rebeccakuder

“Go away, you rainsnout…” NOVEMBER! (30 days with the inner critic)

photo of Gaunt park at sunset

Dear people,

I am issuing a gift/challenge/invitation for the month of November (a month I love to abhor, by way of Tom Waits’ “November,” which you can hear him perform here and read lyrics below.).

(If you read this after November, it’s never too late. Start anytime! And this does not have to be elaborate. You can simply do a 2 minute power pose, then write “Dear Inner Critic” across the top of a page, and write a letter. Or skip the power pose—though if you’ve never tried a power pose, it might be useful. It might help you feel stronger as you approach the letter.)

*

Every day, for 30 days, communicate with the inner critic. (If you miss a day, okay. But do as many days as you can.) (If you don’t know what the inner critic is, good for you! You don’t need this practice. If you do need it, read on.)

This work involves free-writing without stopping, without editing. The general rules are to keep writing for a set amount of time (or one page), and if you don’t know what to write, just write the words “tick tick tick” until you get back to what you are writing. If you only have 5 minutes, that’s fine! It can still be very useful. (The “tick tick tick” is courtesy of Lynda Barry, whom I’ve blogged about here.)

OPTIONAL PREPARATION (Not mandatory, but helpful):

DAY ONE: Get paper and pen.

Imagine, describe, SEE the inner critic. (If you watch Lynda Barry’s video, you might think of the inner critic as the mom with the bacon, interrupting the kid in the middle of his playing to say, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”) It’s fun to start by drawing the Inner Critic—use the Lynda Barry method using a random shape, then making it into a monster or character. Whatever works! But don’t think it in your head. Instead, move pen on paper to make the thing come to life (and to get it out of your body). Set a timer for 2 or 3 minutes if it helps. You can describe the inner critic with words if you want to. The point is to somehow embody (on paper) the inner critic. When you’re done drawing or writing the character, take a moment to name this thing.

Then on a new page, write Dear Inner Critic… and write a letter, as long as you want. Sign your name when you’re done. (I’ve done this with young people who have asked “Can I use bad words?” Yes. You can use bad words.) 

DAY TWO (& BEYOND)

Write a letter to the inner critic/monster/thingy every day for 30 days. You can also try any of the activities below if you get bored with letters. But remember, boredom is often good and necessary! I’ve done a letter every day for 30 days. One page at the beginning of my morning pages. (If you don’t know what the morning pages are, go here.) When I wrote a one page letter to my inner critic for 30 days, I arrived at some plateaux where I thought I was saying the same thing day after day (and thought, This isn’t getting me anywhere!). It got a little boring. But I kept doing it day after day, and noticed that things began to shift. I gained some pretty nuanced understanding of the dynamic between “me” and the inner critic (which is part of me, of course, which is part of the point). Among other things.

Alternatives to the daily letter (use any or all, combine, okay!):

  • Write the GIFT that you would give your inner critic. (It’s my suspicion that there is something the inner critic is lacking.) Describe the gift in great detail, how you would wrap the gift, etc. Really give time to What’s missing? What do they need? You might try: Dear Inner Critic, if I could give you a gift, it would be… (What is his/her/their/its deepest unmet need?) (You can also give them something you want to give them, but which they would not necessarily want!)
  • Write a dialogue between you and critic—you get the first line and the last line!
  • Write a physical fight scene!
  • Draw a one-page comic! Color it in! Good, good good!

If you know some friends who want to do this together (every day, or at some point in the month) maybe after you write, someone will want to read back what they wrote. If so, while the person reads, everyone else must draw a slow, careful spiral a la Lynda Barry’s practice, and listen quietly–MOST IMPORTANTLY, GIVE NO FEEDBACK!

Take care of yourself. This inner critic practice can be hard and upsetting, so please do figure out what support you need. It can bring up stuff that might need more time and attention than you can easily give it. Have a cup of tea or some sitting and breathing (or whatever nourishes you) as needed, and be extra generous with yourself now.

Please let me know how it goes! I’m going to do it, too. (Eeek!)

Love, Rebecca

p.s. I’ve written about self-doubt here.

p.p.s. I’ve written about the inner critic practice, including some of my letters, here.

p.p.p.s. If this practice is useful to you, remember: YOU CAN DO THIS ANYTIME! You don’t have to do it for a whole month. Have a job interview? Put the inner critic in its place before you brush your teeth that day! Find the inner critic something else to DO while you do what you need & want to do (without static from the inner critic).

*

The Black Rider (Soundtrack)

The Black Rider (Soundtrack) by Tom Waits

November

No shadow
No stars
No moon
No cars
NovemberIt only believes
In a pile of dead leaves
And a moon
That’s the color of boneNo prayers for November
To linger longer
Stick your spoon in the wall
We’ll slaughter them allNovember has tied me
To an old dead tree
Get word to April
To rescue me
November’s cold chainMade of wet boots and rain
And shiny black ravens
On chimney smoke lanes
November seems odd
You’re my firing squad
November

With my hair slicked back
With carrion shellac
With the blood from a pheasant
And the bone from a hare

Tied to the branches
Of a roebuck stag
Left to wave in the timber
Like a buck shot flag

Go away you rainsnout
Go away blow your brains out
November

rebeccakuder

Spring One-Day Seminar at Antioch Writers’ Workshop: March 24, 2018

two images of garlic (top-cross section of cloves, then bottom, whole head)
Maybe we’ll write about garlic. Who knows?

Dive Into Your Story!

I’m thrilled to be teaching at the Antioch Writers’ Workshop one-day “Dive into your story” workshop. We’ll play!

When: Saturday, March 24, 2018, 9am-4:30pm

Where: University of Dayton

To register, go here.

 

rebeccakuder

Breeching Protocol (a birth story)

Breeching Protocol

by Rebecca Kuder

(An abbreviated version of this essay was published in Midwifery Today, Issue Number 106, Summer 2013.  Following is the essay in its entirety.)  

The nurse couldn’t find my cervix.

What was I doing here, in this medical factory?  The Plan had been to have a natural birth, at a birth center, assisted by a midwife, with support from my husband and doula.  But circumstances changed the plan.

I was 41 and pregnant for the first time.  Forty-one is considered advanced maternal age (AMA) by the AMA (American Medical Association).  AMA also means “against medical advice.”  Like, for example, when someone leaves the asylum without benediction of the medicos.

Convention pushes against natural birth.  When I told my previous obstetrician I was interested in the natural birth center connected to the hospital where he worked, mentioning water birth, he laughed and said, “I don’t have waders!”  So I left him and met the birth center midwives, who were in practice with an enlightened OB, Dr. Stephen Guy, and hired a doula named Amy Chavez.

* * *

Pregnant women are fed on fear.  Browsing at Barnes and Noble, I saw more books about miscarriage and loss than about healthy, natural pregnancies and birth.  Anxious and mildly obsessive by nature, now I was pregnant with the scarlet “AMA.”  But instinct told me to avoid too many books and late-night Internet searches.  After reading a few customer reviews of What to Expect When You’re Expecting, I saw a reference to Ina May Gaskin’s books.  Spiritual Midwifery eclipsed the scary images of birth that are splattered across mainstream TV and film.

* * *

Against type, I cultivated the ability to relax, indulging in massage and prenatal yoga.  I paid attention to my thoughts, challenged my fear and negativity.  With my doula, I acknowledged terrors, dispelled some anxiety.  I wanted to prepare for anything, but knew I had to quiet my obsessions about how things could go wrong.

That year, I was taking a class called conscious living/conscious dying, which was about preparing to die, and how to live more fully.  We discussed pessimism: the way people assume something will be hard, or impossible.  Instead of approaching birth with the assumption of difficulty, the teacher suggested I consider, “how easy this will be.”  I drew a ten-centimeter circle and focused on it, visualized opening.  I read that what we believe about breastfeeding (and whether or not we can easily nourish our babies) affects milk supply.  Applying that notion to birth, I did an exercise from Birthing From Within.  I drew pictures of what I thought would happen, and what I wanted to happen.  Before thinking, I drew the picture of what I thought would happen: the baby was head-up.  A breech baby.

* * *

To each prenatal visit, I brought a list of (obsessive) questions.  “What if the baby is breech?”  I asked Dr. Guy, during my second trimester.

“Don’t worry about that now,” he said.  But because I hadn’t “proven” I could give birth, I probably wouldn’t be “allowed” to do it naturally.  I had learned to trust Dr. Guy.  I knew he supported natural birth if he thought it was safe.

When I was 33 weeks pregnant, our daughter hadn’t turned head down yet.  Only about three to four percent of babies are breech after week 37.  By week 37, she still hadn’t turned.

Breech babies’ heads comes out last–trouble if the head is too large.  There is also the risk of cord prolapse–the umbilical cord is squeezed, limiting the flow of oxygen and blood to the baby.

Dr. Guy tried to turn the baby from outside my belly.

I breathed deeply.

“You’re a good relaxer,” he said.  But she wouldn’t turn.  He smiled and said, “She’s stubborn!”

We scheduled an external version–in the hospital “just in case” I went into labor, or needed an emergency C-section.  Then Dr. Guy hurt his back.  Could I trust another doctor, relax with a stranger?  And if it worked, I would have to wear a girdle so the baby would not turn back to breech.  This sounded medieval.  If I waited to go into labor, the baby might turn at the last moment, allowing a vaginal birth.  This happens.  Or I could schedule a C-section.  In my desire to avoid surgery, I left the question to time and nature.  Caesarian sections are chillingly common nationwide, comprising about 23% of all live births in Ohio.  When necessary, medical interventions can be essential and lifesaving.  But I wanted a natural birth.

Why hadn’t the baby turned?  Perhaps there’s a good reason she’s breech, I thought.  “Trust your instincts,” I told her, “If you need to be born breech, it’s okay.”  In the meantime: inversions, moxibustion, visualization, and chiropractic.  Fetal speakers placed low on my pelvis, my husband Robert and I played the Ramones, and Elvis Costello, trying to snake-charm her to turn.

Because the baby was in the frank rather than another breech position, Dr. Guy didn’t consider a vaginal birth prohibitively risky.  He learned we had great support from our doula.  He respected our commitment to natural birth.  I was lucky.  Dr. Guy was one of the only two “old school” doctors around who still supported vaginal breech birth.  Medical students don’t learn this stuff anymore.

I’d have to go to labor and delivery, not the birth center.  This was disappointing.  Labor and delivery was just a few turns down the hall, but miles away in enlightenment.

“And,” Dr. Guy said, “The best thing you can do is come to the hospital at eight centimeters dilated, and have labor progress smoothly.”

No problem.

* * *

A week after my due date, midmorning, mild cramps began.  I ate a sandwich.  Robert made final corrections to a collection of short stories and sent them to his publisher.  After lunch, I rested in bed.  The contractions strengthened.  Over the phone, Amy suggested I rest and eat, reminding me that early labor can last a while.  I called Dr. Guy.  Five minutes apart, my contractions were still pretty mild.

Around dinnertime, Dr. Guy called to check my progress.  He said to come to the hospital when my contractions were 2-3 minutes apart and I had trouble walking or talking.  About ten o’clock, Amy arrived, and gave me a massage.  Robert, always a counterbalance to my anxiety, seemed calm.  Home was a cocoon, safe, peaceful.  Though we forgot to take photos, fixed in my mind are the winter night shades of our living room, the heart of our house, dark purple sofa, woodsy trim, and my deep red nightgown.  Time was velvety, as we three steeped in this mystical stew of hushed intensity.  Wrapped in the purple-striped shawl my mother had knit, enveloped with warmth and maternal love, I was aware of this special thing happening, expectation, a quiet gem waiting, waiting.  The night was thick and dark as my pain swelled and subsided.  I moaned, trying not to wake the others as they napped.  In bed, during contractions, Robert pressed his knees into my back to relieve pressure.  Amy reminded me that each contraction, each specific moment of pain, would never return: once a contraction is over, say goodbye, let it go.

* * *

Around six a.m., everything intensified.  Was it time to go to the hospital?  Amy suggested I take a bath, then see how I felt.  She explained what to expect at the hospital–answering intake questions, being admitted to labor and delivery.  Within reason, the longer I could wait, the less chance my labor would stall.  The more chance of birthing naturally.

Amy said giving birth was the hardest thing I would ever do.

Daylight finally came, and with it, more optimism.  Robert made hash browns and a goat cheese omelet; all I could eat were small bites of toast with almond butter.  I drank a little cocoa.  I went to the bathroom and bled, tangible proof of what was happening.  Progress.

By one p.m. on Sunday, about twenty-four hours after the stronger contractions had begun, we decided to go to the hospital.  After weeks of dress rehearsal, I put on my birth bracelet, each bead given by a friend, colors spangling my wrist with love.

The nurse who couldn’t find my cervix summoned another nurse who could.  She said I was eight or nine centimeters dilated.  (As the doctor ordered!)  Although the nurse offered a wheelchair, I walked to the birthing room.  Because I was Group B Strep positive, which means there was a slight chance of passing it on to the baby, protocol necessitated IV antibiotics.  And, though the nurse knew I wanted a natural birth, she said an intravenous site was necessary just in case I wanted pain medication.

It seemed the nurse was waiting for me to break, and scream out for an epidural, like a clichéd movie scene.  I touched my birth bracelet.  The Mylar hospital wristbands clashed with the multicolored beads, juxtaposing the medical and the beautiful.

Labor was nine additional hours of breathing, working, chanting ohm…I laughed, wondering what the hospital staff thought of our hippie circle of three, almost four.  After I’d been pushing for a while, Dr. Guy broke my water to relieve the pressure.  Hooked up to IV saline and monitors, I tried lying in different positions.  Amy was benevolence embodied, contrasting the bossy coach nurse.  I focused inside, and bid good riddance to each contraction.

The nurse yelled:

“Don’t give up!”

“Push my fingers out!”

“Show us what you got!”

“Just get around that corner!”

Is there a corner somewhere inside my body that I didn’t know about?

With false sincerity, she said, “I know, I know,” but without much credibility.  Yelling, “Push!” at a laboring woman does not to help open the birth sphincter.

I wish I’d told the nurse that words have power and hers were not helping.  I formulated sentences in my head, ways to tell her, but it seemed pointless.  Her hand was inside my body and my daughter needed to be born.

Amy, who had a great working relationship with Dr. Guy, cornered him in the hallway.  She told him I’d probably kill the nurse but that I’d be able to birth this baby naturally because I trusted him.  If he recommended a C-section, I’d believe him.  He returned, which was reassuring, though the nurse was still in the primary spot between my legs.  But having Dr. Guy there, touching my arm, smiling, helped me feel safer.  I’d come to trust his voice, his round, childlike face.  His presence soothed like sunshine.  Later, I learned this was unusual–the OB usually arrives just in time to catch the baby.

I was exhausted.

Robert joked about a contortionist who squeezed himself through the head of a tennis racket.

Robert gave me water when I was thirsty.

Amy helped me find breath.

I thought, “This would be okay if not for the heartburn!”

I only recall feeling fear once: during a very strong contraction, as I was chanting ohm, my voice wavered.  Chanting had become my buoy, bringing focus, and when that faltered, my head dipped underwater.  But somehow I knew I would be okay.  All the women who’d ever birthed helped pull me through.  I never doubted I could do it.

* * *

Somewhere in the cascade of pushing, a new nurse arrived; the first nurse’s shift was over.  Gentler, wiser, the new nurse suggested different positions.  But the first nurse stayed, wanting to see the breech birth.

Even Dr. Guy, a valiant proponent of natural birth, would have recommended a C-section after two hours of pushing, but he had to go catch another baby.

Many women describe the moment of birth as feeling split in two.  The description fits.  I pushed, pushed, pushed…I’d been pushing for four hours; strangely, it didn’t seem that long, yet each breath and each movement of muscle was eternal.  The baby must be partially out–she must be.  But she was still inside my body, and there was more work to do.

When the baby was finally ready, we moved to the operating room…protocol, “just in case.”  By then, I knew I’d push her out naturally.  Someone asked if I wanted to touch her when she was crowning, or in her case, butting.  I didn’t, I couldn’t, it scared me; I needed to focus on my work.  But a few pushes later I put my hand between my legs.  I felt her emerging.  My body had been changed for months by her body, but now here was her form, blossoming.  I felt the force of her, almost here, and I felt gravity, and I felt the world.

And then Merida was born, though we hadn’t named her yet.  Dr. Guy lay her on my belly.  She was sweet and slippery and new, and she was our baby, and writing this, and thinking about that moment makes me cry.  As memories fade or are immortalized into story by retelling, I don’t want to forget the sensation of her slick little body on mine, us, finally together, skin to skin.

They put a striped hat on her head, and a warm blanket over us.  She was fine and I was fine and it was amazing and wonderful and I was so glad to be done!

The placenta came out, and Dr. Guy said I’d torn a little and needed stitches.  I don’t recall feeling pain then: in our weary celebration, I was experiencing a metaphorical orgasm.  She was here.  We were done.

* * *

While they wheeled me back to the labor room, I told Dr. Guy how grateful I was that I’d been allowed to do this.  He’d forgotten my age.  Amy stayed for a little while but needed to go before she was too tired to drive.  The three of us had summoned this power, formed a circle of humor and love and rubber-band-bonded-glue-team: mama, papa, and doula, a family, in a way.  There was a new hole, with Amy gone.

Before we were transferred to postpartum, the new nurse asked me for a hug–she said I’d made them all look good.  I was glad people were impressed with how hard I’d worked.

As I think about enduring a breech birth without medication, with very little fear, two clashing facts seem crucial: 1) It will hurt; 2) Our bodies are made to do this.

Support from Robert and Amy, laboring at home, and the Ina May energy embodied in my birth bracelet gathered to protect me from the harshness of the hospital IV jewelry and what it represented.  Dr. Guy was experienced and comfortable–accepting breech as another normal (if rare) birth position.  A warm, caring, giant-hearted man, he wanted the birth we wanted.  I’ve since learned more about the AMA (American Medical Association, in this case) and their vast lack of support for natural birth.  Envisioning how hard it must be for Dr. Guy to work in this context, my gratitude to him is ever-deepening.  And as one of the midwives had said, they’d had several “good” breech births recently.  Unwittingly, the other woman whose baby Dr. Guy had to go catch gave me more time.

I was lucky to have these people help me birth my daughter.

I had no reason to believe I could do it.  I let go.  I trusted that I would have medical help if truly necessary.  Amy was my fierce angel.  Robert never faltered; he was completely present and real throughout the whole adventure.

As a 41-year-old first time mother, at this point in the history of birth, having my breech baby naturally felt like a victory.  My baby and I worked together: to/get/her into the air, healthy and whole.  Because I’d advocated for myself, and the birth was so powerful, I entered motherhood clearheaded and victorious.  Strong.  Like a warrior goddess.

Women’s bodies are made to birth babies, including breech babies.

My story should not be so unusual.