A Baby Story, Chapter 1

Once upon a time,
In the land of mom,
There lived a beautiful, young lady,
Who was gleefully with child.
One beautiful, sunny spring day,
The joyful lady was doing some Spring Cleaning around her house,
With the help of her bluebird and chipmunk friends,
Of course,
When she felt a tiny rumble in her belly.
“Ooh,” she said. “It’s time.”
And she smiled, her beautiful smile.
The lady finished sweeping up the kitchen floor, collecting all of the dust into a neat pile,
As the bluebirds picked up each piece of debris in their beaks and flew away,
Tweeting sweetly as they went.
The lady whistled and trilled, to summon her dear, doting husband,
And before she knew it, he was by her side.
The man carried the lady, gracefully, up to her bed chambers,
And she took one, small sip of water as she spread out, daintily on her bed.
With one small push, scarcely making a sound,
The lady sighed,
As her husband caught the tiny, pink, perfect baby in his loving arms.
“What a wonderful day,” said the lady, before falling into a deep, restful sleep.
And that’s how babies are born, in the land of mom.
Except, not so much.
At least this is not how this baby was born to this mommy in this story.
But, that doesn’t mean that our story doesn’t have a fairy-tale ending.
It does, I promise.
We just had to slay some dragons to get there.
***
Once upon a time, in the land of Suburban Philadelphia,
Lived,
Well,
Me.
I was pregnant with our first child,
A little girl,
And all of our dreams were coming true.
Although there were some trying times,
And a little craziness on my part,
Clinically, my pregnancy was not particularly eventful.
The baby consistently measured on time,
I took every precaution under the sun,
And the doctor was optimistic that I would have an easy, quick delivery.
He told me that these things usually run in families,
And the fact that my mom had delivered me
Without any drugs,
In a fast, hard labor,
Meant that I would, most likely, be able to do the same.
And so, like every prepared (read: starry-eyed, ignorant, clueless) new mother,
I made a birth plan.
I decided to try for a natural delivery.
No epidural.
Nada.
Now, this wasn’t because I am masochistic.
I have drug allergies,
And decided that I would do my darn best to persevere through the pain, to avoid any allergic reactions.
Plus, not having anything numb would inevitably help me to push, right?
I had this delivery in the bag.
I laughed in the face of contractions.
Ha.
Yeah.
Ha.
I decided to be proactive in terms of my delivery plan,
And I began practicing hypnosis.
Now, this kind of hypnosis is not the kind where you have  a pocket-watch waved in front of your eyes before clucking like a chicken.
No, this was more like guided meditation,
Visualizing the birth, so that I would be prepared and relaxed when the time came. Kind of like a suped up Lamaze.
My hypnosis training had me visualize myself in my most relaxed, pleasurable state.
Well, if you recall, during my pregnancy I had a certain penchant for all things drinkable, gulp-able and thirst-quenching, so, inevitably, my “happy-place” was somewhere where I could get my cold drink on.
Like every good mom-to-be practicing hypnosis, my relaxation visual was the Spa at the Four Seasons.
If I had to visualize, I might as well visualize the best.
And so, every night, my husband would guide me through the luxurious hotel spa,
Lingering at the description of the coolers.
Ahhh, the coolers.
These coolers were my oasis in the desert of pregnancy.
My hypnotized mouth would water as my husband described the giant, ice-cold coolers of citrus water, iced tea and red Gatorade.
And so, armed with my hypnosis training, decent pain tolerance and sheer will,
I was ready to bring on labor like a champ.
Or so I thought, when my contractions,
Which I had been having for weeks,
Started to come at short, regular intervals during my 40th week of pregnancy.
I went to sleep that Wednesday night, feeling a strong, tight pulling sensation in my abdomen,
Occurring every five minutes,
Knowing that I would be heading to the hospital the next morning to meet my daughter.
I could hardly sleep.
Only one more night to go
and then my dreams would really be coming true.
Or so I thought.
Little did I know all that the very next day would hold…

Stay tuned. This story ain’t over until the 7lb12oz baby wails…

By Sunday, July 18, 2010 1 No tags Permalink
1 Comment
  • Maya
    July 26, 2010

    This was the very first blog I read of yours. I have just read the blogs preceding this one. I can’t wait to read the next chapters of this. As I have already mentioned, you write beautifully. Now I need to sit down and actually write out my son’s birth story, a bit late, but not a detail forgotten, although some I wish I could…but hey Moms are superheroes and its the journey that earns you the proud title of Mommy.

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