Noah will be two months old on November 15. So much has happened since the last time I sat down to write about this whole baby adventure. It has been incredible to watch a brand new little person unfolding before my eyes.
I wasn’t able to write anything during my third trimester of pregnancy – I had absolutely no perspective. Everything I started to write sounded grouchy and woefully unappreciative of the beautiful miracle of life blossoming in my womb. My awkward, achy, swollen frame did not seem particularly miraculous to me at the time. In hindsight, it is miraculous that a 7-pound, 21-inch baby ever fit inside of me…and even more miraculous that he came out.
The beginning of my third trimester was when I really started to feel pregnant. Of course I had been pregnant for the first six months, but I had never been this huge, this achy, this clumsy, or this grouchy. You know those terrifying pregnant women on movies and sitcoms that you know must be exaggerated for laughs? They’re not. We really do waddle, we really do need to pee every time we stand up, we cry for no reason at all, and we can be awfully mean when we’re feeling uncomfortable (which is most of the time).
One of the first events of my third trimester was the beginning of childbirth preparation classes. I was excited for these classes. I felt completely clueless about the whole birthing process, and I missed college classes. Of course, the final exam for this course would be more painful than any literary criticism test. Chase was much more reluctant to give up his Tuesday evenings to sit around in a circle and hold hands with strange people, but, good husband that he is, he agreed to come with me. Fortunately for him, we usually sat in chairs, and he only had to hold hands with me during the floor exercises.
The videos were the most terrifying part of the birthing classes. Women in labor make awful noises and faces, and everything that happens to them looks extremely painful. Chase would look over at me at the end of a birthing video with a big smile and say:
“Did you see how happy that mommy was to be holding her little baby?”
“Did you see how much pain she was in for the rest of the video?” I would retort, wide eyed and white faced. “I don’t know if I can do that.”
I wanted to have a natural birth, but I actually cried after watching one video that showed lots and lots of women giving birth naturally. Noah was just going to have to stay in my tummy forever. (Of course, that was back when I could still see my feet.)
Despite the bloody, traumatizing videos, Chase and I successfully graduated from childbirth classes, fully equipped to do what billions of women have done for thousands of years. That was the last big milestone. Now we had to wait another month and a half for the grand finale.
During the first six months of pregnancy, I had been “adorable,” “beautiful” and “cute.” All of a sudden, I started hearing, “You’re so much bigger than you were yesterday!” and “If you’re tummy grows any more, they’ll have to carry you around in a wheelbarrow!” Cashiers and store clerks unabashedly asked when I was due. One random businessman that I passed on the sidewalk commented, “Hey, you’re just about to pop!” By the end of my eighth month, I was ready to be done with the whole pregnancy thing.
Fortunately for me (and for my poor tongue-lashed husband), Noah arrived a week before his due date. The day before, Chase and I had made a bet on when he would come. I bet September 21 (his actual due date) and Chase bet September 15.
At 4:35 on the morning of September 15, I gently nudged Chase – who was sleeping on the couch because he couldn’t sleep through all of my tossing and turning and getting up to go to the bathroom – and whispered:
“You won.”
“What?” he asked groggily, barely opening his eyes.
“My water just broke.”
Chase’s eyes flew open and he sat up. “Holy crap! Are you sure?”
“Yup. I felt these weird little pops and now everything is all wet.”
“Wow.” He grabbed my hand. “We’re having a baby. Do we have everything ready?”
We had packed a bag for the hospital, but, of course, we had forgotten to pack a million little things, and we ended up hauling a very large load out to the car. Well, Chase did. I had a large load of my own to haul.
It was a half hour drive to Silverton Hospital, but the roads were clear and the drive through the countryside in the morning mist under the fading stars was absolutely beautiful. I started having “real” contractions in the car, and Chase carefully timed each one. We were giddy. After months of waiting, we would finally get to meet our baby.
TO BE CONTINUED…
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