Edwin Birth Story: Part 5 - Conclusion

Being that the day was sort of a blur for her, Mindy asked me to write down my recollections of June 12, 2008, the day Edwin was born. It took me a while to get to it, but I finally finished it as a present for her 30th birthday. In honor of Edwin's 1st birthday today, we have decided to put a serialized version here on the blog. See part 1 here, part 2 here, part 3 here and part 4 here.

He’s Perfect

The next couple hours are pretty surreal. Just hanging out in the room with nothing to do. No tests, Mindy’s fine. Thank God we brought the laptop. We listen to Leona Lewis from our iTunes because we took countless naps to it over the last few months, it’s gotta be our baby’s in utero fave. The boredom causes us to get desperate. Since the hospital’s wifi is helplessly slow (yeah, we’re spoiled 2008ers), we have to find ways to pass the time.

We play heads up Texas Hold’em with the deck of cards we brought, but instead of chips, I nerdily track our chip counts via Excel. I take an early lead but it’s still close. I‘m having fun and start to forget we’re there to have a baby. It feels no different than Mindy and me hanging out in the dorms, eating chili-cheese burritos and laughing at her T-Bell pog collection.

Just as Mindy wins a hand to take a small lead, the doctor comes in to check on us. “OK, it’s time.” I guess the game’s over—Mindy wins. Wait…who cares? The doc said it’s time. Are we having this baby in, like ten minutes or something? Just then the nurse scoffs that Mindy’s had it so easy so far, that she’ll probably only have to do a couple hours of pushing before the baby comes.

OK, great. She said a couple hours as if that was an incredibly short amount of time. I give myself about five hours before my life changes forever. The doctor starts to get Mindy into position on the bed. A-ha, so that’s how the bed turns into a birthing table. He and the nurse start us off on the procedure that essentially boils down to Mindy breathing and me counting. Man, I don’t remember anything from birthing class.

The doctor leaves and only comes back every ten to fifteen minutes or so. It’s Mindy, me and the nurse. Counting and breathing. Jeff Buckley’s on iTunes at this point. Grace is almost over, and I ask Mindy if she thinks Jeff Buckley feels OK to give birth to. She couldn’t care less. I start it back from song 2, but think to myself I’ll have to figure something else out for later, because we’re not gonna want to hear it three times in a row.

About forty to fifty minutes in, the doctor says next push he’s going to try to turn the baby slightly. OK, whatever that means. Mindy seems indifferent. She looks like she’s preparing to do this for another few hours. Next push, doctor’s doing something down there, Mindy lets out a slight scream. “I’ll be right back,” says the doc, “do NOT do any pushing.” “Huh?” Mindy and I turn to the nurse. “That means it’s coming soon” she says. “Oh” we both say…I’m thinking “What?!?”

Doctor’s back. He positions the table just right. Next push, and despite what told myself I couldn’t do, I have to take a peak. My eyes start to water as I catch a glimpse of the top of my baby’s head. The nurse shouts words of encouragement at Mindy, “just a few more pushes.” A couple of second later the doctor tells Mindy to stop…the baby’s here.

“Get down here, Dad” the doctor says as he hold up the scissors. “No, he doesn’t wa—“ starts the nurse. “C’mon” the doctors says to me sternly as if calling out my manhood. I take the scissors and cut the cord. Why would I not want to do that? I was an idiot.

“Call it out, Dad” say doc as he holds up the baby. It feels like it takes me an hour to give my final confirmation. “IT’S A BOY!” I yell (well, my version of yelling, slightly raising my voice). “Edwin Randall Ross!” The doctor and nurse take the little guy to do whatever they need to do. I’m making sure Mindy’s OK. She’s crying and is calling for her baby. This probably feels like an eternity to her. Finally, the nurse asks, “do you want to hold him?”

Mindy extends her arms and takes Edwin from the nurse, then weeps, “He’s perfect”.