Childbirth is like the judgment of God.

Childbirth is like God's judgment. Especially the eighth. Here everything is fast, the brains are boiling, painful, scary - what to hide... And from these hectic thirty minutes depends the life of a new person, so long as such a small and such a big life. Never wrote anything about how it all happens, what feelings and thoughts, impressions you experience in childbirth. Perhaps we need to “mature”, grow to the correct understanding of all this difficult experience. Or don't wait, write it down while everything is fresh in your head, alive?

I'll try. I am afraid to judge or be dissatisfied. All I have to do in life is thank you for everything. Even sorrow is merciful to us.

Therefore, I will say right away that the situations in which I found myself, I describe not for judgment, but for reasoning and gratitude.

I can be honest, I can say what I think, I’ve been through it.









s***

The first contraction was like something warm in the lower abdomen: it spilled a wave and passed. That evening, my children and I were sitting over an old Japanese camera with a tiny screen, watching videos of antediluvian undigitized tapes. A little lobasty boy, “X-legs”, in red sandals, stood on the bank of the Ob next to his older sister, a blond girl in stretched white panties, and tried to reach for the water with a twig. These are my now shattered conditions — 16-year-old Ivan and 17-year-old Lisa — as the enchanted look into their rapidly rushing infancy, not believing their own eyes — and torture me with pro-life talk.

Time has taken on an unrealistic speed. We don't have a single wire in the household to connect a 1997 video camera to a current computer or smartphone. These little ones in a funny doll screen live in another, serene and sweet life, where a young mother, not yet pregnant with their sister Marina, stands slim, in a swimsuit, barefoot, but is afraid to wear shoes to children, not knowing about the obvious benefits of summer sand for small legs.

- Mom, how things have changed...

The second contraction follows in half an hour. I also can’t take it as a harbinger of childbirth, three weeks before the official date, I don’t even try to think about what’s going on. We keep talking to the kids.

- When my father and I entered the temple, we were a little older than you are now. I was 19 years old, and he was even earlier, and by the time I was 19, I had decided to become a priest.

s***
I will risk taking the reader’s attention with irrelevant thoughts. It’s been two decades, but it’s as if people have been rebuilt. In the last century, they searched for the meaning of life: entire generations, just had to do it. In Soviet times, it seemed as if they were not looking – at least not so massively. The Soviet Union had a socialist doctrine. When everything collapsed, there was timelessness, the dashing 90s.

The secret of the unprecedented success of the church mission: educated by Soviet culture, intellectuals – a multimillion-dollar “layer” of society – lined up in line to be baptized. People wanted a forbidden God. The authorities overreacted, too vehemently rejecting Him at all levels of socialist realism. The reality inside the church of that time was that almost every young man, a man who began to church, thought of himself as a father, and the girls sang on the choirs and from there they were seized - straight into the groves.

Then, perhaps, did television destroy the spiritual quest in people? Chewal with “Orbit”, drowned in vulgar TV shows, taught to appreciate only financial well-being. On the crest of this wave in the temples periodically there are people selling spirituality - products of the era, so to speak. They either leave, disappear, or are reborn: the Church is not a simple organization, but a living organism with a powerful immune system.

But society does not have such a gift of self-purification, here, on the contrary, entropy increases. Youth are more interested in the economy than history; the temple is perceived as a store or a religious service bureau. Reviews on the city Internet portal about christenings, priests, church services roughly repeat similar genre notes from a spa or cafe. People evaluate the “level of service”, the “price-quality ratio”, are angry that they still have to “understand” something.

Children should live in this Church, changing in this world, a friend, not a “mother and father”, but their own, and coordinate themselves not with us, but with this “stranger”. We can't stand our hands here, just pray.

In fact, this was the main topic of our difficult conversation with the children that evening, and I was obviously too much worried, at least for my pregnancies.

s***

The father came home and fed him; the children were going to bed. At last I felt the first, rather painful contraction and realized what was going on. My husband quickly started the car and got dressed, I collected the necessary documents, threw it into a pre-prepared bag, added hygiene supplies and dishes, woke up the eldest child — in fact, we put it on our bed, closer to our youngest son — and went to give birth.



The contractions grew rapidly. I asked my dear husband not to leave the foster room, despite the anxiety for the children who remained at home.

The doctor immediately looked at me on the chair, reported that “opening 8 fingers”, (give birth at 10), and, turning to the nurse, rather strictly recommended to quickly take tests and bring me to the birth.

And it started. The contractions quickly became unbearable. And the nurse, inserting a catheter into a vein, demanded to sit evenly, put her hand straight, do not move. At the same time, she smiled sweetly, saying that my name means “grace”, so everything will be fine with me and the child. I was completely exhausted in pain and also felt that I was beginning to lose consciousness. The remnants of feelings managed to get scared, with her free hand began to whip herself on the cheeks. The nurse was outraged.

- What are you doing? Have faith with a mustard seed!

Wow, I came across either a very new Orthodox or adept of one of the Protestant denominations!

Then I cried out in horror: Lord, have mercy! I was seriously afraid that this sweet woman was about to start preaching her naive understanding of Christianity to me, and in the meantime I would die.

As a result, by the grace of God, the catheter was inserted into my hand, where no one ever found a vein, even in the intensive care unit! Have faith...

Between the terrible fights, I asked my last strength to finally be taken to the hospital, but, it turns out, I still had to take my things to my husband, in which I came (and instead of which they regularly give out “drag wings” – something airy from nonwoven material).

In these very "wings", writhing in pain, with a bag in her hands, she called her husband from the foster room. Seeing me in such a state, he perhaps even overly emotionally demanded that I be taken to give birth. The nurse apparently finally realized that the woman was having an eighth birth and led me to the elevator.

s***

I will stop again, with unjolly reflections about the fact that we do not know how to accept women in the seventh, eighth, tenth births and do not really understand how to behave with such a woman in labor, at least at the level of foster peace.

Well, can't you take blood right in the hospital? And not make us urinate in a tiny test tube when it's physically impossible to do? I am not against the necessary formalities, but if the head of the child has almost come out, and you need to sit on a chair with the last strength to take blood from you, and manage not to lose your temper and not allow yourself to faint... Just imagine for a second that a woman giving birth 120 kg weight, in childbirth, suddenly finds herself unconscious on the floor? What does that mean?

s***

The elevator seems to have been going to the second floor forever. The way to the table seemed like a tourist “two” with the crossing of a mountain river. Finally, I somehow climbed into the chair; almost immediately, a bladder literally exploded with a fountain. Then came the fast, one-time delivery. There was almost no pain.

It was over, they put a completely blue baby on my chest, from which the umbilical cord loop wrapped tightly around my neck was removed. The baby was not breathing well, the resuscitator took her away in the intensive care unit, putting 7 points on the Apgar scale.

And in the emergency room, meanwhile, my husband “was registered for childbirth”, that is, he filled out a lot of papers and signed various consents for me. I am afraid that I would have to do all this myself.

I will make a reservation that next week I planned to go to the hospital and lie quietly in the department of pathology of pregnant women until the birth. But it turned out differently - our daughter was born prematurely with signs of fetopathy of newborns and asphyxia. We didn't get home until 19 days later, after almost two weeks in hospital with pneumonia and high bilirubin. I am well aware that if it were not for the professionalism of neonatologists in the maternity hospital - in the intensive care unit, and in the pathology of newborns in the city hospital - our baby would have died in the first hours after childbirth. Thank God we are at home together and preparing to baptize our daughter.

s***

My stay in the maternity hospital, in the postpartum ward was for the first time for me - without a child who can be breastfed, pampered in my arms. I could go to Matrona (as we called her) in intensive care only twice a day, stand over her, pray quietly, cover her with a cross, stroke her little lobe.

The doctor daily informed me of the good changes in the condition of the newborn: here, we removed the tube from the nose, replacing it with an oxygen mask, the probe disappeared, and the baby learned to suck out of the syringe. Soon, only an intravenous catheter into the umbilical vein with glucose and antibiotics remained from the tubes.

The baby lay under blue lamps and slowly lost her swelling. She was born overweight because I had diabetes during pregnancy since 2010. Of the three children born to me with this diagnosis, Matrona was the first victim.

The excess weight for her was about seven hundred grams, so when Motya lost the extra four hundred, she began to look more or less normal, without cheeks lying on her shoulders, without a swelling back, eggs and bluish heels.

I could not feed the baby in the hospital with milk. Here, in the maternity hospital of the city hospital, oddly enough, there are no sterilizers for mother's milk, no bottles, no space for expressing. This sad omission naturally made me doubly concerned with lactation.

s***

And finally, the reanimobile moved our baby from the maternity hospital to the children's hospital. I was promised a joint stay with Matrona and the possibility of breastfeeding: after childbirth I did not have to take any antibiotics or other drugs that can get to the baby with milk. Imagine my condition when I followed the nurse into a sterile box and saw a tiny daughter lying alone in a plastic cradle. Embrace and not let go.

But, alas, not all at once. And here as a nurse, I had to listen to long conversations about hospital procedures and sign a bunch of papers before I could hold the baby to my chest. What a pain it was when the nurse told me that breastfeeding was forbidden! Until the doctor gives his permission, it is impossible!





The medics soon left without telling me anything new about being able to feed the baby. Our girl is awake! The nurse brought a bottle of mixture, immediately leaving us, and Matrona in my arms began to look for breasts.

I couldn't say no to her, sorry, dear doctors and all the nurses in the world! Thank God, it turned out that the baby sucks well - and does not want to come off and take a bottle. Breastfeeding was officially allowed that evening. During our stay in the hospital, we gained four hundred grams.

So began our happy hospital life. We have all endured meekly and with gratitude. We tolerated all the injections, tests - at any time of the day, and droppers in the head, which twice tore the wreath and inflated the frightening subcutaneous "tumors" from glucose. We didn't need magnesia compresses and phototherapy, any examinations and a hospital diet, the only thing I was worried about was the need to leave the child alone in the box to eat, because there was no food in the wards or to store food.

It's easy to pray in the hospital. And tears, no matter how sorrowful, teach and purify, strengthen much better than any joys of life. It can be scary that I am 39 years old and have 8 children on my hands, two of whom are unintelligent babies. “Takes by the gills” and subjunctive inclination: what if you died in childbirth? What if a child...

I certainly don't know what will happen to us next. But I understand how dangerous it is to live with one foot in the future, because already in the present there is so much to think about, to take care of so many people, to love, it is important now to be courageous. Why should I be burdened with something that only depends on God?

Here is our grateful today - the oldest mother in the hospital, and in the pathology of newborns says: Lord, thank you, be merciful to us sinners.

s***

As a postscript, I would like to tell you a little about the women I had to visit.

Coincidentally, the maternity hospital of the regional hospital was closed for sanitary days, and maternity women from the region were “on the slide”, as we call the 1st maternity hospital of the city hospital. Contingent - pathological births that must be planned to send to the city. Of course, these are mostly ordinary women, torn apart by work and alcohol, talking to mattresses.

When I was in a room of 8 mothers with children, I could not withstand the flow of swearing, asked to stop using mate. Although women did not stop expressing themselves, they significantly reduced the flow of obscenity. However, at the same time, their mood dropped, and jokes, various indecent conversations gave way to despondency and tears. As if from a mat they drew some bad, black energy, and, giving up their expression, dried up, exhausted? It seems that the expression from the Holy Fathers “mat is a prayer to Satan” has real ground.

I am glad that compared to the last decade, the number of mothers with two and three children has increased. Unfortunately, often the third child is born, to put it mildly, not from the first husband, and are worried about how there children with a new father will get along in their absence. Or children have to be left to the drinking grandparents. The story was particularly striking when a four-year-old boy boiled his own eggs on a gas stove because he was hungry.

Lots of women from the suburbs. A husband with a seven-grade education, in constant search of work, does not drink, but drinks; an alcoholic grandmother, children are registered with a psychiatrist. The mother herself is struggling to pull this strap and raise people from children. My roommates asked me why I didn’t have an abortion.

- I love children, I do not agree to an abortion without evidence.

In the hospital faced a postpartum neurosis - a young mother of twins who were treated for pneumonia of newborns, shouted at them fervently, of course, with a mat, and whipped on the cheeks. Neighbors from the nearby boxes almost wrote a joint letter to the guardianship authorities, as I understood it, to find “rule” for the “psychopath”. But they were stopped in time - they say, the children are guaranteed to be in the baby's house - and a psychologist began to work with the woman. How quickly people get brainwashed! On TV show stories about deprivation of parental rights: it means that you can easily eliminate an uncomfortable neighbor, no one will make noise!

Another surprise was the father of a wonderful girl, who throughout his pregnancy boorishly treated his beautiful wife and continued to do so when she and her child were in the hospital. The woman gave birth to a daughter instead of the expected son. This is their second child together, and the second girl. It is very difficult to be in such a position for an unhappy mother, especially when a child has high leukocytosis with an unclear perspective.

With me in the maternity ward lay a young Kyrgyz woman, Amina, twenty-two. She really wanted to breastfeed her daughter, but it did not work. I asked everyone, no one helped, no one explained anything properly. She was taken by my breast pump. Amina thought that if she got one, she could easily learn to feed her baby, and she would have plenty of milk.

I try to explain to her that a baby in the hands is the best pump!

I don't. We fight with her for a long time, we apply a child to his chest, tormented standing - you can not sit because of the stitches. It's not coming out yet. Finally, after an hour of struggle, it works! Baby sucks, mom is happy - silence, beauty!

They bring food, which is immediately eaten, but the mother does not let the child anywhere from herself. Demands breasts over and over again.

- Why is she like that? asks Amina.
- I'm afraid you won't give her breasts anymore, I laugh, tell her you won't take away forever what you'll feed her.
- Does she hear? Do you understand? he asks Amina seriously.
- Sure!

Then the little woman, tilting her head directly to her daughter’s ear, long and long promises her in her native language, singing and shuddering with her tongue that she will never abandon her, that she will feed herself, that she loves. Standing, in an uncomfortable position, patiently, smiling at the greed of his baby, who does not want to part with his mother's breasts.

And I imagine the small city of Jalal-Abad, lost somewhere in the Fergana Valley, the foothills of the Tien Shan that surround it, the red big sun, the mountain lake Toktogul. Climate subtropical... There are healing mud and springs - a resort. Nevertheless, interethnic riots break out periodically, although not the same as in 2010, the Kyrgyz and Uzbek diasporas are fighting.

Amina lives in Siberia. My daughter is welcome. Second pregnancy after miscarriage. The child whines, greedy, demands breasts, mother smiles.
Amina lies here as a citizen of another state - for a fee. At home, her whole family grows strawberries. Her husband from morning to evening at the market, parents and four brothers take turns visiting the young woman, bringing her hot tandoor cakes, then lamb soup.
Russia – as always, for everyone: terem-terem Who lives in a hospital?

s***

And that's my last feeling. The Russian maternity hospital is the most sterile place in the galaxy. I don’t mean the cleanliness of the surfaces. Here people, by virtue of the ruling order from time immemorial, are forced to temporarily get rid of everything external, superficial, become alien to any aesthetics. Everyone is the same - a shapeless nightgown from a rough X / b canvas, invariably a torn robe with a seal ... No makeup, not even laundry... Only slippers are different. As one woman in the stitching line said, I'm behind those black slates...

All relationships are exposed: no one can hide from anyone: along with happy and calm motherhood, small and large tragedies unfold here, real dramas are played out. If men who today have something to celebrate with friends in the absence of wives, one eye would look at the despair and pain of their loved ones, who absolutely can not relax for a minute. It is necessary to feed children, after 5-6 hours after childbirth, overcoming pain in the shrinking uterus; nipples crack before blood, and the baby sucks for days... Incomprehensible complications, diagnoses of tongue-twisting... There's no support. No one will tell you how to feed, what is the norm, and what to be afraid of. The spouse “gulevanitis”, children at home without supervision: postpartum depression will come necessarily, just against the background of nervous exhaustion.

I am glad that women, even in such circumstances, remain, with rare exceptions, human and kind, trying to support and cheer each other. Nothing can disfigure motherhood - not terrible hospital gowns, not lost attractiveness, bloated after childbirth tummy, no pallor, no bloody sheets, no swelling and seams ... Here joy, happiness, pain - all at the forefront of life! Here, in spite of everything, love is the open door to the future. published

Prepared by Anna Romashko P.S. And remember, just by changing our consumption, we change the world together! © Join us on Facebook , VKontakte, Odnoklassniki



Source: matrony.ru/rodyi-eto-kak-sud-bozhiy/