Good Communication Skills

[Published previously for SFGate.com/moms]

If Mikey wants something and it conflicts with what I want, I can be sure that the conversation won't end there.

Here's a scenerio: Mikey is standing on a foot stool in the pantry holding the jar of fig bars. We are just about to sit down to dinner and he wants yet another fig bar. So, I say, "Mikey wants another fig bar. Yep, I hear you sweety, you want another bar." His shoulders relax and his face softens and he nods his head. Then I say, "Mikey, you've already had two fig bars, no more, just two."

Most of the time he'll repeat back, "just two." And sometimes we'll do the scenerio again or I'll have to look for a compromise like asking him if he'd like to start eating dinner a little before papa gets home.

What amazes me about this scene is that it works every time no matter what the conflict. By just repeating back to him what he wants, he is soothed into listening. The poor guy just wants to know that he is understood. Don't we all!

Write for Choice!

Here's me on KPOO radio yesterday campaigning for Certified Professional Midwives to be included in the Obama Health Care Reform bill. That's my cute little red-headed baby with me.

When looking into using a midwife for my pregnancy and delivery, I wondered what the difference was between a Certified Professional Midwife and a Certified Nurse Midwife. Here's my unofficial knowledge of the differences:

Certified Professional Midwives specialize in out-of-hospital births like at a birth center or a private home. Certified Professional Midwives can only work outside of hospitals; and therefore, have a lot of experience with low-tech, unmedicated births.

Certified Nurse Midwives specialize in hospital births and are licensed to work in hospitals. Certified Nurse Midwives have gone through more schooling than Certified Professional Midwives. The extra schooling allows them to work in hospitals. Most of their experience comes from working with mamas in a hospital setting, so they are more familiar hospital births than out-of-hospital births.

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Health Care Reform

Certified Nurse Midwives are currently included in the first draft of the Health Care Reform bill, but Certified Professional Midwives are not. Certified Professional Midwives are licensed by their states and should be added to the list of Medicaid-eligible providers recognized at the federal level.

Because I had such a fabulous prenatal, birth, and postnatal experience with a Certified Professional Midwife, I would like to see them included in Obama's Health Care Reform bill. Around 50% of births are paid for by Medicaid users. Medicaid only covers Certified Nurse Midwives not Certified Professional Midwives.

I would like to see women given more choice. And so, I am working to get Certified Professional Midwives covered by Medicaid. It's one sentence in the bill. If you're interested in helping, please go

here

to the MAMA Campaign to send a letter to Boxer, Feinstein, and Pelosi.

Please send your letter this weekend because they're moving fast on the hill and we want our voices heard.

More choices for women!

Listen to me and midwife Maria Iorillo on KPOO radio Thurs. July 16th

Midwives and Mothers talking about Health Care Reform and how Certified Professional Midwives can be a part of the solution!

I'll be there because I've had both a hospital birth and a birth under the care of a Certified Professional Midwife. Listen to my birth story and what care I prefer and why. Plus, listen to one of the most experienced San Francisco midwives, Maria Iorillo, talk about Certified Professional Midwives and our nations health care reform.

It's this Thursday, July 16th, from 12noon to 1pm PST on Reality Sandwich, KPOO, 89.5.

Tune in on your radio if you live in San Francisco or listen from the Internet at http://www.kpoo.com/hearus.html. Click on the jukebox image on the right.

Wisdom of Inconsistency

{Published earlier for SFGate.com/moms]

I remember my mom killing herself to keep everything equal between the three of us children. As parents, we are told that it is important to be consistent.

I was relieved to read in Gentle Birth, Gentle Mothering, by Dr. Sarah J. Buckley that it is okay to be inconsistent because it's human nature. Have I ever cancelled an engagement or changed my mind about something? I feel relieved because it's hard work trying to line up the way Zack does things and the way that I do them. Buckley says:

Consistency between parents is artificial and unnecessary. ...I also believe that we can have different attitudes, thresholds, and responses, yet still parent together with ease.

I no longer have that nagging voice in my head saying that I am doing this whole mothering thing wrong when I let Mikey make a huge mess with the packaging poppers one day and not let him do it again the next day. Each day is different, each moment is different. Sometimes I feel more tolerant than other times.

If I say no to another book because I am tired from a day of fun with my little bundle of joy, but papa wants to read one more, fine. I don't need to feel like we're giving in to Mikey's attempt to delay bedtime.

Mikey is learning that at different times people are willing or unwilling to oblige. Buckley says, "Our children know that we will respond differently because we are different people. We don't want them to manipulate those differences, but it's okay to do things differently."

Since I have let go of the feeling that I need to be consistent, I feel more real and honest. Inconsistency has allowed Mikey to see more of me as a person and less of me as an authoritarian mom. I hope that he is learning how to be more true to himself as well.

I live on a relocated cemetery

[Written previously for SFGate.com/moms]

This Friday I was alone in my apartment. Husband and 2-year old were elsewhere for the night. I had a nice night out: yoga and dinner. I cleaned up that day's breakfast and the rest of the house from 11pm to midnight. I lay in bed alone. I fell asleep and then awoke two hours later because I felt someone holding my hand. I don't think that I've slept alone, I mean really alone for two plus years. So, I thought maybe I was just imagining that Zack was in bed with me, but I woke to the same feeling every two hours until finally morning came. Much of the Richmond District was a graveyard. The Encyclopedia of San Francisco says:

Golden Gate Cemetery was created in 1868 on about 200 acres purchased by the city north of Clement between 33rd and 43rd avenues. It was also known as Clement Street Cemetery and the City Cemetery. In 1909, it was turned into Lincoln Park Golf Course. It is unknown how many remains were moved, and several hundred were discovered when the Palace of the Legion of Honor was being renovated in the 1990s.

My house was part of a housing development put on top of an old cemetery, one of "The Big Four" cemeteries. After we moved into our house and started digging in the garden, we found a large piece of a tombstone. If they forgot to remove a piece of tombstone, what else did they forget? My neighbor has a fully intact tombstone in her yard. She calls it, "Our New Yorker." He was a pioneer from New York. Although she jokes about it, she confessed that she got holy water from a church and poured it over the top. I am starting to think that I should do the same thing.

It was like people were hanging out in my house, but I couldn't see them. Like trying to sleep with someone watching you. Or, trying to sleep with the lights on. They weren't mean or unfriendly just there. I've felt them before with Zack home but somehow I was able to ignore them better. Friday night was a haunted, sleepless night. I am glad that I've got a full house again.

Opting out of preschool

[Previously published for sfgate.com/moms]

I am going through some sort of journey that I never thought that I'd take. I went from working when Mikey was only three months old to quitting completely when he was just over a year. I had him signed up for preschools when he was one month old and now I've decided preschool can wait.

Mikey is 2.5 years old and it seems that every child his age in San Francisco is in preschool some part of the week. I only know one other mom who doesn’t have her child in a school.

Our weeks are free from commitments. We have no plans and therefore the space to live life slower.

I am so happy that I don't have to rush out of the house every morning. I love playing at the house until Mikey is ready to do something else. I realize how lucky we are to be together all day. He says to me, "Mama, Mikey is happy."

I want to give him what I didn't have. Like most parents, my parents worked. I was shuffled from school to the babysitter. We spent two hours a day in the car commuting back and forth into town. I had to wait for happiness, which I found on the weekends and in the evenings while reading bedtime stories with my dad.

The concept of choosing not to send Mikey to school doesn't seem that earth shattering, but for me it is. I am choosing a path based on my intuition as a mother. I am trusting my feelings and making big decisions based on them. I am not doing what everyone else is doing but doing what I want to do for my child. I can identify with how homeschooling moms and dads must feel. It takes a lot of courage to defend my decision. Although from reading this article, it seems all too clear that our boys are feeling school burn out early.

In this culture of working parents and scheduled activities, I am taking a different approach. Like the slow food movement, I am starting the slow kids movement!

(Mikey is now 3.5 years old and he started at a preschool this Fall (2009). It felt totally right, but it didn't work out for him. Among other major behavior changes, he went on a hunger strike. I spoke with him about it and we decided that he still liked preschool, but he wanted something less noisy, fewer toys, fewer teachers, fewer kids etc.)