So I look at this nine week old and I think, 'where did the baby go?' He is cooing, he is smiling, he is jibber jabbering. Which is my favorite thing to do. Have a conversation with a jibber jabber. You can make up any old story and they will make noises and sounds that seem to follow suit. I was sitting next to another mom the other day with an 8 week old, and she was watching Jacob and I. She leaned over and said, 'is this something he picked up in the last week. because my baby doesn't do this.' A genius I tell you! Baby Jacob is advanced and the smartest baby on earth! No really, I gave this explanation, and it is simply this; Jacob is the third child. It is noisy as all get out in our home, therefore he needs to chime in to keep up. It's merely a survival skill. Whomever is the loudest clearly gets the most attention. I also will admit that to keep my sanity, there are moments when he and I go off to some quiet corner and I tell him all my troubles, and he answers me with sweet smiles, and jibber jabber, and it is very therapeutic.
I suppose I need to add a birth story or it will be awkwardly late to add one I think.
Jacob, the moose, was late. I marched into my first overdue doctors appointment 5 days after his due date, and exclaimed, 'I do not care what you think, I am uncomfortable, this baby measured large, therefore he is large, he is past his due date which I know for certain is his due date due to going to a fertility specialist, and I want him out!' The doctor looked at me, it was the first time I had seen this doctor in my practice, and I think she wanted it to be the last time she saw me. In her Jamaican accent she asks me, 'Is this your first child?' To which I reply exasperated, 'NO!! My third, I know when the goose is cooked!' She looks at the ultrasound I had gotten two and a half weeks before when I was certain they were taking me that day, and she says, 'you poor woman, yes, yes, lets get him out of there.' Uh, hello? Where was she in the middle of April!?!? That is what I have been trying to tell you people!
I go to check out, with instructions to schedule my induction with the girls up front. I am 2 days, just 2 days away from being 41 weeks, and she says, 'oh that is too bad, we could take you tomorrow, but you aren't 41 weeks yet, your insurance wants you to be 41 weeks to induce unless there is an emergency.' I look at her and say, 'Just click the delete button, and put me at 41 weeks, I won't tell a soul.' She didn't, but assured me she was making the call, and would have me put in early the next week, since inductions did not happen over the weekend. She then gave me a pep talk saying, 'I bet you will go over the weekend anyway.' Apparently she had not met my uterus. My uterus is as thick as a concrete wall, there ain't nothing come out of there unless you have got yourself a jack hammer.
She calls, first available date is Tuesday, but the doctor who will deliver Jacob, Speedy, the 8th dwarf, wants me to go for testing on Monday, and to get my cervix covered in some cream that was going to "help me dilate". Mind you, uterus of steel, same dilation since 37 weeks; I was sitting pretty at maybe 2 centimeters. Well, pretty might be a stretch, I was sitting fat, swollen, and miserable at maybe 2 cenitmeters.
We go to the testing at 8 a.m., baby is as snug as a bug, and not in the slightest bit of distress. We then go back to the hospital at 6 p.m. for the cream. Andy wanted them to take me right then and there. He was ready for this baby to be out 3 weeks ago, and his patience was growing thin. I really think he wanted some time off work, and hey a baby is a pretty good reason. The delivery rooms were a wall away and when you are that close to the finish line, when it comes to my husband, come what may, he will get there. Apparently he does not get my anatomy while pregnant. No matter what modern science has come up with, I will not go into labor until my body is good and ready, or has given up the fight against nature, and just releases the beastly thing, which takes a really long time.
We go home to my parents house, because they were going to watch the kids and were much closer to the hospital. I start having contractions, pretty strong ones. But they sit 6 minutes apart maybe lasting a minute, and they never get more consistent, and they never get stronger. I give up and go to sleep. So much for the miracle cream. I think it was just Vaseline and they put it on to make whiny mom's shut up at least until the next morning.
The next morning the hospital was going to call anytime from 5 am to 9 am for me to come in. So I am piddling around, and Andy is pacing. Waiting is not really a strong suit of his. He can't even wait for water to boil. Every 5 minutes he would ask, 'did they call yet,' to which I would reply, 'are you not in the same room as me? Did you hear my phone ring?' I go to get a shower and at 8:30 they call. The Hallelujah chorus begins. I am at the hospital by 9:30.
I am dropped off at the door while Andy went to park. I am excited about this silent walk to the Labor and Delivery part of the hospital, the last time waddling anywhere and to collect my thoughts. But almost every other person I pass is a woman, saying, 'oh been there,' or something of the sort, or a doctor asking if I need a wheelchair, or someone giving me the silent smile, that holds the expression, 'yup, know just how you are feeling,' and then I would have to give the same smile back. Like a soldier going into battle passing the soldier that just left the battle or will go in after you are done. It is similar to the wave that one person that is riding a motorcycle gives to another. Which always cracks me up. Seriously. I am thinking of maybe when I pass another van of the same make as mine, squirting them with a juice box and vice versa, as a recognition that we are both listening to whining kids, and the same songs over and over again, while sitting on snack crumbs and driving with sticky fingers from the juice that spilled on the car seat buckle two weeks ago, and driving the same van. Look out Cherie!
I get all dressed up in my really hot hospital gown and those fun scratchy socks and waddle my way over to the bed. Andy comes in right after that. 'Did they hook you up to the pitocin? Where is the pitocin? Let's get this show on the road!' You know, checking my vitals, giving me some fluid, getting the proper supplies, all not valid reasons to my husband as to why I was not on the pitocin, contracting, pushing out a baby all in 20 minutes of arrival. Again, the whole waiting thing, not so much a fan of it, try living with him.
About an hour later, in prance my sisters, Meghan and Michelle, the last two members of the birthing team. I had given them the option when I got pregnant with Jacob to be in the delivery room if they wanted to. I had never witnessed a live birth before having Kendall, and I kind of wish I had, to kind of know what to expect. You know I like to start with my best foot forward, and I didn't, and I was a royal mess with her, and had no idea what was going to happen to me next. So I graciously presented them with this option of witnessing a gory mess that produces a beautiful child. My sister Meghan had been prepped by my mother for a week or so before hand, 'Meghan, if you feel like you are going to pass out, step away.' See my sister has this whole fainting thing going on, and she isn't really a fan of blood and bodily fluids, not so much an m.d. candidate.
So like I said, the prance in, and they sit, and they look at me in all my birthing glory, hooked up to monitors, wearing a hideous garb, and basically just a big fat blob. It is written all over their faces, 'wonder how long this is gonna take.' If this experience taught them anything, it taught them that birthing a child is no episode of 'Baby Story,' and over lickity split. This is an all day process, make yourselves comfortable.
So I get hooked up to the pitocin at about 10 am, and things start going, and it is a little mind game I begin to play with myself. Let's see how long I can wait before begging for the epidural. I see the computer monitor, I see the mountains going up and going down.
Then a resident comes into break my water. Welcome to the Big Show girls. The resident is with a medical student who looks like she is 16, and she is going to assist a girl, the resident, that looks like she is 18, with breaking my water with what looks like a knitting needle. My sisters come over to the bed to hold my hand, and the 18 year old begins her journey to my cervix, and twists and turns as I writhe in pain about to kick the 16 year old in the face, and then 'pop!' The floodgate is opened, and I am about to tell everyone to hop on the bed and grab life jackets on the way out because this water came rushing out in mad force, I thought we were going to be floating down Old York Rd. within seconds.
By 11:30, I am pissed about the pain. People are asking me questions and I am pissed that they even bother asking me how I am. How dare they even talk to me!?!? When in pain I am one of those crazy people that wants people around them but doesn't necessarily want the people addressing them or the issue at hand. I want them to be concerned, but not ask me what they can do to help. It's a little twisted, I know. But it's pain, it is my cervix that is going crazy, and it is my vagina that is going to birth a child the size of a large watermelon. I agree with my mind that I am going to make it to noon, and then ask for the epidural. Not so sure why I had to play this mental game with myself, its like I was trying to prove to myself that I am in fact She-ra. So at noon, not a minute later, I ask for the epidural. At 12:45, the anesthesiologist that my husband almost knocked out comes in. (long story, but in the end he conceded to keep his mouth shut, which was a good idea since the man was about to stick a needle into my spine) By 1 p.m., I am in another land, a peaceful one with no pain or unhappy endings.
To be continued...Birth Story Part Deux, The Birth of the Child with the Chubbiest Cheeks and the passing on of the Lyons' Awesome Chin Gene to Another Generation.
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