International Women's Day: Festa della Donna

March 8 is a day for us to look at our lives as women, a day of taking stock. Who am I, and what does my life as a woman mean? What does it mean to be a woman? Women all over the world are fighting for freedom, on March 8 as well as every other day. Women are trying to feed their families, they are putting their children to bed, they are collecting water from a communal pump. Women are working, hoping their children are doing okay. Women are trying to get along with their men, and trying to get along with each other.

Today I heard of a sad rift between two good women, women who are changing the world. I read that women had been shot in the Ivory Coast.I spoke with a woman today who is angry about her unnecessary c-section. I spoke with another woman who said "hasn't anything changed since the seventies?!"

What has changed for you over the years? How do you think your life is better or worse than your mother's or your grandmother's life? What do you know about your great, great grandmother's life?

I remember one March 8 like it was yesterday. I was in my favorite city, Rome. It was spring and I was expecting my third child. We went to the airport to meet some friends.Women were standing by the doors with bunches of mimosa flowers that they were giving to every woman who entered. One unsuspecting lady took a liking to my young sons, and she gave each of them a sprig as well. Well, of course the mimosa branches turned into swords, and the first International Women's Day battle was fought, on the shiny and slippery floor of the airport lobby.

We are small and fragile, like the blossom of a mimosa. Let us try to take care.

Carnevale!

I only ended up in Italy by accident, falling in love with a man who had spent the happiest time of his life in Rome. So we moved there and made a life in the Italian countryside, raising children, making wine, and living on a shoestring.
I enjoyed life there - it was a fun place to raise kids, and life was always interesting. There were two things, though, that we could never get right. One was the time change - the annual Daylight Saving. Because we lived such a rural and isolated life, without a TV, computer, or much of a connection with the modern world, we never knew when the time was supposed to change, so we would consistently miss the first few appointments after the time change, or get there too early.
The other thing we could never get right was Carnevale. In our area, the children would dress in costumes and eat sweets, bringing back memories of the trick-or-treating of my Canadian childhood. It was a fun time; there would be a parade, and either a few days before or a few days after, the school-aged kids would dress up to go to school.
This celebration was called "Cicicoco," and our timing for this little holiday was consistently wrong. We would either bring the kids to school dressed up on the wrong day, or everyone else would be dressed up and they wouldn't be, or we would dress them as the wrong thing.

So, you may be wondering, what does all this have to do with birth?
I went to two births last week, and both experiences were poignant in different ways. Both the births taught me, again, that birth is never predictable, and we can never know enough to be able to say "I knew that would happen", because we never do.
No details, because both my mothers are having their "babymoons" and I don't want to tell their stories. But it seems to me that we need the humility to laugh at ourselves, if we are going to enjoy the show. We need to be able to wear a mask, and to dress up as someone else. We should be sweet, and we need to be gentle. And we have to realize that timing is everything, and nothing. Babies don't come when they're asked, sometimes not even when they're pushed. Women don't go into labor on set days, and usually if you work on call as a birth attendant, the baby you are waiting on will arrive the day you've scheduled something else.
When we are born we get dressed up in our bodies, and we eat sweets for the rest of our lives. Let's celebrate! Blessings to all you new mothers and fathers!

The Writer's Life

Writing this book was the easy part - it was very satisfying to sit day after day and work on my knowledge and my words. I carefully filtered fact from fiction, and decanted my prose from other bits and pieces I had picked up along the way. I researched and searched, and came up with sometimes surprising conclusions. At times I was discouraged, when I felt the writing would never be done, then I would start a new chapter and feel renewed.

When I started writing, I was going through difficult changes in my life and writing the book was a way of anchoring myself. Then I spent a summer in Italy, at my safe summer hideout.

Every morning I would see to lunch and then settle in the kitchen, and write. When I looked up I could see "my" mountains. I could hear my family and volunteers building, or working down in the meadow, reclaiming it from forty years of neglect.

The book grew. Back in the wintry city, our new house provided me with a wood stove to feed, and endless cups of tea. I sit at the kitchen table, a window behind me and a window in front, and I write.

Of course, there were births to go to, volunteer organizations to run, and family to feed. But when I look back on that winter, I remember with pleasure my fingers moving over the keyboard, and my mind searching for the right word and the most accurate description

Writing kept me going through my winter blues, through the ups and downs of family life, and into the spring. Tickets were bought again for the summer and I found myself looking at my mountains again, with an almost completed manuscript on the screen.

But that summer, my laptop died, and no intensive care was available in the small neighboring town. I focused on other things and took a break from writing. In the fall, thanks to a friendly geek, I retrieved everything and started working again - and two years after I started, I had a finished book! I thought that was it! My work was over!

When you make a baby, your work is far from over when the child is born. Now I am raising the child - preparing it to send it out into the world. I hope it can stand on its own. I will accompany it, of course. I will let everyone know that I am responsible for any errors, omissions, miscalculations. Essentially, though, it will be independent of me. It will (hopefully!) be read by people who don't know or care who I am - they are not reading a book so that they can be my friend.

To help send it on its way, I have sent out my book to a few reviewers "in the field". I am wondering if anyone else is interested in giving it a look-over and providing me with comment and blurbs.

Blessings

I went to bed happy last night, because every Sunday I get to play jazz clarinet with a small group of amateur musicians (and one professional to glue everything together).

I read for a bit, Adam and Eve, by Sena Jeter Naslund - an interesting read. I put my head down and within five minutes my phone rings and a lady's water has just broken, very exciting, water everywhere. "Just like in the movies," she said.

All is good, I suggest she try to sleep a little. We spoke a few times during the night, as she was having some contractions, but I continued to suggest she sleep as much as possible.

In the morning, she call to tell me that she and her husband have decided to go to the hospital, where the news is that her cervix is not dilated, and they are going to try Cervidil to "jumpstart" labor.

Just asking all you folks out there, whether you're "in the know" or not, to throw a blessing her way. Just throw it out, and if it doesn't land on her, it'll land on another birthing woman...

La Dolce Vita Benefit Dinner

I met a lovely group of women the other night - and I am honored that their organization, Dining for Social Change, has decided that MBC will be the recipient of their upcoming Tuscan dinner.

The event will take place on March 12, 2011 at 7pm
at 5213, rue Hutchison, Montreal .

The dinner will be prepared by a local chef and promises to be a great event. You can eat, drink and be merry, and know that you are supporting a very worthy cause.

The  Montreal Birth Companions  mandate is to provide free doula services for women who are in REAL need: recent immigrants, refugees or asylum seekers, or women living on the street or in difficult circumstances. Our doulas do prenatal classes with these women and then attend their labor and birth. We run on almost no cash. Most of the work we do is a labor of love. We serve about 60 women a year, and one client takes up to 50 hours of a doula's time.

For tickets, please click here.

Looking forward to seeing you all there!

The Final Push!!!

I am feeling like I am almost there - the baby will be born soon - but worried about the shoulders.
My book is going to be on the shelves, speaking for itself, and I am proud but anxious. The new mother feels just that. For nine months or more, she has lived with another person inside her body, creating the bones, muscles and nerves with her own body. But the baby has its own, what? Some call it a soul, others an independent central nervous system.
Whatever it is, when the baby is born, he is definitely separated from the womb, even if his mother has a Lotus Birth, where the placenta is kept attached to the baby until it organically falls off.
And when that happens, the new mother feels proud, happy, and satisfied, but also anxious, worried, and not a little nervous - how will this tiny creature make his way in the world?
So, what this space! The Birth Conspiracy will be out soon!

Se Non Ora Quando

This was the rallying cry for the women of Italy during last week's demonstrations. It means "If Not Now, When! Except I think it sounds so much nicer in Italian.

Se non ora, quando?
 
If you don't breastfeed your newborn, then when will you get that chance again?
If you don't play with your two-year old, just remember, he will never be two again.
If you don't kiss your partner this evening, you will miss that one extra kiss.

If you don't speak up for what you need when you are giving birth, you will lose a world of satisfaction and gain a world of regrets.
The time for change is now.
If you are pregnant, decide what you want for your birth and go for it! Don't let the experts tell you what to do. Remember, the experts are not only the doctors - every nurse, midwife, and lady in the grocery store will be telling you how you should give birth.
If you are a doula, keep your opinions to yourself and let the women speak out! Respect the women giving birth and follow their lead. Change comes slowly and powerfully.

Se non ora, quando!