Well, after having a good rest last night, I feel better about the whole birth thing. As my dh keeps reminding me, in many ways there is no "battle", because we won't be having a hospital birth (unless need to transfer urgently). I am beginning to understand the comments on the AIMS website about women becoming so fed up with it that they even consider having no mw. While I wouldn't have an unassisted birth, I do feel more anxious about who will be attending, and whether I get a nice mw. It has made me rethink certain parts of my draft birth plan, so that I am more inclined to have a mw there to observe etc. and not necessarily provide suggestions and be very hands-on. That would make sense in terms of the hypnotherapy techniques, too.
As a laugh, on the yahoo home birth group last night I laughed and told dh that a press officer from the NCT was asking for stories from women on the group who had had trouble with planning a hb, and to find out about the state of midwifery services in the UK. I laughed because I said that her inbox would be inundated. Then she sent me an email direct asking me whether I'd be interested, as the press officer was interested in my story! Well, why the hell not. I will probably remain anonymous, though. Mine isn't even an epic melodrama of overcoming struggles etc. No so far, at any rate!
We are off to Manc tomorrow to see my family and collect baby things from my sister. I should be more excited but dh has so much work on, and is getting behind and has had no choice but to spend the last few Sundays working to prepare tutorials for the Mondays, and he also is about to start giving lectures and hasn't had chance to prepare those yet (luckily they are already written- that in itself takes MONTHS). Anyway, he is stressing because he doesn't know when he'll get time to prepare for the tutorials this weekend, as we'll be travelling for some of it and be involved the rest of the time. I am a little worried that we've not even touched the nursery to move the furniture, and we'll have huge bin bags of stuff from my sister, with nowhere to put it, and no room for the cot to get put up. I sadly had a feeling this was going to happen. I've been trying to urge dh to get cracking with it, but he thought we' have more time (despite my urging), and now it looks like we really won't have time to get me a car, either. That doesn't matter sooo much to me, except that my boss is asking when I'll get one, and for my work I am having to get up really early to drop dh off first, and some days he needs the car, which can occasionally clash with my work. It's all a bit much.
I've also got to get some more nappies in (which means researching what we might need), as well as a wet bag (NB STEPH, which was the one you recommended?), and order our cot mattress (es), if we do want to go down the organic route. It may be that we won't now due to costs and time. We also have to get the birth pool sorted. I don't want to go ahead and order things without checking with him first, seeing as I've not had much cash coming in due to the off-peak season. I also want to spread the costs without leaving it too late in terms of deliveries and unexpected or last-minute purchases.
I am also a little concerned about how few full weekends we have left (assuming that I won't be up to much for the last month or more), and dh seems to have to work every Sunday. On several Saturdays we are doing courses, or he is doing something and he also hasn't been able to come back to church with me on a Sunday, which is a pain because the baptism courses start soon, and I now look obviously pregnant (altho stuff what people think!). It seems like I'll just have to do most of it, which I wouldn't mind quite so much if the hb thing hadn't got more challenging. Dh also has to see about flights and a visa for going to give a lecture in America in April (am getting my parents to come and stay with me just in case, as I'll only have 5 weeks to go by then ). There's no assuming he'll get the visa, esp after we left the country right after he got a speeding ticket and a court summons about it, tho he wrote and explained.
Better stop winging. I am just a little worried and I suppose that I am getting the need to nest and prepare. It'll probably all be fine time-wise, but in case the hb thing really kicks off at the last minute, I want to not have to worry or think about anything else. This baby will arrive and he'll have no idea about the nappies and slings, or even how to dress the poor thing!
I'm worrying too much.
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