My daughter was born on the coldest day of the year, but my son was born on the hottest day of the year. Go figure. No wonder they're so different.
I should start with the pregnancy. It was a fabulous pregnancy. Wow, what an amazing feeling to have this being growing inside me. Sometimes, I would get chills of happiness when his feet poked through my skin and I could tickle his feet. I'd never felt so in tune with myself. I knew he and I would be kindred spirits.
I was a new mother to be. I didn't know anything except that a c-section was bad, and drugs, too. I wanted a hippie mama birth. Except I didn't know anything about home birth at the time. I found a midwife and wrote up a birth plan. It was such an easy pregnancy, I'd figure it would be an easy birth. My birth plan was 4 pages long. No c-section, no drugs, no suction, no blah blah blah....
Then, the day I went into labor, I remember it being early, early morning - about 5am or so. I was sleeping and having awful cramps and I was thinking in my dream, "oh how I hate when I start my monthly." Then, it dawned on me that I wasn't starting my monthly, I was in labor!
I was two weeks late. I had an induction date scheduled just 3 days away. Who woulda thought I'd finally be going into labor? Not my mom, who decided to hang out with her buddies and have a little drinky. She sure regretted it the next day when I woke up at 5am. "You gotta be kidding me," she said.
The contractions were very close and started to suddenly get more erratic, painful, and frequent. I called the midwife and she said to go in right away. So, at 6am, there we were pulling into the hospital parking lot. One thing I noticed about being pregnant and then being in labor - people move out of your way! So, easy as pie, I made it to the room. There, they said I was dilated already to 6, I think.
It all becomes a blur after this. I remember them saying I would be having the baby within the hour. In fact, the overnight nurse stayed on to see me through. I took a bath and that sped things up. I was in so much pain, I started to get crazy. The pain was so unbearable that I started to distract myself by opening drawers and closets and when I couldn't take it anymore, I demanded drugs. Right now, I want them RIGHT NOW. But my birth plan. "I don't care about my birth plan, I want drugs." And so they gave me a narcotic in my veins. Which slowed everything down. And made my contractions even more erratic. I was already dilated to about 9, but they still had to give me pitocin to get the contractions more steady.
But the drugs. Oh, they tamed the pain and I was in and out of sleep, mostly between contractions. But everything slowed down. When I arrived at 6, they had said 'within the hour,' but now it was almost noon. Finally, I was dilated to 10, so they had me push. And I pushed and pushed and pushed and pushed and pushed. For FIVE hours straight. They kept saying, 'we need to do suction, we may need to do a c-section.' But I held on to the one thing I had left. I had already taken the pain killers, I couldn't let go of my other wishes. But finally, they brought in a team to take me to an operating room, and when they moved me on to the gurney, out popped my baby. Just like that.
He wasn't crying, so I screamed, "is he alive?" Or maybe I was thinking it. But they turned and told me there had been meconium so they had to suction his lungs. Then, there he was on my chest, all bundled. And I remember thinking was, "it's so nice to meet you, mister."
And that night, as I slept with my baby in my arms, I had the weirdest dreams. I was walking through water and saying goodbye to ghosts.
It had been so hot when I brought my little guy home that I spent the first night sleeping upright in a chair next to the air conditioner.
So, 11 years ago today, my life changed. And he truly did turn out to be my kindred spirit. Happy Birth-day to my baby boy <3
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