The Birth Story (Part 2)

We left off with me writhing in pain from the cervidil and the pitocin, the labor-inducing drugs that had given me contractions for the past 8 hours....

But at 5:30 am, I decided to call the nurse and ask for an epidural. I didn’t want one but I slowly began to realize that, even if I suffered through and did it all “drug-free”, I wasn’t going to get a plaque on the wall congratulating me or anything. No nurse was going to applaud my efforts. So I caved and in came the anesthesiologist. Previously I had been scared to death at the idea of an epidural, but in the midst of all that contraction pain, I didn’t bat an eye. I remember the needle hurting but nothing like the contractions. Within minutes I was getting numb and thanking the doctor for being the “angel” of the hospital.

John’s POV: I didn’t have to do much insisting by 5:30am, so I guess I could have played my insistence card at the parking garage. I knew this was going to be the tough part for me: pain management. Because you’re watching your best friend, your closest ally, the love of your life go through the worst pain nature intends for a human being to endure, and pretty much all you can do is rub her back? It’s like bringing a squirt gun to a forest fire. I expected to feel helpless, and I did. I could get her a breakfast burrito when she was nauseous, grab the Maalox from the fridge when she had heartburn, soak a washcloth with cold water when she had a headache, but I’m pretty sure those tried and true techniques were going to come up a little short here. The epidural was as big a relief to me as it was to Lisa. Psychologically, that is. I’m sure physically it meant a lot more to her than it did to me.

Of course, what I had forgotten is that I have a history of bad reactions to pain meds like codeine and vicodin. I didn’t make the correlation but very soon after the epidural, it made me sick. My blood pressure dropped to a level that made the nurses very nervous. And I began to get nauseous. Nausea is one thing I am very familiar with so I knew it was real. I kept telling the nurse and John I felt super nauseous but no one was springing into action. Finally I was just like, “John, get me something to barf in.” He did and I vomited. And then vomited. And then took a break, and vomited some more. This went on for a few hours. I remember thinking though, I’ll take vomiting over the contraction pain any day. I will say that I wasn’t prepared for how “drugged out” I felt. I could barely keep my eyes open. I remember saying, how in the hell am I supposed to push a baby out? I can barely lift my head. In the middle of this time, my water broke while the nurse was checking me and I saw her hesitate. I asked her if there was meconium in the fluid and she looked surprised and said, “you’ve been doing your homework.” But, yes, there was meconium which meant that a NICU unit would be in the room when I delivered so they could clean out little Jack’s lungs with anything he could have swallowed.

John’s POV: This was the only time Lisa got some sleep from checking in at the hospital on. Maybe 10 minutes of snoring between vomiting. And by now, she had checked off a lot of items from the “how you know you’re giving birth” list. Mucus plug, gone. Water breaking, yup. Intense physical pain, hell yes. The meconium in the fluid was a little unsettling, but it was one of the main reasons they wanted us to come in Friday instead of after the weekend. So it wasn’t a curve ball. It was a threat we were well aware of. Also, by now, I think if the doctor had come in and said “C-section”, we would have handed her the scalpel and asked which number blade. Up until that point, if we had actually had a “birth plan”, it would have been a poster board with “NO C-SECTION” in giant red letters. But as we got closer, we just wanted him out and breathing and screaming and alive. Everything else, surgery-free, drug-free, hospital-free, seemed more about ego and pride. Our birth plan was a healthy baby. That’s it. Oh, but with a stealth bomber fly-by at the moment of his birth. Flown by Hannibal from the A-Team. After he single-handedly captured Osama Bin Laden. That’s it.

Eventually I felt like pushing. And I say that sort of blithely but, damn, I felt like PUSHING. And in breezed the doctor who calmly said, ‘yes, let’s push.’ So John grabbed a knee, the nurse grabbed the other knee, and I bared down. The doctor kept telling me to push as hard as I could and I wanted to scream “Look lady, I AM pushing as hard as I can!” I finally got the word that he was crowning and that was encouraging. Up until then John had maintained his very strict “eyes above the waist” rule but the thought of seeing his son born made him cheat I think. He didn’t tell me until afterwards but he watched little Jack be born. Once Jack was out he immediately let out a cry. It was music to my ears but I remember that it did sound super liquid-y. He was put on my chest, all slippery, for a minute and then he was whisked away to the corner to clean out his throat and lungs. John was immediately the perfect doting dad and stayed with him over in the corner. He bounced back to me to make sure I was doing okay as I delivered the placenta and got stitched up. It was all so super surreal, probably partly because I had so many drugs pumping through my system. The nurses finished their work on Jack and I remember John being tentative about touching him. I think I called out across the room, “it’s okay to touch him John, he’s ours.”

John’s POV: Hell yeah, I peeked. I tried at first to be respectful of Lisa’s wishes, but there wasn’t a curtain or anything. So avoiding the view was more effort than holding back Lisa’s leg. So I just watched the whole damn thing. There was the ‘Knocked Up’ moment where he crowned, and I started getting a little freaked out that I didn’t hear him crying. I thought I would have heard him cry at that point. But no one else seemed concerned. So I got un-concerned. Then after the next push, it seemed like he just spilled out onto the bed. I watch him get handed to Lisa, then whisked to the corner where the NICU nurses go to work. I don’t know where I’m supposed to be, stay with my crying wife? Go after my crying son? So I just kind of bounced back and forth. He’s ok, she’s ok, he’s ok, she’s ok, over and over. I’m sure I’m crying cause our OB asks me if I want to cut the umbilical cord, but takes a beat to make sure I’m ok. Of course I’m ok, it’s just kind of a big moment, you know? Cut the cord, tell Lisa the baby’s fine, go back over and see the NICU nurse hold up a little brown vial proudly to show how much poop they sucked out of Jack’s stomach. I don’t know if I’m supposed to be relieved by the reveal or more freaked out. I remember that. I remember Lisa suffering through the placenta extraction. And then I remember the warmer being on and Jack just sort of wobbling around in there in this wonderful soothing heat. I think then I got to hold him and take him to Lisa. But to be honest, I’m not 100% sure about any of that. Looking back, video documentation would have helped. However, it wouldn’t have been forgiven by the new mom. A peek, yes. A gawk, yes. Blatant staring, mouth agape, yes. But a video camera would have gotten me in trouble.

And that was it. 26 hours after checking into the hospital we had little Jack, a healthy and cute little boy. More adorable than we could have ever imagined.