Blog Love

Based off of the Good Parenting Reads and Clicking for Breastfeeding posts, I think I might join in the Sunday Surf that other blogs that I read host, because I love spreading the word about great reads on blogs I love.

This weeks line up is below:

Nursing in Public, how does it make you feel? Birthing Beautiful Ideas talks about different situations in which she found herself nursing in public and how it made her feel. 

"When I ask how you feel about nursing in public, I don’t mean, “Do you think it’s awesome or gross?” For the most part, I would like feelings about the act of public breastfeeding to be completely neutral.

Kind of like if I’d ask, “Hey, what do you think about me eating a sandwich in public?” and you’d be like, “Um…I don’t know…good for you?  I don’t have feelings about it, it’s just eating in public” and I’d be like, “Yeah, I know, it’s just eating in public, WHICH COME TO THINK OF IT IS EXACTLY WHAT BABIES ARE DOING WHEN THEY ARE NURSING IN PUBLIC!!!”

Ahem. Instead, when I ask, “How does nursing in public make you feel?” I’m asking, “How do YOU feel when YOU nurse in public (if you do)?”

Do you feel confident?  Anxious?  Like a rockstar?  Like a target for criticism?" - read the rest of the post at Birthing Beautiful Ideas

The Wait For Mourning... although it is a post on loss, one of my daily blog reads recently lost her grandmother and wrote a beautiful poem in honor of her.

"My grandmother, the woman I cherish more than any other, the one who took my wounded toddler heart and gave it a reason to keep beating… she’s slipping away from this world" - read the rest at Birth Faith

Unexpected, Unassisted Birth - LOVE is a beautiful birth story posted on Mama Birth. I particularly like this birth story as it was her desire to do whatever it took to get the birth she wanted.

"My first pregnancy left me somewhat jaded and mistrusting of doctors and hospitals.  My baby was breech.  He had been breech since the 12 week ultrasound and had stayed that way since.  I tried inversions, hot and cold packs, music on my lower abdomen and even handstands to get baby to flip.  At 38 weeks he was still breech.  An external cephalic version was attempted but failed.   On multiple occasions, my OB used every scare tactic in the book to try to force me to schedule surgical delivery.  He talked down to me and essentially told me I would kill my baby if I tried to deliver my breechling vaginally." - read the rest at MamaBirth

 A Homebirth Story is written (being written) in 7 parts over at First the Egg, and I am hooked!

"At 3:14AM as we moved into Friday, 11 May, I sat in our tiny office and journaled, mostly to take a break from trying to sleep. These notes ended up being the beginning of my second birthing story. At the time, I figured it could be labor, or—more likely—I could still have days or weeks left. With Noah, I had a couple nights up with contractions long before things actually led anywhere, and it was still earlier than I really expected to give birth (though past 41 weeks according to the estimated due date in my chart).

That night, Eric and I had gone to bed together around 12:30 after watching the first chunk of High Fidelity (we’d been borrowing quite a few movies from the library in recent weeks) and reading (I finished Tipping the Velvet). I tried to go to sleep a bit before Eric, while he read with his book light as he often did during this pregnancy, but I was way uncomfortable with lower back pain, headache, our nightly bedtime party-time fetal movement, and uncomfortable/painful contractions." - read the rest at First the Egg

Navelgazing Midwife wrote a perfect post (perfectly timed) for a client of mine, so I had to share with you! She writes about the lovely aspect of mucous during labor. She has such wonderful nuggets of wisdom there.

"I asked folks to “Toss Me a Birth-Related Word” on my Navelgazing Midwife Facebook Page and “Mucous” was the first word. Here, I’ll use the word as a springboard from which to jump.

I’ve written about “gloppies” (my nickname for mucous in birth) before, but thought I’d write about how gloppies clearly demonstrate how far a woman is in labor. I’m sure there are exceptions, but they would be extremely rare. I’ve talked to nurses and other midwives about this so have more info than just mine." - read the rest at Navelgazing Midwife

Authentic Parenting wrote a refreshing and healing post on 11 steps for healing and restoring the peace after being harsh with your child. We all need this once in awhile.

Have you been less than stellar with peacefully navigating parent-child conflicts lately? Has your temper flared, have you yelled, lost  your cool,  hurt or spanked your child? Has frustration, irritability, tiredness gotten the best of you?

Well, you are not alone. In a survey completed a few years ago, out of about 1,000 families, 88% of parents admitted to yelling, shouting, spanking or otherwise being harsh with their children. Yet, we know that these practices can be harmful to children's development, to our relationship and well, it's just not a good feeling is it? - read the rest at Authentic Parenting

Andd there you have it! My week's recommended reads! Enjoy!