The Grand Finale!

Starling came home Thursday morning at about 2:45 a.m. FINALLY having finished his final (that was due at midnight… but his teacher is OBVIOUSLY lineate on deadlines). He was tuckered out, drained, exhausted. I bounced up to him and said, “WELL, there is probably NO point in sleeping since we have to go to the hospital in JUST a few hours to have our BABY!!” I think he was STILL PLANNING to go to sleep… but by the time I was done chat chat chat chattering away to him… he got wide eyed, too, and we giddily packed up all of our stuff to take to the hospital. At about four- thirty I went and fixed my HAIR, put on MAKE-UP, and had tons of energy left to burn. I was feeling pretty darn good! I could see all the cute pictures of the FRESH new mom I would be holding my little baby. I wouldn’t look like a pasty-pale, bed-head, baggy eyed DRUGGY like I did after delivering Brooklyn.

Starling said, “Don’t flip out when you see what I’m bringing,” as he loads up TONS of snacks, the Wii, about 20 DVD’s, the lap top, his GUITAR, our LAWN furniture, … I was like… dang… don’t forget the bubble bath for the Jacuzzi tub since you’re planning on going on a dang RETREAT while I’m off having the baby.

We headed off to the hospital both in high spirits! (probably out of total delirium). On the way to the hospital I remembered how STARVED I was during my labor with Brooklyn watching Starling chomp on Doritos and candy while I chomped ICE. So I told Starling to take a detour to McDonald’s and get me a couple burritos. I packed them safely in my GUT and munched on Starling’s hot fudge Sunday in the hospital waiting room. I was taken to my room and Starling finally finished lugging up ALL of his treasures. The nurses watched wide-eyed as Starling arranged his new furniture. “Planning for a lot of visitors?” They asked. “Well… I like our guests to be comfortable.” He told them. Weirdo. Then I had to put on my “gown.” That would have been fine and DANDY had I been able to figure it out. Starling tried to help me but he couldn’t find the head hole either. So after trying to snap me up about six different ways, a nurse showed us how to do it. I would have rather just wrapped up in a sheet. That gown was impossibly ridiculous and didn’t cover anything anyway.

Despite the atrocious gown, I merrily plopped up on the bed, smiling ear to ear, having fun adjusting the bed up and down and soft to firm. The tummy monitors were attached to me and I giggled watching little Brighton kick them off. (The monitor alarm went off like a hundred times and I thought the nurses were going to GLUE the straps down around my waist). “You’re having contraction six to eight minutes apart already,” the nurse told me. Cool! I could barely feel them through all of the normal kicking. “I’m all ABOUT getting induced,” I told the nurse, “I’ll get an epidural before I EVER even feel a contraction. The labor part is a piece of cake if you skip all of the PAIN.” The nurse looked at me and smiled, totally humoring my naivety. I sat back prepared to spend a lazy day waiting on labor to happen sometime in the late afternoon or evening when I would painlessly push out a little six pound baby. (SINCE that IS what my doctor told me time and time again… “Oh this baby is so tiny… he won’t be nearly as big as your last one.” And “Well, your cervix is still thick so you won’t be having a baby anytime soon… it’ll take a long time… definitely not a noon baby”).

Then the nurse stabbed a ginormous needle in my hand and I didn’t pass out, but it did make me queasy. I smiled weakly and decided that was the worst of it and I’d done fine. So then the nurse checked me. OKAY… WOO… that hurt, I was a three, and I did fine. So then Dr. Carter came in and broke my water. DANG… that was uncomfortable BUT the worst was over and I did fine. My contractions were getting a little painful, but nothing I couldn’t handle. Then the nurse started the Patossin, the drug that induces contractions like QUICK.

YIKES… the contractions REALLY started to pick up in the severity section. WOO… deep breaths. OKAY… contractions getting REALLY INTENSE… “When is that epidural coming??” I asked the nurse. “As soon as that bag right there gets empty.”

I looked at the bag. It was FULL. Oh no, no, no… this was NOT part of the plan. OOOOUUUUCH!!!! Okay EXCRUCIATING contractions that were NOT letting up! I looked at the bag again. STILL full. The nurse checked me again. “Wow… you’re a six.”

YOUCH!!! It hurts! It hurts! “Would you like some Stadol?” the nurse asked. “NO … thank… you… it made me nuts… last time… OOOOUCH!”

“Starling I can’t do this! I don’t want to do this! OOOOUCH! This is all your fault! I’m going to DIEEEE!!! STOP LAUGHING AT ME!!!!” Starling went outside and ordered Stadol. Even though I SAID I didn’t want it. They gave it to me at Starling’s request.

“OOOhhh!!! It STILL HUuu…rts…” And then the room got all spinny and I couldn’t hold open my eyes and I kept trying to sit up, but straight seemed to be bent all the way over to the left. I was trying to run from my contractions and was crawling all over the bed and I couldn’t think straight and everything was floating and the pain was so intense I knew I couldn’t live through it and I couldn’t even see Starling to kick him, but that didn’t stop me from trying… “You’re an eight,” the nurse told me. Eight seconds away from DYING, I thought. Bobby pins, that I so neatly placed in my hair, are flying everywhere, my hair is getting wrapped in my hair and mouth, my makeup is smeared to high heaven…

FINALLY I saw a blurry, floaty doctor come into the room to give me the epidural. The nurse told me to hold still. YEAH. Like that is happening while my insides are being cramped into a ball of agony. She stuck my head into her chest and I tried REALLY hard not to jump off the bed when another contraction came. OOOCH!! Contraction combined with breathtaking STAB in the spine. “umm… hold still.” ANOTHER stab. “Well…” ANOTHER stab.

“WHAT is happening?? It won’t go in??” I asked thinking this was the most horrible pain I’ve ever experienced in my entire life. “You’re really bony. You have to bend and STAY still.” I try to focus with all my strength. Another stab. ANOTHER stab. “Got it.” The human pen cushion was then lowered back onto the bed.

“IT STILL HURTS!” I moan to all the floating people in the room. Starling is asking me 21 questions and videoing my answers while I’m swimming in a puddle of literal water and then the thick FOG that I can’t shake myself out of because of that dang loopy drug I didn’t want. “It isn’t hurting as bad… I can feel it but it doesn’t hurt, now…”

“Good. You need to push.” Huh? But it’s only eleven and my mom and Brooklyn aren’t here yet. The stirrups are up and my legs are put in place. I’m completely happy again. No pain, no brain… I’m just chilling in a nice vast bubble. I can finally open my eyes enough to focus. Everything is so joyous in this little room. “What cha’ doing down there?” I ask the nurse. “I’m looking at your baby’s head.” My mom and Brooklyn come in the room just in time to see me start my pushing. Brooklyn sits next to me in the bed. “HEY Mommy!” She says. “Hey Brooklyn! You want to help Mommy push??” So she chants along with the nurse, “Pu-ish… Pu-ish, Mommy!” I push as hard as I can. “Harder!” the nurse keeps telling me. I think this is funny. I have no idea WHY it’s funny, but everything is comical. “I need a mirror so I can see!” I remember. So they put one there for me to see what’s going on. “WOE. LOOK how big my BUM is.” I didn’t know that the mirror is magnified so you get a better look. “I don’t see the head.”

Starling chimes in, “Well you can’t see the head good through the umbilical cord.” I nod, “Oh.. that’s what that pile of gray stuff is?” The nurse corrects us both. “No… that’s his head.” Starling and I exchange a look. He looks VERY worried. I look VERY drugged. It looks like a gray brain with no skull. “What’s wrong with his head?” I ask, not at all concerned that my child’s head looks like a bull dogs wrinkly face, but interested all the same. “Nothing’s wrong with it… it’s just the skin on top wrinkling up because his head is squished.” Starling doesn’t look the least bit convinced. “Brooklyn’s head did NOT do that.”

“If you can see his head… why don’t you just pull him out?” I ask the nurse. The nurse tells me I have to push again. I push, at least I GUESS I push… I really can’t tell that much. “Wow. That is really nasty.” I state at the mirror. I look at Brooklyn who is peering over at what the doctor and nurse are doing. “Do you want to be a doctor, Brooklyn?” She shook her head, “No,” she said. “PUSH!” I push and OUT plops a big gray, purply, glob. “Look its Brighton!” My mom says to Brooklyn. Brooklyn looks confused. “Cut the cord Daddy!” the doctor tells Starling. Blood shoots out everywhere. Brooklyn turns white as the glob approaches her. It kind of freaks me out, too. “Oh. Ok.” I say as they plop him in my arms. I can’t say that I thought he was beautiful right away… I was wondering why he was gray. He barely made a cry. And he didn’t look six pounds to me.

“You want to kiss him?” I teased Brooklyn. “No!” She practically shrieked. I laughed. They took him to the sink and wiped him off a little. “Ah that’s better. He’s human colored now.” I felt like a third person watching my meeting with my little man. I kept waiting for that BURST of emotion. But I was still just thinking everything was funny… funny that the nurse weighed Brighton and he was 8lbs 2 oz., one ounce bigger than Brooklyn, and Brighton measured 21 inches long, one inch longer than Brooklyn. And that it would be funny if Brighton had been born on the 13th instead of the 12th so he’d be one day earlier than Brooklyn. And then I thought it was funny that he looked JUST like Brooklyn did when she was born and yet just like Starling’s dad. And then I got tickled that he looked like a little old man.

I felt so terribly sleepy, but it didn’t seem like a good time to pass out. My dad came in with doughnuts, which looked delicious. But… suddenly I had to puke. SOOOO I threw up and threw up… And then I had a slight panic attack because I thought they were going to give me Finergan like with Brooklyn which knocked me out for TWO days. “I don’t want Finergan! I’ll just throw up. I don’t want to get knocked out.”

It was just so pleasant seeing my baby and knowing what the heck was going on. I don’t even remember seeing Brooklyn until two days after she was born. Brighton came out with a Johnson appetite and immediately latched on to me and gobbled milk hungrily. I asked Brooklyn, “What is Brighton doing?” She said, “Bri-uh-ton es drinking milk. Ay-and he es eating Mommy’s twisters.”

Slowly the drugs wore off and the day wore on. Tons of my friends and family came by to see my little dude. Everyone ate him up EXCEPT for Brooklyn. She was fine with all of US holding him but she did NOT want him to touch her. She was SOOO happy when Mia and Pi Paw decided to go home. She went to stay the night with them for the 2nd night, and where some kids would miss their parents, Brooklyn was joyous to be with her grandparents.

Starling and I crashed hard, exhausted. Brighton, who hadn’t really cried all day, whimpered when he got hungry. I couldn’t move because my back and bum were on fire. Starling handed Brighton to me and I fed him and we basically just slept in that position. We would have had a perfect rest if it wasn’t for the other 7 babies being born and the constant hustle and bustle of nurses in and out of our room. Brighton never wanted to be in his little bassinet… but so long as he was touching Mommy, he was perfectly content. And with the drugs out of my system and little Brighton in my arms I finally felt the bonding warmth and love that can only exist between a new mother and her newborn child. As I stroked his soft skin, his little cheek rose in a smile. And there in that cheek… a tiny little dimple. WOO HOO! He got ONE of my features. ONLY one, but I’m taking it and it brings me great JOY.

SOOOO then Brighton got taken away to get his bilirubon test and get his pencil sharpened. Starling and I tried to sleep again. We were snoozing OH so WELL when the LOUDEST rendition of Lullaby and Good Night started BLARING in my ear. “OH.. Brooklyn, you’re back… and Mia bought you a toy that plays music.” Brooklyn gleefully showed me how she could mash the foot and it played her favorite goodnight song. “Go to sleep Mommy,” she told me as she pressed the bear’s foot. “I WAS asleep Brooklyn.” Brighton jumped every time Brooklyn turned on the toy, which was every time it turned off.

They took Brighton again and Brooklyn started flipping out when the nurse began rolling him out the door. “Oh, brother will be back, sweetie…” the nurse told Brooklyn. “Es MY bear! I want my bear!” Oh. Take the baby brother. Give her the bear in his bassinet. A doctor came in and checked me out. “Do you want to go home or stay another night?” Starling took one look at the Hilton couch bed he’d been sleeping on and chirped, “GO HOME.” The doctor said, “Alright, well the Pediatrician will come by and look at your baby and then you are free to go.” The nurse said we could probably leave around noon. So we told everyone that we were getting discharged.

After FOUR, the Pediatrician FINALLY showed up to see Brighton. What does she say? Well, his biliruben was a bit high so she had to recheck his biliruben in the morning. So Starling went on to eat with his family at Brown Stones for Eric’s graduation dinner while I munched on unseasoned MEAT, some lima beans, and a dried out hash brown globby pile with no ketchup. Thank goodness Starling brought me back some Brown Stone’s. We hung out with more of our family and friends. Brooklyn finally held Brighton, but only for a few minutes and then she wanted Mia to “put him back in the basket.” Starling attempted to get her involved with Brighton and Brooklyn completely blocked him out. Every time we’d mention Brighton, she’d try to divert our attention elsewhere. Then my cousin, Shannon, showed up with her little baby Madison, and Brooklyn almost broke her neck climbing into the chair to hold Madison. She loved all over her, kissed all over her, played patty-cake with her… and then looked at Brighton and her eyes glazed over as she tried to pretend he wasn’t there. Poor thing.

Then Brighton cried. It was the softest little cry and Brooklyn said, “Little sweetheart is crying!” Little sweetheart? Then she ran to the bassinet where my mom had just momentarily set him down. (He kind of LOVES to be held. ALL the time). “What es Wu-RONG, buddy?” I said, “Brooklyn do YOU want to put his paci in his mouth?” She had to think a second. “Ye-es.” And so my mom lifted her up so she could do it. “THANK you! What a good big sister!” I told her. She smiled, but then was done with him. “Mia want to ride in tha stu-roller.” BUT we’re making a little headway with her.

She returned home with my parents again tonight. She’s loving it. They are REALLY going to appreciate sleep when she comes back to our house. My dad said that my mom finally went to sleep on the floor last night because Brooklyn was kicking them so much in the bed.

I’m just spending time cuddling my little man before we go home tomorrow because I know once we leave here, LIFE begins again. I don’t feel like facing it. It might be easier if I could WALK properly instead of hobble around like a wounded horse. But hopefully I’ll heal fast. Stitches weren’t part of my plan, but I got a ton of them. AGAIN. And even though I’m going home looking 6 months pregnant, it’ll still be nice to be back in my own bed. I’ll just miss having all the amazing nurses a button push away. More meds? More ice water? Any questions? They have been incredibly helpful and SO kind. And the doctors have been terrific. And then of course, my parents taking over Brooklyn has been a blessing. And tomorrow… all that goes away… Back to housework and neighbors and Charkley and Brooklyn plus baby. But I’ve never balked at a challenge before. Plus, I’ll have Starling there… although THAT’s another thing I’ll miss… Starling stuck in the same room with me. Tomorrow he’ll have the whole house to roam and can conveniently find a million other things to do than hand me things all day. (No wonder he wants to leave so bad! Lol). He’s been such a good daddy. I haven’t changed a single diaper yet. And Starling has been changing them four at a time. (haha- that really happened. I told Starling that Brighton was working one up. His little face was turning blood red and he was kicking those little legs. So when we THOUGHT he’d finished Starling cleaned him all up. While reaching for the second diaper out squirts a tinkle in the air and a chocolate squirt out the bottom. I laughed and laughed at Starling’s reaction, grabbing wipes and covering the little fountain while trying to catch the poop. “Never supposed to leave those little things unattended. Gotta keep all holes covered,” I laughed. He just shot me a look that said, “Shut your trap, woman. I got this.” He cleaned up the mess, changed the blanket out and THEN proceeded to put on the diaper, deliberately ignoring my advice. SQUIRT goes the tushi again. “Ahhh!” Starling bounced around trying to get wipes to catch it AGAIN. Finally, he just let him sit for a bit until he appeared to be completely done. Starling snapped on the diaper and was holding baby. Not a minute after he put the diaper on a little thunder erupted in Brighton’s tummy and then a HUGE thunder erupted in Brighton’s pants. I told Brighton I’d pay him off later. It was too funny).

Now Brighton and I are curled up in my bed and we’re going to attempt to get a good night’s rest so we can be ALL set for the big journey home tomorrow. Starling has no chance of getting a good sleep on that bar infested thing they call a couch. But he’s a trooper for staying. Wish us luck, especially Charkley. That poor dog only THOUGHT he’d been put on the back burner for Brooklyn… he’ll probably go into a deep depression.