There will be meltdowns (pg mentioned, but mostly IF oriented)

So, I had my first childbirth class last night. At first, I thought I was going to have to go by myself: My ever hardworking hubby had training for a part-time job all day, and had to do his regular job at night. However, thanks to our slow economy, he could slip away with me to the exciting world of hippy birth class.

Now, when I say hippy, I don't mean the old-school, hard-core, Flower-and-River-build-a-birth-teepee-type class. Not even a home birth-oriented class. They take all comers, and are very, very sweet, thoughtful, and exceedingly well-informed (the main educator has a PhD and a brain like a steel trap). But, yeah, we were all sitting on rocking chairs and eating organic apples and hearing about the magic of the birth ball.

People at random meetings like this are always the most fascinating part. There was a woman there with her mother (single mom by choice? I wondered), a couple very scared looking gals who seem nice enough, a couple hipster/hippy couples working with a completely kick-ass local midwife whom I love and adore and would have gone with if... Well, IF. You get it.

***(if you're in a bad place, skip the babblings below)

My midwife does hospital births only, and that's fine. She's all about vaginal natural births, so I feel like I've found a good compromise for my insane anxious self and my side that sees childbirth as a totally natural biological process, albeit with complicated sides sometimes.

Anyhoo, the class was fun, the educator excellent, the information familiar but with some cool added facts and twists. It was amusing to watch the guys--the hipster with his eyes wide with wonder, the sullen shy guy-guy repressing gentle waves of terror and disgust and discomfort (his wife had introduced him, and he hadn't said a word). One guy even left in the middle of the class, leaving his nervous and very young partner? wife? to deal on her own.

Interestingly, the people who knew most about their own births had the most positive reaction to the mechanics of normal labor. Something for us gals to keep in mind.

***(Okay, it's all about IF now)

However, when we were introducing ourselves, I found myself using the wierdest formulation to describe myself and our state. Nothing too out there--I just said that our kid was "apparently male"--but enough to make my husband bristle. After the class, he brought it up with me, semi-seriously.

And what do you know. I had me a meltdown. I told him that it was all going to be provisional for me until I held a living child in my arms. I couldn't be sure that any of this would end happily, and I still had doubts about what my body was able to do, as it had so often left so much to be desired... the miscarriages, the bizarre inability to get pregnant except with injections and catheders. At first, this frustrated my man, but soon he understood--and I told him he could feel confident, he just needed to acknowledge my anxiety and pain.

In tears, I finally said out loud that I still felt like a fake and a failure, with all those seemingly blithely ignorant gals around me, hoping and planning for a beautiful birth experience. I still felt that my child would somehow be more precious, more shockingly miraculous for having required the long, dark journey, and that in the end, if this little boy lives, I will have no complaints about labor, birth, interventions, whathaveyou.

In the end, my birth plan could be summed up in a few, bitter words: Oh please don't let him die. Let me die first.

I've never felt this way before.