Dancing with Dogs: Living in the Moment

Living in the Moment - II

Now that you have all seen that adorable little tyke in the picture below, let me tell you how it was after he came to be. It was a pretty hurried labor - My doctor had checked me up on Monday and told me I was not ready in any way whatsoever to give birth. I started having cramps on Tuesday and by Wednesday night, the cramps became pretty rhythmic - every ten minutes. My husband and I went to the hospital early morning Thursday and they sent us back saying I was still not ready and needed another day or so.

I decided to stay home take it easy for the daya nd my husband left to work. At 2:30 in the afternoon I had gotten tired of timing the contractions so I decided I would go to bed when ~~hell~~, sorry, my water broke. I needed to get to the hospital at once, but my husband was at work in a meeting 20 minutes away, so I simply got dressed and drove to the hospital with my in-laws. Once there it was the usual pandemonium and cacophony of pains, deep-breaths, screaming for my husband and ultimately the welcome hush brought to you courtesy of “Epidural”. I swear, all the people on my floor must have heaved a sigh of relief after all the ruckus I made.

At about 7:00, I started throwing up (yeah, I am the queen of throwing up - my hangovers suck!) and the nurses realized it was time to push - there was three hours of that interrupted occasionally by cell-phone calls to my husband from people at work asking for help - I am not making this up, he was taking calls while holding my feet and helping me push - he had to tell them he was in the middle of his wife’s frigging delivery before they would hang up. Well, it was about 10:20 already and the doctor had had it with me. She told me it was two more pushes - my son had to come out or she was cutting me up for a caesarian.

Next push, the little head was out enough to be vaccuumed out, which was when we discovered he had wrapped the umbilical cord around his neck that was preventing him from coming out. Of course, it seems like a little thing now, but it freaked me out then to realize how close we had come to choking the poor little one before we finally got him out.

That though folks, was just the beginning. It was the beginning of a two-week-long nightmare that to me was punctuated by sleep, feeding baby, trying to eat while feeding baby, trying to sleep while feeding baby, trying to feed baby while trying to feed baby…oops, where was I again? But then that was the reality of those days - the little bundle of joy did only three things - eat, sleep and poop - and did them on an hourly basis. 24/7. Even the most patient, mommy-like people can get exasperated by all this.

Husbands, if you have any compassion at all, please do not piss off your women during this time. Try to do everything they ask you to do - no more, no less. Remember that there is a lot of hormonal fluctuation going on and emotionally and physically it is a roller-coaster ride that only a woman who has been through this can truly imagine. Another piece of advice would be - don’t take anything personal. Seriously, you might start wondering why she hates you so much but it is not really you - it is the hormones talking. Remember the voices talking through the girl in Exorcist? Kinda like that. Take the baby away from her for a few hours a day - let her rest - it might help save your marriage.