I Had a Baby

I haven’t been around the blogging world at all for the last two months, but I have a good excuse… I had a baby!

Lydia Joan was born March 20 at 5:16pm. She was an itty bitty 5lbs, 8oz and 18.5 inches.  And life hasn’t slowed down for one second since she got here!

One Day Old

Being a mom is awesome.  I’m still sneaking in some reading time, but I’m not sure that reviewing books will happen again any time soon.  My internet time is mostly limited to checking Twitter on my phone!  I want to post some things about my experiences with a newborn and plan on just using this blog to do so… so stay tuned for that.  We’ll see if/when I can get back into reviewing once Lydia gets a little older.  Until then, I hope you don’t mind if I post sporadically and on a more personal level.  I miss all you blogging friends!

My smiley girl at 7 weeks old

 

Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth- Ina May Gaskin

I am hoping to have a natural childbirth and this book came highly recommended from my doula and from a friend of mine who has given birth naturally.  If you are curious at all about natural childbirth, this is a good place to start.  Ina May Gaskin is probably the most famous midwife in the US and she has attended tons and tons of births at The Farm, an intentional community in Tennessee.

The first section of the book is dozens of birth stories of women who have given birth on The Farm or who have some other connection to Ina May.  The idea is that these stories show what childbirth can be when it is done naturally and to show that many of the common complications resulting in medical interventions can be handled by less invasive techniques (changing position in the case of shoulder dystocia, for example).  If all these ordinary women from a variety of circumstances can give birth without medical interventions, then surely you (and most other women) can.  The stories get to be kind of much after a while– there are A LOT of them, but they are interesting and contrast pretty strongly with the stories I’ve heard from many of my friends, who’ve been induced or who have had multiple c-sections.  I really envy the freedom that the women on The Farm get during labor.  They get to walk in the woods during labor or take baths and feel comfortable enough to assume whatever positions might work or to make noise while in labor.  It’s quite a different scenario than being hooked up to a fetal monitor in the hospital with strangers (nurses) coming and going throughout your labor.  That said, it was REALLY important to my husband that we have a hospital childbirth, so we are going to make the best of the situation.

The second section of the book is the actual childbirth guide and there are lots of helpful and interesting tidbits here.  I particularly enjoyed the chapter about “sphincter law” in which Ina May compares the cervix to other sphincters… it is difficult to urinate or defecate when you are feeling anxious or “watched” so it makes sense that similar conditions could slow or reverse the dilation of the cervix.  I also liked her response to the question “how does something that big fit through such a small opening?”  Ina May reminds readers that the penis expands and contracts without causing irreversible damage… and so can vaginal tissue!  (This post is going to attract all sorts of spam, but it’s hard to talk about childbirth without using the word “vagina” so I guess that’s unavoidable.)  What I wasn’t all that impressed with was the section on orgasmic childbirth.  I’m sure that exists, but I am skeptical that it is even remotely common and well, I’ll admit that I’m not perfectly comfortable with Ina May’s argument that childbirth is a sexual experience.  I think I am very much a product of the culture that has erased the connection between sex and childbirth, so it was hard for me to think outside of that.  I also had some quibbles with some of her data– there is some out of date medical info in here (mercury is not being used as a preservative in most vaccines any more and I’m pretty sure no one is using Cytotec to induce labor either ETA: I was wrong, apparently Cytotec is still being used by some docs to ripen the cervix and induce labor.) and there is a whole chapter talking about maternal mortality statistics.  She criticizes the US statistics for being incomplete, while also using them to support her argument that maternal mortality has stayed at the same rate for 30 years, indicating that the US is failing mothers in comparison to other developed countries where rates have improved.  My husband pointed out to me that she can’t have it both ways– if the data is inaccurate and incomplete, then it isn’t really responsible to use that data to support your argument.

What I find most personally troublesome is the antagonistic tone that we see here (and in most all literature about natural childbirth).  Being that natural childbirth and midwifery are the not the norms in the US, there is a lot of negativity towards doctors, hospitals, and the medicalization of childbirth.  While I fall much more into the natural childbirth camp, I really don’t like the tension between the two systems.  We need both doctors and midwives, both c-sections and unmedicated vaginal births.  There shouldn’t be opposing systems, there should be complementary systems.  Unfortunately, there’s historically been tough competition between midwives and doctors in this country and doctors pretty much ran midwives out of business by the 1950s.  Things are getting a little better, with there being midwives in doctors’ offices, but still I don’t think the antagonism between more extreme sides helps us move in the cooperative direction, though.

Ok, off my soapbox.  I think this is a book worth reading if you are curious at all about natural childbirth or even just childbirth… there’s a lot to learn from someone who has witnessed hundreds of natural births.  Take it with a grain of salt and supplement this with more up-to-date readings, of course, but overall this was a worthwhile read.

P.S. If you want to read a great birth story about a natural birth in a hospital, read Michelle’s story here!

 

Blackberry Winter- Sarah Jio

Blackberry Winter tells the parallel stories of two women who experience May 2 snowstorms in Seattle.  The first, Vera Ray, lives in 1933.  Her young son, Daniel, disappears while she is at work the night of the storm.  The second, Claire, is a reporter living in the present day, assigned to do a story about the two May snowstorms.  Claire finds Vera’s story while researching the last blackberry winter and, feeling a special connection to Vera and her loss, sets out to discover what happened that fateful night in 1933.

The story is told in alternating chapters between the two women’s stories.  I thought Vera’s story was a little boring, to be perfectly honest.  It focuses a lot on the love story between Vera and Daniel’s father, Charles, which is your typical rich boy-poor girl story.  And I just didn’t care that there were obstacles preventing them from being together that put Vera in her desperately poor single mother position.  To be perfectly honest, the romance was so poorly done that I kept waiting for the next shoe to drop… like I really thought Charles was just using Vera for sex and that he was going to screw her over somehow that related to the disappearance of Daniel.  Just so you know, that was clearly not the author’s intention by the end of the book… I think I was supposed to buy that they were star-crossed lovers.

Claire’s story was a little more interesting, though her big issue/secret was pretty predictable after her reaction to Vera’s loss of her son.  Claire and her husband are on the brink of divorce and neither is able to just break through the tension and silence between them to communicate how they feel or to show that they still care about one another.  This storyline was a little easier to connect with and I looked forward to reading Claire’s chapters.  But I think the author was more in love with Vera’s story than Claire’s, so it felt like there was much more time spent on Vera, both in her chapters and in Claire’s.

I read this book when I was sick and I think that is probably the only reason I made it through the whole book.  It wasn’t too difficult to concentrate on this book, it didn’t get me so heavily invested that I couldn’t put it down for a nap, but the mystery of the plot was enough to keep me curious.  I just had a really hard time connecting to the book and I think (though I’m not positive) that perhaps this was more of a tell than show sort of book.  I just left the book wondering how something that felt nicely written and had an interesting plot could feel so bland.  I was also left wondering how a story about losing a child didn’t tug at my heartstrings.  I’m pregnant, that sort of thing should have me in tears!  So… something was off with the writing, but I couldn’t really put my finger on it when reading.

Overall, this ends up a solid meh for me.  Not bad, not good.  Something I won’t remember I read a month from now, but something that worked pretty well for a couple days stuck home in bed.

 

Top Ten Tuesday: Series I’d Like to Start

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature/meme brought to you by the folks over at The Broke and the Bookish (the button also belongs to them).  This week’s theme is the Top Ten Series I’d Like To Start But Haven’t Yet.

There are quite a few series on my TBR list.  It will certainly take me a long time to get through all these series, but here are the nine (I figured nine was plenty to commit to) I’d like to try one of these days!

1. The Across the Universe series by Beth Revis– I hear a lot of good things about this sci-fi mystery series.  I have the audiobook of the first one, but I keep forgetting to put it in my car to listen to it.  So uhh, this will get started sooner rather than later.

2. The Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld– This dytopian series gets more mixed reviews, but I’ve been curious about it for a while.  I just took a long break from dystopia and haven’t really made my way back yet.

3. The Birthmarked series by Caragh O’Brien– Another dystopian series I just haven’t made it to yet.  This one is about a midwife, so that keeps piquing my interest, as I’m sort of interested in midwifery and childbirth (though I’m sure this book isn’t really about that).

4. The Shades of London series by Maureen Johnson– I had heard good things about the first book, The Name of the Star, which has something to do with Jack the Ripper.  What can I say?  Unsolved serial killer books sound interesting.

5. The Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon– I have really no idea if I’d like this series, but I hear good things, especially about the romance.  I have been super intimidated by the size of the book and the series, though, and have been holding off on reading it as a result.

6. A Song of Fire and Ice by George R.R. Martin– I feel really late to the game in trying to decide whether to start (or not) this fantasy series.  Fantasy is pretty hit or miss with me and my mother-in-law insists that Game of Thrones was a really boring book, but I sort of want to try it out for myself.  Again, though, I’ve been intimidated by the size of the books!

7. Dublin Murder Squad by Tana French– I hear really good things about her thrillers and have had the first book in the series, In The Woods, on my list for about six months.  I just keep waiting for it to have fewer holds at the library (without putting myself on the list… really, I make no sense sometimes).

8. Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer– My mother-in-law raves about this children’s series and usually she has pretty good judgment… I just haven’t heard much else about it.

9. Myron Bolitar by Harlan Coben– This mystery series has been around for a while, but I never really paid attention to it.  More recently, though, it was recommended by a blogging buddy who has good taste.  I definitely mean to try it out sometime.  Mystery series are fun!

What series are you hoping to try in the near future?  Have you read any of mine?  Are they worth investing the time/money/energy a series takes?

 

February 2013 Roundup

At least I’m not 3 weeks behind in posting this like I was last month!  February saw a marked improvement in my reading over January.  I actually read a couple books I was really into (starred below), which was a welcome change!  Blogging-wise, I’ve been keeping to one review a week, which is my goal, but I think that I’ve lost A LOT of traffic, comments, and followers lately.  Is posting once or maximum twice a week a real turn-off to people?  Maybe it’s because I’ve had a harder time keeping up with others’ blogs?  Maybe it’s because I’ve also been reading mostly adult lit and some older titles lately?  I’m not sure… I’m not expecting to have a huge following, but it is really disappointing to not have the same level of interaction I was getting in the past.  I know a large part of that is that what I’ve been putting in has been diminishing, but I really don’t have more time to commit to the blog, so I guess it is what it is.

Books Read:

Line of Vision by David Ellis

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging by Louise Rennison

Unsticky by Sarra Manning*

Blackberry Winter by Sarah Jio

Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth by Ina May Gaskin

Deception by Denise Mina

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell*

In the Works: I just started The Death of Bees by Lisa O’Donnell, which oddly is the second book I’ve read in last month that is set in Glasgow.  So far, so good.  I also checked out the audiobook of Across the Universe from the library, so I plan on starting that once I remember to put the CDs in my car.  I’m still reading Blasphemy by Sherman Alexie in the spaces between other books.  I’ve not got really grand plans for March other than to keep up reading and blogging as long as I am up to it.  I’m nearing the end of my pregnancy (I’m due April 9th), so I’m trying to finish prepping for the baby (the nursery I keep getting asked about is no where near done… it’s barely started, in fact) on top of getting more tired on top of everything else.  So we’ll just wait and see how things shape up!

What’s new with your reading/blogging?  Read anything good lately?

 

Unsticky- Sarra Manning

Grace’s boyfriend dumps her very publicly in her favorite department store on her birthday.  Grace, who is starting to cause a scene, is whisked away to a fancy club by a well-dressed stranger.  This stranger, Vaughan, a very wealthy art dealer, has a proposition for Grace.  He’ll pay her generously to be his mistress/party planner.  Grace, who is in quite a lot of debt and is working a dead-end job as an assistant at a fashion magazine, is tempted by Vaughan’s offer and his extravagant lifestyle– after all, it would just be a business transaction with both Grace and Vaughan using one another to get what they want.  Over the length of their “mistress contract,” though, the lines between business and relationship become blurred and the two misfits find themselves facing a possibility they’re not prepared to deal with: emotional involvement.

This is one of those books where you end up loving characters that aren’t really all that lovable.  Grace has no faith in herself whatsoever, has major abandonment issues, lets people walk all over her, lies compulsively, and spends money she doesn’t have like it is going out of style.  Vaughan, on the other hand, is extremely moody, demanding, unsympathetic, and completely closed off.  Yet I was totally rooting for the two to work it out.  Grace had potential under everything and Vaughan had moments where he was actually a nice guy.

Reading this, I kept thinking about Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester.  Vaughan, like Rochester, is older, very rich, very moody, feels the need to play games in order to have love proven to him, and is hiding from a dark past (Vaughan’s is no where near as detailed or scandalous as Rochester’s, though, sorry), but can be very charming and sweet when he feels like it.  Grace is like Jane in that she is young, practically parentless/friendless, dependent, and in need of cultivating her own independence.  (Grace, however, doesn’t have the moral scruples that Jane does.)  Both couples start with an employer-employee relationship, yet find that they actually enjoy the company of one another far more than they expected to.  They also banter with one another similarly. Anyways, I am a HUGE fan of Jane-Rochester, so I think that is one reason why Grace-Vaughan resonated with me so much… and why I was able to forgive Vaughan for being a complete jerk at times.  (Seriously, there are things Vaughan does that should make me hate him, but I don’t.  I can’t.)

This was a book I had a really hard time putting down.  The characters would get stuck in my head and I just wanted to know what would happen. Could they possibly overcome their massive emotional immaturity and make things work?  Could Grace actually get herself together enough to feel like she deserved more from her career, her friends, herself?  How would things end for these two?  I’ve been having trouble staying engaged with what I’m reading lately, so the fact that this was so addicting speaks very highly of the author’s ability to construct interesting characters and to keep a well-trodden plot fresh and entertaining.

If you like romance, are a Rochester fan, or enjoy difficult characters, I would recommend you track this one down.  This has been the only thing I’ve read so far this year that I have actually been excited about, so yeah, go read this book.

 

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging- Louise Rennison

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging is Georgia Nicholson’s journal, recording her funny observations about her life as a (stereo)typical teenager who worries incessantly about the size of her nose, boys, and the approval of her peers.

This book has been out for a long while and I just now have gotten around to reading it.  I sort of wish I’d read it when I first started hearing about it 10 years ago.  Georgia’s charm and teen worries were sort of lost on me.  Yeah, I think I’m a stodgy old reader at this point.  While I enjoyed that this was a quick, light-hearted read, I was pretty unimpressed with Georgia’s character.  She is very insecure to the point that she just comes off as shallow.  She spends an inordinate amount of time talking about plucking her eyebrows and how to smile to make her nose look smaller and how to wear a school uniform beret without messing up her hair.  The rest of the time she talks about boys.  How boys don’t like funny girls.  How she learns to kiss a boy.  How she’s jealous of her friend’s boyfriend.  Oh yeah, and her parents are completely daft.  I know, I know, basically I’m complaining that she’s a teenager.  But I think there are ways to write about the teenage experience that aren’t so… shallow and superficial.

Clearly this is a book with long-standing popularity and it certainly is a fun, breezy little book… sort of like chick lit for teens.  I just don’t think that I’m cut out for the continuing saga of Georgia Nicholson.