Birth in the city

Right now my little one is 6 months old. I had her here in Istanbul and I was worried to death. I was worried about having a baby here and the biggest reason was that here they push for cesarean. I think the facts for the US are that 25 percent of women have cesarean compared to 75 percent here. The doctors will go along with your request to have natural childbirth until the last month where they will tell you that you should be scheduled for a c-section because of this problem or that. The real truth is that they don't want to be woken up in the middle of the night and it costs you a lot more to have a c-section. I had had an emergency c-section with my son and I did not want to go through that again. I hated the thought of having a surgery to have you baby. I wanted to do the work (yes, it hurts but at least you are having pain for a reason). My ultimate dream was to have a water birth but here everyone looked at me like I had 5 heads when I said that. Now, about 5 months after I had her it was all over the news that a family had flown in water birth equipment from the US and it is all the rage now. Aghhh. My timing sucks!

Another reason I was scared was because my family couldn't be here. I had my husband's family and our best friends. That was nice to have my best friends there because when you live so far away from your own family, they become your family. Celebrating Christmas, birthdays, etc. together. But something about giving birth turns you into a little girl again. I really wanted my mama. I wanted to feel comfortable and safe.

It all turned out OK, though. I had my scary c-section and got out of it a beautiful, healthy girl. I guess in the end it really doesn't matter how they got here, it is the end result that counts. I ended up with an infection of the skin at my incision and had to take 3 rounds of antibiotics and go to the doctor everyday to have it cut open and drained. It was a hard time. Taking a newborn baby to the doctor's office everyday for 3 weeks. Feeling tired and the effects of the infection on top of scheduling feeds and her naps around going to the doc's everyday. I ended up with a pretty bad case of postnatal. I was snappy and ill. I was fighting with my husband over the smallest things and then breaking down and crying for hours. After about 2 months it was all over and I was back to me....

Almost.