For My Family

 https://open.spotify.com/album/4SBmdtSiTmlYJLdUWYjn67?si=_VtoEZPZShCXHBvbSfncEQ

Authenticity

 https://open.spotify.com/artist/0zWF7pWQPoqp2pKD37kSKa?si=KDGtT2dETG2F_UMJbA6W2w

USD Podcast

 https://www.sandiego.edu/news/detail.php?_focus=91134#:~:text=Bridget%20Frese%2C%20clinical%20associate%20professor,care%20goes%20beyond%20the%20superficial.

Lyon, France

Coffee is a language in itself.

Song: Where Are You Going?

https://soundcloud.com/bridget-jean-71619884/where-are-you-going

Happy birthday, Gabe!

Gabe turned one on November 29. 2018

Dissertation defense

Family photo at my dissertation defense

September 21, 2018 

The Absentee Blogger

Where have I been? Like most new moms, I have been a little busy. But the past year has had some special considerations. I gave birth to our son, Gabriel Archer, on November 29, 2017, and immediately become critically ill. I owe an enormous amount of thanks to my husband, my mom, my mother-in-law, and countless friends that went the extra mile (or two) to ensure my baby and I had the care that we needed. Shortly after recovering, my dad entered hospice care. Shortly after that, we moved our family from CT to OH to be with him. Six weeks later, Dad died. Two months after that, I defended my dissertation in CT. Two months after that, my husband moved to AZ and we have been having a long-distance marriage for the past two months with a week-long visit from him over the holidays. So, although the first year with a new baby is typically busy, I have had some things to keep me extra busy. I am grateful to be on the other side of 2018, grateful for my health and the health of my family, and grateful for everyone who made that possible.

Our bundle of joy!

Post a year late, but better late than never!

Broken Road

What Other People’s Births Taught Me About My Life

“Claire!” I snapped at her. “You’ve got to pull yourself together. Put your hands behind your knees, hold your breath, push, and this will all be over.”  This was the last birth I attended. I wasn’t there as a midwife or as a nurse. I was there as a sister. My sister, Claire, was giving birth to her second child and her labor took a quick turn; too quick to get the epidural she was expecting. Like many women faced with unimaginable, raw pain of birthing a baby, my sister was disorganized and was using her energy to try to crawl backwards out of her body and back away from the pain. Let’s just say this technique is common, but ineffective. So, I got real with her. I went back to my nursing and midwifery mode, turned my soft voice to a commanding tone, and offered firm and direct instruction. But, I wasn’t in scrubs, so this surprised those who were. There was a pause, the doctor, who I didn’t know me, just looked perplexed and said, “Thank you.” The next push, little Warren was born into the world.

That was nearly four years ago. I have been a maternity nurse for thirteen years and I graduated with my midwifery degree six years ago. I have attended hundreds, if not more than a thousand births. But I stopped attending births at the end of midwifery school, with the exception of Warren’s birth. Instead, I worked as a midwife in community health doing home visits with young first-time moms and babies. This eventually led me to clinical and academic questions that inspired me to pursue my PhD in nursing. Today, I am privileged to be a full-time student. I am not sure if I am on a hiatus from birth or if those days are behind me, but I am immensely grateful for my experience at the bedside of birth. Birth is a unique and raw form of humanity. Being immersed in its environment has taught me much about life.

Here are a few lessons I have learned from working at the bedside of birth.

1. Women are amazing. Most people assume I work in maternity because I love babies. Babies are great (see #3), but what really inspires me is the women. How privileged are we as women to grow new life? We then get to nurture and promote the growth of that child. Weathering the countless and unpredictable storms this involves often requires soul searching and digging deep to delivery what is needed. I’ve drawn what seems like endless inspiration from the women I have been privileged to work beside. Women. Are. Amazing.

2. It’s good to have a plan, but you can expect things not to go accordingly. I encourage the women I work with to create a birth plan, a written document of their desired labor course. Mostly, I see this beneficial as an exercise for her to be thoughtful about what she does and does not want. In addition, it’s a helpful tool to communicate her wishes to her labor support team, both the medical personnel and her personal support team. However, I like to think of labor as a stream or river, with each birth having its own current with unique twists and turns. There are too many unknown variables to be able to successfully craft and predict its course. So, plan for what you would like, and when the contractions start coming, hold on tight. You never know where those currents will take you. So it is with life as well. It’s good to have a plan, but you can expect things not to go accordingly.

3.  Babies are incredible: full of such potential and endless possibilities. They give us such hope. Enough said.

4.  Sometimes the best action is no action at all: just be present. Patience is key to birth. And as a maternity provider, you can expect the laboring women and her support team to grow weary and impatient with this grueling and overwhelming process. It’s powerful being a steady presence of reassurance and by not taking action indicating to others that all is well.

5.   Sometimes the best action is to take action and take action now: know when to step in. Birth is wild and can sometimes get out of control. If and when this happens, it is not time for steady patience. It is time for action, whether that be offering directive instructions or an invasive, life-saving procedures. As a midwife, you need all kinds of tools in your toolbox. Know when to use them and use them wisely.

6.  There is no such thing as an easy birth. Slow or fast. Vaginal or C-section. It’s true that some births are tougher than others, but we all have to pay the price for such radical growth and transition. Similarly, there is no such thing as an easy life. There are various seasons and stages, and some are smoother than others, but life requires growth and growth requires letting go and struggle in some form. We often spend too much time comparing our difficulties to others’ strengths and end up asking “Why me?”.  This is not fair to ourselves or anyone else. There is no such thing as an easy birth and no such thing as an easy life.

7.   Relationships are everything. Research shows that the best indicator of having positive birth outcomes is the presence of consistent support team. I like to think this is true of life. So take time to gather good people around you and nurture those relationships. You reap what you sow in relationships and in life.

8.    Trust the process. You never know what you are going to get out of life or out of birth, but we are granted the experiences we need at the times that we need them. Birth is unpredictable, just as life is unpredictable. Trust in the process.

9.    There are different stages of birth and they are all temporary, just like there are different seasons to life; again, all temporary.  Contractions come and they go.  There are rest periods amidst the trials. One stage leads to another until we have arrived at our destination, at least our destination for now, until the next journey begins. The good stuff and the tough stuff: it’s all temporary.

10.   Birth, like life, is a mixed bag, but overall net positive: and certainly, stunningly beautiful. Amidst the pain and the suffering, the blood and the sweat, there is beauty all around.  There is beauty in the way nurses, midwives, and doctors care for patients, people that are otherwise strangers, with tenderness and compassion.  There is beauty in the technologies that support women and families through the process. There is beauty in the relationships that surround birth, the nine months or longer, that have led to this moment of new life. 

And there is immense beauty when that child is born.  In Spanish, they use the phrase “dar a la luz” to describe birth, which translated literally means “to give to the light.” 

After all the waiting, the tireless hours of hard work, pain, and sweat and suffering, there is a moment when the child is born and takes a first breath. 

And it is as if time stand stills. 

In that moment, there seems to be poetic clarity, that somehow, amidst all the taxes and violence and celebrations and highs and lows of this life swirling around us, it all seems to make sense in the hope of newborn child.  Birth is beautiful.  Life is beautiful.

Being at the bedside of birth taught me some hard realities about myself.  What are my gifts and talents?  What are my challenges?  How can I best put my skills and ability to work?  During midwifery school, I had two severe episodes of bipolar depression. One of the triggers for these episodes was erratic sleep. Unfortunately, birthing babies is not a nine to five gig and sleepless nights are essential to the job description. After being hospitalized three times, I reached a point where I realized that for the sake of my health and well being, I literally could not continue to with the hours required to assist women in labor and birth. So, I retired my baby catching mitt and reconfigured how I could still use my passion, knowledge, and skills to support moms and babies. That was six years ago and the only birth I have attended during that time was my sister’s birth of her son Warren. At times I miss it, kind of like missing the good times of an old relationship that has run its course. I still consider myself a midwife as this remains foundational to my research as an academic. And although it is a thing of my past for now, working at the bedside of birth has been foundational to my career and shaped me as a person.

“Claire!” I snapped at her. “You’ve got to pull yourself together. Put your hands behind your knees, hold your breath, push, and this will all be over.”  I actually cringed at those words.  See, I am a midwife, and I don’t believe that this is the best position for a woman to give birth.  But, when push comes to shove, you do what you’ve gotta do to finish the job.

As I write this, I am 35 weeks and 6 days pregnant, expecting my first child. It is Thanksgiving morning and there is so much gratitude brewing in my heart: my past, my present, and my future. Just as I have learned much from attending to other women’s pregnancies, births, and experiences of motherhood, being personally pregnant has also taught me so much. Despite having a healthy obsession with pregnancy and childbirth for nearly 20 years, I am surprised at how much I still had to learn by moving through the experience myself.  Over the next posts, I will be writing about what surprised this midwife about being pregnant. But for now, I am grateful for all my experiences with other women’s birth, from the very first child I witness enter the world all the way up until Claire and Warren. The next birth I attend will be the birth of my own child. I am grateful for this child still safely growing in my own body. And I am grateful for all these things have taught me about this one wild and wonderful life.

May your life be ripe with blessings. Happy Thanksgiving 2017.

Psalm 139:13-14

#Am Writing

Links to posted writings:

Blessed is She:

The Kingdom of Heaven is Near

https://blessedisshe.net/blog/kingdom-heaven-near/

Grace Notes:
The Body I Got From My Mama
https://bellagracemagazine.com/blog/the-body-i-got-from-my-mama/

Huffington Post:
How Marriage Changed My Expectation of Marriage
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/how-marriage-changed-my-p_b_10445130.html

Life In My Thirties: What A Surprise
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/life-in-my-thirties-what-a-surprise_us_57abd2aae4b024b403afc330

Embracing the Warrior Within: How Two Friends Faced Depression and Found Their Inner Strength
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/embracing-the-warrior-within-how-two-friends-faced_us_58bdb13be4b0aeb52475fdcf

Learning to Let Go of Expectations
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/learning-to-let-go-of-expectations_us_59da095de4b0cf2548b33805

She Knows:
Tools To Nurture and Create Balance
http://www.sheknows.com/community/living/tools-nurture-create-balance

2020 Mom Blog:
Repealing the ACA: What it Could Mean for Maternal Mental Health
http://www.2020mom.org/blog/2017/2/7/repealing-the-aca-what-it-could-mean-for-maternal-mental-health

21st Century Cures Act is a Victory for the Fight against Maternal Depression, Now What?
http://www.2020mom.org/blog/?offset=1496285712081

Song: Promises

https://soundcloud.com/bridget-jean-71619884/promises-7-ending-4

At the Brink of Becoming

I stand at the brink of becoming.
And in this moment,
There is so much to do.
There is always so much to do.
Like the constant of the moving Earth--
Which I never asked to twirl--
Yet I find myself spinning,
Propelling my life forward
At times at a dizzying pace.

How do I pause this never-ceasing sequence of demands?
How do I create space for will and mind and body?
    To be reflective?
    To be kind?
    To be grateful? 
    To be all the best that life has to offer?
    To be?

So I stand.
I stand at this brink of becoming,
And I breathe deeply into my growing belly and swelling breasts,
Where new life will emerge and then be nourished.

And in this becoming I am not the same as yesterday,
Nor tomorrow.
But isn’t this always true?
As life continues to spin us forward?
So I stop.
     I sit.
     I write the stirrings of my heart.
     I take time to bathe my achy joints
              and wash my skin clean of yesterday.
     I don myself with sweet smelling lotions
              and bright ruby lip balm.
     I put on a bright yellow dress,      
              so bright that it speaks of the beauty of life
              while also cautioning to slow down this pace.
     I frame my face with delicate, light blue, teardrop earrings;
For today is a day of becoming.
And it won’t be long when such luxuries will be unreachable,
Due to the increasing demands of life.
      A mouth to feed and soul to soothe
      On top of sleepless nights.
But that is not today.

Today my child is safe inside my swollen belly.
He is tiny, but growing fast.
I can relate to the feeling.

Today I make space for my yellow dress
                                      and sweet-smelling lotions
                                      and ruby lip balm.
All the while the world keeps spinning,
And the demanding tasks continue to beckon.
But I can make space to savor this moment:
This moment at the brink of becoming.

Blooming Among Sunflowers

I was published in Bella Grace!!!

At the Cusp of Springtime

I exist in a time at the cusp of springtime.
And in a space ripe for the intermingling of the secular and sacred.
Where they bleed into One.
And it awakens in me a aching longing.
For deep rest and sunshine.
For hard work and laughter.
For community and solitude.

And it is in this time and space,
I plant my feet on the ground
And reach for the heavens
Knowing that I am created from the dust of stars,
Yet exist in the confines and expansiveness
Of time and space and awareness.

Breathe it in.  Breathe it out.
For this moment will pass,
Yet it is as it is for all of eternity.

And I dance among juxtapositions,
Finding movement and joy in their music.
And continue to search for their presence on Earth.
This aching Earth.
This aching longing.
Ripe with life's possibilities.
At the cusp of springtime.

Autumn Prayer

Lord, make my life the very prayer I offer up to You.

Let it be in my waking and my sleeping; the work of my hands, the work of my mind, in my dreaming, and my planning.  Especially, Lord, help the mundane tasks be prayers to You, the daily chores of dishes and taking out the garbage grocery shopping and putting on make-up.  For nothing is separate from You, my God.  You infuse this world like tea in hot water.  Let my prayer be a song of thanksgiving and a canticle of concerns for all of Your Creation, especially the small piece of the pie I am called to steward: this body, mind, and spirit; those I love and those who love me; materials in my care.  Help me to stay deeply rooted in You that I may carry gratitude and concern in Light and Wisdom.

Lord, You are God and I am not.  I praise You for even granting me strength and ability to approach You in time, word, paper, song.  For I am so small in comparison to your cosmos and You are so big compared to your cosmos.  Yet, it matters.  I matter.  This day and what I do and do not bring to it, it all matters.

So I pray for the energy to do your work, let my heart rejoice as You rejoice and my soul cry out for the things that break You, break wholeness, break Holiness.

Spare me from being one that loves all of humanity, but cannot love my neighbor next door.

Grant me grace.
Grant me grace.
Grant me grace
        Love and mercy.
        Humility.

Lord, let this be my prayer.  Let it pulse in my veins and radiate from my heart.

Help me to trust.

Dwell in beauty.
     Bathe in beauty.
Dwell there.

Amen.

Slide Show from Rehearsal Dinner