Get This Baby Out Of Me!

When I was pregnant with my first child, things started out great. That fun feeling ended so fast it knocked me on my you know what. Like Sarah, I didn’t like being pregnant. Pregnant didn't like me. It didn't like my gastrointestinal system, my insulin levels, my fluid retention capabilities and so forth and so on. Basically, my excitement about being pregnant each time lasted about a week until I began projectile vomiting. But unlike Sarah, the fun didn't end for me when labor began. No such luck here, but not the least bit surprising because you know the saying "if it's going to happen, it'll happen to me" was written about me.

I did have about three weeks of time during my first pregnancy after the mind numbing nausea stopped that I thought I looked cute. I had the belly and was thinking everything was good. I look back at pictures of myself then and there was nothing cute about me. Funny how our minds try to protect us. This calm period abruptly ended one morning when it felt like I started my period. Well, that can't be right. I went to the bathroom and the toilet bowl was filled with blood. Heart stopping panic. I was only 29 weeks pregnant. I took a cab to the hospital and gave the driver about a million dollars when I got out because he was going to need to get his back seat detailed after my ride. 

The doctors checked me and I was having contractions and was starting to dilate. Everything was happening so quickly that I barely felt the steroid shot they gave me for the baby's lung development in case I delivered. Miraculously they got the contractions under control and they kept me until I reached 30 weeks. And by the way, day two of my stay, they gave me a second steroid shot which felt like they stabbed me with a ten inch needle and ran maple syrup into my vein. Pretty sure the first one did too if I hadn’t been in shock those first few hours.

My doctor sent me home and put me on, what I call, house arrest. Not bed rest per se, I was allowed to work from home but take it easy. I lived in an apartment at the top of a fourth floor walk-up in Manhattan, so there wasn't a lot I could do. The day before my water broke my friends from work surprised me by showing up with lunch. One of my friends confessed to me about two years after this visit that when she left she cried because of how miserable I looked. The woman cried because I was a misshapen monster. Even my husband refused to rub my feet because they were so swollen he was totally grossed out. I know, you all are hating him right now because it's the least he could have done, and I do not hesitate to throw it in his face eight years later, but I don't think I would have rubbed my feet either if I could have reached them.

The next morning, my water broke and it was baby time. When we arrived at the hospital I was told that my doctor, who I loved at this point almost as much as my husband, was in Chicago. CHICAGO?!? As in, she's in Chicago and will be on the next flight and back here in plenty of time to deliver this baby? No, as in, she's in Chicago for the weekend. Did I mention earlier "if it's going to happen, it'll happen to me"? Now I'm freaking out because I'm having a preemie and the person who has walked me through every step of this is not here, great.

We had not packed the infamous bag. I had no bag with stuff in it to take to the hospital. I brought my handbag with a VHS tape of the season finale of The West Wing that my boss had asked me to borrow because her VHS was not working. I figured it had a better chance of getting to her if it was with me than by it sitting in my apartment. After I was settled in the room, I began to panic about not having the bag. My poor husband is staring at me while I am having a meltdown about not having music and candles and pillows and a focal object and all the other "stuff" I had read about that I needed in order to deliver a baby. He ran home and got me a pillow and some Gatorade and brought it to me in a shopping bag. As it turns out, that part worked out fine.

I was obsessed with, well, how do I say this…pooping while I was delivering...(cont)

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