Mmm…afterbirth. [off-topic] Out of respect for the earthiest aspects of the whole birth process, I boiled and ate a portion of our second son’s afterbirth…before putting the remaining share out for the wild to munch. It was gone by the following morning.
Our first son was born in a hospital in Lancaster, CA. The process was pretty much a bummer for my bride, about 30 hours…hooked up to every sort of tube & wire, prodded, numbered, exhausted, cold & uncomfortable; desert storm the only thing on TV; her OBGYN absent most of the time…when not poking his shiny dark brown head in to say, “How are you two doing?” every several hours or so. Eventually leading to an epidural…then a cesarean…so’s his entire posse could cash-in in proper entrepreneurial fashion. …As they pulled our purple syrupy son out of her spaghetti bloody internals…via one smallish handmade detour three feet from my face, I was in awe of him, in love with him, …but only as long as it took them to yank him out of our view to place him under burger lights & clean him aloof like a butterball turkey and poke him and measure him and print him and put him on the conveyor belt and ship him off to the viewing room while they sutured the pallid-faced mom and shuffled-off the dumbfounded dad. What a gigantic bummer ordeal…, which led to 16 bitchin years with an inspired, & perhaps a bit intense, boy.
But also taught us a lesson.
Nearly two years later, in our cozy little place in the mountain pass of Frazier Park, a beautiful laboring woman is in a hot shower with her hubby…getting her lower back rubbed until the water loses warmth; then she is walking around our bedroom…listening to music…or laying in bed in the fetal position with hubby rubbing her lower back and her midwife and the midwife’s apprentice both laying in bed around her…talking about anything & everything girly. Then back & forth into the hot shower several times for more lower back massage by said hubby…until finally she cries…it’s time…and everybody heads back into our bedroom to hold & love & comfort mom while she gives birth to our second son…who, covered in the perfect emollients he came resolutely out the more preferred rout wearing, umbilical cut and tincture of green applied, is placed in the tenderness of mom’s bosom and the two angels sleep, in their heady state, for 8 hours while dad boils afterbirth and hugs the blessed lady and lovely girl who helped make all this process perfect.
Moral of the story. Birth is a down-home affair, just like with cows; if you can…, try it. :o)
~~
a chuckle:
A farmer was helping one of his cows give birth, when he noticed his four year old son standing at the fence, soaking in the whole event. The man thought to himself, "Great. He's four and I'm gonna have to start explaining the birds and the bees. No need to jump the gun - I'll just let him ask, and I'll answer." After everything was over, the man walked over to his son and said, "Well son, do you have any questions?"
"Just one," gasped the still wide-eyed lad.
"How…fast…was the calf going when he hit that cow?"
