bellatrix

I've been chatting to P more often over the past few days. I've said it before; there is So Much Love here. And we're both suffering from empty-bed syndrome... Missing the closeness and warmth and juicy deliciousness that is sharing your life and your personal space with someone you love and trust. But we also know that it doesn't help to keep thinking about what you long for, what you lack; to keep chewing it over until it's a flavourless blob of bubblegum and your stomach is churning for something more substantial. But there's a sweetness about being alone, too, much like cold weather can sometimes envigorate and expand the senses, just as much as it can sometimes deplete the nerves and fold everything in, towards itself. And so goes the rhythm of my days right now; sometimes the folding-inward, sometimes the branching-out. Sometimes the painful curling up and wound-licking, sometimes the slow stretching and unfurling.

In other news, my legs hurt, and my glutes hurt. Sweet Mary and Joseph, I'm freakin' sore. Those among my readers who know what DOMS is will know what I am talking about. If you take a relatively long break between workouts and jump straight into lifting heavy again, you will hurt. Sitting down on a chair will hurt, getting up from a chair will hurt, walking will even hurt. And all I can do is laugh at myself, because I felt like a mighty bellatrix in the gym the other day and now I simply feel like the village idiot.

Easy does it.

Normal Prenatal yesterday was wonderful, and put many of our minds at ease about the intensity of the syllabus. Our teacher, M, just told us to "take a lot of deep breaths" as we tackle all the studying, and that we'd get through it. To give you an idea -- in eight weeks of classes, we're learning how to perform routine physical examinations, including the ongoing assessment of maternal psycho-social and emotional health, and the physical health and well-being of the motherbaby. We're learning how to order, interpret and even perform some diagnostic tests to establish things like haemoglobin, glucose level, urinary protein levels, and the like. We're learning how to measure fundal height; estimate the due date; assess foetal activity and response to stimulation; auscultate foetal heart tones and measure foetal heart rate; assess foetal presentation, position and weight; evaluate signs of developing pathology in the pregnancy (and refer to other care-providers where necessary); and also assess for signs of abuse (and get help for the mother if necessary). By the end, we'll be able to use a foetoscope, lancets, urinalysis strips, a glucometer, and a haemoglobinometer. We'll also have the skills to chart our findings appropriately, and -- the most thrilling part right now, because we're learning this next week -- we'll be able to perform venipuncture and draw blood for tests. Ooh! The dizzying adventure of it all!

And in spite of all this, all the reading, all the studying, all the frenzied acquisition of skills, all the prying into the womb, all the counselling and questioning and prodding of women and babies, birth continues regardless. Right now, in this instant, on the planet, thousands of women have just become pregnant. And their bodies know just what to do to grow those babies in the safety of their wombs without any help from the outside world, thank you very much. And today, 350 000 women will give birth. Most of those women will not be giving birth in a hospital, and yet, in the overwhelming majority of cases, those births will go perfectly fine (whether there is a doctor or a midwife in the room, or not). And that's why midwives love and embrace birth, and trust women's bodies so completely. There is nothing surer to put your trust in than nature.