Last Friday night. 41 weeks and 3 days pregnant. I look at He-Nancy where he’s squeezing limes and lemons in the kitchen and demand he make me a hurry-up-labor-ita. He obliges, omitting the tequila but throwing in a little triple-sec to help jump-start Jamichael’s delayed eviction from the womb. We’ve gotten to that point. The point where we start making up our own harebrained homeopathic labor-inducing remedies.
“This cracker,” I think, taking some earthy Whole Foodsian slab of fiber out of a box to nibble on. ”Maybe this cracker will do the trick.”
He-Nancy believes more in the power of spirits: “Beer, Nance? You want a beer? Or no, how about some red wine? Or wait, didn’t I read something about scotch?”
“Just the laborita, darling,” I respond, extending my swollen arm to grasp the frosty glass. ”Just the laborita.”
But so far, nothing. The previous Monday I am 1 centimeter dilated, 70 % effaced. On Thursday I am 2 centimeters dilated and 90% effaced. I spend the Friday going to my swim class where three other pregnant women are as late as I am.
“It’s a full moon, for Christ’s sakes!” we moan. ”And there are sun flares! Sun flares!”
No cramps, no nada.
So Friday night He-Nancy and I decide to invite people over for margaritas, because, heck, what else are we doing?
He cleans the house; I beach myself on the sofa. People come over. I rouse myself, but feel weary. I make small talk, enjoy our friends, even though I probably should be in hiding. I note that most pregnant women I know disappear from their social groups around month 8.
“Why is that?” I ask He-Nancy.
He shrugs. ”Vanity?”
I sigh and sip my laborita, perusing the small crowd in our apartment. Then at 9:30, I can’t go on. ”I’m heading to bed,” I whisper to He-Nancy, before repairing to our dark boudoir. ”Make my apologies.”
He shoots me a loving look. ”You’re 9 1/2 months pregnant. No apologies necessary.”
And so I fall asleep.
Midnight comes, midnight goes.
1 am.
He-Nancy slumbers alongside me.
2 am.
Then 2:30 am.
At 2:30 am, suddenly, I know: A strong definitive period-like cramp rolls across my lower back and abdomen.
I sit up in bed. ”Oh my god,” I whisper. I reach out to jostle He-Nancy. ”He-Nancy, honey, I think I just had a contraction.”
He sits up and blinks at me in the dark. ”Really? Oh my god, really? A contraction?”
We stare at each other, our faces lit by the dim hall light, as the cats readjust themselves on the comforter. I swallow hard. “I guess this is it,” I say.
He-Nancy puts his hand on mine. “I guess it is.”
“I’ll call the Midwife.”
“I’ll get our things together.”
I call the Midwife to give her the heads up: she won’t be getting a full night’s sleep. ”Okay,” she says. ”Call me back when you’re having minute long contractions five minutes apart for an hour, and I’ll come over to check you.”
“Okay, okay, right, 5-1-1, right, okay,” I whisper, closing my cell phone as another strong crampy wave seizes my gut. Suddenly I feel like I’m going to puke. ”He-Nancy!” I call. ”I think I might puke!” A gush of warm fluid rushes between my legs. Suddenly, I not only feel like I’m going to puke, but that I’m going to have diarrhea and pee on myself. In short, I feel like an exploding person. I wobble slowly to the bathroom in my flannel pajamas clutching my gut.
“Here you are, sweetie,” He-Nancy says, handing me a metal bowl to barf in and pulling back my hair as I settle on the toilet. I no longer know what’s coming out of me nor from whence it comes.
I proceed to sit on the toilet for the next hour or so and feel wretched. He-Nancy will tell me later that I was lying on the bathroom floor for a period of time. I have no real memory of this. Intense cramps of all sorts wash through me continually. I try to keep track of them on a piece of paper (my sister will later find this piece of paper on the bathroom floor and burst into laughter); it looks like this:
3:31-3:33 (poo)
3:35- 30 sec. wanna puke
3:37 -
3:46 -
“) > ” -
The pen trails off the page.
I call for He-Nancy again and he holds my hair as I throw up more laboritas.
“There’s no pattern to them, He-Nancy, the contractions,” I moan. ”It’s just kinda not stopping.”
“Do you wanna call the Midwife back?”
I nod. He runs to get our bags together and I stumble slowly into the bedroom where Arthur the cat looks up at me mournfully. I am now also feeling more gushes of warm liquid between my legs. I’ve already changed two soaked pads. I pause and bend over the bed as another wave of tight horrid crampy nausea grips my lower half, but again, but there’s no pattern. I’m not even sure I can call these contractions. Aren’t contractions things that begin and rise and then fall? And don’t you hang on your husband and breathe together as they pass and then go bake cookies until the next one rolls in? It doesn’t occur to me to even try my hypnobabie’s techniques because my overriding sense is this: there is nowhere to go in myself for relief. The discomfort is so intense and continuous, that all I can do is wait for time to pass. I grab the phone and dial the midwife.
“There’s no pattern,” I say.
“Are the contractions coming one right after the other?” she asks.
“Yeah, I guess,” I moan, the tears in my throat. ”It’s not stopping.”
“Has your water broken?”
“I don’t know. Fluids and stuff keep coming out of me. I’m starting to get worried about the car trip -” my voice catches. The horror of it: the car trip. Across town. To the west side. Feeling like an exploding person. Endure, I think.
“Okay, Nancy,” says the Midwife. ”I think you better meet me at the hospital.”
He-Nancy comes back down the hall. ”We need to go. We need to go,” I say, bending over again as more tightening and stabbing discomfort wrack my body.
“Do you want to change?” he asks. “Do you need anything else?”
“No, no, I don’t care.” I lean on him, braless in my pajamas and tank top. “We need to go. We need to get there. We need to go.”
“Okay.” He-Nancy grabs my purse and leads me down the apartment steps into the dark cold morning. I feel a brief respite from the pain as the fresh air hits my face and I thank god this is all happening at 5 am on a Saturday morning and not at rush hour. He-Nancy guides me to the front seat of the car where I’m relieved to see he’s set down a large waterproof underpad. I don’t know what’s going to come out of me anymore. My pajamas already feel soaked.
He-Nancy drives quickly down Silverlake Boulevard in the empty dawn as I moan and clutch the bar over the door. The road is curving and we take it fast. I grab the barf bowl He-Nancy placed at my feet and up comes more laborita. “The curves,” I moan. I vomit a bit more, the force of which encourages simultaneous vaginal gushing. Suddenly I remember that women in labor are supposed to make themselves go pee so they don’t end up needing to be catheterized and it occurs to me that I have to pee desperately.
“Oh god, I have to pee,” I moan. “Pull over He-Nancy! Pull over! I need to pee right here, I don’t care!” I eye a patch of grass by the side of the road. He-Nancy swings the car over and idles. ”No, no, I don’t have to pee!” I realize, staring at the bumper of a parked car and trying to gage the sensations in my body. “Let’s go! I don’t have to, oh god, oh god. We need to get there.”
Half way down Beverly Boulevard He-Nancy starts going through the red lights. Again, I feel a brief respite from the discomfort by looking at the cool empty street, and then for the first time, I feel a break. It’s a few seconds long. But then the car hits a pothole and the contractions kick back in. I grip the car handle. ”One, two, three, four, five…” I start counting to twelve and down, just to hear my own voice, just to have something else happening inside me that might divert my attention; anything that might take me out of the physical experience. “One, two, three, four…” I regrip the bar over the door as more warm liquid seeps from me and into the covered car seat. I don’t care. I can’t care. I give myself permission to pee my pants.
And then we’re turning into the hospital parking lot. He-Nancy finds a spot right near the elevators. I pull myself out of the passenger seat. ”Just grab my purse and the red bag with our insurance info,” I say as I pause to lean against the side of the car. ”Oh god, oh god,” I moan. Suddenly I feel like I have to pee again. I look around. No one would see me if I crouched down in front of the Subaru. I don’t even care anyway. ”I have to pee, He-Nancy. I’m just, I’m going right here, I have to go.” I pull down my pajamas and squat in front of our car. Then again the urge to pee passes. ”No, no, I don’t have to pee! Hurry, He-Nancy, hurry, we’ve got to go!”
I throw myself on him and he guides me toward the elevators, passing the lot attendant. She indicates an empty wheelchair. ”You can use it,” she offers. For some reason the thought of sitting seems repellant. A man waiting for an elevator steps aside and up we go to the maternity ward.
We stop at the front desk.
“Okay, ma’am, we’re just going to need you to fill out this form,” a smiling administrator says passing me a piece of paper.
“Is the Midwife here? Is she here?” I ask, picking up a pen and shakily writing my name.
“She’s here,” the administrator says.
I lean against the wall as more discomfort washes through me. I push back the form. ”I can’t…Can I do this later?”
“Jesus,” He-Nancy says, as he helps hustle me down the hall to where the Midwife stands, scrubbed, her hand outstretched. I grab her fingers and breathe a brief sigh of relief; She’s here. We’re here. We made it.
“I feel like I have to pee but I can’t I don’t know I feel like-”
The Midwife leads me to a delivery room. ” That’s the pressure from the baby. You’ll probably feel that until he comes. I think you’re close, Nancy. Let’s get you checked.”
Next thing I know I’m on a bed staring at the latter half of a Macy’s sign out beyond the hospital window as the sky lightens into dawn. I don’t remember taking off my pajamas or where they’ve gone; there’s been no time to change into a gown; I’m pantless in my old maroon tank top and a nurse is strapping a fetal monitor to my belly and taking my blood. The Midwife sits at the bottom of the bed. I see her and He-Nancy and they ask if I want anything, any music to listen to, anything else from the car.
“No, no,” I say, extending my hand to He-Nancy. I do not want him to leave the room even for a second. This much is clear to me. He takes my hand. The Midwife checks me and asks He-Nancy to fetch the almond oil she requested we bring.
“The baby is incredibly low, Nancy,” she says. ”This is amazing. You’re fully dilated. Are you feeling any urge to push?”
“No…no, I…”
And then suddenly I feel it.
“Oh my god,” I whisper. ”I think I’m going to crap.”
“That’s it. That’s the urge to push. Can you take a deep breath and push?”
I try to do as she says. Instead I say: ”Arrrgghhhhhhoooooeeeeeuuuuuuugggghhh!”
The sounds coming out of my own mouth are wild; I have no idea where they are coming from, only that they must be fully expressed. Later when asked what they sounded like He-Nancy will say, “Very female. Very female and…canine.” I don’t hold back. Somewhere, outside myself, I realize I sound just like a woman in labor.
“Good job!” the Midwife says. ”You’re doing it. Your baby’s going to be here in no time.”
I grip and regrip He-Nancy’s fingers as the urge to push passes. Her words are incredibly inspiring. He’s almost here. I can’t believe I’m doing this. I’m doing this, I think. He’s almost here.
“Okay,” the Midwife says. ”Now, next time you feel the urge, instead of yelling, I want you to take that energy and bear down into it, all right? A long slow push with a deep breath.”
“Okay, yeah, okay, okay,” I say. ”Oh god, here it comes.”
Another wave of pressure rises and instead of wailing, I groan and shut my eyes and bear down. As I do so, I can feel the Midwife’s hands ringing my perineum and the warm liquid relief of the almond oil, soothing the stretching sensation. The urge passes. It occurs to me that now that I’m pushing, I have a place to go in myself, work to do, a direction for the discomfort. It’s a strange consolation.
“Only a few more, Nancy and you’re going to have a baby,” the Midwife says. ”You’re really close.”
The nurse keeps fidgeting with the monitor. She and the Midwife exchange some hushed discussion: ”Some meconium in the fluid, but not much. Can you get a read on the baby’s heartbeat? That’s her heartbeat. Let’s try readjusting it. Can you get it?”
The nurse fiddles with the fetal monitor on my belly.
“Is he okay?” I ask. ”Is the baby okay?”
“We’re just trying to get a read,” the Midwife says, calmly.
I’m aware that they’re mildly concerned, but I also appreciate the Midwife’s quiet protection. She doesn’t feel I need to know what’s being said.
I ask, again. ”Is the baby okay? Is everything okay? Is he okay?”
I don’t remember if I get an answer, because the next urge to push is already upon me. ”Oh god, it’s here.”
“Okay Nancy, bear down,” the Midwife says. ”Okay two more pushes. You’re doing a great job. Can you give us one more push?”
I grunt and give it all I’ve got.
I hear a new voice then, some new British nurse who must’ve just come on shift. Next thing I know she’s barking in my ear: ”ALL RIGHT, LOVE! THAT’S IT GIRL! YOU CAN DO IT GIRL! YOU GOT IT, WAY TO GO, GIRL! YOU CAN DO IT! COME ON, GIRL–”
The woman is like human sandpaper, a Spice Girl on crack. Her energy is all wrong, way too loud. I squint up at her and put a finger to my lips: ”SHHHHHH!”
The Midwife converses in more hushed tones with the other nurse, then looks up at me. ”Are you comfortable on your back?”
“I don’t know,” I say, panting. ”I don’t know, I don’t know.”
“Why don’t you try turning onto your side.”
With great difficulty, I roll onto my right side. Then the next time I feel the urge to push, I shut my eyes and make myself work; I’m motivated. I want this baby to be here already. And this time, on my side, I feel like I’m disappearing inside myself, curling up in the dark. I have to hold up my left leg, which is shaking. He-Nancy helps.
“Just a few more pushes and he’ll be out,” the Midwife says. Again the news is electrifying. ”Do you want to reach down and feel his head?” she asks.
“Nope,” I say, keeping my eyes shut. I can’t move; I can just push. Hurry up and get here, little man, I think. Let’s do this, come on, come on, come on.
“Okay, two more pushes and he’s going to be here. There you go! Another deep breath, good.”
I struggle to inhale.
“One last push, this is it, Nancy, bear down!” the Midwife says.
I squeeze He-Nancy’s hand for all I’m worth and suddenly the stretching below grows momentarily sharp at the top and bottom. ”Uuuggh! Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch!” I yell and then there’s a release, a sensation almost like a pop, and then a rush of tremendous wet slippery warmth and soft flesh and the next thing I know a crying, wriggling baby is in my arms.
I don’t remember much from this moment, save the amazement and suddenness of it all. I see the Midwife’s face as she handles the umbilical cord, which I can feel connected like a tug.
“Wow, it’s a very short cord,” she notes, grabbing scissors of some kind. I don’t see He-Nancy cut it, but he does.
Then the pediatricians are upon us. Because they couldn’t get a solid read on the baby’s heartbeat they want to take a quick look; he’s bellowing for all he’s worth. He-Nancy goes with the baby to the corner of the room where some serious looking people peer down at our wailing newborn.
“He’s big,” the Midwife says, smiling. ”He’s a big baby.”
My legs are quaking and I can’t stop them. He-Nancy looks at me over his shoulder where he’s helping to hold our son. We stare at each other, speechless. There are tears in his eyes. I know what my face says: I can’t believe we just did this. I’ve had a baby, I think. I know what it’s like to have a baby. I’ve just had a baby. I did it. I just did it. We did it. He’s here. I can’t stop my legs from shaking.
Soon after the baby is back on my chest, and he’s beautiful. He-Nancy and I are in shock. In part, it’s the speed of the labor: it was nothing like we expected. We arrived at the hospital at 6 am. It’s now only 6:46 am. None of the nurses can believe this is a first birth. Maybe the Hypnobabies did do the trick. I must’ve been in early labor all week and not have felt any of it. I basically woke up in transition. The whole shebang? 4 hours and 15 minutes. Drug-free.
Later when asked what the experience was like for him, He-Nancy will say, “You know how they always tell you it’s nothing like the movies? Well, this was exactly like the movies.”
Then in what feels like a few minutes another warm slippery gush escapes my body and the Midwife announces the delivery of the placenta. She has it in some sort of bin and asks if we want to keep it. ”It’s huge,” she notes, holding up what appears to be a large plum-colored organ and pointing out where it was attached to the uterine wall.
“Our baby is nine pounds,” He-Nancy says. ”He’s nine pounds. 21 inches.” This is the first time I’ve learnt of our baby’s considerable size and I’m grateful that I’m only hearing it now that he’s outside the womb. If the Midwife knew he was a biggie she never mentioned it to me or allowed the ultrasoundist to guesstimate. Again, I’m grateful for her quiet protection of my laboring psyche.
As we gaze at our baby, the Midwife commences to sewing me up. Tearing is one of those wonderful words that, as a pregnant woman, you spend a good amount of time fearing. As is stitches. The sharp bursts of pain I felt during my last push? Yup. Unpleasant, but thankfully brief.
Now as I hold the baby, legs shaking, I watch the Midwife wield a bloody, curving needle between my legs. Not a friendly sight. And the anesthesia that’s been used feels faulty. I grab He-Nancy’s hand, wince, and grind my teeth. I have a second degree tear and a urethral tear.
While I’m being sewn up He-Nancy and I have conversation that includes statements like these:
“Oh my god, what just happened?”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Look at him. He’s the most perfectest baby ever.”
“I know.”
“He-Nancy. Four hours. Four hours. I mean, what?”
“I can’t believe this day.”
“We just had a baby. We have a baby.”
“We have a baby.”
“He’s here.”
“He’s here.”
Just like in the movies,
xo
Nancy
“
