She was our first kid.
We’d been married two years and were only 24 when she was born—basically
children raising a child. I am 5’4”, and this baby was nine pounds. I have a
photo from my due date that still confuses medical science. I look like my
spine was freelancing.
The pregnancy itself was awful. I was sick most of the time
and had such a severe meat aversion that if my husband even ate meat in
front of me, I would gag. Cooking it in the house was a felony.
My sister—two years older and my best friend in the
world—was pregnant at the same time. I was due November 14th, she was due
November 16th. Carrying our first babies together was honestly dreamy… until
she went into labor five weeks early, had her baby boy, and I just kept
getting… bigger. I was five days overdue, wildly uncomfortable, and starting to
take it personally.
My job finally told me to stop coming in after my due date
because I needed to “focus on delivering the baby,” which felt optimistic—like
being home would convince her to exit. My mom, a hairdresser of 25 years, said,
“She’s just waiting for her hair to be right.”
She was born with hair like a troll doll, so apparently it was a very high
standard.
On the fifth day overdue, my husband decided it was a great
day to go goose hunting—two hours away. I remember saying, “Are you sure?”
since I was supposed to have had this baby last week. But it was his day
off, it was goose season, and logic was not invited to the conversation. He
left at 5 a.m., confident he’d be home by noon.
At 5:30 a.m., I started having contractions.
To this day, he’s still mad I didn’t call him immediately.
But I got up, took a shower, cleaned the house, packed my hospital bag, and
made sure the diaper bag had the perfect coming-home outfit. Nesting is
just anxiety in a productive outfit.
He called around 9 to check in, and I casually said, “Oh
yeah, I started having contractions at 5:30. You’re going to be a dad today!”
“What?! WHY DIDN’T YOU CALL ME?!”
“They’re not that bad,” I said. “You’ll be fine to come home
at noon.”
“SCREW THAT, MEG. I AM COMING HOME NOW.”
He drove so fast he basically teleported. I was still
puttering around the house when he arrived in full panic mode, unable to
understand why I was so calm. I explained that it was our first baby and labor
takes forever. I suggested we grab food and maybe rent a movie from Hollywood
Video to pass the time.
He agreed—but insisted we call the midwife. She said it
sounded like a long day and told us to meet her at 8 p.m. if things didn’t
intensify.
At 8 p.m., my contractions were getting rough. She checked
me.
Three centimeters.
Cool. Great. Love this for me.
Internally, I was thinking, I will absolutely need drugs
soon. Outwardly, I nodded bravely and agreed to see her in the morning
because I am nothing if not stubborn.
We went home. Things escalated quickly.
My parents—who lived four hours away—showed up, and my dad
started timing contractions with a stopwatch. He’d announce, “Another one
should start… now,” and somehow he was always right, which felt rude.
My mom told my husband to call the doctor. He did, the midwife said,
“She’s just panicking. Draw her a bath.”
So he did. I got into the tub. One contraction hit so hard I
lifted my entire body out of the water using only my arms and screamed through
what felt like my skeleton being split in half.
“I’M DONE. I NEED DRUGS. I’M GOING TO THE HOSPITAL.”
My mom helped me get dressed and told my husband to call the
doctor and say we were coming with or without permission. I collapsed
onto the living room floor, crying that I felt like I needed to poop.
The midwife yelled over the phone,
“DON’T LET HER POOP. BRING HER TO THE HOSPITAL NOW.”
We lived close, so we were in the delivery room within
minutes. The nurse checked me.
Nine centimeters.
I had gone from three to nine in under three hours. Turns
out, baths don’t slow my labor—they launch it.
They made me wait to push because I needed antibiotics and
an IV, which I immediately pulled out mid-push. The delivery was absolute
chaos. She had shoulder dystocia, was stuck head-out for about three minutes,
and had the cord wrapped around her neck multiple times. The nurse saved her
life by dislocating my hips, and she shot out in an explosion of fluids that
sent my husband fleeing the room to avoid losing his lunch.
The relief I felt when she finally left my body is still the
greatest physical feeling I’ve ever had.
For a moment, though, things were very serious. She was born
with no signs of life other than a faint heartbeat and had to be fully
resuscitated. We worried for a long time about possible delays due to lack of
oxygen.
She bounced back quickly.
My favorite story about her is from when she was four. She
showed her dad a paper with her name written perfectly and a rainbow drawn in
the correct color order. He said, “Look how smart you are! And to think I was
so scared you were going to be stupid.”
She looked at him and said, completely deadpan,
“Huh. You thought I was going to be a boy?”
She’s 18 now, a senior at a medical charter school,
graduating with both a Medical Assistant and Pharmacy Technician certification.
She wants to work in the NICU or Labor & Delivery as a Nurse Practitioner.
Her passion is supporting women who’ve had traumatic births—helping them feel
seen and understood and addressing the high risk of postpartum depression. Her
senior project is focused on researching and educating medical professionals
about this incredibly vulnerable group of new mothers.
Turns out, she really did wait to get everything just right
before making her entrance.
