34 years ago today I had a baby boy. That saying that one forgets the
EXTREMELY intense pain afterwards is a bunch of "bunk." On the way to the
delivery room I made the remark that I would never be able to understand why
anyone would want to do this again! He was born the day before my 35th birthday.
Since I had pre-eclampsia, I had to stay in bed for the last six weeks of my
pregnancy. The doctor wanted to hospitalize me, but as we had no insurance at
the time, I was allowed to stay home. Now I don’t know about anyone else, but
when you feel fine and you’re hungry and there is no one there to get you food,
you’re going to get up and get it. After two weeks, I even went over to our new
house and walked upstairs to measure for curtains. Luckily, I had a doctor
appointment immediately afterwards and my vitals showed full-blown toxemia. I
was told to drive immediately to the hospital where I was admitted and further
tests showed everything as normal. The vitals at the doctor’s office though
qualified us for assistance to women who developed toxemia and we had to pay
only 20% of our bill as a normal insured couple. We only had to allow access to
my medical records for "study."
As it turned out he came three weeks early - which was fine.
In the hospital, I was weighed every day and after a week, I got on the scales with water running down my legs. I thought "My God I wet myself," and I’m embarrassed and apologizing all over the place. Of course, I’d just woken up and wasn’t quite "with it" yet. The nurses were very kind and did allow me to take a shower while they were changing my bed. As it turned out my water had broken, and I "leaked" all day. And wouldn’t you know it, I had the inside bed and the girl beside me - her husband was there all day long. Since my water had broken, I was only allowed to wear the hospital gown, which as you know, leaves a lot to be covered. I was extremely uncomfortable and embarrassed when I had to walk past this guy who just wouldn’t go home!
That evening, a stranger, a girl who said she lived next door to me (next to the house I was moving into - we hadn’t even moved in yet!) came to visit me. She stayed and stayed and stayed and in the meantime, I’m getting wetter and wetter and wetter. I’m praying, "God, please make her leave!" By the time she left, I had to call the nurses to come and change my bed again and I had to go clean up, again walking past that dumb man sitting in that stupid chair.
About 4:00 the next morning, I began to feel "weird" twinges and they kept up continually. I finally called a nurse who assured me that I had started labor. By 8:00 I had to again talk them into letting me take another shower. They said I could if a nurse stayed at the door with me. I went back to bed and the twinges increased and I was taken to the "labor" room. There I was assigned a male nurse (the indignities never end) who wanted to give me an enema. As my water had broken I wasn’t allowed to use the bathroom like a nice girl, He gave me a bedpan and stood there and waited. Well, nothing happened. And nothing happened - five gallons of water and nothing! He won’t leave me laying on the table because I might fall off. So he waits! And I wait, my bowels refusing to budge! Finally I win, only just a little though. He agrees to leave the room and all is fairly okay with the world again - a little privacy at last! He finally calls in a female nurse for the rest of this ordeal.
Now the labor room was just that - a room where you labored and the more you labored, the worse it hurt! My husband came in and asked did I really want him there, it was just going to take a long time with nothing happening, and he was bored and hungry. I was in no mood for him to be pestering me, so I told him to just leave and I’d be fine. My parents and a couple of friends came soon afterwards. My husband finally came back (by the way, we are now divorced - see above).
Now I don’t remember having "contractions." I remember hell. There was the pain and then there was more pain (I suppose that was the contractions). That pain never let up like I thought it would, the pain just kep coming. From the beginning it took about 8-9 hours to reach 4 centimeters. And then within 30 minutes I was at 10. Then I hit what I suppose is "transition."
All of a sudden there was this urge to push. However, the doctor hadn’t arrived yet, and the nurses are telling me, "no hold it, don’t push!" Yeah! like right!
The nurses see that I’m still pushing (how in the world do you stop?) and are gloving up and finally the doctor comes in and is all nicey nice to my husband, who by this time I hate!
Finally, when the "doctor" is ready, he tells me I can push - whew - what a sweet guy! Two pushes and the baby is here. I’ll never forget when they laid him in my arms, loads and loads of black hair and weird wadded up ears! A total stranger and all of a sudden I realized I had no idea who he was or what he liked or even if he would like me.
Then they told me that they were going to give me a sponge bath and a massage! I thought, ah, how nice - I don’t have to work at anything now, I can rest. I envisioned a nice dimly lit room with people around my bedside attending to my every need and a wonderful bath and massage!
Whoaaa! Reality check!
The sponge bath WAS very nice. But that massage! Was I in for an education. There was no way on earth that I would have believed that some little nurse was going to come in and jump up and plop herself on my stomach four times in the next hour (at least that’s what it felt like, and that’s exactly what she did! Supposedly this is to make sure that the womb is cleared). Luckly by the fourth time, I knew what was coming and it did get a little better. But that first groan (which was more like a scream) I will always remember! I don’t know why they didn’t tell us this stuff! And as I lay there waiting the next 15 minutes for her to make her rounds of unfeeling manipulation, I could hear the groans and screams of the other ladies who had also unknowingly entered this hell.
The next morning, I went down to a special class to learn how to take care of my little baby and I’m in this room with about 40 other women. The room is about 10 by 12 and crowded. I don’t know how the other ladies knew to bring inner tubes along to sit on, but nobody gave me one and it was extremely uncomfortable and HOT! I finally figured out that when I was little I’d played with dolls enough that I could figure out how to change a diaper and asked to go back to my room. I’d barely gotten back when a bunch of friends came into my room for a surprise baby shower. Normally, I would have been so pleased, but I was just tired and guiltily wishing they would all go home which they finally did!
Today, my baby is 34, married and maybe one day his wife will have one, though I hope her experience is different.
As it turned out he came three weeks early - which was fine.
In the hospital, I was weighed every day and after a week, I got on the scales with water running down my legs. I thought "My God I wet myself," and I’m embarrassed and apologizing all over the place. Of course, I’d just woken up and wasn’t quite "with it" yet. The nurses were very kind and did allow me to take a shower while they were changing my bed. As it turned out my water had broken, and I "leaked" all day. And wouldn’t you know it, I had the inside bed and the girl beside me - her husband was there all day long. Since my water had broken, I was only allowed to wear the hospital gown, which as you know, leaves a lot to be covered. I was extremely uncomfortable and embarrassed when I had to walk past this guy who just wouldn’t go home!
That evening, a stranger, a girl who said she lived next door to me (next to the house I was moving into - we hadn’t even moved in yet!) came to visit me. She stayed and stayed and stayed and in the meantime, I’m getting wetter and wetter and wetter. I’m praying, "God, please make her leave!" By the time she left, I had to call the nurses to come and change my bed again and I had to go clean up, again walking past that dumb man sitting in that stupid chair.
About 4:00 the next morning, I began to feel "weird" twinges and they kept up continually. I finally called a nurse who assured me that I had started labor. By 8:00 I had to again talk them into letting me take another shower. They said I could if a nurse stayed at the door with me. I went back to bed and the twinges increased and I was taken to the "labor" room. There I was assigned a male nurse (the indignities never end) who wanted to give me an enema. As my water had broken I wasn’t allowed to use the bathroom like a nice girl, He gave me a bedpan and stood there and waited. Well, nothing happened. And nothing happened - five gallons of water and nothing! He won’t leave me laying on the table because I might fall off. So he waits! And I wait, my bowels refusing to budge! Finally I win, only just a little though. He agrees to leave the room and all is fairly okay with the world again - a little privacy at last! He finally calls in a female nurse for the rest of this ordeal.
Now the labor room was just that - a room where you labored and the more you labored, the worse it hurt! My husband came in and asked did I really want him there, it was just going to take a long time with nothing happening, and he was bored and hungry. I was in no mood for him to be pestering me, so I told him to just leave and I’d be fine. My parents and a couple of friends came soon afterwards. My husband finally came back (by the way, we are now divorced - see above).
Now I don’t remember having "contractions." I remember hell. There was the pain and then there was more pain (I suppose that was the contractions). That pain never let up like I thought it would, the pain just kep coming. From the beginning it took about 8-9 hours to reach 4 centimeters. And then within 30 minutes I was at 10. Then I hit what I suppose is "transition."
All of a sudden there was this urge to push. However, the doctor hadn’t arrived yet, and the nurses are telling me, "no hold it, don’t push!" Yeah! like right!
The nurses see that I’m still pushing (how in the world do you stop?) and are gloving up and finally the doctor comes in and is all nicey nice to my husband, who by this time I hate!
Finally, when the "doctor" is ready, he tells me I can push - whew - what a sweet guy! Two pushes and the baby is here. I’ll never forget when they laid him in my arms, loads and loads of black hair and weird wadded up ears! A total stranger and all of a sudden I realized I had no idea who he was or what he liked or even if he would like me.
Then they told me that they were going to give me a sponge bath and a massage! I thought, ah, how nice - I don’t have to work at anything now, I can rest. I envisioned a nice dimly lit room with people around my bedside attending to my every need and a wonderful bath and massage!
Whoaaa! Reality check!
The sponge bath WAS very nice. But that massage! Was I in for an education. There was no way on earth that I would have believed that some little nurse was going to come in and jump up and plop herself on my stomach four times in the next hour (at least that’s what it felt like, and that’s exactly what she did! Supposedly this is to make sure that the womb is cleared). Luckly by the fourth time, I knew what was coming and it did get a little better. But that first groan (which was more like a scream) I will always remember! I don’t know why they didn’t tell us this stuff! And as I lay there waiting the next 15 minutes for her to make her rounds of unfeeling manipulation, I could hear the groans and screams of the other ladies who had also unknowingly entered this hell.
The next morning, I went down to a special class to learn how to take care of my little baby and I’m in this room with about 40 other women. The room is about 10 by 12 and crowded. I don’t know how the other ladies knew to bring inner tubes along to sit on, but nobody gave me one and it was extremely uncomfortable and HOT! I finally figured out that when I was little I’d played with dolls enough that I could figure out how to change a diaper and asked to go back to my room. I’d barely gotten back when a bunch of friends came into my room for a surprise baby shower. Normally, I would have been so pleased, but I was just tired and guiltily wishing they would all go home which they finally did!
Today, my baby is 34, married and maybe one day his wife will have one, though I hope her experience is different.
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