Seeing the West Coast

Some weeks ago Nick and I drove over to the West Coast to visit with his mother's friends.

We were also picking up a washing machine that was going cheap due to an impending move by its owners to Australia.

We drove through Arthur's Pass and saw a female Kea on the bridge. I rolled down the window and called to her and she hopped sideways a few times and bent down as birds do before they take flight but we couldn't stop and she was left behind.

The closer you get to the coast that touches the Tasman Sea, the more Jurassic looking the ferns become. It really does start to look like a lost world that hasn't changed in eons.

There were beautiful Rimu trees with their weeping leaves and huge flax bushes that grew up right beside the highway.

The house we visited was a villa that had been established in the 1930s.

It had a wrap around porch and a variety of trees the original owner had planted. This included a tall Kauri and several varieties of Eucalyptus.

In a side pasture there was an old tree with delicate orchids growing on its branches and on our way to look at it we sent a few Pukeko running for cover.

At night we went out to feed the eels in the nearby stream and we could see a sky full of stars.

The ceaseless pounding of the surf could be heard as well as the occasional cry of a bird in the bush.

We walked down the unpaved driveway and saw twinkling glowworms giving off their soft green light from the exposed clay soil.

I now have some very pleasant memories of the West.

A tiny orchid.

The Baby Kiwi

Baby Alexander was born on August 21 at 1204 a.m.

He has fat cheeks, Phil Collins hair, no noticeable eyebrows, one everyday chin and two back up chins.

He looks like a little old Norwegian sailor in his knit cap.

Nick and I are very proud of him.

The teenosaur stayed home from school today and taught him how to draw rabbits and his grandmother kept an eye on him while Nick and I had a nap.

We are a very happy family.

Re-Floating the Whale

I found that the best relief from my tired, aching, incredibly pregnant body comes from placing myself in the hydrotherapy pool at our local aquatic center.

I like the pool because it is there specifically for people who are recovering from injuries or who just want to submerge themself and not do much else.

It's short on people with svelte bodies who are prone to sudden displays of athleticism and for that reason I find it most welcoming.

Access to it is gained by a long ramp and by the time the water is covering my bump, the terrible ravages of gravity start to be reversed on my lower back.

I just like to float around or prop my arms on the side of the pool and soak.

When I float on my back the words "a hump like a snow hill" come to mind. I wonder if Melville would be flattered to be remembered in such a way?

I wish someone would invent a portable water tank for pregnant women which could be like a hoveround/aquarium combo. They could call it "Mermaid Rover 1."

I know it is specifically written in the ten commandments, "Thou shalt not covet they neighbor's mobility scooter" but sometimes when I see my elderly neighbor whizzing out of the driveway in his with a jaunty orange flag flapping in the breeze behind him, I feel the creep of envy.

The worst part of the pool experience is getting out again. Each step up the ramp leaves me more at the mercy of the force of gravity and makes me want to "return to sea."

I am fearful that one day they will have to employ a crane and a crew of confused marine biologists to get me land bound again.

This fear will not keep me from the pool however. It's the one relief I have left in these last weeks of tribulation.

Pregnant Women Aren't Livestock

I am due to give birth to my fourth child any day now and for some reason I have become incredibly incensed and defensive.

I am anticipating hospital staff trying to pressure me into breastfeeding which is something I have been unable to do with my last three children.

I don't know if there is some brainwashing cult out there for health professionals that make them push, cajole and guilt new mothers into thinking that "breast is best, in all cases" but that shit needs to stop.

Yes, it is great if you can feed the baby from your own boob as nature intended. But if you can't or *gasp* don't want to there shouldn't be a huge army of Nursing Nazis that descend upon you to make you feel like shit about it.

Lord help the insistent lactation consultant that tries to bully me into attaching my spawn to my teat.

With my first born I tried and tried and tried to breast feed. Switching to formula was a lifesaver and at the current age of 16, I can say that my daughter has grown up safe and healthy.

The eight and nearly four-year old seem to be doing well too.

The free baby book and sample package given to me by my midwife had a section devoted to breastfeeding.

I thought I was on to something progressive when I read its acknowledgement that some women are not willing or able to breastfeed. But then it went on to list a series of health complications and developmental difficulties that can occur from not breastfeeding.

The local NZ news site Stuff.com featured an essay by a woman who had undergone a C section and become gravely ill and how she was treated by hospital staff when she expressed doubts about her ability to breastfeed and asked for formula.

Her treatment made me livid although, the supportive comments from fellow moms on her post were somewhat comforting.

I think being pregnant brings up memories of my time living in the southern U.S.

Despite my mother's dubious claims that "things have changed" I recall the omnipresent attitude in that region that because women are the ones who carry the babies, motherhood alone must be their highest calling and the most fulfilling thing they can experience.

The attitude of many men there seemed to be "I knocked you up, what more do you want?"

I don't think this attitude or the re-enforcement of "traditional gender roles" is good for families.

If anything it seems to isolate fathers from having a closer relationship with their children and put more unnecessary pressure on their mothers to do everything for the children and have no time left for themselves.

I recently read an article in a local magazine about young mothers who had become entrepreneurs because being a 24-hour baby slave was leaving them feeling depressed and unsatisfied with their lives.

To me, dedicating myself to child rearing 24-7 is a waste of my intellectual gifts and accomplishments. I need mental stimulation and to contribute something to the wider world other than being a brood mare.

I will be a much better mother if I am also able to do things that maintain my mental well being and make me feel like a whole person. Motherhood alone will never do this for me.

I think another problem is that too often men are still pushed to be the breadwinners of the family and many people don't have extended families to help raise the children.

In my case, I have a supportive partner who takes an active role in parenting. This was one of the reasons why I fell in love with him in the first place.

I am also fortunate to have his mother here with us and a teenager who is really good at being a big sister.

This is a huge relief.

Overall society still expects women to sacrifice careers and personal goals for the sake of motherhood. We are made to feel guilty and terrible if we don't drop everything and let our individual identities fade into the title of "mother."

Eff that.

I am looking forward to singing my little one to sleep and giving him baths and teaching him all about birds (because dammit, one of my children has to inherit my love of avians and since none of the others seem to care the youngest will have to accept his fate.)

You can be a good mother and not want to spend every waking moment with your baby.

While I'm listing grievances and misconceptions that piss me off, let me just go into a few of the other things I've been reading that have made my brain hurt:

A recent article by the NZ magazine North and South asked why aren't more smart women having kids?

Their article only concerned women who have achieved higher education and it left me feeling icky for several reasons.

First, there was the assumption that "smart women" must have some sort of higher degree. Intelligence exists in various forms and a college degree isn't a requisite for having one of them. This seems to suggest that only the "ignorant masses" or "the rabble" are breeding.

The next thing is that the article completely left out the contributions that men can make as fathers and caregivers which would make parenthood more equitable and, in my opinion, doable.

Lastly, as someone who was until recently enrolled in a PhD program and who is expecting, why wasn't I consulted? *sniffle*

Next issue:

Where the hell does the Supreme Court get off letting a corporation like Hobby Lobby dictate to women what they can and can't have access to with their own healthcare coverage?

This coverage is not something "given to women" it's part of a compensation package that they work for and earn.

Hobby Lobby is not a thinking, breathing entity. It should have no say in how its employees live their lives and what they do with their hard earned benefits.

If the thought of a woman controlling her own fertility or preventing the implantation of an egg hurts someone's fee fees maybe they need to do some soul searching about why they are obsessing about what goes on in someone's private life. Cause that's just creepy. And these people never follow through to ensure educational and financial funding to women who are forced to raise children by themselves.

The only thing this decision has going for it is that lead to another scathing commentary from the feisty goddess known as Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

I am tired of white old men having the power to legislate and control what is and is not appropriate sexual behavior for women.

There is nothing like a bunch of womb-less assholes dictating to women that they shouldn't have sex until they are married and even then it should be for reproductive purposes and that if they do have the unmarried slut sex, they deserve to have to carry any resulting pregnancy to term because that's what Jesus and the GOP have declared to be best for the cattle, er chattel, I mean women.

And God forbid any of their taxes have to pay for the resulting welfare necessities of a single mother with limited means trying to raise a helpless child on her own.

You can't have it both ways.

And woe betide anyone who declares pregnancy to be "a beautiful thing" within my hearing range.

There is nothing beautiful about morning sickness, low blood pressure that makes you almost faint every time you stand up, being bed ridden by a preterm labor scare, throwing up and pissing yourself at the same time and facing the dangers and complications of giving birth.

Did I mention that I have had severe postpartum depression with each pregnancy? There is nothing quite like finding suddenly that life has no meaning and you want to die while there is another human life depending on you for everything.

Only an out of touch individual who has never and will never have to go through the process would say something so daft and untruthful.

And by the way, I'm not "glowing" right now, I'm burning up because my internal temperature gauge has been set to Mt. Pinatubo and there's nothing I can do about it.

Final issue:

People need to stop shaming women who breastfeed in public. That's what breasts are for. They aren't just titties and fun bags for the drooling frat bro's pleasure, they are life giving feed stations for baby homo sapiens...unless we're talking about my breasts in which case, they are disappointing drip bags that malfunction and stress me out, but still, you get the point.