PSALM 37:7

What a fast summer it's been! I've been dying to update the blog and post a bunch of baby preparation photos for the last few weeks, but I was held up by the temporary loss of my camera. Thankfully the camera is found (who would have thought it would be buried in my hospital bag... silly me!) Since most of you have been calling or texting about updates lately you already know how everything's going, so I'll keep the wording to this blog short(er) and focus mainly on supplying our pictures.

Our baby is due in... FOUR DAYS!!... and I am becoming very impatient about meeting him or her. At the last OB visit the doctor proclaimed us quite healthy once again and told us everything's coming along normally. I was 1cm dilated, 50% effaced (thinned out), and the baby was nestled down at a -2 station. There's probably not much chance of me delivering any earlier than expected, but my Braxton Hick's contractions (warm-up or fake contractions) have been coming more frequently and getting me all excited throughout the days and nights. It's now just a BIG waiting game!

Throughout our last few weeks of waiting Rich and I have managed to keep very busy. Rich is in the middle of his OB rotation and he's on-call (working 24hour shifts) about every 3 days. It's been a very draining schedule for him, but he's handling it quite well. He's been sleeping a lot a home and he's had a great time getting to know the charge nurses at work (who are all very excited about our upcoming delivery). Meanwhile, I too have been working, in my new position as the Mental Health Therapist for a nearby rural school district. I see kids in grades K through 12 and I work about 15 hours a week. It's been absolutely great! On the weekends we've managed to fit in fun time with some of the other residents and local friends, a pre-birthday celebration with our Bradley Class, a visit from a great college friend, 2 beautiful weddings in or near Wisconsin, and I've been blessed by family and friends with 2 baby showers. And to top it all off, Rich, Grandma Tam, Uncle Jason, Aunty 'Mandy and I all teamed up one weekend to pull the baby's room together. Uncle Jason spent hours measuring off stripes for the walls while the rest of us followed with green paint. Amanda and I then created an 'Under the Sea' mural to finish it all off. It's been a whirl-wind!

Thank you all for your patience with the 'Non-Blog' as of late, since I haven't kept it updated. We hope you enjoyed the photos... and we can't wait to share pictures of the BABY when he or she finally arrives. You will all receive a phone call when we head to the hospital and/or when we have a new family member to announce. Thank you for all your prayers and thoughts during this time.

MY HUSBAND; MY COACH

As promised, this post should give you all a better idea of how Rich and I are preparing for labor and what natural 'method' we've chosen to use. Our friends the Kreagers tipped us off to the husband-coached method of natural childbirth, devised by Dr. Robert Bradley, when they first heard our big news. They mailed us a care package with a cigar for the daddy-to-be and a book on this method for both nervous parents.

Rich and I chose to go au-naturel because we know that if I am well prepared (physically, mentally and nutritionally) and the baby and I don't experience any significant complications during labor, my body is plenty well-equipped to produce this baby on its own. Not only do we believe this honors the Creator's ingenious plan for the human body, but birth without medicine is known to happen more efficiently. In medicated labor one drug often leads to another... when the mother can't feel or react well to contractions due to pain meds, she typically has to receive contraction-inducing drugs to push the sleepy, sluggish baby along. The docotor will begin cycling these two types of medicine to keep the labor going. And if all this still goes too slowly in the long run, a cesarean may even be necessary to complete the process. All-in-all, several studies show that women who don't receive pain meds have a shorter labor and report labor being a more positive experience than those who do receive pain meds. Additionaly, we believe the health of the baby will be better maintained without drugs (even if my body is the first line of defense, the baby will still be effected by their potency), and that things like bonding will happen more naturally if both baby and I are alert and able to cuddle and nurse without the dulling effect of medication.

Now of course, many unexpected things can happen during labor, and it's for this reason that we're going to have the baby in a hospital. To use a metaphor sited in one of our books, labor is like swimming; most everyone can swim, but it requires special training to be safe and effective in the water and it requires a lifeguard, or doctor, for emergencies. We agree entirely.

Dr. Bradley, the founder of this method, began his research by studying numerous other mammals giving birth who instinctively react in all the same major ways to labor. Although women don't exactly have the same built in labor instincts, we do have the capacity to learn and reason, and we have the same general bodily functions and needs as these animals. Rich and I spend 12 weeks in class reading, learning and discussing the classic emotional and physical signposts of my body in labor, and practicing the appropriate reactions we should take to facilitate the best possible functioning of my body to pop out a beautiful baby. I am learning to relax my entire body during the 1st stage of labor while experiencing strong contractions that dilate the cervix so that my uterus can work freely and with all its might; to utilize proper pushing positions when it's time; and to nurse and hold the baby immediately after birth to establish strong bonding and nutrition for baby, as well as facilitate the 3rd stage of labor when the placenta is expelled. In addition to classes, Rich and I have to several other assignments. We practice very deep relaxation every day (with 'simulated' contractions to boot), I have a strict diet to follow to grow a healthy baby and to build up nutrients I'll use to perform certain labor functions, and I have daily exercises to complete that stretch and enhance very specific labor muscles.

After years of study and trials, Dr. Bradley's method has proven to be very effective for achieving safe and natural labor that does not use medicinal intervention either for augmenting the labor or for managing pain. After reading several books and attending a few classes, we are very pleased with our choice to use this particular method. It is effective because it teaches me how to work with my body and its powerful contractions rather than training me to ignore or work against it all (as many other so-called natural and non-natural methods do, like Lamaze). And as I finish up the pregnancy and then endure the marathon event that is labor and delivery, Rich is trained to act as my magnificent coach. It's a full-on family event!

Well there you have it. I'm never short on words, so I apologize if this is far too much information for some of you (or full of too many 'details'). We hope you know how much we appreciate the interest in the delivery that some of you have shown, and the love and support we receive from all of you. We can't wait for you to meet Baby Z!

SUMMER LOVIN'

Surprise! Baby and I grew since we last posted. And, to say the least, a lot of other exciting things have happened as well. Let's see if I can sum it all up...

On May 21st I finished my last day of work and the following day Rich officially became Dr. Zentz. I am indescribably proud of my amazing husband and all of his hard work (I wish we could give him two degrees!) We had a great day spending his graduation ceremony with all our family, and then getting 'wined and dined' as the new Dr. and Mrs. at a local restaurant (I don't think they realized that the physician lifestyle starts in the negative digits, and they probably won't get our business again for a while... but all the complimentary champagne and dessert sure was great!). Without losing any momentum, Rich spent the weekend at the race with his buddies while I relaxed at the lake with my family, good friend, Tricia, and my Grams. Then a couple of us ladies unloaded one last carload of pre-moving day goodies into the house and did a good cleaning of the whole place. The day after Memorial Day our movers showed up and loaded us into a UHaul, I got the Chicago apartment cleaned, and then Rich drove the UHaul through terrential rains all the way to South Bend while I followed in our Jeep. Our fantastic family made it possibe to unload everything that evening and we celebrated by ordering pizza.

The following 4 weeks were a crash course in first-time-home-ownership. Rich worked tirelessly inside and outside of the house assembling blinds, cabinetry and closet organizers, filling holes in the yard, digging up fieldstone and mulching to create actual landscaping, planting, cleaning the garage and basement, spraying for critters, installing my washer and dryer, and (my personal favorite) dealing with multiple plumbing issues. He and my dad were resident plumbers for a couple of days and we've now had close to 10 visits from the actual plumbers. Meanwhile, I kept busy by generally organizing our home, playing the role of Rich's trusty fix-it assistant, registering for baby items, shopping for any new homey 'necessities', unpacking, and working on any of the 'big' projects anybody would allow me to (this sit on your butt part of pregnancy is just not for me... though I will admit the complimentary naps have been nice). Some of our free time was spent helping other people move (a set of friends in the area and Rich's brother both recently bought houses), and of course, lounging on the lakes of Warsaw with family. Ahhh. All in all, our little 4 week vacation together was pretty fantastic and we finally feel very comfortable in the new house. It will be the perfect size for our family and we love the area. I can't pass up this opportunity to say, THANK YOU again to all our family... You have been a crucial part of putting our home together and a great support system and we are so grateful!

Finally, on June 22nd, Rich began his residency at St. Joe. It was slow going at first, but now he's fully submerged and seeing patients, working 30 hour shifts, and really experiencing the learning curve of a new environment. Please pray for his smooth adjustment and a sense of peace during a stressful transition. I've also started seriously networking and looking for my own job. Although I'll soon be working the most important job I could imagine as a full-time mother, I'm exploring my employment options as a social worker just in case a great opportunity (with flexible hours) is available. I actually have an interview in just under a week for a part time position as a school mental health therapist. I'm pretty excited about what I know of the job so far... we'll see what the interview yields. Wish me luck!

Alright, now on to what everyone REALLY wants to know about; the baby. We are officially in the home-stretch, the 3rd trimester, and this week marks 7 months for us! This means baby is in his or her final stages of cooking and most of the growing that's left is in weight, in the fine-tuning of organs and in brain development. The baby now usually protrudes as a little curled up bump or a swell of ripples across my belly instead of just a feeling inside. We talk to him or her often, and I'm fascinated with watching all his or her acrobatics close to bedtime each night. I can't wait until we meet! And when we meet, it looks like we will be saying hello to either Elijah Dean Zentz or to Grace Catherine Zentz. Elijah is obviously biblical and Dean is Grandpa Zentz's name. Grace is, well, exactly what we'll need to start our family before we celebrate our first anniversary, and Catherine is the name of my (amazing) patron saint. We're still playing around with the idea of an Isabelle Marie or a Luke (middle name unknown), but a little Eli or Gracie is more likely.

In terms of care and prep, we had prenatal classes set up prior to moving and we began attending as soon as we got to Indiana. As I mentioned in previous posts, our goal is to have an unmedicated labor and delivery as long as both baby and I are healthy. This means no drugs for augmenting labor or for 'managing' pain. Our Bradley birthing classes are aimed at achieving this and have a high success rate. For anyone who's interested, I will post separately about the classes themselves. All in all, we've really enjoyed them. Another big baby event has been my first prenatal appointment with our new doc. She is a family physician who came highly recomended from other residents and I really enjoyed my first appointment with her. She's somewhat young, very personable, and supportive of our birthing goals. Week 27 was my last monthly visit, and begining at the end of July I will see her every two weeks. My next task in this arena is to meet some of the labor and delivery nurses and take a tour of St. Joe. This is on hold for now due to holiday scheduling conflicts in July, but we should be able to work something out soon... which is good because I have lots of questions I hope to get answered. If you're curious, you can read a little about St. Joe's birthing unit here.

And of course, up above you can see our 'family' photo on the lake and below is a picture of us at the new house... hope you've enjoyed the update!

MY (LACK OF) PATIENCE REVEALED

It is 3:48PM on Tuesday afternoon. And by 'Tuesday' I mean it is the day Rich and my dad are painting our house, it's 1.5 days before I'm officially finished with my current job, 3 days before Rich graduates as a Doctor of Osteopathy, and exactly one week before the movers come. On top of all that, today marks the beginning of week 22 in the pregnancy and my co-workers just finished throwing me a surprise baby/farewell shower. So as I was saying, at 3:51PM on this Tuesday, my mind is nowhere near this office. I'd rather be looking for another job, buying homey items or working on our yard. I could be trying to fit into a dress for Rich's award dinner and graduation, packing boxes at the apartment, or helping the guys paint (er... maybe supervising is a better term, since I'm not allowed to inhale paint fumes or drink beer, which is what their day consists of). I have a whole exciting list in my head.

On the other hand, I am feeling sad to go. I have some fantastic coworkers and I work with many really great clients. Today I've been calling many of these clients to tell them I'll be leaving in a few days, and I've received some really sad but supportive responses. It's affirming and it's humbling to know that the rapport I've built and the services my program offers have made a positive impact on others who live in a very, very difficult world. As for my coworkers, I mentioned before that they took time out of their busy work days to plan and throw a baby shower for me. It was so full of joy, thoughtfulness and love... I was overwhelmed. I will truly miss their support, example and friendship.

As I sit here thinking about my time spent at MFS (and the arrival of 5:00PM) I can feel the baby swimming around and kicking furiously inside my belly. He or she has been extremely active lately, and the kicks have changed from one little 'pong' here and there to whole bunches of 'ping-pong-pows!' all at once. This baby has at least 4 limbs (we won't have to count those when he or she arrives). Additionally, our little bundle of joy is now almost 1 foot long and almost 1 pound in weight. Before we know it we'll have another little person to be filling up that new home of ours. But I've got to focus on one step at a time for now. It's 4:24PM and my 'lunch break' is surely over.

WHAT'S IN A NAME

In the beginning of the pregnancy, Rich and I made a short list of baby names sorted by gender and 'middle' or 'first' name. After only a couple of weeks Rich gave up on the obscurity of this task because he wanted to wait until we knew the baby's sex before really racking our brains over names. I was not terribly thrilled about this strategy (and whined here and there when I heard a new name I liked) but for the most part we stuck with it up until today. Now the joke is on my husband, as we still have to choose names without knowing the gender.

I'm writing this somewhat unusual post to ask any of our close friends and family who read it to submit their own name suggestions. We are by no means short of ideas, and we're certainly not going to take votes on the best name (sorry to disappoint)... but it's fairly important to Rich and I to come up with a name that is meaningful. It could have religious meaning, meaning or history within our family, etc. What better way to more thoroughly search for meaningful names than to ask the people who mean the most in our lives (and who will play a big role in our baby's life)? So if anyone thinks of a striking or meaningful name, feel free to suggest it over email (aislinnu@gmail.com) or to post a comment on the blog.

And for the record... the name 'Marlo' has already been submitted by Rich's 9-year-old brother. You will all have to really amp up the creativity to beat his growing list! Also, for a thoughtful story about naming children, read this post from one of my favorite bloggers (I should mention that the saint spoken of is the same patron I took my name from when I was confirmed as a member of the Catholic Church. She is known as a visionary and a political zealot. She often advised the pope).