This is a reprint of a Facebook post I wrote three years ago.  Teddy turned 14 on February 23rd and I struggled to write something meaningful that I hadn’t already said in the past few years. So I decided to repost two of my past entries because they still seem significant, timely, and entertaining.  I’ll post the next one tomorrow.  I hope you enjoy.  As always, thanks for reading.  

Eleven years ago YESTERDAY my water broke. Of course we called all the requisite people to let them know there would be a baby soon.

“I’m gonna win the pool” my brother-in-law stated.

“Ummm..noooo…you picked TOMORROW as the day” I replied.

“It could happen.”

It was 9am. To this day I blame him for my 15 hours of labor. I hope he enjoyed his $20.

Like any true Greek girl my biggest concern of the day was eating. The one thing I did remember from the countless books and classes was that once we got started there would be no food allowed. I should eat. Should I eat? What should I eat? They won’t let me eat! I’m starving! If my dad were around he would have said (like he always did to me and my sisters when we complained we were starving), “You girls could go three weeks without eating and you’d be fine.”  Clearly this “new age” idea that dads had an influence on daughters’ body image was not for him.

Midway through a day of nothing but boredom, Ted exclaimed with a sigh, “I’m so hungry!” I don’t think I need to explain what happened next, but unbelievably it ended with him bringing a hearty meal back to the labor room and eating it right in front of me.

The day passed with nothing happening and the hours drifting by.  They gave me pitocin and nothing happened.  I had an epidural and nothing happened. Shift-one nurse left and shift-two nurse arrived. Ted decided to risk his life again by complaining at about 4pm that he was “tired.”  One look from me and he realized that if he wanted to be alive to see his child born it was a good idea for him to just stop talking altogether.

Things finally started to happen when the second nurse left and the head of the Gestapo arrived. Third-shift nurse was terrifying. Apparently she thought that by screaming at me that baby would come out faster. When she raised her hands and they were covered in blood like some sort of horror flick she finally decided it was time to call the doctor.

“Looks like we’re going to have to do a C-section. Your hips are just too small for a baby to come through.”

Hips. Too. Small. Was I delirious?

Woo hoo! I have small hips! Can I get that in writing please?

But then the cold chill of reality hit. No, not that I was going to be cut open. But that my hips were small. INTERNALLY. I was not “big-boned.”  Which could mean only one thing about my hips EXTERNALLY: My dad was right. I really could go three weeks without eating and not starve.

Panic set in. A C-section? This was not in the plan. I had at NO POINT considered a C-section as even a possibility. My sisters’ had seven babies between them and hadn’t even needed epidurals. For crying out loud, one doctor had actually told Chris to reach over and pull her own baby out! Why did this stuff only happen to me? First braces, then glasses, now this!

I looked at Ted and shouted “They never told us what to do about a C-section!!”

“Yes they did. You just always skipped over those parts in the books and videos.”  Dear Lord, did he really just say that? This man was either the bravest or stupidest man who ever lived. I vowed right then and there to raise my new son differently. He will NOT make stupid comments when his wife is in labor or at any other time of his marriage.

It was 11:35pm. This doctor had 25 minutes to get this baby out so Bill would NOT win this pool and come out on top. Well, obviously it took longer. And I’m sure that at this point I am supposed to say that “all the bad memories of the day were wiped away.” But as you have just read, clearly they were not.

But what I will say is that he was beautiful and perfect and worth the day and every horrible and wonderful day since then. Happy birthday my dear, sweet, sarcastic, must-have-the-last-word first-born: This is the story of your birth.