or, “The Night That Lasted Forever”
[Author’s Note #1: This story is preceded by The Birth of Borealis: Part I and Part II. Don’t read this post if you haven’t read those first.]
[Author’s Note #2: The content of this post is true to my memory and to the recollections of Taylor and my mother, but please bear in mind that the following events occurred at the end of two very, very long days. Some of the conversations herein were reconstructed from a few recollected scraps of speech, and are therefore more true to the spirit of events than to the letter of events.]
[Author’s Note #3: This is the third installment of a very long story. If you are fed up with what you have read so far, then you can read a summary of the balance of this tale in the last few paragraphs of The Birth of Borealis: The Executive Summary.]
Act IV: The balance of February 15th and the first two hours of February 16th
My son had his first “real-life” car ride at about twenty-one minutes old. He tried to call shotgun, but since our family cares *so much* about safety, I insisted that he ride in the back with me — and Anika, and the carseat, and the placenta. Chauffeur Taylor, of course, occupied the driver’s seat. So, in the end, none of us rode shotgun.
In those days, I owned a little manual Kia Spectra that was [thankfully] equipped with snow tires. As Chauffeur Taylor pulled out onto the icy street, we skidded only a little. He carefully navigated us down the hill, out of the neighborhood, and onto the main road.
“Be careful!” I admonished (somewhat unnecessarily). “If you crash, we’re all gonna die back here!” After all, I was buckled — but the baby wasn’t.
My husband nodded in acknowledgement, then continued piloting our little sedan down the street, which was deserted. (Few people would *willingly* choose to be out in those conditions if they could avoid it.)
“Ok, so I need to call the hospital so that we can have you admitted directly into the labor and delivery ward,” Anika stated. She twisted around in an attempt to retrieve her phone, which had slipped beneath the edge of the carseat. I scooted to the side to give her an extra inch of searching space.
Upon retrieving the elusive device, the midwife swore and exclaimed, “It’s actually dead now! Well, it was only a matter of time.”
“We have a car charger in the front,” I yawned. (The events of the night were really taking their toll on me — physically and emotionally.)
Taylor held his hand up for the iPhone, then managed to plug it in without swerving too wildly. Anika turned back to me — which meant that she craned her neck really far to the side, and her torso valiantly tried and failed to twist as well.
“Ok, well, while we wait for that to charge, let’s get your next fundal massage out of the way,” she delivered in a clipped tone that clearly indicated my lack of choice in the matter.
I eyed my midwife warily. “Really? You think you can do it with so little space?”
Anika didn’t reply. Still mostly unable to twist in her seat, she nevertheless managed an impressive contortion, the conclusion of which had her hands positioned at the top and bottom of my newly-empty uterus. Another heartfelt squeeze and gush of placenta-wound-blood later, and Anika’s hands once again returned to her own seat.
“Ughhhhh,” I groaned.
“Don’t worry, they get less severe each time,” she assured me.
“Yeah, but it’s unfortunate that this one was, you know, not un-severe,” I articulated eloquently. After another unsuccessful attempt to shift in my seat, I resigned myself to having a warm, slightly-sticky throne for the duration of our travels.
I turned my head to look at Anika — and then, of its own volition, my head continued its arc and landed on her shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Anika, I’m just sooooooo tired,” I mumbled into her shirt. I managed to twist my noggin so that it was my ear, not my face, that was resting on the midwife.
“You’re doing great,” she lied. “But you probably shouldn’t sleep until we get there, ok?”
I nodded my head against her neck. In a different situation, I might have felt uncomfortably like I was coming on to my midwife. However, with my newborn clutched to my chest and my husband just inches away, our backseat cuddles were indisputably sexless.
The rest of the fifteen-minute drive was a blur for me. Through half-slitted eyes, I watched the dark suburban landscape speed past the car. At one point, Anika listened once more to Bo’s heartbeat and breathing. Soon afterwards, Taylor quietly handed back the somewhat-charged iPhone, and Anika hastily called her contact at the hospital. Meanwhile, I drifted in and out of lucidity, my son still firmly grasped in my arms. Snippets of conversation slipped through my mental fog.
“… ETA of five minutes. We will be arriving in a personal vehicle…”
“… accidental home birth… precipitous delivery… mom and baby are both doing fine…”
“… hematoma… no visible tear… have a wheelchair available…”
“Great. We’ll see you soon.”
That last statement roused me from my stupor. “We’re almost there?” I slurred, trying to raise my head.
Chauffeur Taylor grunted in confirmation, then elaborated, “We’re about to exit. Maybe three minutes out?”
I slumped back against my bony headrest.
Anika nudged my side. “Hey, I need you to stay tough. When we get there, Taylor’s gonna drop us off and go park. I’ll be with you the entire time. We’ll go up to Labor and Delivery, and then he’ll meet us there, ok?”
A pang of fear stabbed through my heart at the thought of my husband’s absence. Something about my silence must have communicated this, because he was quick to assure me, “Don’t worry Wifey, I’ll be as quick as I can. I’ll be there in no time, ok?”
“Ok,” I peeped. I still didn’t love the idea of being separated.
In seemingly no time, we were slowing before a brightly-lit hospital entrance. As was his duty, Chauffeur Taylor leapt out of the front seat and opened the door for me. Unlike a traditional driver, however, he then hefted me bodily from the backseat and onto my feet.
Anika scrabbled out after me. “Here’s our wheelchair,” she announced as a chair-toting attendant appeared seemingly from nowhere. He positioned the seat behind me, and Anika helped me sit [read: flop gracelessly] into the wheelchair.
“I’ll be there as soon as I can, babe,” Taylor promised. He hopped back in the car as Anika started to wheel me away.
A key principle during labor is “rest when you can” (which was the motivation behind my four-minute naps in the hour before Bo was born). I figured that the axiom also applied in this case, so I half-closed my eyes and laid my head back (which is not actually a very comfortable position in a headrest-less wheelchair). Accordingly, the trip passed in an unpredictable combination of turns and straightaways, during which we rarely slowed. I got the impression that this wasn’t Anika’s first wheelchair rodeo.
After a few minutes, we reached Labor and Delivery, at which point I reluctantly lifted my head and opened my eyes. We were directed into a surprisingly capacious room with a wall of [thankfully shuttered] windows. The laminate-floored space was remarkably spartan, with little more than a hospital bed, a baby-weighing station, several rigid chairs, and an adjoining bathroom. I actually couldn’t picture what it would have been like to give birth in that room. I think it might have felt a little like delivering in my high school locker room — except without the lockers.
I was helped into the uncomfortable cot by several people who introduced themselves to me in rapid succession. I remembered neither their sundry names nor their various roles. As far as I was concerned, Strangers 1-5 were a bunch of serial killers, all of whom were already plotting to steal away my son.
After these preliminary greetings, Stranger 1 welcomed Anika warmly, and the two immediately struck up a rapid exchange of information. I reduced my Serial Killer Count to four. My midwife briefly regaled Stranger 1 with a summary of my “unconventional” birth situation, after which Stranger 1 appraised me curiously.
“Wow, I bet it’s been a really long day, ” she remarked.
I nodded silently. Indeed, it had.
“Ok, well, you’ve already done all the hard work!” she encouraged. “We just have to do a few checks, and then you’ll get to simply enjoy this time with your baby and your fam—”
She broke off and glanced around. It was extremely obvious that I had no family in the immediate vicinity. Stranger 1 attempted to camouflage her assumption with a deep inhale and a wide, forced smile.
“Um, yeah, her family’s on their way,” Anika supplied after an awkward second. “They’ll be here any second.”
I desperately hoped she was right. And, as it happened, she was. Within the minute, my husband appeared around the corner, chest heaving and face glistening with sweat. I briefly wondered if the sight of a sprinting Millennial had caused any concern among the hospital staff.
His eyes swept the room and immediately found my gaze.
“Babe!” I moaned piteously. “Baaaabe!”
Taylor rushed to my side and took in the sight — his wife, grimy and exhausted, clutching to her chest their firstborn son, who was also grimy and exhausted. A wide smile crinkled the corners of his hazel eyes, and I noticed the beginnings of happy tears — tears that were also present in my eyes. I realized that this was the first point since Bo’s birth that either of us could actually relax.
For once, the responsibility for our child’s safety (and my safety) rested entirely with other people. It was exactly the peaceful postpartum experience we had expected — only, we had *expected* it to occur at our commodious and inviting birth center, not in an austere hospital room.
“Oh, he’s beautiful,” Taylor whispered. Puzzled, I looked around — because clearly, he wasn’t talking about Borealis, who looked like he had literally just rolled off the set of Coneheads while wearing a miniature version of my father’s face. Nevertheless, my husband’s eyes were fixed firmly on the infant in my arms.
“Wait, the baby?” I spluttered.
Taylor: <grunts in confirmation>
“T, I hate to burst your bubble, but he is *not* beautiful. In fact, I would currently characterize him as ‘hideous’. He’s puce-colored, and shriveled, and I think his lumpy head would be unattractive even as a potato. Oh, and he’s also still attached to a gently-oozing organ.” This brief monologue had worn me out, and so, breathlessly, I concluded with, “I’m pretty sure the ‘beautiful’ part comes later.”
My husband laughed. “Ok, you’re not wrong. But I’m not saying that he’s ready to go on the cover of Baby Vogue — I’m saying that he’s perfect and complete. Ten fingers, ten toes. Two eyes, two ears, a mouth and a nose. He’s breathing, and his heart is beating, and that — after a night like we’ve had — is beautiful. God has been so good to us.”
This was an incredibly long speech for my laconic spouse, and yet I could only nod in response. His humble and grateful assessment of our situation had brought me to tears again. We both looked at our son with damp eyes and full hearts, which was the perfect time for Stranger 2 to announce, “Hi, I’m sorry, but I’m actually going to need one of you to provide some information before we can admit you and the baby.”
Taylor straightened from his crouch. “Oh, actually, we did the pre-admission form through the birth center, in case we needed to be transferred. The hospital should have it on file.”
Stranger 2 grimaced with what might have been meant as a conciliatory smile. “See, that’s just it. The hospital doesn’t have anything on file. Do you want me to check again?”
Taylor nodded. “Our last name gets misspelled pretty often.” He slowly spelled out my whole name, then looked on expectantly as Stranger 2 disappeared from my sightline — presumably in an attempt to locate my pre-admission form.
Anika sidled over. “Ugh, they lose these all the time,” she grumbled. “I’m glad they gave you a room, at least. I’ve seen them make women in labor give all their information before they’re even allowed up to Labor and Delivery.”
Stranger 2 returned in time to overhear Anika’s remark. With an affronted glance at my midwife, the nurse turned back to my husband and admitted, “So, the bad news is that we really don’t have anything on file for you guys. But, the good news is that you can call the front desk from here, and you’ll be able to tell them all the necessary information over the phone!“
“That’s the good news?” I grumbled.
Anika nodded. “In the past, prospective patients would have to physically supply their information at the front desk, so yes, this is better.”
I shuddered. I wondered if any accidental lobby births had occurred in this hospital.
Taylor grudgingly followed Stranger 2 over to a corner of the room, where he accepted an old-fashioned landline and thus became tethered to the wall. This unintentional abandonment effectively left me in the tender care of Anika (a certified nurse midwife — i.e. a nurse with additional training) and the Strangers (all registered nurses, from what I remember).
“Ok, so we need to check out your hematoma again,” my midwife informed me. “You know, now that we actually have real medical equipment and, like, a light.”
“Oh-em-gee, yes, let’s,” I raved. “Actually, can you find a few more people to come see me naked? This isn’t sufficiently embarrassing for me.”
I shifted on the cot and heard the crackling of a plastic-lined underpad beneath me. It was as if my prudishness had suddenly gained a voice of its own. Crackle crackle! No nudity! Crackle crackle!
Anika rolled her eyes and admonished, “Yes, that’s exactly why we all signed up to be nurses. It’s solely so that we get to see people naked. No interest in helping others.”
I giggled despite myself. “Ok, you make a good point.” Then, gesturing to my pants (and underwear), I remarked, “But I can’t get these off on my own, so….”
Anika shifted aside the meager hospital linens, then assisted Stranger 3 with the removal of my blood-stained garments. “Um, I’m going to find a bag for these,” the latter mumbled as she briskly walked away.
Meanwhile, Stranger 1 dragged a light to the foot of my cot, then returned to Anika’s side. [Note: Unlike the dying iPhone that Anika employed to examine me in the previous installment of this story, this light was actually designed for, you know, medical use.]
As Anika and I watched, Stranger 1 strode over to my side and started fiddling with some medical equipment. The nurse explained, “We’re going to get your vitals before we do anything else.” She quickly took my temperature, blood pressure, pulse, oxygen, etc. Apparently, I wasn’t dying, because all she commented was, “We’ll need to keep an eye on your blood pressure. It’s pretty low.”
Stranger 1 moved back to the foot of the cot, and as one, she and Anika crouched to inspect my nether regions. The two nurses conferred briefly about my hematoma and my seemingly-manageable bleeding, then seemed to come to a concensus.
“Ok!” Stranger 1 finally exclaimed. “So I’m not worried about your hematoma. Those usually clear up on their own. And we’ll keep tabs on your bleeding — especially after the next fundal massage. Right now, though, I have to determine whether or not you tore, and then after that we’ll do the massage. Does that sound alright?”
I shrugged in response. (I figured the request for consent was merely rhetorical.) There was some light pressure down there, and then Stranger 1 announced, “Good news! You barely tore. Hardly enough to even classify as a first-degree tear. You won’t need stitches.”
That was good news. Anika had already assured me that I hadn’t torn [badly], but it was comforting to have her assessment confirmed.
Stranger 1 turned to Anika. “Do you want to do her fundal massage?“ Anika nodded, and the other nurse continued, “I’d like to palpate her uterus as well, as a second opinion.”
You know things are about to get weird when someone says “palpate” instead of “touch”. (Seriously. Can you imagine TSA getting away with that? “I’m sorry, ma’am, but we’re going to need to palpate you.” Lawsuits all around — even more than the usual amount.)
Sure enough, I was then treated to the strange sensation of four hands palpating my bare belly. Anika had been right — the intensity of the fundal massages had decreased with repetition, and the accompanying gush of blood was positively mild by this point. What joy!
Stranger 3 reappeared with some low-quality, low-fashion mesh hospital panties and the world’s largest pad. She caught me eying the set dubiously and quickly explained, “Don’t worry, you’ll get a fresh set after you use the bathroom.” As if that had been my primary concern.
“Aren’t there, like, Depends or something?” I muttered as Anika sought to affix the pad to the mesh tangle with the thin strip of not-actually-sticky adhesive.
She shot me a conciliatory frown. “No, that’s not really the hospital’s style.”
I fantasized briefly about the birth center, which I remembered was stocked with an impressive array of adult diapers. Alas, the pad-and-mesh-panty set proved to be as cumbersome as it appeared, and maneuvering the garment into place required several attempts by Anika and Stranger 1.
Finally, I was once again “decent”. Except, you know, that mesh panties aren’t exactly full-coverage. I was grateful that the only boys in the room were my husband and my son.
I glanced up at the former. He appeared to be talking into both his cell phone and the landline at the same time, and I thought I caught him relaying directions. Maybe the receptionist was fed up with him and just wanted to come ask me questions in person?
My attention was redirected as Anika softly told me, “Ok, this is actually probably a good time for you to feed him. Are you up for breastfeeding?”
I was caught embarrassingly off-guard by her question, so I took a few moments to collect myself. A number of situational factors were still less-than-ideal: my husband was still on the phone; I was not yet emotionally recovered from the ordeal of the day; a handful of strangers milled about my unfamiliar room; and my family was still MIA.
And then I looked down at my son — a sweet, tiny, puce-colored infant. [Note: The number of times “sweet” has applied to Borealis since then can be counted on both hands. “Puce”, in contrast, is applicable whenever he’s mad.] His eyes were closed, and his chest rose and fell regularly against mine. I couldn’t believe all we had already been through together. I was filled with so much emotion, I just wanted to wake him up and stick a nipple in his mouth. Ah, the things one feels as a mom.
“But shouldn’t we let him sleep?” I asked.
Stranger 1 shook her head. “He’s going to have plenty of time to sleep. At this point, what he needs is to start getting nutrients back in him. Also, the more you feed him, the sooner your milk will come in.”
“Yeah, that makes sense,” I nodded. Babies are expected to lose some amount of weight soon after birth. Generally, a newborn will slough 5% to 10% of their birth weight via pee, poop, and/or vomit, but there’s a pretty big emphasis on turning that weight loss around as fast as possible. Unfortunately, this process usually takes almost two weeks for breastfed babies — which is, needless to say, a stressful two weeks for the breastfeeding mama.
So why does this process take such a long time? My gut answer is, “Just to stress out the breastfeeding mama,” but that theory is a bit narcissistic. The real explanation is that breastfed infants don’t intake many calories in their initial few days of life. The first two to five days of breastfeeding produce a thick, yellow-ish fluid called colostrum that is incredibly rich in nutrients, antibodies, white blood cells, etc. It’s basically the best thing a newborn could possibly eat. The downside is, there’s not much of it. It’s normal to produce only 5-20 mL of colostrum per day — which is plenty to provide the infant with the nutrition he needs for his marble-sized stomach, but is *not* enough to reverse his weight loss. That turnaround starts to occur around five to seven days old, with the production of transitional milk and then mature milk.
All of that was a long-winded way to say that I saw the physiological benefit and emotional appeal of beginning my breastfeeding journey now — despite the non-ideal circumstances. I inhaled deeply, then exhaled noisily through my teeth.
“Ok,” I finally decided. “Let’s make this happen.”
I exposed my nipple by shrugging the thin hospital blanket off of one shoulder. Easy breastfeeding: one of the few perks of unwanted nudity. I positioned Borealis like how I had learned in breastfeeding class, then looked up for confirmation.
Surprisingly, it was Stranger 1, not Anika, who stepped confidently to my side. “Just like that,” she encouraged. “Then tickle his lip a little — yes, with your nipple — ok, perfect, and then wait for him to open his mouth.”
After a few tantalizing nipple-tickles, my son opened his mouth in the most appalling lazy fashion. I thrust my chest forward in an attempt to achieve the desired latch, desperately jabbing my breast at his mouth and wildly hoping that willpower and tenacity were the main components of a successful breastfeeding relationship.
Alas, my infant quickly shut his mouth, sans nipple.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Already, I felt like a terrible mother (a feeling which has not abated in the intervening months). In my first hour of parenthood, I had already failed in two major tasks: 1) have baby in desired location, and 2) feed baby in desired manner. At least he was still alive, right?
“And now?” I mumbled.
In contrast to me, Stranger 1 maintained the calm comportment of someone who has seen a bad latch and lived to tell the tale. “Don’t worry — sometimes it takes a few tries. Go ahead and express some colostrum first this time, and bring the baby to your breast — not the other way around.”
I followed her advice. This time, when Bo half-opened his mouth, I aggressively clutched his face to my chest. There was a bit of fumbling — on both of our parts. Actually, it wouldn’t be too far off to compare the first time breastfeeding a baby to the first time, you know, trying to make a baby. Ahem.
But then, after a few seconds of awkward snorting and shimmying, Bo secured my nipple in his mouth and started to suckle.
“You did it!” Stranger 1 extolled. “Hopefully he’ll feed for about ten to fifteen minutes. He’s probably not going to get very much, but he’s stimulating your breasts to make more colostrum, which will eventually turn into mature milk.”
Taylor ambled back over to my cot. “I love seeing you be a mommy,” he whispered into my ear. He rested a large hand on my back as our firstborn continued to suckle. It was a really beautiful moment — and it was truly just a moment. Maybe thirty seconds later, a deafening knock shook the door, and my quiet hospital room suddenly became a hive of activity.
The door opened, and four people piled through in rapid succession: my parents, my sister, and Taylor’s Aunt Francis.
The first thing Aunt Francis did was take advantage of the photo opportunity — which was good, because up until that point, we had essentially no record of the evening.
After snapping a picture or two of me breastfeeding in erotic seminudity, she ordered, “Taylor! Kiss Holly!”
And so, like the good little nephew he is, my husband leaned down and favored me with a smooch.
Glancing down at her camera, Aunt Francis decided, “Ok, well, I need some with the baby’s face.” Taylor hastily scooted back as his aunt strode to the other side of the cot.
“Gosh, Franny, I look awful,” I complained — and I wasn’t wrong. Thankfully, modern phones are equipped with a cropping function, by which I can bring you this gem:
Aunt Francis ceded her position to my mother, who immediately sought to give an explanation for her absence. “We didn’t know where you were!” she exclaimed. “We were waiting at the entrance to the Emergency Room, since it seemed the obvious choice for where you would go — but then we were waiting and waiting, and I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, they drove off the road and are freezing in a ditch somewhere!’ But then I checked your location on Find My Friends, and your phone said that you were here, but I couldn’t get through to either of you, and no one knew where you were, and then finally Taylor answered his phone and told us how to get to your room, so we rushed up here right away.”
She paused for breath, at which point I cut in, “Well, we’re not dead, so we have that going for us! Also, Taylor has my phone, because, you know, yeah.” I nodded at my nursing babe / lack of clothing / bag o’ placenta in loose explanation.
“Well, all that matters is that we found you guys eventually,” my mother concluded. Then, smoothing back my hair, she whispered, “I’m so proud of you! You’re so tough!”
I eyed her warily. “That’s not what you were saying earlier! You were all like, ‘Why don’t you ever listen to me, I told you to get checked, if you had listened to me, none of this would have happened, blah blah blah.’”
My mom straightened up and declared, “Yes, and I stand by all of that. If you had just woken the midwife up and got her to check you, we would be at the birth center right now, not here.”
I shrugged, because she was absolutely right. “I didn’t want to disturb Anika,” I explained lamely.
I looked around for the midwife in question. She appeared to be deep in conference with Stranger 1, who I decided might have been the Nurse-in-Charge (if hospitals indeed work that way). Upon noticing my gaze, both nurses returned to my cot-side. As Anika, my parents, my husband, and my aunt-in-law watched with detached interest, Stranger 1 methodically adjusted my breastfeeding form until Borealis had given me a good latch again.
With that awkward bit of family fun over, Anika stepped up to my side and informed me, “I need to get back to the birth center. You are in great hands here, and I’m on rotation here tomorrow, so I’ll see you in the afternoon, ok? It’ll be good. We’ll be able to chat about all of this craziness, once you’ve actually had time to sleep on it and process it.”
I had known that this time would come, but I was still reluctant to let Anika leave. The events of the night had been incredibly unexpected and emotionally draining, but no-nonsense Anika had been an element of stability in a torrent of chaos. Even so, my protests were weak.
“But you don’t have your car!”
Anika nodded. “I’ll just run to the birth center, and my boyfriend will come pick me up in the morning.”
I shuddered. “But it’s still an ice storm! Let Taylor drive you. Taylor!”
A stricken Taylor limply held up his car keys and forced a smile.
Luckily for him, Anika was having none of it. She cocked an eyebrow and demanded, “Really? You’re going to send away your husband right now?”
I realized that, no, I did not want to send away my husband right now. I wasn’t even sure he’d gotten to touch our new baby yet — let alone hold him and/or bond with him.
Anika’s guess was confirmed by the emotional turmoil she surely saw flitting across my face. “Don’t worry!” she assured me. “It’s only a quarter mile to the center.”
This was not technically true. It was actually a half mile to the center. But, in Anika’s state of fitness, the distances probably blurred together.
“And you wouldn’t let my dad drive you, either?” I offered.
Anika shook her head. “Nope!” Then, she leaned in and cryptically whispered. “Remember — you can refuse anything. They might make things sound mandatory, but don’t feel pressured to say ‘yes’ to anything. Do you understand?”
I nodded, which was really an overstatement. A shrug would have been more appropriate.
Anika straightened up. “And don’t worry about me. I’ll see you tomorrow, ok?”
“Ok! Be safe!” I called after her.
And with that, my ad hoc postpartum home birth midwife was gone.
The cot area had finally cleared enough to let my father approach. The other adults continued to hover nearby.
“What a cutie!” my father exclaimed over his grandson.
I laughed. “You would have no way of knowing this, but everyone thinks he looks just like you, so your compliment is a bit self-serving.”
My father critically assessed my son, who had conveniently stopped nursing and was now crying piteously. I hastily pulled up the hospital blanket once more.
“I don’t know if I see it,” my father concluded after a few seconds, “but he sure is adorable.”
“Wow, and that was *intentionally* self-serving!” I exclaimed. “But thank you, since, you know, the appearance of a newborn directly reflects the genetic material of his parents.”
“Yeah! Biochem-ery and whatnot!” my father laughed.
Since I didn’t have anything to say to that, I changed the subject, “Do you think Susan wants to say hi to the baby?”
My father glanced dubiously at my sister, who was perched on a seat, blithely singing Linger by The Cranberries. “Maybe?” he guessed.
My mother cut in. “I already asked her, and she wasn’t really interested.” Then, turning to my older sister, she called, “Susan! Do you want to come say hi to the baby?”
Susan stopped singing long enough to mechanically shout, “Hi, Baby Bo!”, then picked her tune back up on the chorus.
My mother turned back to me. “Yeah, she’s really annoyed that we had to leave the hotel. She just wants to go back as soon as we can.”
Now, before you feel righteously indignant that my sister had no interest in meeting her nephew, I need to point out that Susan has autism and is a creature deeply rooted in habit and ritual. Leaving her hotel room after going to bed must have been a cruel torture indeed. It was no wonder she was loudly coping with her favorite song.
“Um, yeah, you guys can leave really soon, then,” I promised. “I mean, now that Taylor’s gotten us admitted — wait, you did get us admitted, right?”
Taylor nodded.
“Thank goodness,” I continued. “Yeah, I mean, like now that we’re admitted, we’re not going anywhere until we get discharged tomorrow. What time do they usually discharge patients?”
Stranger 2 was lingering close enough to overhear my query, and she promptly informed us, “The hospital discharges at noon.”
I grinned in relief. “That is excellent news! We’ll be home before our housemates even get back from work. School. Whatever.”
Stranger 2’s severe expression was not very encouraging, however. “You won’t be able to leave until the pediatrician discharges you,” she snapped harshly. “And they never discharge before twenty-four hours.” [Note: Maybe she’s just harsh in my memory. Stranger 2 is probably a perfectly warm and gentle person in basically any other context.]
“Yeah, well, we’re both doing fine, so I think we shouldn’t have any issues,” I retorted sharply. Stranger 2 skulked away to the sound of some ominous music. [Note: Truthfully, I have to let you know that she definitely did not skulk, and the only music in the room came from my sister.]
“Babe, we’re not going to get out of here in less than a day,” Taylor stated. “But we should be able to leave tomorrow night.”
“Ok, whatever, we’ll leave tomorrow night then,” I relented with a sigh.
Taylor flashed a thumbs-up.
“Anyway,” I continued, turning back to my family, “We’ll be here — apparently for a while. And Susan will be in a much better mood tomorrow.”
“Oh, for sure,” my mom agreed. “We’ll probably come in the morning so that we can head back down to the Springs in the afternoon. Is there anything else that you need tonight?”
I thought for a second, then responded, “Yeah — I’m STARVING. Do you guys have any food?”
I could tell immediately that they did not. My mother was clearly mortified, which was unnecessary but totally understandable.
You see, my mother is a mom’s mom. She’s been a stay-at-home mom for decades (literally). She carries pads and hand sanitizer and gum wherever she goes — and usually, she has food with her, too. Unfortunately for me, however, it seemed that the hectic night had robbed my mother of her normal preparedness.
“No, I don’t,” my mother admitted. “Do you want some gum?”
I breathed out heavily. If I hadn’t been so tired, the exhale would have been more recognizably a laugh. “I don’t think that’s gonna do it for me, Ma,” I sighed.
“I’m sorry, baby,” she soothed. Then, after a second, she perked up and announced, “I’ll ask one of the nurses if you can get something from the hospital kitchen!”
I went back to adjusting my hospital sheet for the umpteenth time, and my mother returned a few seconds later with Stranger 1 at her side. Looking around, I realized that Strangers 4 & 5 had disappeared. I had never even spoken to them.
Stranger 1 sincerely encouraged, “Yes, let’s definitely get you some food! Here, I can grab you the menu.” She took a step away from my cot, then glanced down at her watch. “Oh… actually, the kitchen’s closed.”
I was appalled. Don’t sick people get hungry at all hours of the night? How dare the hospital kitchen close before they could feed me!
Calmly [read: not calmly], I clarified, “Did they just close? Like maybe they still have someone there anyway?”
Stranger 1 shook her head sadly. “No, they closed at 10pm, so it’s been almost an hour and a half now. But we have some oyster crackers!”
I shook my head. “Ew. Not great.” Then, suddenly realizing my oversight, I shouted, “Babe! Grab the sunflower seeds out of my labor bag! And there’s some Stroopwafels in there, too. Are you hungry? You should grab one.”
Taylor looked stricken for, well, not the first time that night. “I didn’t grab the labor bag,” he mumbled.
“What!?” I bellowed. “You had one job, Husband!”
Taylor responded with much more verve than he usually displays. “I’m sorry, babe, but we had a lot of stuff going on tonight, and it is patently false to say that I had only one job.”
“Ugh! Maybe!” I half-conceded. “But, how am I going to eat now? I need to eat something or I WILL DIE.” I was pretty sure that my eyes had done that crazy, round-saucer thing that always scares my audience, but I was on a roll. “Babe. You are going to be responsible for the death of me and the death of your son!”
Poor Taylor.
Luckily for him, my dad stepped in at that point. “Is the labor bag just at your house? Do you want me to get it?”
“Yessss!” I hissed in my best Parseltongue.
Taylor rolled his eyes at me before addressing my father. “I’m pretty sure I left it right next to the front door. Maybe even just inside the screen door. Thank you!”
My father nodded to us. “Ok! I’ll be back soon!” He kissed my mother and sister goodbye, then vanished in pursuit of snacks.
I flagged down Stranger 1 and mumbled, “Um, yeah, so I actually will be taking you up on that offer of oyster crackers.”
With my father’s departure, the pace of the room slowed way down. Even if my father sped the whole drive, he wouldn’t be returning within thirty minutes.
“Has Taylor had skin-to-skin time yet?” my mother asked soon after my father left.
I shook my head. “Not yet, but he should. Although, I’m not entirely sure that I can even unglue the baby from my chest.” I gave my son an experimental wiggle, and he scooted a few millimeters across my skin. I glanced up to see Dad Taylor looking on hopefully. It was his first chance to spend some time with his son, and the desire was written all over his face.
Laughing hoarsely, I offered, “He’s all yours, babe. But, unless you want some pretty gross cuddles, we should do the cord cutting — and isn’t that usually the dad’s job anyway?”
My mother, ever ready to ask for help, signaled Stranger 1 and politely requested, “Could we do the cord cutting now? Is it a convenient time?” …as if the Strangers had anything to do but care for me and my child.
My husband slid my phone behind my pillow, then carefully, carefully extracted our son from my grip. At the same time, he picked up the Ziploc bag of placenta.
“Don’t drop him!” I croaked.
Taylor: <grunt that communicated the [accurate] sentiment, “I don’t drop things”>
I slumped back against my cot as Dad Taylor, my mother, and Aunt Francis reconvened at the baby-weighing station. I couldn’t really see what was going on, but I was pretty sure that I didn’t want to watch Taylor hack through the umbilical cord anyway. A little too gory for my taste.
I finished the packet of oyster crackers that Stranger 1 had procured for me, then pulled the sheet up to my chin and closed my eyes.
After Dad Taylor and the nurses accomplished our [very] delayed cord cutting, I heard one of the Strangers approach my cot. “Would you like to keep the placenta?” she asked.
I cracked open my eyes and grunted, “Uh huh!”
The nurse shifted uncomfortably. “You know, usually you have to get it on ice sooner if you’re going to have it encapsulated,” she pointed out. “It’s probably not safe for you to consume after so much time at room temperature.”
I opened my eyes wide enough to see that I was addressing Stranger 1. I sat up slightly — or, at least, I lifted my head off the pillow an inch or two.
“Don’t worry,” I yawned. “I won’t be consuming it.”
Stranger 1 nodded. “Oh, so you’re going to bury it, then?”
I shook my head. “Nah. First of all, we don’t own our house, and it’s kinda weird to plant a placenta in the yard of a rental house,” I explained. “Plus, we have a dog who likes to dig, so planting the placenta is tantamount to simply feeding it to her.”
“So…?” Stranger 1 prompted.
I reopened my eyes. They had involuntarily slid shut at some point. “Oh! So we’re just going to feed the placenta to the dog.”
Stranger 1 gasped. “Wait, are you serious?”
I somehow got the impression that our plan wasn’t a very common one. Yawning again, I assured her, “Yep! Trust me, it’s not that weird. I want all that hard work to go toward sustaining some form of life, but I’m not really that jazzed about auto-cannibalism.”
[Note: In addition, one of the primary functions of the placenta is to filter out toxins from maternal blood so that they are not transmitted into the fetal blood. And what happens to those toxins? Well, they stay in the placenta. Talk about unappetizing! So, while there are purportedly some (anecdotal) benefits of placentophagy, numerous entities (including the Mayo Clinic and many OBGYNs) have come out against the practice.]
After accepting my explanation, Stranger 1 returned to the nurses’ hub, then reappeared a minute later with a placenta-filled plastic container, labeled with my identifying information.
“I’m going to put this in the refrigerator so that it doesn’t continue to decay,” she informed me. “And we’ll move it down to your recovery room, once we transfer you.”
I nodded, eyes closed once more. I barely felt when, a few moments later, she returned to slip an indestructible hospital cuff around my wrist.
Soon afterwards, my mother breathlessly trotted over to report, “He’s eight pounds, four ounces! Pretty good size!”
Indeed. He might have reached nine pounds if he had been full-term.
The nurses then proceeded to measure the length of my squalling child — a herculean task that seemed both highly unpleasant and somewhat unnecessary. I take pleasure in imagining Bo “accidentally” kicking Stranger 2 a few times, just for good measure.
After an uncomfortably long time (for the nurses — I was quite comfortable at this point), my mother announced, “Twenty and a half inches! He’s gonna be tall like his daddy!”
So true. Only fifty-six inches to go.
I smirked a little as I heard the nurses wrestle with my son in an attempt to get those commemorative ink footprints. [Note: I shouldn’t have been smirking. At the same time, they equipped him with a hospital bracelet that was virtually impossible to remove.]
My son’s wailing reached a new pitch when he received his vitamin K shot. Afterward, I heard Taylor firmly refuse the erythromycin eye treatment, but mostly just because I don’t have chlamydia.
Oh, maybe that’s the refusal Anika was talking about, I thought blearily.
After a few more seconds of listening to him bawl, I realized that I should probably take advantage of having someone else care for my child — since, as a new mom, I would now have significantly less free time.
Forcing open my eyes once more, I rooted around for a bit before I uncovered my phone. (I swear, it can move on its own.) After accomplishing this feat, I proceeded to update some of my closest friends via text. I was exhausted even by holding the phone, so I simply typed out a generic message, then copied and pasted the missive to everyone I could recall off the top of my head — which was certainly not comprehensive. (To my shame, I must tell you that some family members did not hear of my son’s birth until days later.)
During this copy-and-paste extravaganza, Stranger 1 brought me a cup of water and two tablets of Tylenol. I barely acknowledged her as I dutifully swallowed the meds, then went back to my texting.
The most unique message I sent that night was to my housemates, thanking them for the privacy they gave me and informing them that we would not be home within the night (as we would have been, had we gone to the birth center). I asked that one (or more) of them watch our dog, and I verified that Samara had, in fact, cleaned up the bathroom, which definitely could have passed for a murder scene.
Thankfully, my housemate assured me, Lol I had that clean before you left. Then, in response to the picture I had included, she marveled, He looks like your dad! — a sentiment that applies to my son even to this day.
Finally, I was able to put down the phone and watch my son sleep against my husband’s nearly-hairless chest. Ok, I’m stretching the truth a bit. (Not about the hair. That part is true.)
However, I didn’t actually do much “watching”. It’s more accurate to report that, once I ensured that my son was safely in his father’s care, I let my eyelids drift shut once more. I decided that I wouldn’t open them again until food had appeared in my life.
My father returned to the hospital room a little before midnight-thirty.
“You were right,” he said to Taylor. “It was right by the front door. But it took me a while to get down to the car, and then again to park and get back up here.”
“I want a Stroopwafelllllllll,” I moaned.
Since Dad Taylor was still holding the baby, my mother unzipped the duffle and started to extract its contents.
“They should be right at the top,” I informed her. And, indeed, they were.
“Are you sure you want one?” she asked. “They’re super crumbly, you know.”
Not my bed, I thought. [Note: Alas, this line of thinking proved to be detrimental to my comfort during the balance of my hospital visit.] I accepted the caramel-y treat and reveled in that amazing feeling of eating while really, really hungry.
“Ok, now that Dad’s back, we need to go,” my mother sighed. “Susan won’t lay down, even though I keep asking her to.”
Sure enough, Linger still emanated from one corner of the room.
“But we’ll be back tomorrow!” my mother quickly assured me.
I nodded, then mumbled, “I’m sorry you all had to stay so long, but I really appreciate it. I was so hungry. Oh, and also I like seeing you guys.”
“It was no problem, baby,” my father graciously answered. “We love you!”
My parents and sister all said their own personal goodbyes as they exited. (Susan bellowed: “Bye, Holly and Taylor! Bye, Baby Bo!”) Aunt Francis followed them out.
“I’ll be back with them in the morning,” she stated as she left. “And then I’ll come in the afternoon, and I’ll bring Paul with me.”
Taylor’s younger brother, Paul, lives with us at the time of this writing. He and I now share a close and heartfelt connection — one that was not present during the events of this tale, when he was still virtually a stranger to me. And so, at Aunt Francis’s pronouncement, I peeped a halfhearted, “Goodie!”
Sometimes, the people who can make you the most uncomfortable are your own family.
Once the exodus had ended, Stranger 1 looked at me seriously and asked, “Do you want to use the bathroom now?”
My immediate answer was obviously “no”. There’s a lot of fear surrounding the first postpartum potty trip. First and foremost, I knew it was gonna hurt. (That was just a given.) In addition, I was not at all certain that I could even transport myself to the bathroom.
“Remember, you won’t be able to leave your bed within the next twenty-four hours without someone there to help you,” Stranger 2 admonished. “The last thing you want is to pass out and hit your head. So it’s better for you to use the bathroom now, while we’re here to assist.”
Great, I thought. I just birthed an infant, and it made me as helpless as an infant! Now Taylor has two invalids to worry about!
I spent a few seconds contemplating whether or not I should request a wheelchair — but, in the end, my stubborn pride won out. Under the direction and aide of Stranger 1, I painstakingly swung my legs out of bed and slowly rose to a sitting position.
“You’re doing great,” the nurse fibbed.
And then, under the watchful eyes of my husband and the three nurses, I deliberately — yet gracelessly — rose to my feet and made my way, step by step, to the first toilet I would use since my son had entered the world. [Note: Since this was a labor and delivery room, it’s entirely possible that I was, in fact, using yet another commode that had been instrumental in the birth of a child.]
Strangers 1 and 3 practically bore my entire weight as they lowered me onto the seat. (Dad Taylor was still holding our son.)
Stranger 1 handed me a squirt bottle filled with warm water, and Stranger 3, of course, stood by with a fresh set of mesh panties and another ginormous pad.
“What am I supposed to do with this?” I queried, holding up what I later learned was a “perineal bottle”.
“It’s for when you pee,” Stranger 1 chirpily explained. “The warm water helps it sting less, so you’ll want to squirt it at your perineum while you’re peeing, and then you use the rest of the water to cleanse the area after you’re done!”
Easy peasy, right? Not so much.
So, I normally have some pee anxiety, but I really, really have pee anxiety in situations where three strangers avidly spectate as I work up the willpower to do something that will undoubtedly be quite unpleasant. We all sat expectantly for about thirty seconds as I waited for my urge to urinate to overpower my urge to not urinate in front of strangers. Finally, the first few drops of pee magically arrived.
And I was right — they *did* hurt!
I artlessly aimed the peri bottle at my peri, and was relieved that Stranger 1 had not been lying to me, and also that I managed to miss peeing on my hand. After squirting the rest of the bottle to “cleanse the area”, I procured a handful of toilet paper and went to wipe.
“Just blot!” Stranger 2 shouted. “Don’t wipe! You don’t want to overly irritate the area.”
I proceeded to carefully blot my nether regions, and in doing so, I couldn’t help but notice my mangled belly skin once again. The popped-balloon texture, fading henna lines, and multicolored stretch marks brought gorge to my throat. I quickly looked away, and back toward Stranger 3, who was offering me the fresh mesh panty and pad set. Once I had slipped the combo around my ankles, she also handed me some witch hazel rounds and an aerosol can of numbing spray.
“Use the spray on your hematoma, and then layer some of the witch hazel pads on top of the other pad. They’ll help reduce the stinging,” she advised.
Since I apparently had no other option, I spread my legs to spray my sensitive regions with numbing spray, then attempted to layer the three-inch-wide witch hazel rounds on the much larger feminine pad. I had no idea how I was going to slide the combination up to my waist without losing every witch hazel pad — and probably also the large pad as well. I half-rose to attempt the feat, and did somehow manage to pull the mesh panty contraption into place. I think I probably lost a few witch hazel rounds along the way — but by that point, I was not in a position either to tell nor to care.
At the moment of my rising, what little blood I had left in my body rushed out of my head and into other parts. I promptly collapsed back onto the toilet.
“She’s gonna lose consciousness,” Stranger 1 barked as my vision grayed out. “Get me smelling salts!”
The next thing I knew, a hand was thrust under my nose, and from it wafted a strong — but not totally unpleasant — odor. I buried my face in Stranger 1’s palm and inhaled deeply, hoping desperately that the ammonia salts would do their job. (After all, I played Psychonauts as a kid. I know what smelling salts are supposed to do.)
And then I was back in Kinetics class. I was taking notes, and there was a test coming up.
“What day is the test?” I whispered to my best friend.
He leaned over and shouted in a woman’s voice, “Ok, she’s coming back around!”
I opened my eyes to find Stranger 1’s face about three inches from my own.
“Oh my gosh,” I moaned. Upon further analysis, I discovered that our faces were so close because my forehead was being supported on the nurse’s shoulder. “Hey, I’m sorry for passing out on you,” I slurred.
Stranger 1 lightly tapped my cheek. “Hey, stay with me,” she commanded. “Come on! Here are the smelling salts again — take a breath, come on Holly, come on.”
I dropped my face into her hand once more and sucked in a gasp through my nose, at which point, I —
was at a carnival, and Taylor was there, and also some of my friends from back in Oklahoma. I walked up to the ferris wheel, and the carnival barker announced, “Alright, I think she’s regaining consciousness.”
It was Stranger 1 again. What a letdown.
This time, I stayed awake (ish). I kept breathing into the smelling salts, and little by little, I was able to remove my head from Stranger 1’s shoulder and return to a sitting position.
“I didn’t know you could dream when you’re passed out,” I mumbled.
“Yes, it’s actually not uncommon,” came Stranger 2’s clipped reply.
In a more conciliatory tone, Stranger 1 soothed, “Well, we’re just glad to have you back. Do you think you’re ready to move back to the bed? We got a wheelchair for you, and we’re going to wheel you back.”
I nodded, then slowly (and fearfully) transferred myself from the toilet to the wheelchair, supported once again by two of the nurses. I was then treated to the embarrassing experience of being wheeled ten feet across a room. (Maybe I should have requested the wheelchair pre-pee, after all. Then, at least, I would have felt more “in control” of my status as an invalid.)
The nurses helped me rise from the chair and return to the cot, and Taylor (and the baby) meandered back over to my side.
Once we were all situated, Stranger 1 addressed me somberly. “Now, I assume you’re pretty eager to go to a recovery room and get some sleep.” [Note: Her assumption was right.] “But since you had low blood pressure when you came in, and then you passed out, we have to run some blood tests before we can release you from Labor and Delivery.”
“Ok,” I acknowledged, since apparently I had no role in this decision.
She turned to my husband. “Would you like to put the baby down?”
Taylor had been holding Borealis for the better part of an hour, so he was understandably weary at this point — especially after the night we had endured. He nodded, and Stranger 3 walked him through the steps of confining our child to a constrictive cloth wrapping. [Note: This is also called “swaddling”. It works well for some babies. I’ll let you guess if Borealis was one of them.]
Then, with our son cocooned up in a slightly-ragged hospital swaddle and placed in a clear bassinet, my husband returned to my side and wrapped me in an awkward side-hug. We waited together for the phlebotomist, who appeared shortly thereafter with a strange apparatus that, in hindsight, I think was probably a refrigerator of some sort.
After getting the device situated, she proclaimed, “Hi, I’m [Miss Phlebotomist], and I’m going to draw your blood.”
Now, I’m hoping that you can empathize a little with my frame of mind. It was nearing 2am, and I had not slept in increments longer than ten minutes in almost two days. I had ingested no alcohol in the past day (or, in fact, in the past nine months), but the best adjective to describe me at that point was still, well, “drunk”.
Please bear that assessment in mind when I tell you that, after Miss Phlebotomist introduced herself, I replied, “Are you gonna give me a hematoma? I already have one, you know. It’s down there.” I stage-whispered the last phrase, and pointed subtly to my crotch.
“Nah!” Miss Phlebotomist replied, clearly mock-offended. “I don’t do that, man. I’m a *good* phlebotomist.”
“Oh, well that is a relief!” I crowed. “Because I have met some bad phlebotomists in my day! There was this nurse at the birth center who tried to take my blood once, and she was sooooo bad, and after sticking me twice, she was like, ‘Oh-em-gee, your blood is basically just dripping, are you like dehydrated or something?’ And Taylor—“ <gesturing at my husband> “—who is literally a blood device engineer, was like, ‘Um, yeah, you actually just gave her a bad stick, so you’re only getting capillary flow right now.’ She was super embarrassed. And I went home with two hematomas! So, it was a pretty bad day for both of us.”
Taylor cut in. “I was like, ‘Yes, she’s so dehydrated that she has 80-crit blood.’ Can you imagine?”
This last part only makes sense if you understand blood mechanics — but, thankfully, it was literally Miss Phlebotomist’s job to understand blood mechanics. She threw back her head and laughed merrily at my husband’s “clever” engineering humor. Then, still chuckling, she prepped her blood-draw equipment.
Sure enough, it was a clean stick. I was sad to see some of my blood go, since apparently I had so little left in my body. Nevertheless, Miss Phlebotomist finished the draw, packed up her equipment, and left us with the exhortation, “Man, you guys are in such good moods! Try to stay that way.”
Taylor and I shared a bemused look, then turned back to Stranger 1. We were ready for this night to be over.
“Alright, are you guys ready to go to your recovery room?”
We sluggishly nodded our heavy heads. Taylor retrieved our child, and the Strangers converted my cot into a gurney. Then, within further ado, we were off into the maze of hospital corridors.
I had the most crazy vertigo as lights passed overhead and sounds came and went. At one point, I realized my arms were empty. “Where is my baby!?” I whimpered.
“Don’t worry, Taylor has him,” one of the Strangers consoled me.
I tried to stop hyperventilating, reminding myself that Borealis was safe, and so was I.
Finally, we arrived at our recovery room. The nurses returned my cot to its uncomfortable half-sitting configuration, and Taylor placed the baby in another clear bassinet.
“Ok, so before I leave, I want to introduce you to the night nurse on duty,” Stranger 1 announced.
“Wait, so I won’t see you again?” I mewled.
Stranger 1 shook her head. “No, sweetie, I’m in Labor and Delivery, and you are officially done with that,” she explained.
I realized that I was quite sad to see her go. She may have still been a stranger to me, but she had been kind and conscientious and responsible. She was exactly the sort of stranger I would have liked to have as a friend.
But before I could say all that, Stranger 1 was introducing me to Nurse A, who would be on call until 7am. Nurse A was a soft-featured woman in her early thirties who seemed like she might be described by words like “bubbly” and “vivacious”. At the very least, she greeted us with a smile, which was more than I could say for some of the Strangers.
Stranger 1 said her farewells, and I returned a tearful farewell because, well, it’s really easy to cry if you’re that tired.
My attention was quickly diverted back to Nurse A, who informed me, “Alright, I’m going to check your hematoma so that I have a baseline for how it looks, and then I’ll feel how your uterus is doing.” Well, at least she was upfront about the privacy infringements she was about to make.
After pulling my mesh panties aside for me, Nurse A palpated my stomach and mused, “Yes, it’s gotten boggy again.” Whatever that meant. A few “massages” later, and apparently my uterus was no longer boggy.
“Do you want to go to the bathroom so you can change pads?” Nurse A queried.
I shook my head vigorously. Better to have soiled undergarments than to pass out without enough nurses to catch me.
Nurse A shrugged. “Ok! Please let me know when you need to. I’ll accompany you, or you can have your husband help you.” (I knew which option I would choose.)
She then showed me how to call the nurse’s station, and assured me that she would be checking in on us again soon.
“Oh, and one last thing,” she said. “Since you had low blood pressure, and you passed out, I need you to wear the pressure cuff continuously. It’ll take a reading every once in a while, just to make sure you’re still doing ok. And hopefully, it won’t even wake you up! We’ll check up on the rest of your vitals in the morning.”
Then, encouraging us to get some rest, she slipped from our private room, pulling the door shut behind her.
I looked at Taylor. “I guess I should feed him again, huh?” I croaked.
Taylor: <grunts uncertainly>
He rose from the couch where he had been resting and slowly lifted Bo from his holding cell. Our newborn muttered grumpily as he was transferred into my arms.
Poor kid — he was exhausted. Despite my best efforts, Borealis wouldn’t rouse enough to latch for more than a few seconds at a time.
“You know what? I think he’ll actually be fine until the next time he wakes up.”
Taylor: <grunts ambivalently>
“Should we just leave him swaddled like this? Or should we change his diaper?”
Taylor: <grunts noncommittally>
“Yeah, I think he’ll be ok. Let’s just—“ <yaaaawn> “let’s just try to sleep while we can.”
Taylor: <grunts in agreement>
My husband retrieved our son and returned him to the clear bassinet, where he fussed only a little between returning to a peaceful slumber. Taylor, meanwhile, returned to the couch.
And so, for the first time in our marriage, Taylor and I prepared to sleep in separate beds while in the same room. Although, it’s not really fair to either of us to label our accommodations “beds” — although my cot was certainly the more bed-like of the two. It was, at least, nominally designed to hold a snoozing human.
Taylor’s couch, in contrast, was proportioned for someone a foot and a half shorter than he was. One leg was curled uncomfortably under him, and the other flopped awkwardly over an armrest.
“Do you think you could fit in the cot with me?” I suggested.
Taylor: <grunts in the negative>
“Yeah, I don’t think so either,” I muttered. “And I probably shouldn’t have the baby in here either, huh? Like, she’ll just come in and tell me about the dangers of cosleeping, right?”
Taylor: <grunts sleepily>
I sighed. “Ok. Sleep well, babe. Say your prayers.”
That is how, a little after 2am on February 16, we settled in for what we hoped would be the conclusion of what had been a very long night.
Dear reader, you’re almost there. Between you and freedom stands only a sixteen-thousand-word mammoth post: a post that goes by the name of The Birth of Borealis: Part IV.
I think Borealis has been called “sweet” thousands of times! He is sooooo sweet.
Haha! He is more sweet for you than he is for me, certainly.