Illogically Enthused (What medical nutjobs fail to see)

I was tumblin’ this morning like ya do on summer break after sleeping for 14 straight hours, and I came across a post on my dashboard from another local mama-to-be detailing a barrage against her well reasoned hospital birth plan.

This is where both sides of the medical fence are in error.

While she catches hell for wanting a hospital birth with legitimate life threatening complications that no reasonable midwife would take on at home or a birth center anyway, I catch hell for being healthy and young and planning on a birth center birth with no intention of even looking at OB/GYN practitioners.

No matter what either of us chooses, based on our own history and needs, there will be a medical field nut job/ advocate/ unreasonably bossy person in our lives telling us that we’re wrong purely because they prefer a different type of medicine.

I love naturopathic medicine, and I’m nutty about midwifery. That didn’t stop me from being on serious narcotics and having surgery to remove my right uterine tube earlier this year. Sticking with natural medicine in that situation would have killed me months ago. My surgeon told my family post op that she was guessing, from the amount of blood in my abdominal cavity, that I only had about a day left to live if that completely necessary, fully invasive procedure hadn’t been done.

There is a time and a place for both types of medicine. In 3 more years, I’ll be a full fledged primary care naturopathic physician here in Oregon. I’ll be able to take care of all of the things that a primary care physician needs to be able to take care of- hormone balancing, stitches, prescribing drugs, basic health support of all kinds. I’ll also be able to gauge the situations and refer to an MD or a surgeon when a health situation escalates beyond primary care.

This is an important and very necessary step!

No health care provider can provide all care for every patient. We need to be open minded and logical as we look at health care situations. Personal decisions based on the comfort level of the patient, the history of the patient, and plausible outcomes of the patient should never be judged and found wanting, just because our own personal beliefs disagree

Before we tell you about Germany...we have some other news.

99.9% effective is apparently not all the protection it's cracked up to be.
And we kept it a secret for 10 weeks this time, so we're almost out of the danger zone.
Keep your fingers (buns?) crossed.
Backdated posts to follow

Medieval times

Though energy is down, and sucking wind is up, our trip to cochen castle was a ton of fun!


From the brown bread with lard to the wasser with gahs (bubblies) to the turkey leg that was the size of my forearm, it was a night that was surprisingly alright on the stomach. (also! First day I haven’t thrown up in Deutchland.)



My husband and I danced with the “Lords and Ladies”, saw two secret passageways, took pictures with the roses (cochen castle is suppose to be sleeping beauty’s castle- I had to get me some rose pictures), and had ice cream down in the town.



Ice cream always stays down. This kid is clearly related to me.



Today is the pig festival in wittlich (or something spelled equivalently) where villagers have been killing pigs out of spite for a very long time. And it’s raining, hurray! I can’t wait to get outside.

Being from the northwest USA, this much straight sunshine and 90 degrees has been weirding me out. Give me yo drizzle, sky!

Schwangershaft und reisen

One car ride, two airplanes, and a shuttle ride later, we have arrived in Germany!




I told my husband that if he ever gets me knocked up a couple months before we travel to Europe again, we will have harsh words.



My stomach seems to be a bit shy of airport and airplane bathrooms, so instead of being nauseous, throwing up, and then feeling better for a couple hours before putting that cycle on repeat, I was miserable for pretty much the whole trip. Of course, airplane food doesn’t really help the situation. Nor did the devil child in the chair behind me, who kicked my seat for 8 hours while it’s father indulgently smiled at the little spawn.

Once we got to the in-laws house (which is absolutely gorgeous, btdubs) and I puked for a while, then took a nap, everything was much better.



I’ve even eaten meat (!!!)

We went out to dinner last night, and I had grechensnetzle or something equivalent, which turned out to be gyro meat (lamb) and french fries in a delicious goo. Totally stayed down.

Being able to carnivore it up makes me happy.



Speaking of which- 9 weeks along!

Baby’s got fingers (webbed) and is working on finishing those 4 heart chambers this week. Go, baby, go!



I can feel my skin starting to stretch out on my abdomen. It’s weird, it feels like I’m perpetually at the level of stretch that I’d normally have during a total backbend. Mother-in-law gave me a bottle of cream that helped her, and I started using that last night. So thoughtful! I had no inkling of bringing skin care stuff like that. I’m glad that Moms and Mominlaws know what ya need, cuz I’m so clueless.



All the clinical embryology in the world doesn’t actually give you any common sense.



Now, for a lovely day of German bread, chocolate, and walking in beautiful old streets!

internet images

*Actual baby may vary.




I stole this off of the all wonderful google, to celebrate our first meeting with a midwife!



I strongly believe that a woman’s body is built to withstand the process of birth- and that if women couldn’t handle birth naturally, then our entire species would have gone extinct thousands of years ago.



Papa-to-be and I went down to the Portland waterbirth center, Andaluz, which has a staff of 8 professional, licensed midwives and 5 beautiful rooms with huge tubs, gorgeous showers, beautiful beds, and the same strong belief that birth can be non-traumatic, lovely, and natural. They operate on an informed consent basis, which is nice- especially since most people have no idea that they’ve consented to screening/ procedures until those things show up in a medical history. This means I don’t have to agree to a hepB vaccine at birth (which, you know, isn’t great for baby during its first day of life) or antibacterial eye drops (since I don’t have chlamydia) or even to having my baby leave the room that I’m in for the first little bit of it’s tiny adorable life.



What’s new at 8 weeks?



Well, I was a size 6 a couple weeks ago, but now I’m wearing my size 10’s that I (thank the good lord) hadn’t donated yet. I’ve also re-graduated into bras that I’d lost weight out of, and might need new ones soon.



Eating is still a challenge, and I’ve basically been a vegetarian for the last week, which is an interesting experience for a dedicated carnivore. Tempeh is so weird. I can’t tell if I like it or hate it- but I can tell that it stays in my tummy!

(and really, at this point, that’s all that counts.)



Big fan of the Apple Cider Vinegar- having a sip before a meal decreases my chances of throwing up that meal by about a third- and it’s such a simple remedy!



I love naturopathic medicine.



Also coming in at 8 weeks- 3 wonderful years of marriage to my favorite nurse!

The man of the house has been so wonderful- taking care of all of the smelly stuff so that I don’t have to, making iced ginger tea, giving me backrubs, intense tournaments of Jenga, and incredibly sweet goofy grins every time that guy looks at me. <3



Thursday all of my bloodwork comes in, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say that I feel like I am exactly where I am supposed to be right now.

NPR, Baby!

Well, baby-


According to this article, you’re going to like peas, hummus, pesto and cream cheese on potato bread, ginger tea, graham crackers, and mango sorbet.



Someday, when I don’t throw up almost every meal I eat, I will introduce you to a world of delicious and exotic flavors!