Ryan and I had some pretty solid plans. Now that we feel ready to procreate, we’ve done quite a bit of research (via books, movies, classes, and first-person accounts) on the subject of gestating, birthing, and caring for new little people. This, coupled with my experience working with infants and young children, has guided us towards some fairly solid ideas about the direction we’d like all of this to take. For one, we decided to go with the midwifery model of care, rather than the traditional OBGYN route. Up until this past week, we’d planned a home birth here in our little one bedroom apartment. We paid for a birth tub rental, checked our lease to make sure there aren’t any “no waterbed / no aquarium” clauses (which typically indicate that the floor up here on level two might not be strong enough to bear the extra weight – and birth tubs are HEAVY when they’re all filled up), and began mentally planning the changes in layout needed to accommodate a newborn. We figured the baby would be sleeping close by for a while anyway, and we’d manage to move into a bigger place well before their 18th birthday.
Then we had a stroke of good luck. We found out that we’ll have the opportunity to move into one of the annex spaces run by my school when the current tenant moves out. It’s a beautiful three bedroom house, a block away from work, where we’d live rent- and utility-free in exchange for some property maintenance and pet care (there are several rabbits and chickens living outside). The money we’ll save on rent will allow us to afford two days/week of childcare, and the proximity to my school will mean almost 2 hours cut out of my commute everyday. The one difficulty is going to be the fact that while children are in care downstairs, we (the tenants) are to stay out of sight. That means no access to the downstairs (most importantly the kitchen) during the week between 7:15 am and 5:45 pm. We’ve been telling ourselves it won’t be so bad. The current tenant has a mini fridge and microwave set up in her upstairs living space. That seems workable. And who are we kidding? I absolutely hate cooking. It’s not like I’m desperate to bake bread in the middle of the day. By the time we moved in there – September-ish? I’d be almost ready to head back to work and wouldn’t be around during the day anyway.
And then on Thursday we found out we’ll need to move earlier than we’d thought. On July 1st, about a week before the baby is due. We cannot have a home birth if our new home is also a childcare center. What if I went into labor in the middle of the day when all of the children were there? No, no, no. Not what we’d planned. Not quiet or private or familiar. I can see working myself up into a total panicked frenzy. And I doubt the parents would be too keen on it either.
We did have the forethought to get our midwives’ opinions on what we should do in case this happened. They suggested renting a hotel room. Seriously. They said they’d done it before. For couples living right across the river in Washington state, where they aren’t licensed to attend births, or for people living in houses with a bunch of roommates, or in some other living situation where a home birth just wasn’t feasible – like our situation has become. We would have to wait until I was actually having consistent contractions before we’d even call to get a room. It’s not like we’d be able to schedule it in advance. And where would we go? Midwives suggested someplace not too skeezy, not too fancy – La Quinta Inn perhaps. They seemed fairly certain we’d be able to find some place even with no notice. It’s Portland, not NYC. The hotels are never completely booked up, they said. It seemed kind of reasonable until we discovered that we might actually have to do it.
Our other option, the one we’re aiming for now, is to get a spot at the birth center where my midwives practice. It’s right across the street from my school, 2 blocks away from our new home, and a really lovely space. They have doulas to help out during and after labor, people to bring or make you meals, and in-room birth tubs. It’s like going to a bed and breakfast to have your baby. No worries about set up or clean up. We just need to come up with $2,000 more… Which is actually a huge problem because I had to cash out my retirement funds from when I was teaching in New York just to cover the cost of the midwife care before, during, and after the birth. And I paid for two birth classes. And (fine, if you want me to be honest) I bought some other stuff: a body pillow, maternity clothes, ice cream. Lots of ice cream. The point is that the money we had earmarked for this birthing business is long gone. We don’t have savings. We can barely pay our bills as is. So we’re going to have to apply for a financial hardship price reduction from the midwifery. Maybe they can put us on a very long installment plan. And my dad has kindly offered to pitch in.
So here we are. Packing up and moving at week 39 in my pregnancy (assuming that this baby doesn’t come early).
Scrambling to settle the whole “labor location” business, and hoping (even though my yoga instructor explicitly advises against feeling that feeling) that we’re able to settle in and set up and calmly start our new little family in the same house as a daycare.
Who knows what sort of wacky turns this journey will take next? Stay tuned…
