Working toward my vba2c

First I better fill you in on what a vba2c is in case you don't know.  There is a lot of lingo surrounding this topic, and I had to look it all up to figure out what it was when I was planning Glory's birth.  

VBAC = Vaginal Birth After Cesarean

VBA2C= Vaginal Birth After 2 Cesareans (the most I have ever seen while researching this is VBA7C)

HBAC= Home Birth After Cesarean

CBAC= Cesarean Birth After Cesarean

WBAC= Water Birth After Cesarean (I haven't seen this term used often)

HWBAC= Home Water Birth After Cesarean (water birth usually isn't allowed in hospitals so a water birth would more than likely occur at home or in a birthing center)

Whats a birthing center?  It is a place usually staffed by midwives that has a home like environment.  It is not a hospital, and it doesn't offer drug pain relief.  They do it all natural!  Some people go to a birthing center instead of opting for a home birth because it may be closer to a hospital in case of an emergency, or because they feel more safe birthing in the birthing center than at home.  Unfortunately every state does not have birthing centers.  You can go to http://birthcenters.org to locate the closest birthing center.  One of my friends just contacted me via facebook and told me that her first birth was at a birthing center, and how she was so thankful she chose that option because she felt like the water helped her immensely.  She had a very long birth with a very big baby, and pushed for a long time.  In most hospitals and with most OB's they would have been pushing for a csection in that case.  She birthed vaginally!  

Alright now to what I'm working on at the moment.  I am not pregnant right now, but we want to have a baby within the next two years.  Most women in this case could just enjoy their time until they became pregnant, and then do their preggo thing! :)  I however have something that I'm working toward, and I want to make sure that I do everything I possibly can think of to achieve my goal.  My goal is to have a vaginal birth.  NO MORE SURGERY PLEASE!  

Here are the things that I am working on now:

Titled Pelvis and Back Pain/Injury:

If you know me than you know I love to run!  Sadly, I believe that by doing what I love, I can't have what I want ultimately.  No, I am not giving up running forever!  I am however, taking a break.  I truly believe that running has worsened or possibly caused a lot of my pelvis issues.  Running is a great cardiovascular exercise, and I also believe it is wonderful for the mind and spirit, but if you don't have excellent form (which most people don't) and you like to run a lot than it can be really hard on your body.  I'm not going to go into detail about the negative effects of running on a person's body because I seriously believe that running is more positive than negative.  For my specific instance at this very moment running would be more negative on my body than positive.  :(  

I talked to a yoga instructor recently that told me she has a lot of private classes with older women who have been running for a long time, and now have a lot of back, posture, and balance issues.  This is probably because of their tight psoas muscles, hamstrings, quads, calves.  If you are a runner it is very important to stretch each of your major muscle groups daily, and to do some cross training.  Most people don't do this.  She checked out my posture and noticed that I don't stand correctly.  Both of my feet point out, and one points out a lot more than the other.  I also don't hold my pelvis stable when I'm doing moves.  It is constantly jutting forward or too far backward depending on what im doing.  What causes this?  My muscles are playing tug of war on my pelvis.  Now, the prescription for this.  

1. No more running for awhile.  I will be taking walks, and making sure to stretch really well after each one.

2. Yoga: Hot yoga twice a week, women's health yoga dvd done 5 days a week.  This will help with my posture and balance.

3. Stretching: Every morning I stretch for about 30 minutes.  This helps a lot with my back which gets really tight and sore if I don't stretch.  I actually do the cobra stretch throughout the day to keep my back loose and mobile.  

4. Pelvic Rocking: This is actually like the cat pose/cow pose done in yoga.  With pelvic rocking you are only moving your pelvis not your upper back/shoulders.  This also feels really good on my lower back.  

5.  I practice Mountain pose all throughout the day.  The mountain pose is basically just standing with perfect posture and body alignment.  Everything I do throughout the day, especially when I'm standing still, I check my feet and make sure I have a stable pelvis, my back is straight, and my shoulders are down and back.  The space between your big toe and second toe should be aligned with your knees.  

6. Nutrition: This is the really hard part!  I have cut out sugar.  I also don't eat fried foods, fast foods, fatty meat such as beef, pork etc.  My diet consists of mostly vegetables, fruits, whole grains, nuts, lean meant like chicken and turkey, and some venison (luckily my dad hunts deer!).  This isn't the hardest thing ever because I actually already ate pretty well, but I have a bad sugar addiction.  I would make good choices for the most part because that is my preference, but I would crave something sweet after lunch, after dinner, and then late at night.  Normally I ate something high in sugar at least once a day.  Its been three days and the only place I have gotten sugar is from fresh fruit, and a drink of orange juice.  I actually haven't craved it that bad yet.  It is more hard when it is around.  

Example:

Breakfast: one small cup of coffee with just a little bit of soy milk (because I can't even fathom giving that up!),  a bowl of plain oatmeal unsweetened with a little bit of soy milk in it.  

Lunch: A Lettuce/Veggie Wrap with a Whole Wheat tortilla shell, romaine lettuce, cucumbers, tomato, and a little bit of vinegar and oil.  

Dinner: 4-6oz or chicken breast baked with unsalted tomato sauce, a lot of steamed veggies seasoned but not salted, and mashed sweet potatoes (YUM)

Throughout the day I snack on plain almonds, greek yogurt with granola, fresh fruits, fresh vegetables, and if I feel really hungry I eat a piece of whole wheat toast or whole wheat english muffin with natural peanut butter on it.

I will keep you updated on how this is going…

WOW I'm late going where I have to go because this blog usually gets done when the kids are napping but I tried to multi task today for a second and Brayve wasn't having it!  So more to come later!

Glory Reign Wakeland November 13th 2010

  When Brayve was 7 months old I became pregnant again.  No, this was not on purpose, but a wonderful blessing all the same.  When I found out, I was scared again.  Obviously, my last experience was pretty terrifying.  Right away I started researching my options.  I had heard the saying, 'once a csection always a csection,' but I knew that I could never schedule a cesarean.  I found out about VBAC, Vaginal Birth After Cesarean.  I was relieved to know that I had another option, but did read a lot about how it was recommended that the scar should have at least 18months to 2 years to heal before trying a VBAC.  Glory was due to be born at about 16months post cesarean.  I switched providers to a group with midwives, and was told that I seemed like a good candidate to try a VBAC.  I was satisfied with that, but decided this time I should educate myself more.  I spent the next 9months reading books, watching birth videos, and reading articles about birth, VBAC, uterine scar ruptures etc.  I was a little worried, but the negative outcomes were  such a small percentage that I had to think positively about it.  I stayed in great shape by continuing to jog/walk at least 4 times a week for at least 3 miles per time until my 9month of pregnancy where I transitioned to only walking 3 miles.  With Brayve I didn't exercise much and I gained almost 60 lbs.  I was swollen from head to toe!  I was back to my prepregnancy weight before I became pregnant with Glory though.  I only gained 33lbs this time, and felt great!
   My goals for this birth were to try to stay as relaxed as possible, try to do a lot of hands and knees to help my baby get into the anterior position, and try to stay at home for as long as I could considering I was terrified of going to the hospital.  I knew my chances of having a VBAC went up if I could do this naturally, and in order for me to do that I knew staying at home as long as I could was the best option.  I hired a doula, the only one I knew, because I had also read that my VBAC chances went up if I had that support.  I also knew that having a midwife instead of an OB helped me.
   At 36 weeks I went in to have my Group B Strep test and was positive.  They told me that I would have to come in early so that I could have penecillin administered so the baby didn't get an infection.  After researching about that I found out that the chances of an infection coming through the birth canal was low, and a bunch of other stuff that lead me to decide not to take their advice on coming to the hospital early.  At this point I became nervous because I realized then that I didn't have the most supportive team I could have.  My doula did not want to be called unless I was being admitted into the hospital, which meant I was going to be doing all the hard work alone since I was not going to the hospital until I felt it was unbearable.  I also realized that the midwives I chose, whether they meant well or not, were still employed through an OB office and still had to follow hospital protocol.  I felt that, even though my family wanted to understand, they couldn't because they all had their natural quick births and I felt like every time I talked about it with them or my husband they seemed to get that glazed look that people get when they aren't interested.  My baby and I were alone, but in it together, so I had a talk with her.  I told her that I would try my hardest to give her what she deserved, and that it would help if she could just turn in the right position.
    My due date was November 14th, and I went into labor on Thursday, November 11th 2010 at 10pm.  Up until that point I had been doing pelvic rocks, visualization, and spent a lot of time on my hands and knees hoping that she would turn anterior.  My contractions were about 10 minutes apart or so for a couple of hours, and I was able to sleep on and off through them.  Then at 5am the next morning I woke up to an unusually uncomfortable one.  I timed them for an hour and realized they were 6 minutes apart, but they were the exciting kind that I felt uncomfortable with, but not too uncomfortable.  I went about my day taking care of Brayve.  Alex had to take his CDL test that afternoon, and I told him that more than likely this labor was going to be long and that I didn't need him yet and to go ahead.  I picked him up at 3pm on Friday after he had passed his test, and we went home to relax.  At this point the contractions were 4 or 5 minutes apart and I had to stop to breathe through them.  Around 6pm I had an english muffin with peanut butter and jelly on it, some orange juice, and water.  My mom came over to watch Brayve so that Alex and I could go for a walk because that is what I felt like I should be doing.  It was dark, cool, and misting.  It was beautiful and so relaxing.  Alex suggested that I try to walk through a contraction instead of stopping to see how that felt.  It felt great!  When we got back my mom stayed for a little while longer, and then she took Brayve to her house to put to bed since I was pretty sure we would be going to the hospital sometime that night.
    I got into the tub around 9pm and Alex sat and read a book to me.  I laid on my side for a long time trying to relax through the contractions that were now 3 mins apart and feeling pretty intense.  Around 11 my eyes shot open and I started crying to Alex about how I didn't think I could do this anymore.  He said that it would probably be a good time to go to the hospital and I agreed.  He unplugged the bath, and I stood up.  All of a sudden I felt a little pop and realized that something had come out of me.  I had read and researched so much before hand that if I was in the right state of mind I would have known that it was my water breaking, but since I was already standing in water and couldn't see how much came out of me I honestly thought it was my mucus plug.  I was just basing that on the theory that I didn't think I had lost it yet, that is what happened first last time, and it was discolored not clear like amniotic fluid should be.  I got violently shakey and began to giggle uncontrollably.  I emptied my bladder to try to give the baby more room, and we got ready to leave for the hospital.  At some point in time Alex called our doula.
   When we got to the hospital the contractions were very painful, and I was dreading laying down to be checked.  The midwife on call was the only midwife that I hadn't seen since the first visit at 6 weeks pregnant.  This made me a little nervous because I felt like I knew nothing about her.  Luckily though she was so loving and her voice was very calming.  She told me that I was 7cm dilated and 100% effaced!  Victory!!  She also asked when my water had broken which I then realized that was what happened when I stood up in the tub!  Another victory!!  I was admitted and had to be hooked up to IV and given penecillin which I hated!  It gets kind of hazy from there.  I knew I was in incredible pain, but they told me that I was transitioning and that I would be at 10cm within a couple of hours, so that gave me the drive to keep going!  Four hours later I was checked and told that my cervix was swollen and that I was now only 6cm dilated and only 70%effaced.  I told them to get me an epidural NOW!  She tried to talk me out of it, and told me that I had said I wanted it natural, but in my head I was thinking, "I'm fucking going backwards…what the hell is natural about that?!"  I got an epidural, and was told to try to sleep.  Unfortunately I couldn't do that because I was able to think straight again once my pain subsided and decided that I just screwed myself.  I was hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.  I did feel some pressure feelings in my bottom a few times and had to wake my doula up to ask her if that meant anything.  It seemed like everybody just sloughed me off after I received the epidural.  After that I was just monitored… not really reassured.  Around 5:30am I began to run a temperature.  The midwife checked me again and I hadn't made anymore progress and she said that if I was running a temperature she was worried about the baby considering my water had broken and there was meconium in it.  I agreed that it also made me nervous and asked her if she was thinking a cesarean was best.  She admitted that those were her thoughts, and I told her I wanted to meet the OB that would be performing it.  I felt very supported and loved in the decision because I had my doula, midwife, OB, and husband all rubbing my arms, legs, and smoothing my hair back.  I was still very upset and crying, but at least it was better.
   I can remember my experience in the operating room better than the first time because I hadn't had any nubain, sedatives, and I wasn't AS sleep deprived as the last time.  It actually felt more terrifying then the first because I was so aware.  I knew what it was like recovering last time, I knew I had a fever and was in fear of infection for me and my baby, and new that my blood pressure was low.  I could hear the machine beeping, and people were whispering.  I really was having an out of body experience because felt like I was somewhere else.  I honestly thought that I was dying and could feel myself slipping away, and I completely gave into that.  At 6:15AM on Saturday morning, Glory Reign was born after 32 hours of labor weighing 8lbs 9oz, 20.5 inches long.  She was posterior, stuck in my pelvis, and trying to come out forehead first.  She also had a very large head.  I was not given a sedative, but once again I fell asleep immediately.  I do not remember what she sounded like, what she looked like, what she felt like.  I did not see her open her eyes for the first time, and I was not the first to hold the baby that I had housed and nourished for the last 9 months.  When I got back into the room that Alex and Glory were waiting for me in I felt detached.  I was almost too exhausted to open my eyes or even care.  I was asked if I wanted to hold her and I said no, that I was too tired and thought I might drop her, but really I just didn't want anything to do with her.  I felt no connection with her at all.  As soon as she heard my voice she started crying and trying to look for me.  The sound was pulling on my heart strings, and I decided that she needed me.  They rolled me onto my side because all she wanted was food!  She latched on great and has eaten like a champ ever since.  She definitely is a momma's girl!
    In the hospital a couple of days later one of the midwives that I had seen often throughout my pregnancy came in and had a talk with me.  She told me she was sorry that things didn't turn out how I wanted, but that she was so proud of me for trying so hard.  Then she decided to tell me that when she did a cervical exam on me earlier on she noticed that my pelvis felt tilted and narrow.  I wasn't sure what to think about this information.  I couldn't figure out why it would be that way.  I kind of wish she would have told me that before hand, but at the same time I could understand why she wouldn't.  She didn't want to give me negative information.  The next midwife that came in told me that I better schedule my next csection with them because it would be dangerous to try that again.  That same midwife I have heard is now studying to be an OB.  I don't know if that is true or not but it makes sense because she seemed to be the most medically based one there.
   My daughter is now almost 6 months old.  She is beautiful, healthy, and still nursing.  I have completely fallen in love with her.  My incision has healed wonderfully!  The dissolvable stitches that were used last time were not used this time.  I had staples that were taken out in the hospital before I left.  The OB completely cut out my old scar and made a new, thin, straight one.  I do not have that pocket of fluid above it anymore.  It still is numb and still feels very uncomfortable and tender to touch, but it is better than before.
    What I know now is… if I knew for certain that I would HAVE to have another csection my family would stop at two children.  However, my husband and I have always wanted four children, so my journey to a better body started the moment I walked out of the hospital for the second time!

Brayve Anthony Wakeland July 9th 2009

     I had always had irregular periods so when I missed a month I didn't think anything of it.  I didn't catch on very quickly because all the signs were pointing to my little Brayve developing inside of me.  I suddenly was very emotional and very tired.  My last mma fight that I had was when I was 4 weeks pregnant.  I won, and then got out of the ring and began to cry, claiming that it was scary!  hahaha  Of course everybody thought I was nuts, and you could see why.  Then I decided that I wanted a puppy.  We already had one that was only a couple months old.  I remember driving to go pick him up with Alex (now my husband), and searching for names.  I remember having conversations about how certain names would be so cute for a baby.  Then a couple of days later I told Alex that I thought all of the chest press lifts I had been doing were making my boobs grow!  The next week I decided I should take a pregnancy test just in case.  I found out on November 7th, 2008 that I was pregnant!  I began hysterically crying.  I was scared.  That is all I can say to explain it.  My first trimester was full of sickness.  I'm guessing a lot of it was from stress.  I stayed in my living room on a giant bean bag chair rotating between crying, sleeping, and throwing up.  My relationship with Alex was very up and down.  Most of the time I didn't even want to look at him.  He proposed to me and I said, "Hell No!"  Then suddenly in my second trimester I was in love again, and we did become engaged.  I remember the exact place and feeling of Brayve's little body wriggling around.  What was amazing was not only did I feel him 'early,' everybody else could too.  So, Alex was able to feel him the moment that I could.  That was exciting!
    I signed up for childbirth classes at the hospital I was going to deliver at.  I learned a good deal that I didn't know, but when she began talking about cesareans I tuned her out.  I knew that wasn't going to be me.  I wanted a natural delivery with no narcotics or epidural.  There were also a lot of things going on at the OB office I went to.  The only midwife they had left, and the only OB I had met actually retired the week of my due date.  OH, and just to share a little bit about him.  I liked him, and I thought he was funny, but one thing he said still rings in my ears.  When he asked me about pain medication I said that I wanted to labor and deliver naturally.  His reply was, "well my wife and daughter had nothing but csections and they claim it is the only way to give birth!"  WHAT?!  There are so many things wrong with that statement.  I'm not even going to go there though.
    My due date was July 4th, and I went into labor on Tuesday July 7th at 8pm.  I began having contractions that were about 12 minutes apart for about an hour, and then they got closer and closer together as the night went on.  I had learned that the average first time labor is around 12 hours.  I don't ever remember researching or hearing that labors could go on for days.  I was so uneducated about everything.  I tried to sleep, but only got a few minutes here and there because I would wake up with every contraction.  By 4am they were only 5 minutes apart consistently, so I called my mom and we all went to the hospital.  I was checked and hooked up to the monitor for awhile.  They said I was only 1cm dilated and not effaced.  The monitor showed that I was having contractions every 5 minutes but they said they weren't strong enough, and the longer I stayed the more they spaced out.  I was sent home, which was kind of defeating, but I was dealing with it.  I was on a clock in my mind because labor was only supposed to be 12hours!
     When I got home they sped back up to 5 minutes apart again and every passing hour they seemed to get more and more intense.  I wasn't able to sleep, and at 8 pm that night we called the doctor again.  I was exhausted because I hadn't slept since Monday night, and it was now Wednesday night.  He told me to take a couple of tylenol pm and try to take a nap, and that I should come in when the contractions were 3mins apart or my water broke.  At 2am on Thursday morning I was in the bathtub crying because I still hadn't slept and I was in a good amount of pain by then.  Alex and I decided that we would go back to the hospital because they were finally 3 mins apart.  When we got there I was 3cm dilated and about 50%effaced.  When I went to the bathroom my mucus plug suddenly came out.  I got a little excited by that, but was still feeling very stressed that I was only at 3cm and that I hadn't slept in almost 48 hours.  They broke my water sometime that morning because they said it would speed my labor up.  I labored in and out of the tub in the hospital until about 1pm on Thursday afternoon.  I got out and felt insane.  I actually don't remember too much after this, and had to be told about what happened next.  I was at 6cm dilated and decided that I couldn't do it anymore, so I decided to get a shot of nubain.  This was horrible!  I felt really drunk and it felt like one endless contraction.  I would sleep for a minute and then wake up to another horrible contraction.  I remember feeling like I was fighting it.  I would tense up and yell for them to go down.  I had lost it!  This went on for two hours.
   Around 3 pm I said that I had to have an epidural.  I wasn't supposed to get one because I had two herniated disks and stenosis and was told that I could have bad back problems after.  At that point I didn't care.  The anesthesiologist came in within the next hour, and I can't even explain how relieving that was.  I finally was able to sleep, and I had a smile on my face because of how relieved I felt.  They decided to give me pitocin to help the contractions become intense enough to dilate me the rest of the way.  Unfortunately that didn't help, and when I was checked again I was actually less than 6cm dilated because my cervix was swelling.  hmmm…maybe because my poor baby's head was posterior and had no cushion left because the bag of waters had been broken and his poor head was being slammed into my cervix.  Around 8pm the doctor came in, whom I had never met before I had gotten to the hospital, and told me that I needed a csection.  I was devastated.  My epidural was wearing off and I was having horrible pains shooting down my left side (probably from the effects of the epidural on my herniated discs).  Alex, my mom, and I were all crying by now.  I actually can't even explain how horrible that moment was.  I was at an ultimate low, and I was terrified.  I remember screaming profanity at the anesthesiologist who was somewhere out in the hall taking his sweet ass time!  If I was going to have a csection then they might as well take me back out of the pain I was in because it was getting me nowhere but crazy town!
   At 9:15pm on Thursday July 9th, 2009 after 49.5 hours of labor and only 3 hours of sleep since Monday morning at 8am I was cut and Brayve was removed from my uterus by cesarean weighing 8 lbs 4 oz. and 21.5inches long.  I remember being strapped down to the bed like I was on a crucifix.  Alex said the nurses were literally jumping up and putting all of their body weight into the top of my stomach.  Maybe this is why I remember violently rocking from side to side.  I was given a sedative as soon as Brayve came out because they were worried that I was panicking.  I fell asleep immediately.  I do not remember his first cry, or what he looked liked, or what was talked about as they sewed me up.  I do not know what he looked like when he opened his eyes for the first time, and I was not the first to hold my son who I had housed and nourished for the 9 months leading up to that moment.  When I finally got back into the room where Alex, my mom, and Brayve were waiting I was on drugs and don't remember what happened.  I don't remember holding him for the first time.  The next thing I remembered was waking up in a different room by a nurse around 5am telling me that it was time to try to walk.  I tried to stand and couldn't.  It felt like my legs were too weak to hold my weight, and the burning in my incision was unbearable.  On top of that my vagina was swollen and bruised so badly from Brayve trying to make his way out that if a picture was taken nobody would be able to distinguish what it was!
    When I woke up the next morning the nurse told me that Brayve would probably want to eat soon.  I guess the night before he was so swollen from the iv fluids that I was given, and so tired from the long labor that he just slept and didn't act hungry.  He didn't latch on well, but we fumbled through it.  Eventually somebody told me his tongue was too big and he needed a nipple shield in order to latch on.  Unfortunately nobody told me that I shouldn't use that long because he ate with that for the next 6months!  Once again, completely uneducated.
     The recovery was horrible.  Every time I tried to stand or walk my incision burned from the inside out like nothing I can explain.  After a couple of weeks blood started to come out of the incision site and then little bubbles full of blood were sticking out between the stitches.  It was gruesome.  When I went in and showed the doctor he told me that eventually it would stop doing that… that the blood looked old, so  it was okay.  Another week went by and I got a big pocket of fluid above the incision side.  My skin looked bruised and when touched it would wave underneath like a bag filled with water would if you touched it.  I went in again and he said that I could try to put hot compresses on it, but mostly that I needed to stop being vain and my bikini days were over.  He was the most insensitive person I had ever met.  The stitches that were supposed to dissolve never did for some reason and months later they would come to the surface of my skin and I would have to push them out.  When the incision had finally closed the scar was huge, itchy, swollen, and crooked.  You know the mouth of those smiley faces, the ones that I call the uncertain face, that is what it looked like to me.  That pocket of fluid above the incision… it never went away.  My body looked grotesque to me.
   However, I LOVED my baby!  He was amazing.  He was incredibly handsome, and smart.  He slept through the night at just a couple weeks old, and barely ever cried.  He was the most laid back baby ever, and I was so blessed for that!  He was rolling over by the time he was 3 months old, sitting up at 4 months, crawling right at 6 months, and then walking by 10 months.  He said his first sentence before he he was 16months old.  His vocabulary is incredibly extensive for his age.  He is amazing, and I love that little boy with all of my heart, big head and all! :)

About me and my road leading me to now

     I am starting this blog for a bunch of different reason, but mostly I want this to be documented and available to be searched and viewed by others.  At so many points in my life I have felt like I was educated enough, and have always found that I am no where close!  First of all I have a degree from St. Ambrose University in Fitness and Human Performance.  After I got out of college I felt like I had a pretty good understanding of the body, and how it works.  I experimented with myself on different levels of exercise to see what I could create, and how far I could push myself.  When I got pregnant with my son I had just graduated 4 months earlier.  I was competing in cage fighting at the time, so I was in very good shape.  I could run 10 miles without breathing hard, and I could lift weights for hours.  This led me to believe that I could easily give birth to a baby.  I had heard people compare childbirth to running a marathon, which I had already done in 2007, so I was ready right?  By the way I think that running a marathon is so much easier than childbirth, especially when it comes to the level of control you have over the outcome!
      In this blog I am going to take you along with me as I try to heal myself and prepare myself for what comes next!  I have two children with two very similar birth experiences.  I had two cesarean births within 16 months.  At first I felt like the health system that I believed in so much had failed me.  Then I realized that even though maternity care is in serious need of a revamp, there were a lot of issues with my body that led me down the road of a cesarean.  I will get into that later.  First, I would like to share with you my birth stories because every woman whether they have a good or 'bad' experience should do so.  After all it is the most amazing thing a woman's body can do!