Book Rec: “Birth: The Surprising History Of How We Are Born”

jeditang — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 04:46:07 +0000

I’m in the middle of reading this amazing book about how humans have given birth in the modern world. Tina Cassidy touches on some interesting evolutionary ideas, as well, but I’m sucked in by the stories of labor from the past couple of hundred years. Medicine really used to treat pregnancy and labor as illnesses, long before the advent of the pathogenic theory of medicine become popular. This led to all kinds of messy births and (in retrospect) CRAZY ideas of how people should be born. And the loony stuff they were doing when your parents were giving birth… don’t even think they knew what they were doing! If you’re expecting and are tired of reading the same old “baby manuals”, give this book a spin.

Second Trimester To-Do list

jeditang — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 01:38:29 +0000

I spent most of the day in bed today resting and icing my back from a hard day of ice fishing. As I was falling asleep, Tori was my stand-in secretary, jotting down the beginning of our second trimester to-do list. Here’s what we have so far…

Investigate and Research Doula. I posted about the search before, but it’s time to get down to work and start interviewing. We’re still on the fence about pre/labor/post doulas. I’d like to find someone we like in Clintonville that does all three.
Budget. We’re going to be spending some serious money on lots of stuff we know we need, but what concerns me more are items I don’t/won’t know about until they come. I despise MS Excel, but it’s my secret best friend for finances.
Look Into Furniture. What the hell do we need? I have no idea and I’ve yet to see a definitive list in any of the myriad books I’ve thumbed through. A crib, a changing table and a dresser are all must haves, and I’m thinking a nice comfy adult chair for nursing and the like. Ikea, here we come! I’m sure I’m missing something, but what?
Ready the nursery. This will be an actionable item in a few months, but the second trimester should be good for plotting and planning. Again, we have a good idea what we want to do, but I’d like to be able to start gathering items now for the baby’s room. There are a few handyman type things I’d like to get done in there before we begin decorating, too.
Investigate Baby Gear. I’ve always said that if I had a kid, gear would be my favorite part. Turns out that I enjoy the love and anticipation more, but any time you get a geek in gear-buying mode, a happy geek you will have. Strollers, car seats (but it seems that most strollers are car seats? WTF?), bassinets, boobie pumps, pack and plays…. this is going to be fun. And expensive. And confusing.
Register For Classes. Should we take classes at the hospital we will deliver at? This would ensure a very thorough understanding of how they do things, but we’re thinking classes at CHOICE might be re educational and give us more…umm…CHOICEs. I’m also hearing some rumbling about how Catholic hospitals have certain “rules” about some of our birthing choices. We’re looking into this and you can probably look forward to a long post about it.

What am I forgetting about? Do you have any insight into getting a shopping list together? We’re really not sure if we will be having a shower or not, so most of this stuff will be out of pocket. If you have any tips or tricks, let us know in the comments, K?

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Book Rec: “Birth: The Surprising History Of How We Are Born”

Second Trimester To-Do list