How To Tell If Your Husband Really Loves You

Despite Cher's warblings, it's NOT in his kiss.  It's totally wrapped up in his willingness to take 2 days off work to drive you to another state so you can attend a guest lecture by America's most "famous" hippie midwife.

For those of you that know me at all, you know I am *slightly* obsessed with all things birth and read pretty much everything ever printed about it.  So, you wouldn't have been surprised to have seen this book on my nightstand for the last 10 months:

Spiritual Midwifery by Ina May Gaskin, bookmark by Amelia

I bought it online on my due date with Liberty and paid extra to have it shipped overnight.  I was trying to get my head in the game for my upcoming home birth and thought what better way to do that than to dive straight in to the world of hippie birthing.

Ina May Gaskin is a self taught midwife who, in her free time from lecturing and teaching, attends births on The Farm, a self sustaining "commune" in Tennessee.  She's AMAZING.  She is spry at 70, witty and wise, and all things a midwife should be, like motherly and possessing of many flowy skirts and Birkenstocks.  Her punch lines are as hard hitting as her facts about the unfortunately sad state of birth care in the US.  Having seen her earlier this year at the Midwifery Today conference, it took me about 3 seconds to decide I really really really wanted to go to this lecture when I first read about it a month ago online.  When I broached the subject with Chris, he was like "Cool, let's go."

Huh? 

You mean, you want to take off work, arrange babysitting for Rory, drive to Alabama, and sit through a lecture that will most likely in some way lightheartedly disparage men and their feeble attempts to understand the exclusively female activity of birth, as well as certainly involve use of the proper terms for parts of the female anatomy?  Now I remember why I married you!!!

So, we sent Rory to a sleepover at a friend's house and packed up Liberty, a pack n play, 2 bags, and my beloved copy of Spiritual Midwifery and went to Huntsville to see the inimitable Ina May.

Unfortunately, we forgot the camera.  Therefore I have only cell phone pictures of this event.  Boo.

I was very excited.

Chris was less so, but putting up a good front.  Liberty was jealous of all the breastfeeding infants in the lobby with their mothers.

Then, they let us in the auditorium!  Ina May was surfing the net on her Mac while we waited.

Then, she talked!  And we all sat, rapturously listening.  There were so many heads bobbing and people saying "yes!" it was like being at church.  Actually, there was even one lady behind us invoking "Jesus!" every time she said something especially shocking. 

She said many things that were memorable, but the most memorable thing she said was in response to a question from the event organizer.  It was kind of a "boring" question, so I thought:  "Ina May, what is your favorite thing about being a midwife?"  Ina May thought for a moment and said, "Oh, I guess it's probably the part where I get to watch people turn into parents.  You see them go through the whole journey of birth, and if they're a really good couple that works well together and really has a lot of love, you can see it in their baby.  You just watch and you see that baby kind of get their bearings in the world and look around and realize "Oh, I'm one of the lucky ones!  I've got it real good here."  And it's those babies that you see smiling so soon, sometimes even in the first hour.  People always say it's gas, but I'm sorry... gas doesn't look like that."  

Of course I was totally about to cry, seeing in my mind's eye this picture of Liberty when she was 4 days old:

So, I turn to glance my adoring eyes on her and Chris, who have been so well behaved the whole time I was in another world soaking up the wisdom of Ina May, and this is what I see:

Which of course made me completely break down into laughter AND tears.  She was such a great sport.  She happily munched on Cheerios until almost the very end, at which point she and Chris went for a little walk to the back of the auditorium and chatted with Ina May's husband, Stephen.  After the lecture, I stood briefly in line to speak with Ina May and ask her to sign my book (during which I sounded like a blubbering idiot of course) and then we were on our way.  It was pretty much the coolest date night we've been on yet.

And now I want to hear some of your stories of the unconventional ways your man has shown his undying love... ready, steady, GO!