My Second Baby
On the eve of my second son’s birth, the details of his arrival are at once crystal clear and a bit fuzzy with age. It was so long ago, but each birth becomes a part of the soul - and so cannot be forgotten.
We had decided the November before that perhaps it was time to start trying for baby #2. Our first had turned a year old a few months before, and we were settled into our own house. We conceived right away - yikes! It was difficult to be pregnant and chase after a toddler. Eldest son was incredibly active - as most boys are. The nausea was real, and wanting to nap from time to time. My number one son and I were so tight; I adored him and we did everything together. He was so smart and incredibly funny. I adored this new life as well, but how would I ever be able to divide my heart among 2 sweet babies?
We lived 9 hours away from my parents by then, and my husband’s family was 20+ hours east. My mother’s exhortation was to “follow the money” and go wherever we could bring home the biggest income. My husband and I were still committed to me staying home with our children, so living one his salary required careful management.
As my due date approached, my mother came up from Florida to stay with eldest beautiful blond 2 year old baby boy. Eight days later, she was getting itchy to return to her husband. I’d delivered 8 days late with our first as well.
We had a regular prenatal appointment with our family doc who was to attend the birth. We’d been seeing the group of midwives at the clinic/hospital, but became disenfranchised with their care. Our female doc had not had children yet herself, but we felt good about the care she would provide. The appointment revealed that baby was well and we prepared to go home.
I casually mentioned that I thought I may have had some fluid leaking. That got the doctor’s attention and she asked to check for any fluid with a pH strip - which would reveal if it was amniotic fluid. Apparently it was, and the plan changed immediately. We were instructed to go home and get our bags, then check into the hospital. We were going to start the Pitocin and get this baby born!
I don’t remember the hows and whys of that decision. Was there informed consent? Did I panic because we felt that we had no one else to love on baby #1 while we delivered baby #2 and the clock was ticking on my mother being there? I know that I did NOT want the same kind of Pit induction/augmentation and concomitant epidural that I had had for birth #1. And yet - here we were…
By about 3 that afternoon, we were ensconced in the hospital and everyone was excited that baby would soon be born. We knew to request the epidural long before I got “run over by the Mack truck”. The worst part of being tethered again in bed was when I needed to go #2. I was not allowed to go to the toilet. Using the bedpan, and trying to wipe myself cleanly with all the dexterity of a beached blue whale, was humiliating.
I was able to push this sweet darling out of my body around 10 that night. He had some difficulty breathing at first - so the nurses whisked him away to the warmer and worked on him for a bit. His shoulders had gotten stuck up on my pubic bone as well. He was beautiful - with dark hair and dark eyes - and weighed 10 pounds 10 1/2 ounces. I was relieved to have him here, and had resigned myself to a repeat kind of birth as the first.
My mother went back home 3 or 4 days later. There we were - our new foursome. We had no family around and our friends all had babies of their own. We owned one car. My husband worked full-time and was going to school at night to work on his MBA. We were lonesome and isolated, and now had a 2 year old whose world had been rocked, and a beautiful new baby who was not going to sleep much. The next six months were going to be a blur…
