speaks to the very contemporary notion of being able to manage and arrange every milestone in our lives.
EVEN THE BEST-LAID PLANS…
Megan Kennedy and her husband Rob are unabashed planners. They have to be. In operating Rogue Heart Media — a video production and photography company that specializes, coincidentally, in documenting life milestones — out of their home, they have to schedule assiduously to maintain a suitable work/life balance. “I feel like I did everything I could to not be fearful, whether it was the books I was reading or the people I was confiding in,” Megan says, describing her pregnancy with Dane, their first child, born this past February. “I actually took a Tibetan meditation course, trying to gain some additional skills on mental strength and focus. That made a huge difference in my pain management.” She and Rob opted for a home birth for several reasons. One was the “pragmatic” concern over cost. “Because [the hospital] billed in three different sections — at the beginning, the middle and the end — it would have meant meeting our deductible
twice in full.” Another was her mother’s disconcerting experience with Caesarean section, which had been necessary to birth Megan and her twin sister. Another was the “impactful” 2008 documentary The Business of Being Born. Finally, “the whole hospital environment seemed very uncomfortable. I was worried that [my labor] would be drawn out if I were in a stressed state of mind.” Despite her best-laid plans, Kennedy’s labor proved to be anything but quick. Contractions began early on a Monday morning and continued without progress until Wednesday evening. By the time they hit the 60-hour mark, the attending midwife, doula and family members calmly informed her that they’d decided to transfer her to a hospital. Roughly eight hours and one epidural later, their baby finally was born. Throughout it all, despite her physical exhaustion, Kennedy says she generally felt at ease with things, if not exactly wholly in control of the situation, thanks to her close-knit support group and her advance preparation. “All in all, the part that I was most nervous about, more than the labor, was
what it would be like to have a newborn in the house. I’d never been around babies that much. They always looked so fragile, and I hardly had any exposure to holding them. But everyone says it’s different when you have your own, and it’s true. I couldn’t believe how easily Dane assimilated. It’s two months and we’re like, how did we ever live without you?” Kennedy admits that the adjustment, though smoother than anticipated, has prompted them to rethink their plans for a large family. “It’s mostly just how big of an impact it is on life. We already have our hands full with one, and are having a hard time imagining what two would be like,” she says, while acknowledging that they felt an added personal and professional obligation to resume work quickly. As an instructor, Bennett says it’s important for her to give people, even those as tenacious as the Kennedys, “permission” to fall short of their own expectations during the postpartum period: “It doesn’t matter that the floor needs vacuuming. You’ve got the rest of your life to split an atom, the rest of your life to run a marathon. You will have a beautiful baby. You don’t have anything else to prove.”
Is your life controlled by drugs or alcohol? Take charge of your life. Call 1-800-939-CARE today. New Vision is a hospital-based medical stabilization service offering crisis intervention, assessment, screening, hospital admission, stabilization and discharge planning. The average length of stay is three days.
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