. I especially like the extremely pretty baby clothes we are now in possession of. I just don't understand why Pink has hijacked the wardrobe of little girls across the globe. That said, Kizuki will be very stylin in her new digs, pink from head to toe, Monday through Sunday, from here on out.  

Not So Secret Santa

Grandpa T has dedicated himself to single-handedly filling in all the gaps (chasms?) in our baby wish list.  From infant car seats to baby leg warmers, his little grand daughter will want for nothing. In addition,  he has been the go to guy for any and all Uta pickups that Papa H couldn't do during my house bound days. It makes no sense geographically for this job to fall on him, but it has meant the world and more to Uta to see his Grandpa's smiling face waiting for him in the school lobby. We are deeply grateful for his generosity and time. Thank you Grandpa T!

Loving Kizuki

Pumpkins!

Confession

This little girl makes me work for her sleep. It's unbelievable how much jiggling, bouncing, swaying, dancing, and pacing I must do to achieve even a little slumber time. I'll try anything, and have, to lull her into dreams. I discovered, through desperate efforts, that the sound of running water works like magic. But this means standing with her in the bathroom with the faucet running at full force. I am willing to abandon any and all environmental morals if it means a little sleep for the baby (and me!), but I'm not so crazy about standing in the bathroom through the wee hours of the night. So I thought, embarrassing though it is to confess, there must be an 'App' for that. (My mother, for one, will not know what that means... App: a little program, game or tool of some kind, that you can put on your phone.) Sure enough there is. A free App called WhiteNoise. 'Extreme Rain Pouring' works like a charm. Uta prefers 'Beach Waves Crashing', but on this matter he doesn't get to vote. Besides, I think he's just being contrary.

Big brother

Mostly Uta loves his little sister. He thinks she's the cutest thing he's ever seen and has decided to marry her when she turns five. He is extremely proud and protective, and genuinely delighted she has joined our family. But this is not entirely a happily ever after romance. Uta is human after all, and seven, and just the slightest bit jealous. Since becoming a big brother he has developed an overwhelming urge to punch. Papa H has to take him into the bedroom, equip himself with pillows, and let Uta punch his heart out. 

On some level he's just got to be frustrated, its not physically possible to give him the same kind of attention he had before. Baby's are squeaky wheels by nature, and Uta is doing a stand up job taking care of himself when he needs to. But something has to give on occasion. I'm glad when it does. His occasional melt down seems healthier than being a constant trooper.

This new violent streak is never directed at the baby. It will, however, surge to the surface in her defense. I made the fatal mistake of shushing her and Uta started posturing to hit me in the head. This girl will not get messed with on the playground. Her brother is a bonafide psycho.

Kizuki today...

Prayer

When Uta woke up on the day of Kizuki's birth the midwife was already here. Labor was well underway, and it would only be a few hours until Uta met his sister for the very first time. Uta was excited, but mostly because he had grown very fond of our midwife Cara, and always has a million things to show and tell her. I wasn't particularly thrilled to share her attention during contractions, but it did add a little levity to the situation to be discussing legos during the worst of pains. 

Uta wasn't all play during the labor. He had a special job to do which he took very seriously. His Grandma in Japan, Baba, had sent a candle and a tiny piece of paper with a red character painted on top. These things were from the buddhist temple and meant to ensure the safety of me and the baby during the birth. Once labor started the candle was to be lit and the paper dropped in water. While the candle burned, we were meant to pray. 

To prepare Uta had been learning to light a match, another grown up privilege to get him pumped up about being a big brother. We set up a little shrine atop the dresser, where we placed the objects Baba sent. Uta drew a teeny tiny picture of the buddha holding a baby. We have never really talked about what prayer is or how to do it but Uta didn't seem to need any explanations. When the time came he just did his job in earnest. 

Homebirth

I always thought home birth was for the truly brave. I envied those that could step so confidently into the unknown of birth, trusting just their bodies to see them (and their baby) safely across the threshold of new life. Of course I was terribly naive about the reality of home birth, believing as many do, that the midwife comes with little more than a towel over their shoulder and instructions to boil water. 

Plenty of towels were on hand, water was boiled, but there were also heaps of steryl medical stuff assembled beforehand. Cara, our midwife, carted in her own treasury of equipment at the time of the birth, not to mention her extensive training and ten years plus experience doing just this. There was an oxygen tank leaning casually against the wall in Uta's lego corner. A doppler was used to monitor the baby's heart during the birth. And the fastest route to the nearest hospital had been mapped out and studied by everyone. 

Midwives are a cautious breed, not big risk takers in my experience, at least not when lives are on the line. They don't want to be heroes, but prefer simply to help guide moms in birthing their babies into this world. In the hands of a midwife, the power of birth gets to stay in the hands of the mother, and it is upon the mother that all the heroism of birth ultimateley falls. 

When I learned I was pregnant with Kizuki my first thought was not homebirth, like I said, that, I thought, was for those courageous few, not me, and certainly not Papa H. I imagined having her in a birthing center, like I did Uta. With Uta it was the best of both worlds. I was in the no pressure atmosphere of a birthing center, free to move and eat and take as long as need be, but the hospital was right there, just in case. 

Apparently that experience was a luxury of living upstate. I would soon discover that the city was not the same.

So I began my prenatal care with a team of midwives in a birthing center attached to a hospital. I had heard good things about the center, but after each visit I would come home in a heap of tears. I was quickly realizing that having a natural birth at this birthing center was unlikely. It was, as many are in the city, a hospital in birth center clothing. They were short staffed and as a result the birth center was only sometimes open. And although the midwives were wonderful they were quick to confess circumstances were far from ideal. Fight and advocate for the mom as they might, hospital protocal simply prevailed. There was little they could do. In a hospital the stage is set for intervention, thats what hospitals do, intervene. They are not designed to deal with healthy bodies functioning normally, which is what most Moms are, if you let them be.

I thought my requests were simple. I wanted a natural birth  and I wanted to keep the baby with me afterwards. Was that so radical? I didn't think so, but apparently I'm in the minority with such requirements. I felt truly heartbroken that those two things were not a given. The midwives encouraged me to write letters of protest to the hospital. But I didn't want to be an activist, I just wanted to have a baby. I didn't want to fight for what nature intended. Why should I have to? 

When I found out the baby would be transfered to a nursery after the birth I was horrified. Uta was not taken from me, and I couldn't believe such an archaic practice still existed. I would not willingly lose those precious first hours of the baby's life just because it is hospital routine. In the first few hours after birth the baby is more alert than she will be for some time, and bonding is easy and instinctual. I would not let my baby be in the hands of strangers during that special time, or worse yet, alone in a nursery. 

We were running out of alternatives. We had a family meeting on the kitchen floor. Me sobbing, Uta consoling, and Papa H listening with all his heart. Homebirth was emerging as the only option that didn't terrify me. The boys were more open and willing than I could have ever imagined. If homebirth was for the truly brave at heart, a hospital birth was for the downright fearless. We all agreed. The hospital/birthing center was not for us. We would have this baby at home.