What's Next?

Outside my window winter is giving over to spring. Sun breaking through fog. Cold of the early morning receding with the darkness and returning at night. Years of birth work have brought me a unique appreciation for the cycles of seasons and nature.  I’m feeling some synchronicity in this season of change. A burst of newness in the grey. 

My 5 year-old and his drawing of spring sunshine

In less than five months, all three of my children will be attending school.  My role of stay-at-home mom tips on the precipice of change. All my 12 years of motherhood I have anticipated this coming date as one to be celebrated.  A time to step out of one stage of life and into another.

What will I do with myself? 

It’s a question I’ve been toying with for months now. I’m qualified for lots of different kinds of jobs. I have connections with several wonderful community agencies. I’ve felt my passion for birth work dwindling, my ardor for birthwork gone. When I think of doing something else I feel excited and overwhelmed. My options lay open like the thawing farmer’s field. I’ve been busy dreaming.

So I’ve putting myself out there.  I’ve tried new things, sent off a Curriculum Vitae or CV, some fancy new term for resume. I completed a first very-rough draft of a novel manuscript. My ear is perked for new positions opening and I’m up for study- college or certification.  Maybe a job at the elementary school, so as to not be so far from my growing children? The possibilities are many.

But then:

February 8, 2015. I held her hand as she rested her head on my shoulder.  The white sterile operating room is cold and sounds seem to bounce off the walls in an echo.  Her nerves were at their end. “Breath, Sarah, its ok.  I am here with you.  Just breathe and rest into me.” I told her. Sarah was in the midst of getting a spinal block for her planned Cesarean birth.  Her baby girl, lay breech within her, and refused to turn. By her side for the fifteen minute surgical prep my goal was to keep her calm. 
"Sarah, listen to my voice, you are ok. This is just where your baby needs you to be.  The doctor is taking good care of you. Just breathe.” Slowly and soothingly I keep speaking these words.

Face-up on the operating table a singular tear escaped her eye, running to her ear. She blinked hard, trying to control the anxiety beating in her heart, in her head.  I wiped the tear. I held the hand of her strapped down arm. “You are not alone. I am here with you Sarah. It is almost time your husband will be here soon.” I coached.

“Don’t leave me alone.” Panicked words spoken to me through more tears.

The prep was finished, time for surgery to start. I, the doula, traded my place with Sarah’s husband and left the operating room. I waited outside the double doors that separated me from Sarah. I prayed, I paced, remembered to breathe. Five minutes passed, six, seven; hearty cries filled the air. The rhythmic wail of a babe just released into the world.

As I waited in the recovery room I texted my husband,“I’m good at this doula thing.” 

"Of course you are, you always have been.” was his reply.

It had been almost a year since I had attended a birth in the role of a doula. And I hadn’t missed it.

UNTIL I DID.

Three weeks later I find myself late evening squatting beside a whirl pool. My fists press with all the strength I can summon on a laboring mama’s back. A skill I have perfected through many hours of labor. I turned down the lights, lit the candles, and played soft music, scent of lavender in the air. Simple things, small things, easy things. She may have not even noticed. Things she would have been fine without. Things that the busy nurse doesn’t have time to think about. But a doula does, I did.

Driving home from that birth I felt it. A crack in the shell around my doula’s heart. “I’m good at this.” I say to the empty passenger seat. “Why are you looking for anything else?” the dark night replied.

I can come up with a long list of reasons to leave doula work behind me. Lost sleep, life on call, difficult births, dead babies, long hours and little pay –all things I can live without. 

Are the moments of satisfaction enough? The joy at the end- knowing that my in small ways I helped? Is the time spent away from my family worth it? I don’t know. 

There is time still to wait and see.  The answer to my “what’s next”? Well maybe it’s what I’ve been doing for years. I need help remembering that it isn’t all or nothing- an EITHER/OR. I could fit doula work into my “what’s next” stage?  More of a BOTH/AND?

Regardless of the outcome I an grateful for moments of joy breaking through to me this spring.