Family Archive, Name, Birth Retrospective

New Project: Family Photo Archive

So (at least on my dad's side) we already have a family historian, that would be cousin Colleen. And she occassionally gets a hold of some ancient photos for us and makes us all copies which is super cool. It occurred to me recently that it would be cool, not to mention important, to digitize all of our family's old photos & negatives so we can all have prints of whatever photos we wanted, and they would be archived for future reference/reprints. So I swiped a huge batch of my parents old negatives and bought a negative/photo scanner (35 mm, 120, & slides). This is so much fun & exciting though EXTREMELY time consuming, so I imagine this will be a project that will last my whole life and then some. The ideal would be for us all to have a family website that we could all upload our scanned & retouched photos to and we could all browse & download/order prints of these pics. A couple of the photos so far are in kind of rough shape, shich is part of why it's taking me so long. To illustrate, here is one I just finished. It's of my dad and my sister, JoAnn, as a baby.

Before (Close Up):


After:



I'm having a little trouble with the quality of the scans even though they're being scanned at 3200dpi. Somehow I am still getting chunky black parts where is suddenly a jump to a lighter color instead of a gradual change.
Example:

Check out the hair at the back of her head. Ok so it's probably (although I haven't tested it) fine for a 4x6, but if we go any bigger...

Anyone have any expertise in this area? I'm using a Canon CanoScan CS8600F to scan and GIMP for photo editing. I don't know if it's scan settings or how I'm adjusting the levels afterwards. I should probably figure this out before I scan any more. I mean, I have spent several hours on this already, and I've only "finished" (assuming I keep the same setting I'm currently working with) about 10 images. The JoAnn & my dad picture took over an hour alone to edit (not to mention scan). Still, it's fun, and exciting to unearth these lost pictures. I feel like the family archaeologist. :) I will probably post some of my more fun finds on here from time to time.

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What's in a Name?

So, I've been talking to a lot of people about Regin's name, where it comes from, what it means, etc. As far as I know, it comes from the character of the same name from Old Norse mythology. His story goes something like this: He was a smith and a dwarf and he had a falling out with his brother over (I think) killing their father/inheritance or something. His brother was so consumed by greed, he became a dragon (Fafnir). Regin took Sigurd as a foster son and told him the story. Sigurd killed Fafnir with a sword forged by Regin & retrieved the stolen treasure. Regin tried to take the wealth for himself, but Sigurd found out about the deception and killed Regin. There are of course other versions, but this is the one I am most familiar with and I THINK this is the one that they talk about in the Faroese Ballad (Regin Smiđur) which Regin was named after. You can see some people doing traditional Faroese Chain dance to the song in this YouTube clip. There is also and awesome heavy metal version of it. Great song.

So what does the name mean? According to 20000Names.com it means "wise." (also: advice, decision, counsel.) And it is the basis of all the Ray, Reggie, & Ron names and more. Here is a list of some of the names (the bolded ones may be very familiar to you) that come from my boy's awesome name: ;)

Rae, Raghnaid, Raghnailt, Ragimund, Raginmar, Raginmund, Ragna, Ragnar, Ragnbjorg, Ragnfridr, Ragnheidur, Ragnhilld, Ragnvald, Raimo, Raimondas, Raimondo, Raimonds, Raimun, Raimunde, Raimundo, Raimundo, Rainard, Rainer, Rainerio, Rainier, Rajmund, Ralf, Ralph, Ramiro, Ramirus, Ramón, Ramon, Ramona, Raniero, Ranold, Raoul, Raul, Ray, Raylene, Raymond, Raymonde, Raymund, Raymundo, Raynard, Rayner, Reamann, Redmond, Reg, Reggie, Reghnall, Reginald, Reginaldus, Reginar, Reginhard, Reginmund, Reginold, Reima, Reimund, Rein, Reinaldo, Reiner, Reinhard, Reinhilde, Reinhold, Reinier, Reinmun, Reino, Rembrandt, Renaud, Rener, Reynaldo, Reynard, Reynaud, Reynold, Rheinallt, Rinaldo, Rognvaldr, Ron, Ronald, Ronaldo, Ronnie, Ronny

Strangely it isn't the basis of the Reagan (or Regis/Regina) type names. Those come from "king." Too bad otherwise Ronald Reagan would have had both first and last names based on Regin. :)


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Birth Story Retrospective

I have been asked to give my current perspective on Regin's birth since my original post scared so many women and they want to know my thoughts on it now, looking back. So, almost three months later, have my feelings about it changed?

The Emotion
I love my son. I have never seen eyes so bright, a smile so charming, heard a voice so sweet (or any other cliché you can think of). He snuggles on my chest and I call him my little monkey (think monkey babies that hang around Mamma's neck). I can't walk past him without stopping and staring in disbelief. How can anything/anyone be so amazing and so perfect? At times my affection for him overwhelms me and it's all I can do to stop myself from squeezing him to bits. I love him. But it wasn't an instant love and he didn't come out of a beautiful/exhilarating/empowering birth. The birth was extremely difficult, maybe even traumatic, and the love grew over time. Sure, I felt affection for him right away, but love, I'm not sure. I'm not supposed to say that, I know. I am supposed to say that the birth was unbelievably painful and difficult but so worth it and so moving because the first moment that I held my son was so glorious and so all-consuming that the word "love" just seems completely inadequate when it comes to describing it. But that's not how it was for me. And part of me wonders if that experience is a bit of a myth. Are mothers looking back so colored by their devotion to their children, and so afraid to commit cultural taboo that they will themselves into believing it is the experience that they really had? Oh sure, I believe that some women have it. Maybe it's like love at first sight. Maybe it's more prevalent than that. But it's certainly not universal. Maybe, it is because most women are pumped full of drugs and the combination of that and adrenaline gives them the ultimate high. I, however, was in complete shock when Regin was born. It took time for me to develop that all-consuming love, and it's still developing now. Right now my little wiggle worm is laying next to me in bed (I'm sick), alternating between cranky whimpers and huge grins. And I just melt with every sound and movement he makes.

The Pain
The memory of pain is getting more and more distant now. On some level it's been something I have been trying to hold on to, a feeling I can relive, so that I remind myself of how real it was and I can remember the intensity of what I went through. That memory was so strong in the first weeks and I felt that pain almost as strongly in my thoughts as I had when I first lived through it. Now remembering the pain that clearly is already becoming difficult.

They tell you that you will feel so much stronger after having gone through this. If you can get through that pain, you can get through anything. I still don't feel stronger. And I don't think I whine any less or experience smaller pains any less. My pain meter has not been reset now that I have a higher pain measurement to add to the scale. The pain was intense, it was long, it was unbearable. I didn't withstand it. I didn't endure it. It ran its course. But the course did come to an end, and always does.

Would I do it Again?
I was so naive. I thought I was going to be uniquely able to cope with birth because I had years of dysmenorrhea to prepare me and this pain would fall somewhere in the range of easy by comparison to unbelievable but manageable because it'll pass. Plus, I'd done all the reading and knew that because I was completely unafraid, I would be in the right state of mind and not exacerbate the pain with fear. Besides, I could tolerate anything for a day.

One of the real myths about birth is that it is an extremely painful day. That's it. You have a pregnancy that may give you some discomfort, especially towards the end, you have your painful day, and then you can relax because the pain is gone and there are different concerns because now it is time to get into the business of parenting. Reality: First of all, for some people, pregnancy is absolute misery throughout. Birth starts to look like relief, but it doesn't just come and go. Labor can last several days. Pushing alone can last several hours and that's a small fraction of time compared to the rest of labor. And guess what? Pushing is NOT easy, but you have passed the majority of the pain by then. And I mean that quantitatively. But that light that you think is at the end of that tunnel (just push it out and it'll all be over, and my body can rest) is an illusion. The pain lasts. Your body has just gone through trauma, and you will feel it. And you will bleed. Bleeding usually lasts at least two weeks, but my mother tells me she bled for 3 months and ended up having to be hospitalized. But the bleeding isn't the worst of it. It takes forever to be able to use toilet paper again. Just a slight bit of pressure in that region is intolerable. In fact there were many times when using the restroom at all felt like something approaching birth. And your mobility is limited. I needed help to walk for a while, and continued needing help up and down the stairs for a week or two. Everything hurts. And then there are new pains. Breastfeeding is easy for some, but for me it was, for the first 2 months, often excruciating. I described it to my mother as "glass shards shooting through my nipples." Now, the pain is almost always minimal or non-existent. But pain is not limited to the birth, and certainly not to the time when epidurals are a help. Birth is not an instant, it's an enduring process. I think I am only just now starting to feel like it's fully over and I can really "look back on it." And no, physically, I haven't fully recovered yet. But I'm almost there.

So I haven't answered the question have I? How about just the birth part? When not considering anything else, would I choose natural birth again? I guess what I'm trying to say is, it's not like you're avoiding all of the pain by choosing medicated birth. But still, let's delay the answer a little further...

Imagine you were held prisoner somewhere. Imagine, if you could, unspeakable torture for hours and hours on end. Then, you meet someone, another prisoner, and as you are rescued and later interviewed you two come into contact over and over again. You fall in love. You fall madly in love. Now someone asks you if you would suffer through the torture again to get your love? The romantic answer is yes, of course. But the truthful one is... I don't know. I definitely wouldn't undo what was done and give my love back again, but go through it again? Time passes, the details of the pain of torture start to leave your mind, and your love grows strong. So, knowing that, and knowing that my Mommy Amnesia is likely to take more of those memories away, I think the answer is: probably. But notice that the question for me is not would I forgo the torture and possibly hurt my fellow prisoner and future love (by passing the ill-effects on to him) with that decision. I still believe fully in the importance of birth without medical intervention. For me it's another drug-free delivery or none at all. And I know that it's possible, maybe even probable, for me to decide to go through it again. But at this point, I'm still not willing. Not yet. For now, my hands and my heart are plenty full, and the memory is still too fresh. Ask me again in nine months when this little one is a year old. Maybe my need to give him a sibling will be a bit stronger and I will have forgotten all about the pain.

But, one cool thing about home/non-medicated birth: you get asked about your experience a lot, as if you are the bearer of somewhat unattainable knowledge. It's sort of a privileged position to be in a guess. The next round of mothers are looking at me and my counterparts to help them make their decisions. I'm a sort of teacher, activist, and carrier of a reborn tradition of a forgotten sisterhood. I'm a strange sort of advocate of natural birth, but I am one. Still.


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