The Birth Part III

In the triage room, the contractions were coming quickly, every two minutes or so.  The pressure monitor was a small disc, about two inches across, that had to stay pressed against the abdomen to do its job.  This was accomplished with a cylinder of stretchy mesh, like a tube top for your pregnant belly.  

Snaking from left to right on a monitor 3 feet above Hannah's head were two lines: one represented the baby's heartbeat and one the pressure in her uterus.  The pressure line would usually waver around 5 or 10, and every two minutes it would rise (Hannah would start to wince, and Cameron would try not to be too overtly fascinated by the science) until it peaked at 80, and then 90, and then 100, which seemed like the top of the chart.  After 30 seconds the line would drop back to 5 or 10 and the pain would subside. 

In between contractions, Hannah said "So 100 is as high as it goes right?  Like, that's as strong as the contractions can get?"  Cameron, sensing a trap, hesitated before replying.  "I mean, yeah, that's as high as it goes.  On the machine."  

"So the contractions can't go above 100, right?  100 is as high as they go."  

Cameron thought: Are you trying to get me to say that your contractions won't get any worse?  Because I will not say that. 

"Well," he said, "I mean, maybe there are contractions that are stronger, but they just can't be measured by this machine."  

"Right, but then why wouldn't they make the 100 higher.  So they could measure all the contractions."  

You are remarkably lucid and persuasive for a woman in active labor, Cameron thought.  "That's true," was the safest thing he could think to say.

Hannah's contractions got stronger and stronger, more and more frequent.  She was required to stay in triage on the monitor for 20 minutes.  The time was marked on the scroll of paper that was spit from the bottom of the screen above Hannah's head, so this much is documented:  Hannah was in triage from 6:30 to 6:50 am. 

Somewhere in the middle of those 20 minutes, Cameron realized he had reached the limits of what he could do to help his partner.  Mostly what he'd been doing was sitting by her side, trying to be silently supportive (he had been horrified by the videos of husbands shouting aggressive breathing instructions at their partners).  But when Hannah, who was groaning in pain, shouted "Say something, Jesus!" he realized that silence was not actually the same as support. 

Hannah needed something, and Cameron didn't know what it was.  Maybe their doula Megan would know.  But if Megan came in, Cameron would have to leave.  And he didn't want to leave.  

Cameron tried to tell himself that this was Hannah's decision.  If she wanted him to leave so that Megan could come into the room, she would say so.   Then he looked at Hannah and knew that he was lying to himself.  She was groaning in pain, she was focused inward.  She would never tell him to leave. Cameron would have to make a decision about what was best for her.  Her partner or her doula?

As Megan went into the triage room, Cameron sat in the waiting area half-regretting his decision.  He watched the quiet, calm couple across from him.  The woman sat stiffly upright, neatly sipping on a bottle of water.  The couple didn't look at each other, didn't speak.  It seemed like the most proper, organized, and boring labor ever.  (It turned out the woman was coming for an induction of labor because she'd gone beyond 42 weeks.) 

Ten minutes later, a nurse came into the waiting room and told Cameron that Hannah had already moved to her delivery room.  Apparently there was a back entrance to the triage unit.  

When Cameron found Hannah she was standing in the hallway with Megan massaging her back.  Cameron walked past the pair of them to deposit a load of bags in Room 22.  He returned to the waiting room to get another load of stuff, passing his wife again and not stopping.  He felt a little bad about this, and on his third time past he was almost overwhelmed by the urge to reach out and touch her, or at least say something.  But there you are in the hallway of a hospital, with nurses and secretaries swirling past, and maybe she might even resent such intimacy in a semi-public space while she's feeling so vulnerable?  Hard to say.  Cameron kept walking, finishing delivering their luggage to the room. 

When Hannah and Megan arrived in their delivery room, a nurse named Lisa was parked at the computer (yes, the delivery room had a computer.  Looking back it seems obvious that this would be the case.  But at the time it was surprising.)  Lisa was overweight, but the type that seems healthy: she moved quickly and gracefully, the extra pounds muscle not blubber. 

Lisa saw Cameron biting his nails and told him to stop.  "You're making everybody anxious.  You're injecting negative energy into the room."  What about you, Cameron thought?  How much negative energy are you injecting by saying that?  But he tried to stop biting his nails.

Lisa took a medical history and clicked the answers into her computer.  Cameron tried to answer as many questions as possible.  Hannah was incredibly aware of what was going on around her:  whenever Lisa asked a question that cameron wouldn't know the answer to, Hannah immediately jumped in with the answer:  Any allergies?  "Codeine, it makes my face swell up," Hannah said before Cameron even had a chance to turn to her. 

Cameron knew that she was born on October 25, 1978, but he did the math wrong and told the nurse that she was 32.  "I'm 31," Hannah shouted through a contraction.  "For three more days," Cameron thought, but was not so stupid as to say.

Finally the formalities were out of the way.  Now the labor could start.  

Or so they thought.  Cameron and Hannah would have been surprised to learn, at that moment, that the labor was half over. A baby would be in their arms before a screening of "When Harry Met Sally" could get to the part where Harry says that when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible. 

The Birth Part II

The three of them arrived at Roosevelt Hospital at 6:10am.  The front doors of the hospital opened at 6am (otherwise they would have had to enter through the emergency room).  They walked in the front entrance and took the elevator to the 12th floor.  They had to fill out insurance forms before anyone would initiate medical care.  The secretary handed a clipboard to Hannah, and she filled it out in the middle of a contraction, which Cameron found incredibly moving. 


The L&D nurse insisted that Hannah come into the triage room alone, without her partner or her doula. Megan explained that this was to allow the nurse to ask Hannah questions about domestic violence that she might not answer truthfully in the presence of the hypothetical abuser (i.e. Cameron). Only one person would be allowed to accompany Hannah in the triage room.  As Megan and Cameron sat in the waiting area talking pleasantly, Cameron wondered who would be called in.  When Hannah was asked who she wanted to join her in the triage room, would she choose her partner or some woman she'd just met?  Cameron wondered how he would feel if the nurse came through the door and said that Megan had been chosen to join his wife in labor.  He wondered how hurt he would feel to be excluded from even this small portion of his first child's birth.  He briefly considered whether he was being selfish by spending so much mental energy on this petty matter, but quickly returned to worrying about who Hannah would ask for.  

Here's the thing: This was a time of stress, a time of great importance.  Choices made in these moments said huge things about people's true feelings.  We say things like "I love you" and "you're the most important person in my life," but words spoken over a dinner plate after a glass of wine are just that, words.  The way you know how someone really feels is to see how they behave in a moment of crisis, a moment of stress, a moment when the heart tugs for what it needs without politeness or inhibition.  

Cameron knew that these were terrible thoughts to be having at this moment, that he should really be focused on his partner, on what was best for her, and that if her doula would be most useful, then her doula should go into in the room.  He knew that devoting even this much mental energy to such petty selfish concerns amounted to a sort of betrayal of his partner and of his professed commitment to her best interests, but still he continued to ruminate.  What would it feel like when the nurse walked through that door and broke his heart?  Would he be able to put happy face on it?  Of course he would.  He would sit quietly in the waiting room, polite and meek, and wonder what the two women were saying and doing together.  

The nurse came through the door and said "She wants to see you."

The Birth Part I

Not many children get an intricate, play by play description of their own birth.  Probably because not many want one.  But tough twizzlers, baby Elliot, here it comes: 

At 4:45am Hannah woke up.  She wasn't in labor, and again was disappointed.  She had to pee, so she got up and went to the bathroom.  She peed, and when she got up from the toilet she noticed there was still some leaking.  

Hannah came back to bed and said "I think my water just broke."  Cameron said "We should get some more rest.  That's what you're supposed to do in early labor."  Hannah said "I think we should call the midwife or Megan (our doula); that's what she told me to do."  Cameron called Megan, and when he told Megan that the fluid was yellow, she said to page the midwife immediately.  


The midwife, Sabine, called Cameron from in the middle of another woman's labor.  He could hear grunts in the background as they spoke.  Sabine told them to come to the hospital immediately to have the fluid examined.  Cameron called Megan back, and she asked to speak to Hannah.  Megan gave two options, and Hannah chose to have Megan come to the house so all three could travel to the hospital together.  

Megan arrived with her bag of tricks, which was a literal bag containing mostly cookies, breath mints, and bendy straws.  Since the midwife Sabine hadn't told the happy couple who they would meet in labor and delivery, they paged her again.  Sabine called them with just hint of annoyance in her voice.  She said that Hannah would be examined by the triage staff and she would come up if she could.  

A car service was called.  It was the service that had performed only adequately during the previous "fire drills" they had been pulled in anticipation of this event.  But this car service was based in Crown Heights rather than Park Slope, and Cameron wanted to give them his business.  The car was outside 5 minutes after the call was placed.  

Items brought to the hospital included the following: a large blue Ikea bag containing several pillows, an iPod dock with two 6-inch speakers, a partially deflated gray birthing ball, and an iPod.  Contained in a large LeSportsac were a green terry-cloth towel, two Cliff bars, a liter of Grape Gatorade, a box of Coconut water, electrolyte tablets, hospital paperwork, a swimsuit for Hannah and Cameron, a receiving blanket, a small onesie for the baby, and a change of clothes for Hannah and Cameron.  And a car seat.  (Let the record show that the soon-to-be-parents forgot to bring socks for their newborn.)

By 5:30 they were in the car.  Hannah sat in the back on the left side, Cameron in the back on the right, and Megan in the front passenger seat. The poor quality roads of the financial district made Hannah's contractions worse, and with each one the cabbie drove faster in a desperate attempt to avoid having a baby born in the back of his cab. Or perhaps he just despised cliche.  

Gourds and Ghouls at the BK Botanical Garden

Christmas Journal

Elliot fell in love with the tree. 

Cameron worked 24-27. 

Cameron got a Kindle from Hannah. 

Anna stayed over on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day  

Fondue on Xmas Eve with cheese.  

Anna had to open her first gift before dinner, because it was the fondue pot. 

Chocolate Mousse on Xmas eve made by Kate

Kate and Ed drove from Michigan with tree and ornaments inside SUV

Blizzard was on Dec 26th.  

Car was snowed in.  Snow was as high as windows on car because of wind blowing snow into piles.  

Generalized outrage over poor plowing and clearing of streets (not limited to West-Page household)

H&C gave K&E TV.  They said it was “too big” and they did not mean the dimensions of the TV.  Secretly they loved it. Ed had a mischevious grin on his face as he talked about where they would put the TV. 

We read A Child’s Christmas in Wales by Dylan Thomas because it is one of Anna’s family traditions. That was minutes before midnight on Christmas Day. 

On Dec 27-28, Elliot really started standing.  Seriously, not just saying that as a parent.  This kid is precocious.  Okay, he had some help. 

Cameron started calling him Pookie.  Unclear why. 

elliot started talking a lot more.  See videos for details. 

Kate and Ed stayed downstairs in the apartment of our landlords and downstairs neighbors.