Labor Lasagna needs it's own post

So I'm on my second bowl of labor lasagna today. Honestly not because I am horribly uncomfortable and need to be in labor immediately, but because IT IS SO GOOD.

I made it with the intention to make it super spicy, but it turned out to be just a normal amount of spicy, which I ended up being grateful for, in the end.

Anyway, I guess I'll write up a ghetto recipe about it, since it is amazing.

First, prepare the ingredients:

-Prepare the sauce. I use my own homemade sauce but you can also just get any jarred sauce of your preference. You would need about 2 quarts (jars) of it though. Heat it up in a saucepan and set aside.
-Prepare the peppers--I used 2/3's of four different kinds of hot pepper cut up into small pieces. You gotta go with the fresh pepper, just using "pepper" or bell peppers is not going to cut it.
After cutting up the peppers, I also cut up a clove of garlic, and put the peppers and garlic in a small amount of sauce (one cup) to heat up and stew.
After a few minutes, turn off the heat and set the sauce aside.
-Prepare the eggplant--slice the eggplant in thin (1/4-1/8 inch) slices. Dip each slice in salt on both sides, and stack the slices up on a plate. Leave them for 15 minutes or longer while you do other things.
Then, when you are ready to use them, wash the slices off and pat them dry with a paper towel or cloth towel. You may notice (hopefully) that they have spewed forth tons of brown liquid--supposedly this is all the bitterness coming out of them. Once they are dried, set them aside for layering.
-Prepare the "protein"--I used tofu but you could also used ground meat or tempeh:
I crumbled up the tofu and fried it in the wok in olive oil with salt for a LONG time, until the water was all evaporated and the tofu was getting nice and browned.
Then I added about 1/3 of the cut up hot peppers and let them cook with the tofu for a few more minutes, as it got even more brown, fried, and yummy. Finally, take out of the wok and set aside for layering.
-Prepare the other veggies. Honestly this could be anything, because the important things are the peppers and eggplant. I used one onion, one red bell pepper, and a grated carrot. Grate or cut into small pieces all of the other veggies you want to use and set aside in individual containers for layering.
-Prepare the cheese. I used vegan cheese (I highly recommend that brand), a mixture of cheddar and mozzarella flavors. If you are not vegan, use regular cheddar or mozzerella ;-). Anyway, grate the cheese up and put it aside.
-Finally, make sure you have a pound of lasagna noodles on hand. I used rice noodles because I'm gluten free and it worked out great, I didn't notice the difference with all the other flavors.

Now you are ready to make the lasagna!

Put a layer of sauce in the bottom of a casserole dish.
Then a layer of lasagna noodles.
Then one or more of the ingredients.
Repeat over and over until you are done, making sure to alternate the noodles in each layer in different directions.
Also make sure to use plenty of sauce--the noodles will soak it right up. After each layer of ingredients put a good layer of sauce before putting in your next layer of noodles.

In terms of what I did for layers: I think I put the carrot and onion in one layer, the tofu in one layer, the peppery sauce and cheese in one layer, the eggplant in one layer, the red peppers in one layer. (Did I forget anyone?)

Finally top the lasagna with a layer of cheese (and Parmesan cheese if you are not vegan), and bake at 400 degrees for a half hour to forty minutes. If you use the vegan cheese, you'll need to crank it up to 475 for the last 10 minutes because the cheese needs to be at a high temperature to melt.

Take it out of the oven, let it cool for at least 10 mins, and then enjoy with some of the sauce that you have leftover from putting it together. If you are lucky, it might look like this at the end:



I can't really get over how good it is, but lasagna IS my favorite food and I probably haven't had it in almost a year, so that might be part of it. I plan on eating it non-stop until it is gone, regardless of the status of labor or baby.

Labor Vibes

So I sent my darling family members a text a few hours ago that said: "I'm feeling kind of weird, just wanted to let you know so you could keep your phones nearby."

Basically, I had my acupuncture yesterday, and this morning and today I have been newly energetic--after having no energy or motivation for several weeks now. Today I made an excel file out of my daily to-do list/checklist (that I had been really into and had blogged about often but which has been neglected now for several weeks). AND I ACTUALLY DID some of the things on the checklist--cleaned up the kitchen, watered the plants, loaded and unloaded the dishwasher, washed dishes, etc.

The other thing I did last night and again this morning was drink "Smooth Move" Tea, because I've been seriously constipated for days. My midwife assured me that this tea was serious business and would cause the desired effect. After last night's cup (and no/little results), I was sure I would wake up this morning itching to go. Annnnnd, not so much. So I had another cup this morning. And still nothing.

Anyway, I started to feel pretty uncomfortable a few hours ago. I had just finished making "Labor Lasagna", a recipe of my own design including eggplant and a lot of spicy peppers (and veggie sauce and veggie "cheese", etc). But I was getting a little worried about even eating it because I felt so internally weird that I wondered if I should even introduce the crazy spicy food into my body! I was almost feeling hot and cold flashes and this restlessness and general weirdness.

At this point I sent the text to my darling family. MOSTLY because my Mother had told me repeatedly to call her if I even felt different at all. So I did, I let her know. So then she immediately called me, and all my sisters texted me back, asking if I was in labor, what was going on, etc.

"No, I'm not in labor! I just feel a little uncomfortable," I said.
"Uncomfortable how?" said my Mom.
"I don't know, just weird--look you asked me to tell you if I felt different at all and I do so I'm telling you!"
"Are you emotional?"
"No!"
"Well look out for that! Oh here Dad wants to talk to you."

"A?" says my Dad, "What's up are you having contractions?"
"Just Braxton Hicks but I've been having those for months."
"But are they coming regularly?"
"No, look I'm not in labor, Mom just said to call if I felt ANYTHING different so I did that."
"Have you been walking?"
"No." (And in this moment I pictured myself waddling through BJ's with my sister yesterday. I can't walk, are you kidding?) "No."
"Walk. That is what is going to get you going. You gotta get out there and walk."
"Okay, I'll keep that in mind." At this point I am getting more and more physically uncomfortable and really don't want to be on the phone. "Okay I'm going to go."

So after these thrilling conversations, I tried the labor lasagna. And it was not actually that spicy, which was good because, as I mentioned, I'd started to get a little worried about how spicy I thought it would be, and if it would even be edible, give me heartburn, or make me have a horrible labor in which I was throwing up spicy food and having spicy diarrhea as I attempted to move a baby through my body.

So I ate some of the lasagna, and started getting another discomfort attack. I visited the bathroom and low and behold, I pooped a little. Not a lot, but some.

Then Amy and Karl showed up and we hung out for awhile--I ate more lasagna, bounced on my birth ball, and when they left I got a serious attack and ran to the bathroom and it happened finally. The smooth move. Not even diarrhea at ALL, just a big ole satisfying poop. God, I was thrilled. I don't know what helped more, the tea or the lasagna! I just hope things keep up this way because I must have days and days of "moves" that need to be "smoothed out" in there.

Anyway, long story short: I do not appear to be in labor, but rather to have endured an internal battle between constipation and "Smooth Move Tea". However, I still think that things do seem to be setting themselves in order somewhere in my mind/body and I would not be at all surprised to go into labor tonight or tomorrow.

Especially since I will be eating "Labor Lasagna" for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Circumcision

Okay, I'm pretty sure I never wrote about this before. One decision people expecting a boy are faced with is whether or not to circumcise their son. This is a personal decision and honestly one that I don't feel SO strongly about for other people--I could care less what other people do because I really don't think it matters THAT much (in comparison to breastfeeding, for instance, in which I'm a pretty serious "lactavist" and feel pretty strongly that everyone at least should give a try with it because it is SO important).

But, though I could care less what other people decide to do, I decided quite a while ago that sons of ours would not be circumcised. When I brought this up years ago to James, to ask him what he thought, he said:

"Well, I don't know. Aren't kids supposed to look like their fathers?" (James is circumcised).
"Honey, I don't know how many baby penises you've seen, but they don't look like adult penises. Trust me. There is nothing you could do to make them look the same. Adult penises are huge and hairy. Baby penises are tiny and hairless. No child would ever look at their father's penis and think it was nearly the same anyway."
"Hmm, I don't know."
"Well here, let's watch this youtube video of a circumcision being performed to help you decide." (I tried to find an "unbiased" one to post here but didn't feel like spending that much time looking--feel free to shop around for your circumcision video of choice, though, or watch this one with the sound off so you can't hear the commentary (or the baby screaming in the background).)
Anyway, 20 seconds into the video James is like: "Turn it off, I agree, I agree, we won't do it, just turn it off!" (LOL)
"Okay Honey." I said, and we've been in pretty serious agreement about it ever since.

More specifically and personally, I feel like I've spent 9 months growing my son in my uterus. God/The Universe (call it what you will) spent 9 months building his body step by step, following a very specific blueprint. When he is born and put onto my chest and I look down at him, I know he will be the most beautiful and perfect person I have ever seen in my life. Every part of him will be perfect, and I don't feel the need to mess with what God made. Or put him through an unnecessary cosmetic procedure in his first day/week of life.

With this being said, sometimes there are good reasons. If it is part of your religion and you feel strongly about it--or if you feel strongly about it for some other reason . . . I heard one story of a women, and her husband was uncircumcised as a child but had some physical abnormality that made it painful for his foreskin to retract. So he ended up being circumcised as an adult, which was obviously a way bigger deal than as a baby. So if they had a son, they were planning on having him circumcised because they could make the assumption that their sons could have a similar issue. Okay, sounds like a good reason to me.

But personally, "looking like the father", or "because other people are", or something like that, I just don't buy it. You don't keep doing something unnecessarily just because it's been done before. I try to look at each of these parenting decisions outside of the context of "what other people are doing", because I'm not a freaking lemming.

With this being said, since the Academy of Pediatrics changed it's stance on circumcision about 30 years ago to reflect the fact that it is an unnecessary cosmetic procedure with no basis in medicine, the rate of uncircumcised boys has been steadily on the rise. In the U.S. now, about half the boys in our country are uncircumcised--obviously this varies greatly by region. But if you are expecting a son, there is no need to circumcise just because you think he will stand out if you don't. Who knows, where you live, he might stand out if he is.

So that's that. We'll all get to enjoy Little James' foreskin for many years to come. (Hmm, that sounds a little weird but you know what I mean, hehe).

Acupuncture!

So I had my first (and hopefully only) acupuncture appointment today for stimulating me to go into labor. God I think I was in the best mood ever when my friend Craig came in to needle me. He was like:

"So if you are still a week away from your due date, you might end up going a few days early if we do it today. Is that okay?"

"GOD, YES, IT IS AWESOME. DO IT. DO IT NOW." I said. And the look of eye-rolling joy that those caps conveys is a perfect vision of what I looked like in that moment. Picture those horses who look insane and their eyes are rolled back in their head and their mouth is hanging open. That was me.

"It should work pretty well since you are young and healthy and everything," he went on.

(YES AWESOME THANK YOU.) I was as freaking jovial as a kid on Christmas morning, and that is after only like 5 hours of sleep--easily half what I need to feel rested.

So now I'm guessing any time between tonight and Sunday. So probably the 10th-14th. That window is like half as big as my original 9th-18th one!

Anyway, if I'm still pregnant on my due date, I have another appointment then.