it was 20 years ago today
Saturday, November 7, 2009 at 04:04PM I think I may have used that title for a previous blog post, relating to my anniversary, but, oh well.
Twenty years ago today, I gave birth to my first son. It's not his 18th birthday or his 21st, both somehow more legally significant, but to me, this is a biggie. He's no longer a teen and, well, it just feels different on my end saying out loud that I'm mom to a 20 year old.
So much time, so much has changed, so much has stayed the same.
We were living in Philly, in the Bush Sr. era. Two, now three, crazy kids intent on doing things outside of the box, continuing on in our rock and roll Grateful Dead lifestyle, only now with a diaper bag and car seat.
No minivans for us. No vaccinations, cribs, disposable diapers, playpens, strollers, or school. The pacifier? Not my idea at all.. that was a lovely gift from my MIL... sarcasm intended.
Nope we were gonna... sorry, I should say, I was going to be the quintessential alternative earth mom if it killed me. Or the marriage. Or the baby.
Won't go into the long and horrific details of the birth... well, not really horrific. Let's just say that using the book, "Spiritual Midwifery" as my only guide as to what to expect was perhaps setting me up for some very high and unrealistic expectations. Staying up for 12 hours with labor pains, sure I was ready to pop the next morning, and then getting to the hospital* only to be told I was dilated maybe 1 cm. was not the best way to kick it off.
It wasn't another 19 hours until my first born made it into the world. My husband teases him to this day that ever since then, his habit is to keep us all waiting.. that he was sure he could hear him saying from the womb, "Hold on. I gotta get something."
In my son's defense, I wasn't in a great hurry to push him out. I mean, I was, but was actually holding out for a more ideal solution. Or for someone else to do it. Kinda the story of my life. It felt far less painful when he wasn't crowning than when he was, so, of course, I chose the easier route. Easier in than out.
God, I really had no idea how true that would be.
But out he came. Blue and not breathing, and with the cord around his neck. Five minutes of panic, praying, and possibly the closest connection I had to my husband before or since, until we finally heard him cry.
And then weeks of baby bliss. Intermingled with stress, sleep deprivation, heart-wrenching that I never could have imagined, and utter, and total amazement.
A person. A person came out of me and is now here beside us. A tiny, beautiful person, with a pinched lower lip and one green eye, and one flecked with brown. And not a clue of how much upheaval he would come to cause in our lives.
I would never be the same. Nor would I want to be.
Happy Birthday, R.E.M. We made it pretty far.
(* And, if you're wondering about the incongruence between my earth-mama aspirations, and me going the hospital, it's because that particular one had a "birthing suite", run by midwives, and the director of which was the dad (yes, a male midwife) of a good friend of ours.)
