Green-eyed Brown Eyes: A Birth Story.
We learned of the medical extras Elliott would bring (exception: trach) during my pregnancy. As a result of the worry around her heart, specifically, it was suggested that a vaginal birth was not wise but rather a C-section would be a safer route for getting Elliott out of the womb. I had never given birth before and my doctors were not comfortable putting Ellie through potentially more stress than she was already under should the labor and delivery be complicated. Therefore it was decided for me; C-section it would be.
As a result of our experience the concept of "birth plans" are comical to me - that would assume the pregnancy and delivery are going to go just as you intend it to. I want to meet five women where this has been the case. And then I want to punch them in the face. Just kidding...I would only punch one of them, I'm not a monster.
Around week 30, Elliott's growth started slowing. Nonetheless, she was still growing and the guidance was to continue to watch her and "take her" when needed. (I always hated that term, "take her" - like she would be kidnapped from my body.) It was clear Ellie wasn't going to make it to 40 weeks and the name of the game was 'go as long as possible'. Fighting this effort, was the fact that I was already measuring 40 weeks. I had an obscene amount of amniotic fluid. This was partly due to Elliott's cleft lip/palate making swallowing tricky and partly due to my growing baby having a 3rd 21st chromosome. How it was explained to me was this: the body gets the direction from the DNA on how to grow the baby. So when there is an extra or missing chromosome it's like the directions are missing a page or perhaps out of order. This mix up changes things in the development and can account for oddities such as larger amounts of amniotic fluid than are necessary. Basically, Elliott spent 8 months in an Olympic size swimming pool. I have a feeling she will love the ocean one day.
Weekly, sometimes twice weekly, check-ups showed Ellie's progress and monitored her state in the womb. We hit week 35 and my Perinatologist said, "We've come to the point where we can do more for your baby outside the womb than you can with her inside." So, we next met with my OB and decided when the world would meet Elliott. It's odd to be given a choice of when you will meet your child as opposed to your child deciding when they will meet you. Despite my disappointment for it not being the latter, I decided it was exciting to choose her birthday and took joy in this decision. It could either be Friday, 10/21, which would be 35 weeks and 4 days or Monday, 10/24, which would be 36 weeks. My competitive self was immediately drawn to Monday as 36 weeks meant I made it further (mind you at this point, during the decision, I was measuring 47 weeks - the size of carrying twins!) Monday also meant that the weekend would be spent in terror worrying something would happen only to be dealt with by the on-call team covering instead of my all-star team who knew ev.er.y.thing about Ellie. All-Star > On-Call. The appeal to Friday was less time spent worrying and, more importantly, the meaning behind it...
October is Down syndrome awareness month. (Along with every other anything... who chose October?! I would like to speak to the board of Down syndrome and appeal to switching months. I mean let's be honest, competing with Breast Cancer is a battle we've already lost.) Also, as you all know by now, to have Down syndrome means you have 3 copies of the 21st chromosome. So to choose 10/21 means we are celebrating Elliott's arrival during Down syndrome awareness month and on the 21st day. YESSSSSS. DONE. Let's do this. I adore dates/things/events with meaning behind them.
This decision was made on 10/17, so 4 days later we show up at the hospital in the late morning. My belly full of white grape juice, water, coffee and anxiety. My scheduled time was 1 pm but as all hospital things go, that was not when the party started. We arrived at my prep room, the 1st nurse got me all ready (sparing all the nitty-gritty details for my PG {and male} readers.) The 2nd nurse (my actual delivery nurse) is the one who eventually got me all hooked up with the goodies. Drugs. I am referring to drugs here in case there was any confusion.
The husband/baby-daddy can't be in the room when the mom gets an epidural. (I'd love to know which father-to-be flipped out and ruined this for everyone??) They wheeled me into the OR and Brad waited back in the prep room just down the hall with the promise to be retrieved once it's go time. Inside the OR, there was that all-star team of people awaiting Ellie's arrival, her name we've yet to actually announce. There are heart specialists, plastics team members to consult on her cleft, genetics team members to make sure she displays the markers of Down syndrome and nothing else, and neonatologists to give her an overall check then whisk her away to the NICU. Then, of course, the team focused on me - significantly smaller. My Doctor (the best OBGYN ever, I will request a voluntary hysterectomy when she retires {not really}), an anesthesiologist, and a few nurses. A team of 15-20 people in this giant, intensely illuminated and frigid room. An intimidating feeling to roll in there with what is essentially a blue paper towel covering your nakedness, full of fear towards delivering a baby via surgery - or really, just delivering a baby at all, and unsure of the status of your baby upon her arrival. My vulnerability peaked at this moment.
A few of these team members moved my giant, water engorged body onto the true operating table and started preparing me for an epidural. My nurse, Susan, was an angel. She was brilliant at her job - her voice had me fooled into thinking I was taking a yoga class while instead an anesthesiologist was sticking a giant needle into my spine. She hugged and soothed me through the whole experience. Frankly, and nothing against my very comforting husband, I'm glad it was her and not Brad. Don't tell him I said that.
If you've never had an epidural let me try to describe it for you. The flow of medicine shoots through your body slowly but with purpose, removing feeling and control of every inch it passes. The job is done when you are no longer in charge of your own body from the chest down. The sensation is so foreign, but so quick, that you aren't left with any time to comprehend what has just transpired within you.
I feel this is a good time for a brief and totally unnecessary public service announcement. I am all for drugs during birthing a human... not that I had a choice to go drug-free with a C-section anyway. But if I had, I would still choose drugs. The journey of conceiving Ellie, growing Ellie, and worrying about Ellie was/is such a painful one; I felt some drugs were deserved and they were certainly appreciated. This pro-drug stance is directly against my stance in other categories. Meaning, I'm a hypocritical-hippy. I use natural deodorant that likely does nothing, I shop at Whole Foods, I eat organic whenever possible and am super weirded-out by where meat comes from/what's in it. And then, their is my love of Taco Bell and Funyuns...Who am I? I don't even know. Whatever. We've all got our things.
...
The epidural had done it's job and suddenly, I knew that I was going to hurl. The stomach acid and the stuff they made me drink earlier slowly rose up my esophagus as I lay, useless, on this table. I said "Um, excuse me, I'm going to throw up" and my fabulous OB rushed one of those blue vomit bags to my face and told me to tilt my head towards it. I threw up so awkwardly without the use of my stomach muscles all while a team of nurses prepped my downtown for delivery... and don't forget the room was filled with those ~20 folks, none of which were my husband. (Remember that vulnerability peak I mentioned earlier; I was wrong - the climax was here).
Suddenly, people previously sitting calmly jumped up and started taking action. Ellie's heart rate began to drop (as an epidural can cause) and the room of specialists was not having it. They told my Doctor to start the surgery immediately, which she did. Meanwhile, alarms were sounding in the hallway where Brad is kept waiting to alert people of what is occurring. I blurted "My husband isn't here yet! Can someone please get him?" A nurse rushes to get him and bring him in the room. He later revealed to me that he heard the alarms, saw them coming from my OR and witnessed my exposed organs as he was rushed into the room to hold my hand. Quite the experience for me, quite the experience for him.
In a matter of minutes, my doctor had Elliott out. She was delivered at 2:22 pm, weighing a small but mighty 3 lbs 12 oz, measuring 16.5 inches. She was lifted briefly for us to see and then flown to the incubator against the wall. Surrounded by ~6 specialists all at once while they examined and cleaned her. Near my head was a TV screen showing the team tend to Elliott so that Brad and I could both watch how she spent her first minutes of life. After maybe 10 minutes, they wheeled Elliott in a travel incubator by my head. It's the kind that has the armholes on the sides so that parents can reach in. She was bundled in a hospital blanket with a pink hat to keep her warm. I was almost scared to touch her - she was tiny and seemingly so fragile. I reached in and stroked her right cheek. She was laying on her left side looking at me with her head towards my feet. I stroked her and whispered to her - though I couldn't tell you what I said. This whole event was so overwhelming and built up with such adrenaline. For 8 months, we were unsure if this moment would even happen. Would we get to meet our baby? Would she prove herself as strong as we'd hoped and prayed she would be?
After literally just a few minutes, the resident neonatologist asked if they can take her to the NICU now. My eyes, still actively streaming tears, look at him and give a nod.
This is a moment Brad and I had discussed, I wanted him to go with her at this point. Be with her every step of the way. Yes, I would've loved to have Brad by my side but it was critical for him to be with her for advocacy, for knowledge, and for reporting back to me with updates. With my nod, Brad leaves with Elliott and her all-star team.
The next 5 days were spent going back-n-forth between the NICU and my hospital room for resting/healing/pumping. I knew that we would leave the hospital without Elliott but I think I kept myself in a state of denial those 5 days just so that I could survive them. In fact, I know I did. The 5th day came and we didn't leave until 11 pm that night. Of all the hard nights that this journey has presented, the hardest by far was the first night at home without my baby. I cried the entire way home, passed out from exhaustion, cried while pumping in the middle of the night and cried on the way to the NICU the next morning. Rinse and repeat times 101. To deliver your baby then leave the hospital without your baby is a crime against nature. Then, to be forced to recognize that strangers can take care of your baby better than you can is a nightmare. It's a dagger straight to the soul of motherhood.
You know those Pamper's commercial's where the Mom has clearly just delivered the baby and he/she gets placed gingerly and immediately on the Mom's sweaty chest? She kisses the babies' forehead and whispers sweet nothings to the miracle she brought into this world. Well this commercial makes me cry. It also makes me call bullshit. While I have friends who've experienced this scene and friends who have not, it doesn't accurately portray reality. At least not mine anyway. This commercial pulls on my heart strings so intensely that I have to look away or even leave the room.
My eyes are brown, but really, they are green. Green with envy. I can deny all I want to that I'm fine with how my daughter came to be - but I'm not. I'm jealous. Hearing other people's easy conception stories, easy pregnancy stories, and easy birth stories of healthy babies make my heart and stomach sink simultaneously. I want to get pregnant easily. I want to not lose a baby. I want so badly to birth my baby without fear of her survival. I want her to be put directly onto my chest. I want my husband to be there for the whole thing. I want to be able to breast feed because her mouth anatomy formed completely. I want my baby to go home with me and to not need any surgeries. I want... I want... I want...
I firmly believe in the cohabitation of two opposing feelings. For example, for my friends whose baby stories were smooth and joyful, I am genuinely happy for them and I am also jealous. I don't want to take away their happy experience; I want to experience it for myself too! I feel BOTH of those feelings, at the same time - delight and envy. While I can't eradicate my jealousy, I can choose to allow myself to feel that authentic feeling, then let it go, and finally move onto the happy side to dwell. While I absolutely want all the aforementioned experiences, I don't want to linger in such an unhealthy and jealous state. It makes me question everything and it makes me weak - two things I certainly will not allow as I raise my darling girl.
So, I don't. I don't live there. I choose to live in the happy.
Seeing the Pamper's commercial reminds me of what I didn't get. It attempts to suck me into a reality I refuse to live in because the truth is, in spite of all the hard, we have so. much. to. be. grateful. for.
Plus, thank God we are a Huggies household.
Until the nexT21,
Aubrey
