by StephanAfter living in the bus, and then the tiny home in Albuquerque I tried hard to live in San Antonio again. "Hit the ground running" I would say. Within the first month back I started my classes back up at a studio I use to work in, did several photo shoots, joined and performed with 2 different improv troupes, started writing and performing poetry.. started working as a tour guide at the Aquarium, for a split moment in time, a beautiful few months I was back home and BACK AGAIN! Then Covid Hit My classes halted, my roommates left to Alaska, my job just... stopped. Just like I'm sure it did for you. Within a couple of months without an income and my roommates I wouldn't be able to cover rent even after starting another job at a spa during covid. Eventually the choices had to be made. We were set to move to my mothers land in Central Texas about 2.5 hours from SATX. I was devastated to be away from San Antonio and the community I loved, but could live with it because no one else was able to do much either, so I wasn't missing out, and I couldn't visit people anyone. Isolation was isolation regardless of where and staying away from people completely was easier in the country and of course we weren't going to be evicted from my moms. A year ago when we arrived we were tasked with cleaning and building a home in her back corner, a secret area behind the mound made from digging the stock pond. It's a private little area with what was a shed, and in true Stephan style I changed it to a tiny home. (Lookout for a tiny home blog post) Now that some time has passed, I've worked a year a waiter and building, gardening, building a road to our home, it was time to tackle another project. The bus after it's breakdown stayed on my mothers property and so I wanted to give it life again in it's retirement as a rental space, towing it to our corner of the land, easy, cleaning it up, simple, getting it electric, not hard but.... Required a huge line run to the barn on the property that had no electric previously. A barn that had only been used for storage.
So we open on the 25th of September, with still a ton of work ahead of us. A dance floor and mirrors to put in, a bathroom to build, counters to put together, lights to install... the list goes on and on but knowing it can be done makes it seemingly easier.
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It’s hard to see all the hate comments flooding this video, and at the same time, I should know that in this world hate is always going to be visible,sadly. Words do hurt, to say the least, and it has taken some mental toll on me, but at the same time, I am so GLAD I shared my story. Even if I only had 1 positive message from this video I would be happy and my video would have been a success in my eyes. Astonishing enough, I couldn’t be more grateful for the number of positive messages and comments we have recieved, and even if It doesn’t outnumber the hate that is okay. Your hateful bashing words are not going to change who I am, I will always be a man regardless of my genitals. The journey through pregnancy as a man has been hard, emotional, mentally exhausting and frustrating at times, but the adventure of birthing my child has been a connection I will never forget. Having a baby doesn't make me a woman, it makes me an individual strong enough to fight through something that is so physically and mentally exhausting but the most empowering evolution someone could walk through in their lifetime. Powering through those contractions with no medication all the way through 10 cm dilated was something I thought I could never do. It has made me grateful for the idividuals that do birth their child and I have gained so much love and respect beyond my mental capacity can handle sometimes. I am now a little over 4 months post-partum and I feel like I could do anything I want because of this little life altering journey. I am proud of the father that I have become and birthing parent that has transformed me in ways that made me more proud of who I am. My kiddo has two dads, and the fact that I was biologically born a female doesn’t change the make-up of our same-sex family. Gender is not defined as what is between your legs, it is the deep down connection and knowledge of knowing who you truly are mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Knowing my show aired worldwide has flooded me with anxiety but in a good way. To be able to break the social distortion of what society has on what a standard family kills me, it’s sad and so toxic in reality. To know that only WOMEN birth these cute little humans is not true at all. Gender comes in all colors, and so does being a dad a birthing parent, and so much more. All we can do as a family is support and educate and we will continue to do that, to fight for our freedom, rights, and be the voice for the voiceless. XoXo Papa September 8,2018 - finally, after a long,crazy,wonderful,life-empowering,body-empowering birth came to an end and was handed the papers and was wheeled down to the car. My fiance got admitted into the same hospital.
September 9/10,2018- Rented a room right near the hospital so it would be easier to see him. our neighbors have been watching Cyrus since i went into labor. I miss him dearly … i hope he remembers us. - I miss Stephan’s laugh,kiss,smile,presence, showering with him, cuddling him. -i hate how he is not able to see his son I’m an emotional papa right now :( Am I strong enough to get through this? yours truly, Papa Wyley After having light contractions start on monday night at 11:15pm which consisted of a few every couple hours . Nothing was concerning except that I was finally having something happening after feeling like I waited an eternity! :) . The same thing was happening every hour, nothing changed until about 2am when the contractions started happening more frequent; about every 5-10 minutes I was having them , at a constant frequency and same amount of intensity. I contacted the midwife and she stated I come over in the morning whenever. So Stephan and I packed our bags at around 9am and headed over them . Contractions were progressing forward everyday and after the first 24 hours went by I was hoping something happened. The midwife checked me and I was finally about 80% effaced and 4 cm dilated. I was excited, finally I was on my way to seeing him but as the contractions got worse it got challenging to stay focused but with the help of my wonderful fiance, midwife , and the doula everything was moving along quite smoothly on the outside .
September 4th, it was late into the evening , i was growing more exhausted but still trying to be a positive papa! Contractions were coming every 2-3 minutes and I was pretty much dilated and 100% effaced. Only thing I was waiting on was for my water to break, I got in the tub , did many different positions and soon it felt like i was in a gymnastics class. We tried everything possible to get my water to break naturally . September 5th, body & mind was exhausted. got my contractions to go up with herbal remedies. Rowan’s heart rate was slowing after each contraction and became concerning to stephan and I . The midwife eventually broke my water in regards to speeding the natural process up . It helped to an extent but the issue now was that he was not wanting to move down in my birth canal . We tried again for a couple more hours to push , it because even more daunting and it felt like I was never going to see him. I kept looking at my fiance and in reassurance I knew I had to keep going for him , Rowan and myself . By 5am nothing had changed , we opted to go to the hospital . Arrived at 6am , did the normal paperwork and got me admitted. Started me on IV fluids , Added pitocin and since i was pretty much fully dilated they wanted to make sure that everything was good to go to possibly start pushing . There was a little bit of cervix not thinned out but over time i was ready to push . Nothing happened excited the decrease in HR of Rowan. The pain was so intense but i just somehow managed to keep pushing through it. Shifted positions constantly to see if that would help the baby naturally come down, but again nothing. Gave me another dose of pitocin. That ramped it up twice as much pain almost to the point of crying. I told myself as a man , it’s okay to cry and everyone was so supportive . Stephans mom was holding my hand and stephan rubbing my back every time a surge of energy rushed through my body. I kept telling myself to fight through the pain. Still nothing was happening after pushing more with the assistance of the OBGYN helping out. 12:30 rolled by , I eventually opted to have a cesarean section because baby’s HR was not responding well to the contractions compressing his head and he wasn’t even lowering down into the birth canal . They put in an epidural and started the meds; it was nice to have somewhat of a break after so many days of pushing and being awake, barely any food and even with staying hydrated I was still so exhausted. Epidural in, anesthesiologist came in briefed me about everything and we were on our way down to the OR . I was excited and nervous, didn’t know what to expect . Rowan arrived at 2:22 pm on September 5th, 2018. He was covered in his on myconium (feces) since my water had already been broken earlier that day at around 3:30am. Turns out he had the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck 3 times . He just wanted to make a grand entrance :) He was cleaned off and sent down to transition room for about 6 hours to make sure the myconium didn’t affect him in anyway. He got released and he is in our room Happy and healthy as can be ! There you have it my fellow friends just a little snipit into the last few days of my life <3 we are excited and overjoyed and can’t wait to be his parents . It was love at first site. On the contrary before I started transitioning almost 7 years ago into the man I am today, I never wanted to be pregnant. It was such a feminine thing to attach to my body and wanted to make sure I stayed away because I was never a woman and wanted to be farthest away from that attachment as possible. Here we are 2018 , and I can say this process of birth and being pregnant has had its downs but has had so much more positives and taught me so much and it was so wonderful being pregnant as a man , made me see into the eyes of what women go through and its quite amazing! -Wyley AKA Papa
First off let me start this off with this is not an Anti-technology post HAH. Well for one, then it would be pointless for me to have this post, or have a Facebook, my personal blog (tumblr) , music , digital photography ... the list could go on. I am actually very grateful for technology because it's a great way to share my journey with this world I happen to inhabit.
Smartphones have come a long way , and in many cases provide us with something to do all the time at out fingertips wherever we are at in this world from simply listening to music on the road and watching endless hours of you-tube to staying updated on current events. There is thousands of apps for anything which is suppose to help us out in our lives to some degree and that's great in all but where I draw the line is when it takes time away from people you can spend quality time with or even just checking to see if you have any notifications because its only been about 20 minutes . I have had a long internal struggle with any smartphone that I have ever owned. It may sound silly but yes I soon realized in very early on in owning my first smart phone how encompassed my life revolved around it. Spending countless hours in a day just checking notifications to any social media website that I had available to me on hand, even while I was working it caused a major distraction and some people wont admit it , but honestly I will and it caused me to decline in my focus at work from time to time. Whatever I was doing on my phone in the end it was never really beneficial to me to be honest. The constant checking of my social media websites; i wanted that constant social validity and acknowledgment without even having to do much. I always poured so much money into having the better phone when in reality I was loosing touch with the things that I loved to do . For example, I have always been into photography and always told myself "hey if I just get a better camera phone I will go out and take more photos" What was I thinking? taking the easy route and not wanting to learn more about an actual physical digital camera and to go out and practice. The more and more I indulged in this portable computer at your fingertips I became less grounded with myself, less time spent doing things i loved to do; drawing, playing guitar, reading, blogging. I would go hiking and even if I had my phone on silent and turned off I would still be thinking if I take this photo lets see how many people will respond if I repost it Instagram or Facebook. Lets face it, I have a very addictive personality and still knowing I had a smart phone on me in my vicinity It was still a distraction away from the one thing that always kept me grounded: NATURE! The straw that broke the camels back; I am about to be a father "OOOOOOVEI"
After the Fire I struggled to gather myself back together and collect my thoughts. What was my plan? How was I going to move on from this? The Winnebago proved to be too expensive to fix and return to normal. The news was getting worse. Talking to more and more people about more and more options I only became more and more confused. There was so much up in the air and not enough stable in the earth. I had several smart and strong choices to pick from but only one really kept calling out to me. TRAVEL. Not to return but to keep going. Always on the move always looking at the next step the next adventure. I feel ready for an epic journey something that'll lead me to find more! I want to be out there looking for more and enjoying more. Maybe it's some early mid life crisis or just a sampling of what one will be like. Maybe this is an actual calling. "Go! Do it now while you can!" I was scrolling through the internet the other day and found a bike caravan trailer. It's a handcrafted master piece and I fell in love with it.
I found his email, his facebook, his phone number. I felt called to this little red wagon. Eventually he returned my email. {below} Not exactly the message I was hoping for but it was a start and a bit of knowledge I needed. I knew what I wanted to do. I was going to build my own bike trailer and bike across the country, seeing sites, people, art. Enjoying nature, exploring creativity, being who I want to be. One step at a time.
"Hi Stephan, I am currently living in a remote area so I only get internet and cell service when I go to town.. My son and I are building an elaborate gypsy caravan to be pulled by car and all our time is going into that. I will answer your questions as well as I can. I loved my year of living in my bicycle caravan. It worked better than I expected but I am accustomed to tiny spaces. Many find tiny houses too small so how well it works depends on the individual . It could not be adapted to two people as it would be too wide for a bike trailer and the necessary additional structure would add a lot of weight. Bike trailers are limited to 3 feet wide due to traffic considerations. I lived mostly along a 22 mile bike path along the beach and didn't take it in the streets too often. I wouldn't recommend traveling in it by highway partly because headwinds are difficult and I think any highway without wide shoulders would be stressful ... Aside from that it was easy to pull and very stable. But it was awesome for my purposes. I spent about $1500 on materials and used largely recycled materials. I also had a small woodworking shop to build it in and about $1200 worth if inexpensive tools. Also, I've been building things like this all my life so I had the building skills necessary to do it. I think it would be difficult to pull off without some building knowledge. If you decide to go for it feel free to study my photo album on Facebook. I don't draw plans for my builds so I can't help you there. Best of luck!" -Barry Howard Hello, I hope that this message finds you and good light. My name is Stephan Gaeth and I'm a dancer, actor and gardener from San Antonio. I also am a tiny home dweller and traveller, but recently lost my Winnebago to a interior fire. Even though the community has helped me immensely I can still not afford the repairs. In looking into new options I quickly came upon your fabulous red wagon. I'm in a very interesting place in my life and very interested in traveling and biking with even less that what I currently own. I have so many questions about function and use. I've read the blog where I found this e-mail, a video made by someone else, and seen several photos, I would love to pick your brian about the process and making it. I have a very small sum of money that I could put into building one of my own and I would be willing to put in any amount of man hours to the project. Does it function well as a house? I know you've lived in yours while making art. Does it travel well? Could it be made to sleep two? How much would it cost to make {estimated}? Thank you for your time, Stephan Onward and forward, new journeys, new chapters. Hitting the road soon somehow, someway. My early 20s are over and my life is transforming. After 7 years of living and exploring in San Antonio, settled into a small flat in Beacon Hill, I felt the need to move and get active in a new way. Perhaps it was closing The Uptown Studio after three years and not knowing where to turn that left me with this feeling. I called up my mother and convinced her to let me have her old 1995 Winnebago. With a dream in my soul and hope in my heart I felt this was the right thing to do.
I sold stuff, donated more and gave away a ton of stuff and still had tons of stuff to still fit into this small small RV. The Winnebago had a rough interior and still has a less than attractive exterior. After about three months of work it was still unfinished and far from where I had imagined it to be but I was hopeful. It was livable by May. So far it's been only two months of full on living in the Winnebago and it's not perfect but I'm a happy camper and adjusting to living in Southtown. Plans? In a year I would love to have it up and running ready to go on tour through Texas and maybe the greater south. Performing shows, teaching classes and designing food forests along the way. Theres still so much to learn and do before I am even ready for travel but I know it'll work out and be great. |
AuthorDancing through life, acting with purpose, tiny living and big planting. Archives
August 2021
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