Twitter, Baby
by When I delivered my second child this past May, things didn't go exactly as I'd planned, which is usually how it goes, but still. I had totally intended to Twitter the whole thing. I had a brand new MotoRazr smartphone and everything. It was going to be awesome. But when the time came, it just wasn't possible. Man, was I bummed.
Turns out that when you have a precipitous labor - that's fancy doctor talk for holy freaking jeebus baby came SUPER FAST (dead-on ninety minutes from first contraction to baby busting out of the nethers) - there's just no time for Twittering. Which, again, sucks, because I really wanted to tweet the whole business. I actually had a moment while my husband sped down the highway, me in the passenger seat with a baby head pushing its way out between my legs, where I thought, oh, hey, this sucks, and also, I WILL NOT GET TO TWITTER THIS DAMMIT. Because, you know, the pain and terror were such that I could not have forced my fingers to tap out text on that smartphone if my very life depended on it. (Which, thankfully, it didn't: the husband was using Bluetooth to communicate with ambulances and the ER. This is why he is always in charge during emergencies: he knows to call ambulances and hospitals, whereas if I could have reached my phone I would have been Twittering: OH HAI EVERYBODY I AM HAVING BABY NOW. IN MY CAR. WHEEEEEE!)
Anyhoo. Such was my luck. Ginny, of GinnyCase.com, however, is Twittering her labor. Right now! As I type!
13 hours ago: Off to the hospital
8 hours ago: At 4 cm. Epidural is in. Doing well.
3 hours ago: doc says we are at 5 cm. Hopeful for regular delivery. Iolani is very active and they had to keep readjusting the monitor.
2 hours ago: Funny that I can use my iPhone during really strong contractions. Dodger game started and we don't get fox sports west.
See? IT'S GRIPPING.
But is it healthy? You know, psycho-emotionally or whatever? It occurred to me after I missed my own opportunity to live-Tweet my own labor and delivery that maybe my priorities were a bit skewed, that I had been jonesing to Twitter during a time when I might have otherwise been, oh I don't know, focussed on the miracle of life blah blah blah? Holding my husband's hand? Chomping ice cubes and taking care of myself? Knitting booties?
Has the Internet really so taken over my life that I couldn't imagine giving birth without inviting in all my Twitter peeps? Is that wrong?
Here's my take: first of all, if a labor is long and arduous (as my first was - 36 hours. I KNOW), having things to do to pass the time and distract oneself is a very, very good thing. First time 'round, my husband did Sudokos and napped while I praised the epidural gods but cursed whatever dillweed decided to not put televisions in the labor rooms at the hospital. Twitter would have been a blessed distraction - and I desperately wanted distractions lo those many hours. But that's just the selfish benefit: the real benefit of having the opportunity to Twitter (or, for that matter, blog) a birth - I think - is that it's just one more way in which we mothers continually lift the veil off of motherhood and childbirth and the like. We provide one more window onto our maternal experiences - good or bad - and so share the complex and wide-reaching realities of those experiences. I think that's a good thing.
But that's just me. What do you think? Twittering childbirth: a service to humankind and really cool distraction, or just more evidence that we're turning into Tweet-happy, blog-crazy, virtual-world dwelling cyborgs?
(Also, does anyone know anyone else who live-Twittered their labor and delivery? Because I think that it's just so cool. Am that much of a geek, yes. What of it?)
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Comments
Too Old
Twitter wasn't around when I gave birth, hell the internet didn't even exist way back then. But when my sister had her son, she blogged the entire pregnancy and had her husband live blog the birth for those of us desperately trying to get across country to her in time.
http://mypage.iusb.edu/~ezynda/jkz/daysofjkz.htm
Totally Would
I tended a nasty flame war on Parent Soup and posted to the boards JUST over 10 years ago during labor.
I never saw the pediatrician assistant again when she didn't say "You were the one on the laptop hooked up to the phone when this one (or that one if youngest was just in tow) was on her way. Yeah. That was me. Totally would twitter it.
~TW
Retro-Food
I Didn't Know Yet!
LittleBrother was born in Nov 2007 and I hadn't discovered Twitter. I had planned on "live blogging" the birth but we didn't even take the computer to the hospital because HE WASN'T SUPPOSED TO BE BORN when he was. I was having some heavy contractions at 38 weeks and the doctor just wanted me to come in to monitor for a bit.
And then he was born. SURPRISE!
That said, if we were having more, I totally would. Alas, I cannot and will live through others.
FireMom of Stop, Drop & Blog
I didn't have a computer
I didn't have a computer when my third child was born at home, but I posted his birth story on the 'net three years later.
If I were in labor today, I'd be twittering from the tub.
Karen
"Life is too short to pout all the time."
A Deaf Mom Shares Her World
Hands & Voices
Considered it, but no
Twitter wasn't around yet (or maybe it's more accurate to say I wasn't on Twitter) when my son was born at home in Nov. 2006. (I'm not really sure when Twitter emerged.) I had considered live-blogging his birth, but in the end I decided I wanted more privacy while in labor. I was worried that if I said I thought I was in labor and then it turned out I really wasn't, I'd have had people bugging the crap out of me from then until he was actually born and I didn't want that kind of pressure. Plus the whole thing went super fast at the end too so there wouldn't have been much blogging actually taking place.
Amy
Crunchy Domestic Goddess
BlogHers Act contributing editor
Our friends did, it was great!
A couple we are very close to had a baby and it was a kind of complicated issue. I was so nervous for them the whole time that I slept with the iPhone next to the bed so I could get the Twitters on the status. I was SO GLAD they were Twittering because I felt like I could participate with them that way!
http://ConscientiousConfusion.blogspot.com
It was my time
When I had my son, I took the whole experience in as "My Time", My time to connect with my body, my mind and my baby. Although the whole experience was NOT near as happy as it could of been (ended up in ER with Emergency cesarian after 17 hours of PUSHING), I was not interested in blogging for the world to read about "my time". Child birth to me was/is the most sacred thing.
Hell, after birth, write all you want about it. But during it, Na, not my cup-of-tea.
Lifeexperiences
I'm that Ginny Case
Twittering through my pregnancy and labor, and I did it without any real thought about the implications. But, as our pregnancy progressed my partner and I figured it would be a good way to keep our families up to date. As my due date approached and I'd find myself walking in the neighborhood, twittering where I was walking. I'll admit, at first Twitter was a novelty, but then it turned into a safety thing.
Then, I saw @jasonburns twitter the birth of his daughter. So, when we headed to the hospital I figured I could also twitter the birth of my daughter, and give a couple more tidbits.
That afternoon I got a couple of "tweets" telling me to put down the phone and focus on the birth of the baby. But, I had a easy pregnancy and a 95% painfree delivery...I needed something to do. The safety of the baby was at the top of my mind. When I needed to put the phone, I did.
If I had it all to do again, I'd do it. But, I'd also say the second most painful thing that day was getting the epidural put in. ;-) Things they don't tell you during the birth classes.
Iolani is coming up on her 3 month birthday. She's got her own blog: iolanib.blogspot.com She is a beautiful little girl, and she is truly the center of everything. And, yes - I continue to Twitter.
****
Ginny-Marie Case
www.ginnycase.com