Birth is about making mothers

[Roryrory]

Birth is not only about making babies. Birth is about making mothers ~ strong, competent, capable mothers who trust themselves and know their inner strength.

I was thinking this morning about this quote in Julie Doula's sig. The older my boys get the less I feel that their birth and babyhood dominates my relationship with them. For example, I was watching "Knocked Up" last night and I pondered on how much time and thought goes into having a "baby" but before you know it you a "child" - not even a toddler - and I know before I know it they will be teenagers. The thought of their birth and birth stories still brings tears of joy to my eyes but it seems so distant now, and dare I say unimportant. Now I am TTC#3 so I still don't feel my personal birth journey is over, and I definately want a repeat of my good fortune with #3's birth, but I was wondering; to what extent did my sons' births make me the mother I am?

I still get the guilts about things, worry that I didn't cuddle them enough as babies (DH says I held them constantly), take mental notes about whether they eat enough vegetables and so on, but I really am pretty relaxed about the whole childrearing thing. I had a very easy birth with Ollie (#2) and a reasonable time with Flynn (#1) and had good bonding and found breastfeeding as easy as walking - a bit painful at first but completely natural once I found my feet.

So did my experience make me this way? I wonder. And I wonder what other women think - did your birth experience set up a pattern for you? Did you move on from it quickly and establish your mothering based on other factors. Or like me, do you wonder? I would also like to know if midwives and other birth professionals notice any real pattern to this?

[MamaPan]

what an interesting thread... something to think about and then come back and post my thoughts...
I do think with DS1 I had a great birth experience and this lead to an relatively easy early motherhood journey - the whole thing was positive for me - i loved being preg, loved labour, loved bf etc - think the mindset and positivity played a great role in making me the mother i am to him.
but as i said need to ponder and then post some more..

[Indadhanu]

I've also pondered this quote!!!!!

Did Jazzy's birth make me a mother, or contribute significantly?
And did it contribute to my trust in myself, or know my inner strength?

For me... no, but at the same time yes.

No... in fact, my labour and birth with Jazzy compeltely shattered my trust in myself, and my notion of inner strength. And it wasn't until weeks afterwards that I could even call myself a mum and believe.

For me, birth did not mark the beginning (mentally) of my motherhood. It did not make me a mother. I struggled in the first few weeks being a mother, but once I fell in love with Jazz, the realisations that birth was but a moment in time compared to the experiences and lessons that I need to teach her. In the future, no one will ask me how she was birthed. No one will compare her to another child and say "oh, well you can tell she was a c/s birth"... no, they will talk about the thins I've taught her, her attitudes towards life, respect towards other... etc...



BUT, at the same time...
Going through the labour and birth with Jazz, and then later on (9-12 months later on) realised that... the fact that I had grown a baby, brought a baby into the world who was healthy and happy, and was raising this baby, breastfeeding and using gentle methods ... for me, that built my inner strangth. Waking every night to her, and not allowing her to cry helplessly without me made me realise how strong I really was. I was strong in my resolve to mother gentley. I trusted in my instincts.

It was the opposite to the labour and birth, which I felt was so hard, forced, and in some ways very violent. And I realised... labour and birth, which was a loong but ultimately a tiny tiny moment in time compared to the 9 months preceding and the years proceeding it, did NOT define me as a mother.

Hmm... well for me I feel that the actual moment was insignificant, but the realisations coming from it were the most important things for me to learn.


I think (or, i'd like to think) I parent in the way I wanted birth to do... instintual and gentle, personal, loving.


Does that make sense... it makes so much sense in my head, but hard to write LOL

[onthefly]

Yes leasha, that makes sense to me and I agree. That's pretty much my take on the quote also.
It's about laying claim to our power as mothers to bear, birth and nuture our children.

[Lolli]

Gee you come up with some good threads Rory Posting to subscribe, I'll bbl aster dd is asleep

[fionas]

Hmmm.

My view is this:

1. I tried my best at labour and to some people I'm sure it looks like I failed. Epidural and forceps. To me, I was a champion. Three days of labour, posterior baby, three hours of pushing. Pain management techniques worked until the third day.

2. Breastfeeding. Tried and again, I'm sure to some people, I failed. When I got home from hospital for the first week, I got a half-hour break between trying to attach, expressing and feeding the expressed milk then a formula top-up. I went on to express for two months.

So I think my early experiences are just indicative of what sort of person I am. I'm not someone who gives up easily, I will try my damndest but at the end of the day, the only person's judgement that I respect and fear is my own.

I actually think I'm a pretty good mum but no, DD's birth and our BF experience are no longer important to me. I think being a mum is much more than that. But, on the other hand, I can totally understand how they would be traumatic.

[mrsmac]

I agree Leash, I had a very medical birth with DD1, induction, forceps, stirrups episiotomy etc yet now nearly 18 years on it means nothing, I rarely think about it. I was young when I had her and probably not the best mother but she has grown up into such a lovely girl/woman that all the hard times were worth it.
I am not sure when I will feel like I am a good mother as it seems to get harder every day but I guess I feel comfortable in my role as a moher at least!

[Oorki Galoorki]

Its all part of the journey..
DS birth was my 1st like anything 1st time i learnt SOOO much. i dont dwell on it (too much) but it has made me the mother i am today, each child and birth changes me more and makes me into a different mum

its kind of like how if you didnt get heart broken by your first love you wouldnt have been on the path to have met your current partner...

[Inanna]

Great thread Rory - I feel sick tonight so I can't give this my best.

However, I gave birth to my Motherhood when I birthed my first baby and my birth did set me up for my experience with her which was abysmal in many respects!
However, the strength and fortitude that I found in myself to birth her also set me up for what i needed to be her mother. I reflect on her birth and know that I really drew on my resources to birth her and I needed to do that to mother her.

With DS - well his birth showed me what my body could do in Peace surrounded by Love and a controlled environment of silence and darkness. He taught me to gather my instincts and listen to them - they will never fail me - that's what birthing him taught me.

DD6 taught me that my body Knows" what to do and that there is no by the book labour. Parenting her wasnt by the book either. She taught me that babies make their own rules!

DD5 taught me that I alone birthed - not my support but me. That me listening to my body and joining with the flow of my body, listening to the Wise Women that surround all birth would help me through. And they did. She taught me that I could trust myself, my decisions and my feelings. Thankyou Eva...

My angel babies my DD1 angel taught me that I could survive the death of my precious child. That the sun would still shine and the people in the street sipping coffee had no clues. No idea and that the orld would still go on... So I could go on - through torturous pain I could go on...

DS angel - He taught me that even in death I could feel joy - I cried through his labour, I laughed, I pushed and I felt triumph at the birth - for a moment. He taught me even in death there is joy.

DD angel - she gave me the strength to continue. She whispered to me that there would be a baby to hold warm in my arms. I parented differently from then on. I had a Faith that sometimes was shaken but it was part of me...

Imogen - when she was born I felt like God or the Goddess had spoken - had personally delivered her. I felt this incredible surge of strength for her angel siblings were in the room that day with the Wise Women of birth. I have no doubt. I could almost see tjem - but definitely I could feel them. Her birth confirmed that miracles happen. They happen and they are real. She taught me about thankfulness, gratitude and Grace. I drank in every second of her life with gratitude - as I never knew if she would stay - at least not for a while. That drinking in of her hasn't finished or changed. I hang on her every action, milestone and mannerisim. For in having her I lost so much - but gained her amazing Being.

I believe with each child we birth we change. There is a lesson, a quality that we are given. For me each birth formed my parenting experience.

[mrsmac]

I have tears in my eyes FC, you are a wise and beautiful woman.

[HotI]

I have had heaps of experience with making mothers, fathers, siblings, families through adoption and i think those bonds can be just as strong as genetic or gestational ones. Mothers can be strong, competent, capable mothers who trust themselves and know their inner strength without having ever given birth. However, i have also been witness to a birth (as a support person), and feel that i share a really special bond with the mother and child that was born.

[paradise lost]

Yes, DD's birth made me the mother i am, or at least the mother i was thosefirst few months. Those first few months made me the mother i was the next few months, and THOSE few months made me the mother i was the following year. And so on.

It was an incredibly transforming time for me, her birth, and there have been many subtle transformations since, as i travel the road of motherhood. I think the main thing her birth made me is flexible. It gave me the initial flexibility that i couldn't have made it through the first 3 weeks without. It made me dig deeper than i ever had before, but i know i've dug deeper since (Leasha - your "night after night" comment made me think of this!) Birth is only a day (ok, for the lucky) but you have to go on caring and loving and responding FOREVER. DD's birth made me dig deep enough and rewarded me enough that i could get through the first few weeks. I have been "giving birth" to myself as a mother at regular intervals ever since.

Bx

[Ca Plane Pour Moi]

I'll let you know when I give birth and become a mother!

I think if I had have given birth to DS, I would probably be a worse mother at first. I spent so long looking after DS on autopilot feeling nothing, just sticking to the parenting "ideal" I'd set up that I know I'd not have stuck to it otherwise - just looking at my friends drop their ideals and knowing that was OK because they were the Mama convinced me of that! And now those ideals are in part second nature.

I'd no way have been calm and patient after two hours sleep in about five days - I only was because I was expecting DS's mother to turn up soon and take him back. I'd not cuddle him as he screamed because "well, he's just screaming anyway". I'd not have learnt his favourite songs, or been excited to buy him his first Wiggles DVD after hearing about them here (I know, more fool me LOL), or calmly made him toast when he refused to eat the meal I spent two hours making that he won't even try. He wouldn't be able to name composers when I play songs on the piano - nor would he be able to play along. He wouldn't be anywhere near as emotionally aware nor would we spend hours just looking at each other and laughing. He'd just be my child and there tomorrow: I've gotten over the thought that his mum's going to arrive and take him off with her (I'd fight her if she did now - especially now he's sleeping at night!) but I still love watching Liebs grow, change, learn... and I love playing with him.

But I now do naughty things, especially when DH is away for the week, because his parents aren't going to find out! We can stay up after bathtime watching a Disney film snuggled on the sofa and not get told off! I'd not do that with my own child, I've always said. Well, not my own toddler. Maybe my own slightly older child on a weekend. But not just so I could maybe get a lie-in the next day. I'd also not consider it important to stand on a cold railway platform for hours with my own child, for Liebling it's his favourite outing so it's great to tell his Dad that we've done that today.

I think I'd be a lot worse mother than I am carer. So I'm kinda glad, for Liebs' sake, that I never gave birth!

eta - I forgot the best thing about not being Liebling's mother... absolutely no guilt when I take him to nursery and go to work!

[Lolli]

There are so many variables in this equation. I came out of ds's birth feeling shattered, broken, a shadow of the person I had been. I told my husband I felt like I needed trauma counselling, like I'd been in a horrific car accident- and that was before I'd ever heard the phrase 'birth trauma'. Of course it effected the way I parented him, especially in the early weeks. I was completley disconnected from this screaming, wriggling little bundle. His crying was a stab at my inadequacy, the desicions I made where steeped in guilt.

But, I had a bad case of PND, which effected my parenting more than the birth experience did. And that's where the variables start to add up- was the PND a result of the birth, or would it have happened anyway? If Id had a good birth, would I still have felt that disconnection, or was that partly a result of my whole world turning upside down, the fact that I knew nothing about babies?

I know it's early days yet but dd's birth was so different. It left me feeling confident, empowered, and intuitively connected to this tiny person who I bought into the world. It made me feel whole- completed, not depleted. And so far, the way I parent both kids have been effected by that- it made me more confident, more aware of their needs and my own.

But again, the variables. How much of this is beacuse I empowered myself, how much is luck? Is it just because I've so far avoided the PND? Is it happening this way because this time I have a little girl, or beacuse she's a better sleeper than ds was? Is she better sleeper because I know what I'm doing this time?

Most experiences that colour how we see ourselves and our world are diluted over time, and I imagine that birth is no different. I can't see ds's birth still being a cornerstone of my parenting in five or ten years time, but I'll keep dd's with me forever. Still, both of them are only a fraction of the total number of things that will-and have already- shape how I relate to my children, and how they relate to the world.

I remember in the postnatal classes I took for ds's birth, the mw running them pointed out that however scared we were of labour and birth, that wasn't the hard part- it was the next 18 years that would really be difficult.

[Inanna]

It is known that women who have had a traumatic or disappointing birthing experience have a higher risk (that is not to say that it happens to every woman) of bonding and parenting their new born.

I definitely fell into that category with DD14. Like Lady Zaidie experienced I went through the motions of caring for her. I fed her 24/7 and she cried probably 20 out of 24 hours. Some of it was due I think to sensory issues but I believe strongly that it was also to do with her birth.

Like LorieRae I felt traumatised after her birth. My body was torn and sore and I had had to fight off obstetric involvement and was being literally forced to agree to a c/section.

After a few months I was able to harness the strength and fortitude I clearly had during her birth and I could look at it differently.

Kate07: Of course adoptive parents can make wonderful parents. It really cannot be compared here and it'snot really what this is about. Physiologically, spiritually and emotionally when we give birth our bodies have a chemical response. If we have been unsupported emotionally or physically - if we had a traumatic experience this has some affect on how we Mother. That is a given.

That doesn't mean that if you don't physically birth a baby that you can't or won't be an amazing mother - just that the process is different.

When we give birth we give birth to or Mama Bear - she is born aat the same time - I am sure that adoptive Mamas have that also but it's a different journey.

[Roryrory]

That doesn't mean that if you don't physically birth a baby that you can't or won't be an amazing mother - just that the process is different.

For sure! Same thing goes for mothers that haven't birthed vaginally.

The reason I posed this thread is that for many women the birth process has the potential to really set up a pattern in their mothering. Adoptive mums have their own process which sets them on a particular path, those of us who had easy times go on another, and so on. And no matter how we come to be mothers, the initiation we faced at the threshhold of that world seems to have a hold on us.

But fathers? They don't seem to be affected in the same way. D'uh, you might say, even biological dads aren't actually "having" the baby, they are just bystanders in the process. What I am getting at is that rightly or wrongly men don't seem to carry the guilt and emotion about their kids the way mums do. (Sheesh I am going OT in my own thread here (but it's my thread and I'll OT if I wanna )

I'll give my DH as an example. He is a full time SAHD and is often the one telling me on weekends when our boys should take a nap. Now he is with them all day and sometimes I come home and the place is a mad house (as SAHMs will no doubt appreciate this can happen quite easily - the other day he said he only got dinner cooked because he put Oliver in our hiking harness). But he doesn't seem to have the guilt about his parenting that my SAHM friends do. He is universally strict when he needs to be and doesn't give in to their emotional appeals (in the way I am wont to do). But he is loving and playful and fun as well.

Now - how does this relate to the thread topic, you ask? I really don't know, but its more an observation that fathers, especially ones like my DH who are very hands on with parenting, ones who can be as good as a "mother" can (I say that because many believe a father can never love like a mother can - this is not true), can get their bond and into the groove with their children without ever having given birth.

What is it about us that make loving our children such a physical thing; so inherently connected to our body, our skin? I sometimes look at my boys' shoulders, their hands, feet - and love them. I love their physicality - their actual shoulders, hands and feet. Morbidly I think how hard it would be to ever see their bodies harmed, as eons of mothers before me have seen in accidents, wartime, suicides. Is this somehow related to birth? I don't doubt adoptive mothers love in the same way - is it therefore something that is inherent in women?

Sorry for rambling - I probably should have stopped ages ago......

[Inanna]

Aaah baby you keep going - if some would call it rambling so be it. I call it entralling!!!

My children's father had a really tough time bonding with our first born - and I do think it was due to the trauma. However, the bonding with the next 3 was quite evident. The births were empowered, gentle and peaceful. I trusted all my body did and I think that was reflected out.

I know what you mean about loving your children - all the bits of them. I look at my only son and his bony skinny little chest and think: "one day that will have hair and you will hold your woman or man close" but always he will be my skinny little boy!

I look at their feet - unweathered from the world. Fresh and new. I wonder where those feet will walk. I love them and the times that I have lashed out and smacked - I have felt such incredible disgust that I could harm anything on them...

I don't know if that is maternal and only with birth mothers - however I think it develops for adoptive mothers too??? I'm not sure. Sometimes my mother bear rises and I think "whoa where'd you come from"??? She is vicious and so protective...

I too fear I am rambling...

[Ca Plane Pour Moi]

Oooooh, I get another gem in my "bad mother" crown today.

Liebling loves running around the football pitch. He gets on the "train tracks" (the white lines) and runs around the pitch. I stand and watch. Yes, there is a car park. Yes, there is a road. But if he goes off the white lines, I will get to him before he gets there. I am fast (and there is a bit of distance and I'm standing nearer the cars than Lieb gets). But many dog-walkers on the field just label me as a "bad mother" for letting my son be on the other side of a football pitch from me, perfectly safe, whilst I talk to his Nursery carer.

Does that mean I don't love Liebling? Of course I do! He's up four times in the night, I like that he only wants to sleep snuggled up with me in my bed. I like that I am his security and his comfort. I love the way he talks, the way he thinks, the way he is so polite. Even having a tantrum, he screams "no thank you" over and over. He's a great little person. If a bit obsessed with playing that everything is a train track.

And I'm a "dad" in that I don't give in to emotional appeals. Maybe it's because my emotional needs weren't always met growing up (although they were as a young child). Maybe it's because I dislike tantrums sone whinging so I don't reward it. I'm cold-hearted enough to say "no". But I like the way it is helping Liebling to develop; he knows to ask nicely if he wants something.

And despite a lot of things, DH loves Liebs just as much as I ever could. He's a great dad - and very hands-on. We both enjoy watching Liebs grow and develop, and knowing that we're helping to mould the adult that he will be. Even without giving birth, you still love. I've yet to find a "mama bear" or any of that sort of thing, but I'm actually pretty pleased I've never needed one yet!