William's first birthday is in two days, and I have yet to document his birth (oops). So I'm going to slide this in under the wire, and then see if I can follow up with a one-year tribute.
Being pregnant with William was uncomfortable. I carried him high and had rib and back pain from like 22 weeks on. The last two months I waddled and groaned and wondered how I would possibly make it until the end (sorry Josh). My belly was a "bullet" as one of my OBs kindly put it; described by others as "bouyant" and "perky." It looked like I had swallowed an enormous basketball. William, bless him, was a steady mover in the womb, but I remember feeling like I had the Incredible Hulk in there. I knew there were "supposed" to be layers of placenta, amniotic fluid, blood, muscles, skin, etc, separating his appendages from the outside of me, but it generally felt like he was about to kick his way out of my skin at any moment. And he did succeed in leaving me with a herniated belly button and diastasis when all was said and done. All complaints aside, it could have been much worse, and what I have to show for it more than compensates for 9 months of discomfort.
He was due on April 22nd, 2014. On Sunday, April 13th, I remember being spectacularly uncomfortable, pretty much everywhere. Nevertheless, we had friends over that night for sukiyaki and I somehow managed to waddle around, chopping a million vegetables, readying the piles of food, and then stuffed myself. I went to bed feeling like my whole body was going to break at any moment.
The next morning (April 14th, 2014, the auspicious day!) I went to my sister Michelle's in Alexandria to FINALLY bring her an "after baby" meal (she had my nephew 5 weeks earlier). Dare I repeat the refrain: I was feeling exceptionally uncomfortable that morning, with about a billion Braxton-Hicks contractions (this was nothing new; basically the last 3 months of my pregnancy were like that). And so it was that around 11:45am, just as I went to sit down on her couch to read Jack a story, I felt my water break. For all who are concerned about Michelle's couch, never fear, it was not the big ol' gush they talk about in the movies. It continued to "break" for like 2.5 hours, so at first I was a bit perplexed as to what on earth was going on down there. Then when it kept coming I figured that this was the real deal. I called Josh, who was not expecting the "my water broke" phone call, since this was a week and a day before my due date, and with Jack they had to break my water after 14 hours of labor. I called the doctor, who told me to waste no time, bustled Jack into the car with several of Michelle's towels wrapped around me, then made the drive home to Reston. At this point I actually had a real contraction or two, but nothing serious.
Josh met us at home and there followed the flurried packing of the hospital bag (which I obviously hadn't done), wishing I had showered that morning, or at least put on make-up, and wishing I didn't have to deal with the waters breaking (still).
I became extremely emotional at the moment of leaving Jack. He had fallen asleep on the way home, and I watched him in his crib, unaware of the event that was about to change his life forever. I felt that leaving him to go have another baby was suddenly the hardest thing I'd ever had to do--the moment of inescapable change, when it would no longer be just Jack and Mommy being best friends all day long.
But that water kept breaking and the OB had been adamant about wasting no time in getting to the hospital, so Josh gave me a blessing that all would be well, and we left our slumbering Jack in the loving care of Auntie Michelle and 5 week-old cousin Aiden.
The ride to the hospital was, in many ways, surreal, because it was so totally different from the ride to the hospital when Jack was on his way. Then, I had been past the point of talking, focusing on trying not to vomit into the flimsy grocery bag I'd brought. We'd had to stop and wait out contractions on our walk from the parking lot to the hospital; with William, Josh and I were chatting amiably while I sat on my beach towel, occasionally experiencing a mild contraction here or there.
So no one was in any doubt when I waddled into the hospital with my beach towel between my legs and that enormous basketball of a belly as to why I was there. I got into my delivery room around 3:45pm, and they asked me if I wanted an epidural. I said: "most likely, but I don't think I'm quite there yet" as contractions had only just started to become decently uncomfortably. The nurse assured me that things would be heating up pretty quickly, so if I wanted one, I should just go for it. So in came the anesthesiologist and he mixed up his drugs and put in the needle and about this time things really had started to get a bit hairy. But alas, no relief from the drugs... for an hour, they did me no good. I was at a 6 when the doctor first checked, and after that hour of increasing pain and much hand-crunching for Josh, I was only at like a 6.5. The anesthesiologist came back for another couple attempts, but still no relief. I was starting to wonder if I was going to be able to keep my cool and if Josh would have a working hand by the end of it.
Finally the anesthesiologist worked up some crazy cocktail of wondrous drugs and dumped it in the tubes and then, immediate relief. Unfortunately this also meant that as far as I could tell, the lower half of my body was gone. Couldn't feel a thing down there. Leg-free Ann Marie. "I think I overdid it," was the anesthesiologist's dry response, with a sigh. For a few minutes I was able to relax, but then I started shaking all over, uncontrollably, and kept almost puking. After a half hour of this, the nurse thought I might be in transition, and sure enough when she checked me, I was at a 10 and Will's head was right there. So I went from a 6.5 to a 10 in thirty minutes, which was why my body was trying to shake itself to pieces.
Pushing was a bit of a joke since remember how I no longer had the lower half of my body? I was legless, so when the doc asked me to isolate and use the muscles it takes to push out a baby, I kind of just started laughing. At one point the doctor was honestly like: "I have no idea what you're doing." Neither did I, Doc. But somehow, muscle memory must have kicked in, and we started making progress. And then, after a mere half hour of this (compared to 2.5 hours of pushing with Jack) at 6:10pm, William Hugh was born: a beautiful, slimy, darling creature. They plopped him right up on me and I got to see and touch my little Incredible Hulk.
He was an unassuming 7lbs 8oz, with a round little head, dark hair, squishy cheeks, and overall unsmooshed look (I was surprised). When I think back on this moment a year later, I remember two strong emotions: relief, and love. Leading up to William's birth, I had felt bittersweet as I contemplated this change in my life. I was so excited to have him, but I wondered how it would be possible to love another baby as much as my Jack. Jack already took up so much of my heart, thoughts, energy, everything, that it just seemed strange to be having a not-Jack baby.
All that wondering was dispelled the moment I held lovely William in those first minutes after his birth. The love I felt for him was instantaneous, enveloping, total. It was as sweet as grace; as natural as breathing. That feeling has only grown. It's like Will has filled a hole in our family that we didn't even know was there.
In the hours after his birth, I was full of peace. It's possible some of this could be attributed to still being heavily medicated, but nevertheless, I felt like William had brought with him a spirit of peace and calm, as if he himself wanted me to know that I would survive having a newborn AND a Jack Toddler, and that all would be well. And so it has been.
Being pregnant with William was uncomfortable. I carried him high and had rib and back pain from like 22 weeks on. The last two months I waddled and groaned and wondered how I would possibly make it until the end (sorry Josh). My belly was a "bullet" as one of my OBs kindly put it; described by others as "bouyant" and "perky." It looked like I had swallowed an enormous basketball. William, bless him, was a steady mover in the womb, but I remember feeling like I had the Incredible Hulk in there. I knew there were "supposed" to be layers of placenta, amniotic fluid, blood, muscles, skin, etc, separating his appendages from the outside of me, but it generally felt like he was about to kick his way out of my skin at any moment. And he did succeed in leaving me with a herniated belly button and diastasis when all was said and done. All complaints aside, it could have been much worse, and what I have to show for it more than compensates for 9 months of discomfort.
He was due on April 22nd, 2014. On Sunday, April 13th, I remember being spectacularly uncomfortable, pretty much everywhere. Nevertheless, we had friends over that night for sukiyaki and I somehow managed to waddle around, chopping a million vegetables, readying the piles of food, and then stuffed myself. I went to bed feeling like my whole body was going to break at any moment.
The next morning (April 14th, 2014, the auspicious day!) I went to my sister Michelle's in Alexandria to FINALLY bring her an "after baby" meal (she had my nephew 5 weeks earlier). Dare I repeat the refrain: I was feeling exceptionally uncomfortable that morning, with about a billion Braxton-Hicks contractions (this was nothing new; basically the last 3 months of my pregnancy were like that). And so it was that around 11:45am, just as I went to sit down on her couch to read Jack a story, I felt my water break. For all who are concerned about Michelle's couch, never fear, it was not the big ol' gush they talk about in the movies. It continued to "break" for like 2.5 hours, so at first I was a bit perplexed as to what on earth was going on down there. Then when it kept coming I figured that this was the real deal. I called Josh, who was not expecting the "my water broke" phone call, since this was a week and a day before my due date, and with Jack they had to break my water after 14 hours of labor. I called the doctor, who told me to waste no time, bustled Jack into the car with several of Michelle's towels wrapped around me, then made the drive home to Reston. At this point I actually had a real contraction or two, but nothing serious.
Josh met us at home and there followed the flurried packing of the hospital bag (which I obviously hadn't done), wishing I had showered that morning, or at least put on make-up, and wishing I didn't have to deal with the waters breaking (still).
I became extremely emotional at the moment of leaving Jack. He had fallen asleep on the way home, and I watched him in his crib, unaware of the event that was about to change his life forever. I felt that leaving him to go have another baby was suddenly the hardest thing I'd ever had to do--the moment of inescapable change, when it would no longer be just Jack and Mommy being best friends all day long.But that water kept breaking and the OB had been adamant about wasting no time in getting to the hospital, so Josh gave me a blessing that all would be well, and we left our slumbering Jack in the loving care of Auntie Michelle and 5 week-old cousin Aiden.
The ride to the hospital was, in many ways, surreal, because it was so totally different from the ride to the hospital when Jack was on his way. Then, I had been past the point of talking, focusing on trying not to vomit into the flimsy grocery bag I'd brought. We'd had to stop and wait out contractions on our walk from the parking lot to the hospital; with William, Josh and I were chatting amiably while I sat on my beach towel, occasionally experiencing a mild contraction here or there.
So no one was in any doubt when I waddled into the hospital with my beach towel between my legs and that enormous basketball of a belly as to why I was there. I got into my delivery room around 3:45pm, and they asked me if I wanted an epidural. I said: "most likely, but I don't think I'm quite there yet" as contractions had only just started to become decently uncomfortably. The nurse assured me that things would be heating up pretty quickly, so if I wanted one, I should just go for it. So in came the anesthesiologist and he mixed up his drugs and put in the needle and about this time things really had started to get a bit hairy. But alas, no relief from the drugs... for an hour, they did me no good. I was at a 6 when the doctor first checked, and after that hour of increasing pain and much hand-crunching for Josh, I was only at like a 6.5. The anesthesiologist came back for another couple attempts, but still no relief. I was starting to wonder if I was going to be able to keep my cool and if Josh would have a working hand by the end of it.
Finally the anesthesiologist worked up some crazy cocktail of wondrous drugs and dumped it in the tubes and then, immediate relief. Unfortunately this also meant that as far as I could tell, the lower half of my body was gone. Couldn't feel a thing down there. Leg-free Ann Marie. "I think I overdid it," was the anesthesiologist's dry response, with a sigh. For a few minutes I was able to relax, but then I started shaking all over, uncontrollably, and kept almost puking. After a half hour of this, the nurse thought I might be in transition, and sure enough when she checked me, I was at a 10 and Will's head was right there. So I went from a 6.5 to a 10 in thirty minutes, which was why my body was trying to shake itself to pieces.
Pushing was a bit of a joke since remember how I no longer had the lower half of my body? I was legless, so when the doc asked me to isolate and use the muscles it takes to push out a baby, I kind of just started laughing. At one point the doctor was honestly like: "I have no idea what you're doing." Neither did I, Doc. But somehow, muscle memory must have kicked in, and we started making progress. And then, after a mere half hour of this (compared to 2.5 hours of pushing with Jack) at 6:10pm, William Hugh was born: a beautiful, slimy, darling creature. They plopped him right up on me and I got to see and touch my little Incredible Hulk.
He was an unassuming 7lbs 8oz, with a round little head, dark hair, squishy cheeks, and overall unsmooshed look (I was surprised). When I think back on this moment a year later, I remember two strong emotions: relief, and love. Leading up to William's birth, I had felt bittersweet as I contemplated this change in my life. I was so excited to have him, but I wondered how it would be possible to love another baby as much as my Jack. Jack already took up so much of my heart, thoughts, energy, everything, that it just seemed strange to be having a not-Jack baby.All that wondering was dispelled the moment I held lovely William in those first minutes after his birth. The love I felt for him was instantaneous, enveloping, total. It was as sweet as grace; as natural as breathing. That feeling has only grown. It's like Will has filled a hole in our family that we didn't even know was there.
In the hours after his birth, I was full of peace. It's possible some of this could be attributed to still being heavily medicated, but nevertheless, I felt like William had brought with him a spirit of peace and calm, as if he himself wanted me to know that I would survive having a newborn AND a Jack Toddler, and that all would be well. And so it has been.
Could you make me cry any more? This was beautiful, and so are you and so is Will.
ReplyDeleteSweetest story ever told. You are an amazing writer.
ReplyDeleteOh William, I love you! Thank you for sharing your gift of writing, Ann Marie, and for bringing Will into the world.
ReplyDelete