HOW PREGNANCY BECAME A LEAP FORWARD IN MY EVOLUTION
Published by Barbara Ratti in take care of yourself · Sunday 28 Feb 2021
Tags: pregnancy, motherhood, meditation, and, pregnancy, positive, birth, music, and, pregnancy
Tags: pregnancy, motherhood, meditation, and, pregnancy, positive, birth, music, and, pregnancy
My husband
and I became pregnant after five years of trying. Two weeks after our fourth
embryo transfer, the pregnancy blood test eventually turned out to be positive.
I remember the look my husband gave me. It was full of surprise, wonder, and hope.
I felt myself shaking. Stunned with relief and joy, I dialed the number to talk
to the clinic. A nurse told me that the test result was good and encouraging
and that it was to be repeated in few days to check the level of the pregnancy
hormones again. The feeling of triumph I had experienced for a few instants suddenly
turned into a sense of doubt and fear. There was no certainty that the
pregnancy would go on. No assurance that everything would be all right. No guarantee
that the struggle would be over.
The second
test confirmed the first and an early pregnancy ultra-sound scanning detected
the presence of a gestational sac and a positive heartbeat. While my husband showed
his dad-to-be enthusiasm by commenting about the embryo dimension and potential,
even though he had never seen another one before, I was stuck, frozen in my thoughts
of potential loss. When we left the gynecologist office, I could clearly remember
only one sentence that the doctor had said, the only one to which I had given
importance: “This is just the beginning, the first trimester is the most at
risk”. For many days, I felt miserable, powerless, at the mercy of fate. But
then I got sick of it. The role of the victim, well, it just does not fit me.
Or at least, it soon makes me bored.
Rebirths are
so much more exciting than paranoia. Furthermore, a new life was growing inside
my womb careless of everything but cell division and development. I had invited
that life to come to me so many times, I had focused on it with such a strong
desire, and now there it was, there with me, there with us. That was our
present reality. Was it worth sacrificing it for fear of what could have
followed? Absolutely not. I firmly decided that I would value every single day
of my pregnancy as a miracle itself. A few months later, I can claim that was
one of the best decisions I ever made. It was the beginning of a marvelous
adventure.
I immediately
went back to my daily meditation practice. To me, meditation is the easiest way
to relax, to recharge and to connect to my deeper self. I soon found out that
when sitting still in silence with my eyes closed and repeating my mantra and
the sutras, I was no longer alone. It was me and my baby, connected with each
other and bathed in peace. Even before the fetus started quickening, I felt
that the two of us were engaged in an exclusive relationship. Although I could
not name it nor define it, I knew it was changing me. Pregnancy has a lot to do with change and
transformation. I chose not to oppose the process. Instead, I observed it with
curiosity as my mood, my thoughts, my feelings and my body changed over the
months. The earliest signs of pregnancy included mood swings, tiredness, nausea
and changes in appetite.
Honestly, years of painful menstruation
associated with irritability have trained me to handle mood swings quite well. I
explained to my husband that I needed him to be patient because the attempt to
have control over my explosive emotions just made me feel worse. We started a
habit to make jokes about it. Not during the crisis, of course, but even the
most harrowing drama no longer feels that way once the storm has passed.
I already knew
that taking long walks at the park calmed me down and had a powerful effect on
my energy level. I decided I would go out for a walk every day, even on cold,
rainy, or snowy days. When possible, I favored unpaved routes and stopped to
hug the trees along the way. I looked at my feet resting on their roots, at the
roots anchored to the ground, and I enjoyed a feeling of belonging to the
Earth. I admired the variety of branches and the shape of the leaves. I
downloaded an app to help me identify plants and I took pictures outdoor. As my
belly grew, sharing my experiences with the baby inside became more natural.
Talking and singing to the baby became a joy.
When my
siblings and I were little, our mother used to sing us to sleep. Not even the
complexities of the troubled mother-daughter relationship that later occurred between
us could undermine the sense of familiarity and belonging created by that
routine. I realized that pieces of those songs were still part of my memory. I searched
on the internet for them and dusted them off. I searched for new ones to increase
my repertoire. My husband and I recorded our favorites with our cell phones to
send them to relatives and friends via WhatsApp. Responses to our initiative
made us feel like being part of a tribe. We loved that feeling of shared
fellowship. I often listened to classical music, especially piano music by
Mozart and Chopin. The music by Italian biologist and composer Emiliano Toso
also offered us peaceful loving moments of relax.
Now, this
might be getting a little bit too much oriented toward spirituality. The last thing
I want would be to give the idea that I spent my pregnancy feeding myself and
the little creature only on transcendence. I did not. I rather paid a lot of
attention to the food I ate. I made it sure to get enough nutrients, enough
water, enough sleep. I took in account that, for our wellbeing, I needed to limit
my commitments and to get more rest; that my body would gain weight and that it
would look different; that the time would come for birth and I wanted to
prepare for it.
Every
pregnancy is different and so is every birth. A woman can not have total
control over the experiences of making a baby and of giving birth. My way to
motherhood taught me a lot about patience and acceptance. I developed varicose
veins. The vascular condition required me to wear compression stockings all day
long. To me, walking barefoot has always been a great pleasure of life. I have
always worn loose-fitting clothes made of natural fabrics. Compression
stockings made me feel so uncomfortable that for several weeks I woke up
unhappy at the idea of pulling them up. Little by little I became more skilled
in wearing them, and as soon as I ascertained that they really improved leg
circulation, I just made peace with them.
While attempting
to turn varicose veins, hemorrhoids, and water retention into opportunities to
enlarge my concept of taking care of myself, my husband and I also had to ask ourselves
what kind of birth we wanted. We read a lot and made it sure to have access to different
points of view. We finally decided that our home would be the best place for me
to give birth. Planning a home birth was an amazing journey. We met skilled
midwifes, we took birthing classes and we got to know expectant parents with
whom to share doubts, concerns, and suggestions. We learned about the
physiology of labor and birth, about establishing breastfeeding, about the
advantages of co-sleeping. We challenged our previous beliefs and we welcomed
with gratitude the possibility to make the decisions that best suited our needs.
The pregnancy
is now close to term. The last nine months have flown by. But, at the same
time, pregnancy has been a rich time for self-exploration, for partner bonding
and to get ready… for the unknown. With only a few certainties: I want to take
care of myself, I want to radiate well-being, I want to nurture joy, fullness
and love. Will I be able to keep such clarity during labor, after a sleepless
night, or when the time for a long shower becomes a mirage? I probably will
not. But it does not matter, I will not need to be perfect. Also, I will not be
alone. I will ask for help when I need it. I trust my instincts, I trust my
tribe and I trust my baby. I trust my competence and I trust their competence. The
baby will be born any moment now. I am ready for the leap. Nothing will ever be
the same again. Oh yeah, that is exactly what I mean by “EVOLUTION”!
Kiara G.
Transcendental
Meditation
https://www.tm.org/home-page
Emiliano Toso
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBz6az_Nedg&list=RDcBz6az_Nedg&start_radio=1&t=0
Positive Birth
https://thepositivebirthcompany.co.uk/
https://www.singingbirth.com/
