Today I have been a mother for a month. It has taken me a long time to write this post, the post about my birth experience and my transition into motherhood. Most mothers, when recounting their birth, whether completely natural, totally medicated, or surgical, look back fondly on the experience. They will wax nostalgic about the pain and the sweat and the exhaustion, dreamily opining about the magical, miraculous moments when they first met their precious child.
My birth experience was somewhat different. It was not magical. It was stark, clinical, and cold. I knew a week in advance what would be happening. My amniotic fluid had simply run out and the baby was simply out of room in my wonky, deformed uterus.
We woke up early on a Wednesday morning and checked into the hospital at 5:30am. It was chilly and I was shaking with nerves. I have always hated hospitals, medicine, and most of all, surgery. But surgery--the biggest surgery of my life--was the only way they would be able to extract my little girl. They made me put on a hospital gown and climb into bed. A nurse, who was really very nice, came in and pricked me with a whole lot of needles. They hooked me up to a fetal stress monitor, and measured my heart rate and blood pressure. In my head I was counting down the minutes until they filled me with drugs and sliced me open. I was terrified.
When the time finally came, Norris and my mom (the people who were going to be in the room with me) got dressed in caps and gowns and those little blue booties and went to the scrub room. I was rolled in my hospital bed down to a set of cream double doors and into a large white room with lots of stainless steel. They moved me to the surgical table, which was cold. In fact, the whole room was cold. I was having trouble swallowing at this point. The anesthesiologist came in and introduced himself. He was a very nice doctor who was all business. And he got right down to the business of numbing me. This was doubly scary for me, because I did not at all relish the idea of the giant needles he would be putting in my spine, and I was also terrified that the epidural would wear off and I would actually feel all the pain of my surgery. After bearing my back and curling my spine as much as possible, he warned me that the first four needles were coming. This was to numb my back so I wouldn't feel the epidural needle as much. That's right, the epidural was so huge and painful that they had to anesthetize me so I could be anesthetized. And those four numbing needles hurt worse than anything. Until the massive pressure of the epidural needle anyway. After I was successfully filled full of numbing agents, I was laid down and manipulated by the doctor and several nurses (I was already losing feeling from the waist down). They forced my arms out and strapped me down so I wouldn't be able to move during the surgery. They don't want you looking at the horrific things that are happening to your body. This, it turns out, is a great and merciful consideration.
According to my husband, who was watching, they took a laser and sliced me open like a tauntaun. Then they stretched my skin over something that looked like an embroidery hoop so they could get at all my organs. Meanwhile, all I could feel was my body being yanked from side to side--they were not gentle with my insides at all. My mom was holding my hand, and I was on the verge of hysteria when both Mom and Norris gasped and I heard my baby's first cry. She was out! I wanted to look up and see her, but I was still wide open and strapped down. The doctor held her up so I could see that she was, in fact, a whole baby. A whole baby that was tinted purple by all the slime she was covered in, and a scrunched up little face. She kind of looked like the baby Voldemort from the seventh Harry Potter. And I said so, which I think embarrassed my mom. After that quick, terrifying peek, they whisked her away to wipe her down and weigh her. I lay there while they yanked me around some more to get everything back in place. Then they brought her over to me. I didn't get to hold her. I got to kiss her and then they took her away again, to the NICU. Thankfully Norris was able to follow.
Mom stayed and held my hand while they finished sewing me up, and then they transferred me back to my hospital bed and wheeled me back to my room. Where I had to sit for four hours while I regained feeling in my legs. We had tons of visitors, all of whom got to accompany Norris to the NICU to see the baby. They all came back in raptures over how beautiful she was, and how big she was considering that she had been born six weeks early. Finally, that evening, the nurse came in and told me that I could finally get out of bed and into a wheelchair so I could go actually hold my baby. It took me about three minutes of excruciating pain to maneuver myself onto the edge of the bed, and stand up with the help of the nurse. As soon as I was fully vertical, a huge wave of pain coursed through my body and about a cup and a half of blood and clots cascaded down my legs. This was one of the scariest things I have ever lived through. The nurse assured me it was normal, but by the time I was sitting in the wheelchair I was sweaty and shaking.
They wheeled me into the NICU where I got to see my baby. She had a tube in her nose, a feeding tube in her mouth, an IV in her foot, and vital sign monitors taped to her chest. I reached out, and she grabbed my finger, and turned her head to look at me when I said her name.
After four days in the hospital, whimpering all night as I tried to turn on my side like the nurse told me to, they told me I was cleared to go home. I was healing well, and could actually walk on my own over to the NICU to visit the baby every three hours. This was the worst part of all. I tried to stretch things out as long as I could, but there was just no denying that there was no real reason for me to be in the hospital any longer. So that evening I put on my shoes and packed up my bag, and walked out of the hospital, leaving my baby behind. It was cold and rainy, and on the way home, Norris pulled out one of her hats that he was bringing home for the dogs. I smelled her baby smell and immediately burst into tears. The house seemed really quiet when we got home, even with the dogs barking and all the fanfare of bringing in bags.
So started Evie's eleven days in the NICU. Eleven days of driving to the hospital three times a day to feed and cuddle with her, then say goodbye and leave her in the care of others (albeit highly qualified, medically trained others). She was not the worst case in the ward by a long shot. Every day she got bigger and stronger. She ate more and more, and one by one the tubes began to disappear. But it was hard. It was infinitely more exhausting to leave her in the hospital than it has been to get up with her in the night. But she finally came home.
But it hasn't been all horrible. The part about babies being magical, enchanting little temptresses is beyond true. The very second that I held her against my chest and smelled that sweet, unique Evie smell, and felt her tiny eyelashes brushing against my neck, I was lost. She was this tiny, warm little bean sitting in my arms falling dead asleep and nestling against me, making little grunting noises. And hearing those grunts, knowing that because I am her mother, she can pick me out with her eyes closed just by the smell of my skin, makes it impossible for me to not do anything and everything for her. She has completely stolen my heart.
So that's my birth story. It was a harrowing experience to say the least, but it was worth it. Not that I'm anxious to do it again soon, and if I could have gotten Evie any other way I definitely would have. But finally, after all that, today, I feel like a mother.
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