Making Water Babies

The last few weeks, as my belly has gotten bigger, I’ve received comments by people suggesting I’m going to need to stop getting in the water. Sure, I can’t ride my potato chip short board any more. As a matter of fact, when I look at it now I see it from the eyes of many of the larger-sized local boys who would sink it. My 5′10″ is small, and sheesh really narrow, and sooo thin! So, besides occasionally borrowing, I’ve been riding a bodyboard until I can acquire a little bit larger stick to keep me afloat. And though it’s more comfortable in some respects (the leg/hip workout being quite gratifying for someone experiencing growing pangs), laying on on my belly is harsh (you adapt to keep pressure on the ribs instead but still). I’m hoping a bodyboard company will extend itself to inventing a bodyboard design for pregnant women, which, of course, I will gladly test out. Just carve out a spot where my now big-ass pooch can hang comfortably (not too much to ask for?).

Back to the comments…. They gave me serious concern, even though I personally know and have seen pictures of many women surfing pregnant (some all the way to term); mostly longboarding or on funboards. And though my instincts seem to adequately keep me in line, this is my first pregnancy so I decided to check in with the experts on my last prenatal visit, to make certain I’m not potentially harming the lil’ kiddle. And what I was told, “If you are able to, you can surf until the very end. The baby is really very protected at this point.” Now, I didn’t tell her I prefer surfing a bit bigger waves (though summer is often small), I’m limiting myself to head-high or less now.

Frankly, my main worry isn’t what I might do surfing, but what others might do to me. Though I’ve hurt myself taking chances -a concussion here and reef slashing there- the worst injuries (including a back broken in three places) have all occurred by other guys in the water. You know, where they think they’re going to make a drop, where they think they’re able to bust a move, where they eat it while magnetically heading straight for you. With just myself in the water, I feel safe, but besides being more cautious in general, surely I will have to keep a better eye on the guys. As a matter of fact, it seems my motherly instincts are already kicking in. For example, there’s this one goof at a local break here, who likes taking off in front of people in precarious spots, then cutting back into you, and making turns straight for you while you are paddling back out. There’s probably one like him at every spot: less soul more soulless. The guy who surfs to show off but in the end he’s just annoying everyone around him. Well, needless to say, during one recent incident inches from my face, I shoved him off his board, grabbed his clownish fro, yanked on it and -though I’d told him before- demanded he stay away from me. He started bawling. Whoa, that instinct is intense!

I also recently learned the chance for miscarriage is more serious in the first trimester and that, in actuality, that’s the time you need to be most careful. Thing is, for the large percentage of pregnant (slightly obsessive) surfer girls, all you are thinking is ‘I’m going to surf as much as I can while I can still lay flat on this thing!’ So, if you naïvely (as I did) made it past that stage, and can avoid collisions with water donkeys, play it safe and you’ll likely be fine surfing (bodyboarding, body surfing, swimming) even into your third trimester*. Now, popping an extra 25 pounds up may be a little more difficult (I’ve already gained that and am only half way there) – but it’s a great way to stay strong, keep in shape, and be physically prepared to pop that lil’ grom out when the time comes.

*This is not medical advice. Always check in with your doctor to see what is right for you.

(Originally written for The Surfing Village. For more info on moms surfing, check out the Surfing Mums web site.)

***7/22 update: seems the belly size increased overnight. Two dayz ago when I tried to bodyboard had to immediately lock it into wave at an angle and lay more on my side. Though I am obsessed with the wonderful fin workout (luv my Kicks), will certainly need that bodyboard with the belly cut out or just bodysurf. At the same time though, my arm muscles are such that I can finally push my new body up while surfing, so…ultimately I’d rather be surfing (just need to be able to update boards -and surf clothes- as the we grow. …will keep ya posted.***

Stop Telling Me It’s Wonderful

Sure, the miracle of birth is…a miracle! And for every person alive ultimately the most important moment in their life. For mothers though, it’s a whole different story than for the other participants. So I’m curious, what’s up with all the comments -wanted/warranted or not- on pregnancy and motherhood that other moms proffer. It’s not that I don’t want to hear stories that will help me through this process. It’s just that these words-o-wisdom start out positive, but ultimately they all seem to end up a horrific saga that you never asked about or wanted to hear. Look, I’m scared enough as it as, and am slowly easing my way into this. Frankly, each tale of woe brings about a borderline panic as it suffocates and increases my anxiety levels.

Usually they begin with how wonderful pregnancy is, how wonderful it is to have a baby, how I’m just going to love it…. That’s fine – totally acceptable. But then, before I can smile, respond or walk away, these sweet tales morph into some twisted or tragic drama. Fact is, you can’t walk away from someone talking babies. It’s as if you’re dissing the whole mom thing – like you’re dissing the mom, the baby, and motherhood in one gesture. So you’re stuck there, listening.

Yesterday, for example, I was talking to a surfer girl who’d had a child about seven months ago. Again with the wonderful talk – and again I’m sucked into it. We were in the beach parking area, and I was trying to fit into my bikini top which was getting too small, too quickly, and mentioned it. She starting talking about losing the baby weight -or not losing it yet- and I responded in a query, “well, you’re still breastfeeding, right?”… though I wasn’t really sure how much of an excuse that was to not having lost the weight. Unfortunately, that lead to her asking me if I was going to breastfeed (of course, yes) and she innocently began to explain how her baby daughter was great – that she just latched on. I responded with a smile, “Oh, that’s good,” while thinking to myself, what, sometimes they don’t know how to latch on. That thought alone was enough to ponder (being that I’m still very baby naïve), but she continues, and all of a sudden it turns into the baby’s mouth as a vice grip, mom’s nipples looking more like bloody knuckles, and the pain being worse than labor. Huh?!?!?! It happened so quickly from wonderful to absolutely awful I was ill-prepared. Did I ask to hear this? Does it look like I want to hear this? Is it helping matters? At this present moment, I’d simply like to go surf (while I still can) without the looming threat of bloody nipples on my mind.

It’s not that I don’t want to hear some of the negatives, so I can aptly prepare – but for god-sakes conclude with a solution, don’t just leave me worrying about the future more than I already am! The other day my friend had a solution for my labor woes. She emailed me, asking whether or not I was going to use hypno-birthing. Hypno-what?

OK, so what are the details? How far along are you? Do you know what flavor? Can I push hypnobirth on you? It’s the best – Bella shot out like a bullet.

She explained it’s a form of self-hypnosis that is designed to reduce pain and shorten labor time. As well it’s supposed to help you avoid the epidural and other drugs and go the “natural” route. Let’s just get back to the “shot out like a bullet” part. That’s all I needed to hear – sign me up! But then, with my hopes up (I’m thinking shot out like a bullet translates into the labor lasting, what, 10, 15 minutes maybe…), she left me crushed. Suffice to say, “shot out like a bullet”, in baby labor terms at least, is not quite as fast as a real gun. Her labor, she would later explain to me over the phone, took hours and hours, going overnight, and they ended up giving her drugs anyway. So, what is a long labor?

Do I need to make my own personalized t-shirts that exclaim, “don’t talk to me about this” with an arrow pointing down at my belly? Or is that too harsh? How about, “my baby and I only speak sign language.” At this point, I don’t know whom to trust when it comes to matters of sharing motherly information…so I tried my mother.

Actually, my mom was kinda comforting, in the sense that the miraculous occasion of her giving birth to me registered barely a blip in her memory. Now, we can look at that as a bad thing, but I tried to keep it positive. My conclusion – she doesn’t recall the event because it was not traumatic.

My mom told me I should ask my father. Ask my father? But she was the one having the baby! Turns out though, for many aspects of my and my sister’s birth and childhood, my dad seems to maintain better recall. In the end, I think my mom ended up speaking to my dad about it, refreshing her memory perhaps, because suddenly one day she shattered my dreams of her remembering such a beautiful moment in her life, and of my birth being easy, pain-free, and perfect. In actuality, she didn’t recall it because she likely purposefully blocked it out.

It starts with the fact that her labor lasted forever. They eventually had to induced it, until I was coming out so quickly they had to knock her out. My mom was (is) a very petite woman, so there were also some issues of getting me to fit out the hole, though I was just 6+ pounds. I guess she was awake enough when I came out to see the results of her efforts. “I had never seen anything like it,” she explained. Like it? You mean me? She goes on, with a giggle that conveys the ability to laugh at something once it’s only a memory, “you were long, skinny, no hair, and green (with jaundice). It was scary.”

Great mom. Thanks. Wonderful.

Body Parts Gone Nai-Nai

There are an endless list of weird bodily changes that occur when a creature starts growing in your belly. One of these things is that your limbs fall asleep. I imagine the baby is needing all the blood and energy you can offer up – and as a mom-to-be of course you don’t mind sharing everything you can. Still, you can reserve the option to complain a little bit; to ponder the ridiculous variety of physical pregnancy anomalies. The night before last for example, I experienced something no one should experience, except perhaps when they are very old or ailing…perhaps. My arms, my feet, my legs…have all fallen asleep. And they’re not just tingly kine, but the kind where your body part feels like a rock, dead, no longer connected. But last night, my ear fell asleep. My ear!?! What the f$#& is that about?! No wonder you feel brain dead when you are pregnant – the lack of flow of anything beyond your torso is so limited. And I’m only a little over four months! We’ll just have to see how extreme it gets.

update: now the bottom of my feet -and I mean the bottom half inch- keep going numb. Like you are standing bare-foot in an electrified puddle of water. Yes, every pregnant momma-to-be deserves way more foot massages than she is getting…..

Aloha, Welcome to Preggerz!

I’m just four months pregnant. It was not expected and I’m not prepared – but I am a knowledge whore. So mixed with the emotional and physical is a mental crash course. This is not the oblivious positive pregnancy site, but more about the realistic experiences that have taken (and are taking) place along the way. So hope you can relate, learn, and share your own expectant mother fun!