Mucous Plug

I bet that gave you a delicious image, eh? So we've started going to childbirth classes, which just highlights for me what an odd direction our culture has taken, ever further away from the basics of life and death and community. In the class of about 20 people, only 3 (all women) had ever been present at a birth - which the teacher said was more than usual. All (men, too) had seen a video, except for us - we've been studiously avoiding them. But the time has come to start facing the reality. I've known the general mechanics of how this will go for a long time, but it's the details that matter now. And hoo boy, are there some gory details!

It's like the difference between looking at the instructional diagram in the textbook and actually dissecting that pig in high school biology. The images don't match up, and finding the right bits was always tricky. So we learned about things like the mucous plug, which conveniently blocks up the cervix to keep infection out. But at some point, hours or days or weeks before birth, it falls out - called the "show", even though in reality it is a hunk of slimy bloody snot-like stuff. Yum!

And the actual birth? The part where you see the head emerging from that now-slightly-larger hole? Totally horrifying. Oh, yes, I'm sure it's magical too, no, really, but - totally horrifying. Lots of slime and screaming and hairiness. Can't wait. Not going to start hitting up youtube for more videos. And why would you want to be that woman, shown in all your glory to birthing classes round the country? Why would you want to record the experience on video at all? Are you gonna show your kids someday? Why would you do that to them? I'm all for keeping a journal and sharing that way, but come on now.

This is not going to make me like oysters any better, either.