November 26th

Four more days of constant blogging! It has been quite a month of posts. I was determined to get a post done everyday and so far I'm on track.

November is the last month of birthdays for our immediate family. Each of my daughters were born 23 months apart. Planned each one to the minute almost! The first daughter arrived a week late or they would have all been 23 months and three days apart. #1 decided to wait a week to arrive just after Thanksgiving all those many years ago...

The big guy was working nightcrew, working midnight to 7 a.m. everyday except for the two days a week he worked 4 to one in the afternoon. Oh yeah and then once a week he had to fill in for another guy who worked until 11 p.m. His schedule was so thrown off he didn't know if it was night or day most of the time. I was a week overdue and very much feeling every extra day of pregnancy. I went to bed about 11:30, the big guy came in about 1 a.m. after a long day of putting cans on the shelf. He was due back at work at 4 a.m. and was really exhausted.

At about 2 a.m. my water broke. I thought I had wet the bed. I remember saying to myself "Great! it's come to this, I can't even get through the night without losing control of my bladder! Wonderful!" Then the water just kept leaking out of me. Duh! It's not what I thought! My water must have broken. I wake up the big guy who is thrilled to be awakened at this horrible hour after a half over of sleep. He said maybe we should call the hospital and see what they have to say. We call and they find out we're about an hours drive from them and they say well, you better just come on in. We drove the hours distance and arrived with very little else happening other than a constant leak of fluids.

Labor proceeds. well, not really. Every time I have a contraction this little person decides they're coming out through my throat. Not the expected path for this one! Not at all! And then after what seemed like eons of hours of labor they finally decide to let me in on the secret. Which secret is that? Well the one that you learn that you're really glad it's not a hundred years ago. Because, if that were the case, you and your baby aren't going to make it out alive. You don't dialate. Not one iota! Zip, nada, zilch dialation going on there! But boy oh boy you're really good at labor, it's the most intense labor we've seen in a while. Yessiree bob, you're going to have to wait to have this baby because we're going to deliver it c-section. Huh? How much longer? Well, we have to wait until the doctor/surgeon arrives and makes sure you're really not going to dialte. Hours, hours go by. Doctors come and go. One comes in and does an examination that is so painful, the big guy tells the nurse if he ever returns he'll die. Never saw that guy again.

Finally my wonderful, kind, super doctor shows up and lets me know the decision has been made to do the section. Unfortunately I'm going to have to wait another hour or so because we've got change of shifts coming up. He must've seen the sheer terror on my face. I couldn't take much more. There wasn't pain medication given back then as they didn't want to interfere with the possibility of surgery. All of this pain was really getting to me. I pleaded with him, please can we just do it now? How long could it really take? He asked for a conference and they decided to go for it.

In the rush the prep nurse nicked my very pregnant belly and I was bleeding. Well, my doc told her she'd never work on his team again. It was too risky, and I could end up with a nasty infection because of her carelessness. Ick. I didn't but I bet she was more careful from there on in prepping pregnant bellies. Everything was done in short order, I was wheeled into the delivery room and quickly heard the ever famous SLAM! of darkness. I woke up later the next day and was told I had given birth at 10:33 p.m. I had had a little girl! Yay! A little girl. I simply went back to sleep.

Later I woke up again and they brought this wonderful tiny little girl to me. She was perfect. November 26th became a day of infamy in our lives. It was quickly joined by Oct 17th, and Sept 14th, 23 months and then 23 months later. They were the best things that ever happened to me. Three wonderful daughters.

My husband and I always told them that we would live a sparse life. That we had been blessed with them, and we would need little else. I think they always thought it was a guilt trip. Nah. It was true. I can think of nothing better to keep forever.