Belly Tales

Apparently, 300 people showed up to last week’s Nurse-in at Toys ‘R Us! Wow! Go NYC breastfeeding community! It’s so sad that actions like this are even needed in the first place, but I bet Toys ‘R Us will never make the mistake of harrassing and calling security on a breastfeeding woman again, and every bit of education helps. I wonder what the employees will do next time they see a nursing woman? Hopefully leave her in peace! The Daily News picked up the story here.

We’re moving! Yay! However, this means that I’ll be offline for a few days…possibly the week (eeegads, a whole week without internet? Can we survive???)…until whenever we can get internet installed in our new place. We’re moving tomorrow, so the internet deprivation begins manana. See you on the flip side.

I’ve been tagged by Melissa over at A Womb of her Own to answer a meme, which is not my usual fare, but hey, what the hell. Anything to lighten the mood. Here are 8 totally random things about me:

1. When I was a young child, I had an imaginary friend named Whaley. I have no idea why he was named that, but I used to insist that we set an extra place for him at the dinner table. My first stuffed animals were also named Alacross, Blueshields and Katarooley (sp?), and my blanket was named Blounrey (pronounced bloon-ray). Hmmmm.

2. There are two pretty prominant dimples just below my back (where the skin seems to connect directly to the posterior, superior iliac spine, without much padding underneath), just like britney spears!

3. Early aspirations included being a veterinarian or an animator for Walt Disney.

4. One of my favorite foods is salsa. Which is also my favorite condiment. In fact, with the possible exception of desserts, I think that a hearty helping of salsa makes just about everything taste better, and I’ve been known to eat it straight from the jar with a spoon, like chunky, spicy gazpacho.

5. I hiccouph approximately once an hour. In fact, my beloved boy has been known to time my hiccups on occassion, and they are, in fact, just about on the hour.

6. My two adoreable cats have been known to show each other a little bit more than just brotherly love from time to time. We’re pretty sure we know which one is the bottom, and which one is the top, too. And the bottom never sounds that happy about it. Given that they’re both neutered, and are actually littermates….does this make them incestuous gay cat lovers? Or is it really just about the alpha cat showing the beta cat who’s boss? I can never tell.

7. I’ve been to London roughly 9 times in the past 2 years, not including living there for 6 months last year. Impressive, eh?

8. One of my favorite brain-candy TV shows is Pimp My Ride, 2nd season especially. But alas, I do not own a TV (which is actually just fine by me), so I haven’t had an opportunity to watch any episodes since I was living in London. I don’t own a car, either. Go figure.

And now, without further adieu, I pass this random meme on to LadyElms over at Midwiffle Seed and K over at Told Not to Blog, should either of them be at all interested in taking up the torch (no pressure!).

DONE!!!!

I’m done with the semester!!!!!!

Done! Done! Done!!!!

Omg, off to go party. Byeeee.

Just a quick note to say that the spam track-backs on this website have become a bit unbearable lately. I’ve increased the security on the comments so that no comment can be posted without first being approved, so if you comment and it doesn’t appear immediately, don’t worry—it’s just because I haven’t gotten around to approving it yet. This is in no way a judgement on any of the comments—I promise I’ll approve every comment I get, even if I don’t agree with it. It’s just…I’m sick of comments advertising cell phones, travel packages, or xxx this or that, which need to be erased and moderated at least three or four times a day. It’s becoming a full-time job, and one I just don’t have time for atm. So, my apologies if the new policy on comments is upsetting to anyone. It’s not my intention to deter user comments in any way whatsoever, I just want tto make sure they’re real comments, that’s all!

Oh, and I nearly forgot: a year ago today I wrote the inaugural post for this website. Wow. Was that only a year ago???

Huge congratulations to my dear friend K who just gave birth to a gorgeous baby boy on Thursday, 4/13/06 at 12:09 pm at home, in a kiddy-pool (I’ve only heard a brief account of the birth, but it sounds as if the baby was born into her husband’s arms)!!! He’s a gorgeous chunk of a baby, too: 9 lbs, 7 oz. Unfortunately, I wasn’t there as I had originally hoped, but I’m SO glad everything went so smoothly for everyone involved. Hopefully there will be birth stories and pictures to come. Sooo happy for you, and so proud of you, honey—he’s absolutely beautiful. Congratulations!!!

It’s been awhile. Where has your intrepid student midwife been, lately?? Good question! I’ve been trying so hard to get some writing done for Belly Tales, but lately I’ve been so exhausted at night that all I do is crawl into bed around 1:00 am after finishing my homework, only to wake up the next morning for clinicals, and the day starts all over again. I’ve been squeezing work in whenever I can…and a life? Ha!

However, some really incredible things have been happening lately, and I have so much to write about and share with all of you. I’ve been making lots of notes about things I need to write about just as soon as I have a chance, and I’m really hoping that this summer will allow me an opportunity to get some good writing done. In the meantime, I’ve attended a few really nice births at work (and one not-so-nice birth which really deserves a post…see above). Clinicals are getting slightly easier, which is not to say that I have any more of a clue, but only that I’m finally learning the routine at the clinic, so things are running a bit smoother. So much more I could say about that, but again, I’ll have to leave it for a seperate post. Plus, there’s the news to contend with, most notably the soaring cesarean rate in the US, and the NIH State-of-the-science recommendations for elective cesearean sections, along with all the attendant press coverage. Soooo many posts needing to be written about that.

On the school front, here’s the quick run-down: three weeks ago, Well-woman Gynecology exam (did very well), two weeks ago, Antepartum exam (did well enough), last week, 3rd chapter of my reasearch proposal due on monday (stayed up very late, got it done on time, grade still to come), a case study due for Antepartum on Wednesday, and a presentation on the Midwifery Practice Act for Professional Issues in Midwifery, also on Wed. (both of which went quite well, especially the one for Professional Issues, where we performed a small skit for the class that presented the pros and cons of the Act. And, of course, speaking of the Midwifery Practice Act, that’s a pretty major piece of legislation which also deserves a post all its own).

As the semester has gotten more intense, I’ve quickly discovered that blogging is a full time job. Which is difficult when one already has a full time job (school), plus a part time job (work), plus clinicals (does that count as part of the full time job?). And someone please remind me to do my taxes and fill out my FAFSA, both of which are due very very soon. Good lord, how did it get to be April already?? Where has the time gone?

In conclusion, please don’t give up on me! At least the semester will be over soon. The weather is gorgeous, my beloved boy has finally gotten his visa, and has moved from London to live with me here in New York, and life, though busy, is really really good. Can’t complain, just bear with me if the posts aren’t coming quite as fast and furious as I wish they were. At this point, I feel like I’m just hanging on as best as I can, and counting down the days to the summer.

This is going to sound somewhat strange, but sometimes a few of my posts are inundated with spam track-back comments, which just mucks up my inbox and dashboard, and requires deleting massive amounts of spam comments/e-mails all at once. Which I just finished doing. However, right as I hit the delete button, I noticed that one of the e-mails in my inbox that I was in the process of deleting was not in fact spam, but a sincere e-mail from a reader. Something about Doula Certification. Aaack! To whoever it was that sent me that e-mail: my most sincere apologies for accidentally deleting it. Please send it to me again!!

Thank you!

If I could wish for anything for this site this year, it would be a brand new, shiny banner that actually features a belly, or something pretty and birth-related like that. I think I’ll make that a goal for this year: get thyself a new banner! Enough with the daisies already.