I’m really not one for resolutions anymore. I’ve tried and failed way too many times to go through that ritual every December. So I’ll refrain from making my inaugural New Years Eve post about reading more, hating less, learning more, drinking less or exercising more and re-visit that next week on my own dime. Instead, I think it might be more productive to start off with a quick top-10 most memorable, most awesome days of 2009 (in no particular order).
January 4, 2009 – Dan, I’m pregnant.
My initial reaction: Holy shit. 10 minutes later: I’d never been happier.
After about 14 different home tests that all displayed a purple plus sign, we finally decided to call on a medical professional to weigh in on this little dilemma and help us figure out if we were expecting, or if we were the poster children for that .0000007%. Sure enough, there was a bun in the oven.
January 17, 2009 – Happy Birthday, Dan.
Pack your shit, we’re goin’ to Mexico.
I’m talking about the sunny, sandy, never wanna leave Mexico, not the shady, scummy, get me the fuck out of here Mexico. My wife surprised me with the most amazing 5 nights in a penthouse-level suite with a private pool and hot tub at Playa Mujeres. It’s an adults-only (not in the perv way), all-inclusive resort just outside of Cancun. It was real nice. The hardest part was all of the drinking I had to do. Since my lady was ‘with child’, I decided to drink enough for the both of us to really get our money’s worth. When you consider how watered down those free drinks are to begin with, you can imagine how many Piña Coladas I had. It was nuts.
February 12, 2009 – Happy Valentine’s Day, Mom and Dad
It’s all about hearts – baby hearts.
The belly was growing, but this was the first piece of real proof that there was a living being inside of there. We first heard Lucy’s little heart beating on this day. It was truly awesome. My stomach hit the floor that day. It was beginning to sink in.
March 5, 2009 – Little Kicks
Try to avoid 4D images of children in utero. It’s really weird.
This was our first ultrasound. Just like Tom Cruise, they covered the belly in hair gel and pulled out the baby detector. It took a few but she popped right up on the screen. She was dancing like Elaine from the little kicks episode of Seinfeld.
April 27, 2009 – It’s a girl.
My initial reaction: Holy shit. 10 minutes later: I’d never been happier.
I was totally out-numbered to begin with, surrounded by 3 generations of amazing women. Heck, what’s one more? I guess I’ll just have to try a little harder on the next one. I could really use another pair around the house.
July 19, 2009 – Check out the loot.
The cupcakes from Tartes made the day.
Up until now, we were pretty nervous about all the baby shit we were going to have to buy. Thanks to resourceful grandparents, friends, family and my sniper’s aim with a registry gun, we walked away with a whole bunch of stuff. It was a great day for the baby. And our bank account.
August 4, 2009 – Um… Did you know your baby was upside down?
Back rubs, incense, acupuncture, arthritic pools, and a whole lot of praying.
You want to talk about devastating? Devote 9 months to perfection. Eat all the right foods. Take all the right supplements. Read all the right books. And attend all the right classes. Do everything in your power to provide the most natural birth experience for your child. No drugs, nothing to take the edge off, and certainly nothing to speed up the process. It’s what they call a birth plan. We had one. And it was perfect. Up until we realized that the kid was in a complete breech position. In this day and age, big medicine would much rather extract a baby via cesarean than allow for nature to take its course. It’s easier on them. They schedule it. It takes 45 minutes. They don’t have to ‘deal’ with women in labor. It sucks through and through.
Anyway.. We tried everything under the sun to fix this – acupuncture, chiropractic adjustments, swimming, standing upside down… everything. At one point, I was even yelling at the business end of the belly in an attempt to get the baby’s attention and bring on an about face. Nothing worked. And cesarean was totally out of the question. It just wasn’t going to happen.
September 10, 2009 – Let’s flip this baby
One seriously determined doctor with greasy hands.
We were left with only one option – an external cephalic version. That’s just a fancy name for ‘roll up your sleeves, grease up, dig in, and re-locate that baby’. Seriously, that was it. It sounds pretty ridiculous but if you think about it, in theory, it makes complete sense. The only challenge is finding a doctor that is A: trained and B: willing to perform it these days. Luckily for us, the midwives at the Bryn Mawr Birth Center are integrated with the labor and maternity ward at Bryn Mawr Hospital. They’ve got a pretty heavy influence on the way they do things over there.
I asked so many questions. I wanted statistics, success rates, and answers to about 100 different ‘what if’ scenarios. I got nothing but ‘eh, it’s like 50/50′. We basically had to agree to the risks – and there were tons – including the need for emergency c-section. Kind of ironic how we took such a drastic measure to avoid something that could very well be a result of our action.
Dr Carlson hooked us up big time. He was amazing. He offered 3 10-second attempts, while scanning in between to make sure the umbilical cord was not ruptured. He tried 3 times and it didn’t work. Shit. Just as I was coming to terms with the fact that it didn’t work, he said ‘I think I can do this. She is really close’, and he went at it once more. Sure enough, it worked. He dug deep in, lifted the baby up with his hands and surrounded it with both of his forearms. With a little twist to the right, her head popped up, over and then down. Her body followed, and it was over. Everybody was silent for a good 10 seconds. And then it seemed like the entire room (me, my lady, dr carlson, the midwife, the nurse, the anesthesiologist, grandma) said in unison ‘it worked!’.
After the fact, I asked Dr. Carlson about it. And he told me that was only his 4th successful ECV. Crazy.
September 21, 2009 – Happy Birthday, Lucy
7lbs. 5oz., 19.5″ – and it only took 49 hours.
It takes about a little less than an hour to get from Philadelphia to Bryn Mawr. But when you do it at 2 am, it’s not so bad. Do it again that same day at 6 am, and it seems even easier. Maybe it was delirium as a result of sleep deprivation. Had we not checked into the Radnor Hotel that morning, I would be able to tell you all about a third trip out 24 hours later, because that’s around the time this kid finally decided to surface.
At the end of the day, my champion of a wife spent a grand total of 49 hours in labor. She refused medication. She needed it. Trust me. But she refused it. I’m not sure where she got it from, but she somehow found the energy to withstand the pain of being stuck at 1cm for 30+ hours. I drank all the coffee I could get my hands on, and I was having a hard time sticking with it myself.
For several reasons – mostly the amount of time she labored – we decided it best to transfer and deliver at Bryn Mawr hospital. We checked in around Noon, Lucy was born just after 5, we crashed for a couple hours and checked out at 2 pm the next day. She spent less time in the hospital after giving birth than I did when I broke my collarbone in high school. My wife. My hero.
September 22, 2009 – Help. I have shit on my hands.
And it’s not my own.
Going into this, diapers seemed to be my biggest fear. I was ready for the crying, the puking, the need to be coddled – all of it – with the exception of poopie diapers. I had never changed a diaper in my entire life. In fact, I had never even touched a diaper (aside from the one we put on the dog as a dry run). I was real nervous. I think I was afraid of getting shit on my hands. Who isn’t? I mean, who looks forward to that? Why wouldn’t I be afraid of it?
As it turns out, all it took was a quick case of shit-on-the-hands on day 2 for me to get over it. It wasn’t even that bad. Now, I actually enjoy diapers. I look at it like daddy time. She stares at me the whole time and more often than not, I can entertain her while I’m taking care of business. She seems to enjoy it too. And at the end, she feels better. And I helped. Those are the kinds of things I cherish nowadays.
So that’s it – my top 10. That was pretty tough to edit down. My original list was huge. I could have gone on forever, even though I think I did anyway. But hey, it’s my first ever blog post. Deal with it. I’ll get better. All in all, 2009 was a pretty spectacular year. If 2010 is half as good, we’ll be in business.
I look forward to making this same post 365 days from now.
December 31st, 2009 → 10:29 pm @ Dan DeLauro
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