[mandie.b]

Hi all,
I am wanting some honest advice about my current situation. I am 20 weeks pregnant with baby girl number 2, and I just can't help but feel sad that nobody has mentioned a baby shower. This may be 100% thanks to my raging prego hormones, but I'm just wanting to get my story out there, and get some advice about how I should proceed.

My back-story is this in a nutshell. I had a somewhat unstable and undesirrable childhood, and i was moved around, a lot, (about 1 to 2 different schools a year) so I was hard pressed to make new girlfriends let alone keep them, due to my nomadic lifestyle. I have siblings, but all are younger; (ie: highschool) I do not have coworkers, as I am self employed.

I know lots of you will think this is about the presents, but I promise you, its not. It is more about feeling loved by those around me and gathering all of the people I love to celebrate our new life! I have always tried my best to be the best and supportive friend as possible, attending every shower invite I get, bringing registry gifts along with something homemade and usually a box of nice hand me downs from my first. I have given away most of my baby things to two of my friends who were needy in their pregnancies. I have offered to throw and have thrown so many parties and showers. I feel likei always put the most thought into my gifts and just have so much love to share, but can't help to feel sad that my pregnancy has gone virtually unnoticed.

My husband keeps telling me he will throw my shower, or to throw my own, but, I feel like that would be inappropriate, and honestly, I'd be embarassed to tell anyone I did it.

Please feel free to be candid, am I just being a baby? Should I take hubbys advice and throw a baby potluck?

[mandie.b]

Bump. Just ONE reply, pretty please. I obviously have nobody else to get good advice from. I've posted on 3 forums...no luck.

[way2gomom]

Hey hon - sorry I missed your post earlier! Thanks for stopping by and I'm sorry we didn't answer sooner :-)

I know you said you moved around a lot when you were a kid, but did that continue as an adult? Were you living in the same area hanging out with the same friends when you were pregnant with number 1?

It's really not common for people who are on another baby to get a baby shower, but some areas/groups of friends do throw one for each one. I've seen mostly that church groups throw a shower for each baby.

It is so sweet that you were able to pass on your items from your first baby to your friends in need, and I bet they really appreciated it!

Instead of throwing a baby shower, what about if you had a blessingway for your baby instead? It sounds like you don't want the "stuff" that comes from a baby shower, but you would love the support of your friends and the women in your life, so I was thinking a blessingway might be the best way for you to get that.

If you're not familiar with a blessingway, it's a ceremony/ritual/party that is in the Navajo tradition. Here's an explanation from Aviva Jill Romm's book Natural Healing After Childbirth:

At a ceremony for a pregnant woman, women share positive birth stories, poems and songs to encourage the mother and remind her of her strength to give birth. Gifts are given not only for the baby, but also for the mother - a bottle of aromatherapy oil to use at the birth, a book of poems, an IOU for a dinner brought to her house after baby is born. Her hair is brushed and she is massaged as a means of reminding her that she will be entering a new awareness as she becomes a mother.

There is some great advice in that book on how to set up a new-mother blessing ceremony, and I would be happy to chat with you about it!

Here are some links with more information:
- Mother's Blessing Ceremony, Blessingway (a structured ritual, you can change whatever you want in this!)
- The Mother Blessing: A Baby Shower Alternative
- How To Conduct A Mother Blessing
- http://codenamemama.com/2011/10/26/mother-blessings/ (lots of great ideas!)
- Mother Blessing Ceremonies

Another option may be to have a Meet the Baby party after the baby is born. We had planned to do this, but never actually got to it.

I hope one or some of these ideas help!

[mandie.b]

Thanks Sooo much for the wonderfully informative reply! The blessingway sounds like such an amazing idea!