Sorry for my long hiatus. I've become enmeshed in this new venture of teaching nursing. I love it, I absolutely love it. Slowly but surely I'm clearing my schedule to accommodate this grand experiment. I really thought this was just a part time gig for extra money. I didn't think about it being an opportunity to convert 13 people to midwifery care, or opening 13 people's eyes to birth inequities, or change 13 minds about the delivery of healthcare to birthing women. I've gotten to teach OB nursing exactly the way I would want to teach it. We have visited both the navelgazer's blog and the baby catcher's blog. They sat in raptured awe as my friend Mary told us about her experience being foster mother to an HIV positive child, we thrilled to the stories of my midwife as she told of her struggles and challenges in trying to practice her trade. I watched them giggle as they tried to steady themselves on the birthball the way the doula had showed them. I thrilled to hear their comments about what they saw and heard in clinicals- I knew I had gotten to them before they were enculturated into 'normal hospital birth.' I love watching their minds change right before my eyes. I taught them about the seven types of childbearing loss and watched their eyes grow big as they realized that they had experienced their own losses, but no one had called it that. We've discussed maternal and infant mortality, healthcare in third world systems, unorthodox family structures, healthcare policy and the impact of politics. (Now to be fair, we've also learned how to read a fetal monitor strip, how to assign apgars and difference between a first degree and fourth degree tear- you know the textbook stuff. ) I've tried to focus my skill building on good communication, and critical thinking, two skills indispensable to nurses. I don't think I've ever done anything so difficult that I loved so much.