Part I.
Part II.
"Should we move Mary Jane?" Mark asks. Our three-year-old daughter is sleeping only about fifteen feet away, in the dark bedroom, on the pink "girl sheets" we bought her a couple of weeks ago to encourage her to relocate to the twin bed that's always pushed up next to ours.
We're both hoping she sleeps through what's about to happen. "No, don't move her -- leave her alone." I am moaning a little through these contractions.
Somewhere in there, Hannah arrives -- I see her peek around the closet door, and the rest of her follows. "You're wearing the birth overalls!" I say, pleased. She wore those to at least one of my other births -- they are black, a fuzzy knit. All sorts of slime will just wipe right off! "Did you hear -- the water broke already?" She's beaming. I'm glad to see her.
Also somewhere in there, V____ has gotten her things all up the stairs. They are a trail leading back to the warmth and light of downstairs -- some are in the bathroom with me, some in my closet passage, some further out in the bedroom. Probably more in the kitchen. I don't know, I'm always in the deepest part of the house, being the laboring mother and all. I know what's supposed to be there.
"Should we move MJ?"
"No," I answer. Someone closes the outer door leading to the bedroom, and my world shrinks: a bathroom, a closet. The work is beginning.
The floor is slippery under my feet. I want the bath mat moved in front of the door frame; it is done. I stand on the bath mat, place one hand on each side of the door frame. I stand in the door, lean on the frame for the contraction. And again, and again.
Time passes. I begin to feel a little lightheaded. I need calories. Mark brings me a bowl of plain yogurt, a glass of grape juice, a bagel. I frown at the bagel and wave it away, but I eagerly take the bowl. I glimpse myself in the bathroom mirror, hurriedly spooning yogurt into my mouth before the next contraction can hit me, and I almost laugh -- I'm eating over the sink in my pajamas, like a rushed weekday morning. Time to get to work! I set the scraped-clean bowl down with a clink on the counter, brace myself against the door, and work through the next contraction.
I growl through them ("Should we move MJ?" "No.") and lean my head forward and turn it from side to side as the pain grows, sharpens, subsides. Yeah, it hurts now. I try bending my knees a little, try to open up and feel the descent and the widening. I know that it is possible to fight each contraction, to tighten and hold in. I want to make sure that when I feel the tightening happen, I do the thing that is opposite to that. It seems to take a fairly strong effort of will, of concentration -- it isn't coming naturally to me to open up right now. I keep waiting for the involuntary pushing to take over but it hasn't started yet. So I don't push. I've learned my lesson.
V_____ reminds me not to push anyway. It doesn't irritate me -- she has a calm and soothing voice, and is gentle. She does not touch me. She reminds me to wait and let my body do the pushing when the time comes. I know that somewhere between "tighten" and "push" there is a thing that is just "let go and open." That's the place I am supposed to be.
My brain is a little too busy, scratching at the doorposts to be let out. I can tell I'm still doing a lot of thinking about what I'm "supposed" to do, a lot of expecting and waiting for recognizable signposts that will tell me how far down this road I've gone, how far there is to go. One contraction -- it is only one -- comes in which it occurs to me: What if this goes on for a really long time? Hours and hours? And this sudden thought frightens me badly, but only for a moment. After the next contraction it is gone and I am just living in one contraction at a time.
At the back of my mind I am still worried about the sticky shoulders. It doesn't come forward to my attention because at this point there is nothing more I can do about it. I have made my decisions. I am in my own home; there is no going anywhere else now. I have called my people. J____ is not here; we called her too recently for her to get here on time. V____ is here and she is the one who will be helping me, if it comes to that. I just have to get there and find out what happens.
No, that's not true -- I can help. I can bend and stretch. And I do. I try a very deep squat, clinging to the door frame, and that feels the best of all -- I can feel the baby descending. "Almost there, you're bulging," I hear V____ report.
Perfect! I will do a lot of deep squats, I decide. "You're giving him lots of room," encourages Hannah, and it's just what I want to hear. And then I feel it -- the push expands like a bubble, a globe, from the center of my chest, down through my body, up through my throat in a low groan that rises to a roar. I sink almost down to the floor. That's good, good! I'll do it again.
Except I can't, because now my legs are all jelly. Never have I felt them so tired, shaky, aching. But that's what I want to do! That's what I have to do! I stand up, wobbly, and order people around: Mark, you get behind me and support me on your knees -- Hannah -- in front, I'll hold your hands. I can feel Mark behind me changing position, and I remember I have a little stepstool -- "Hannah, the stepstool, up on the shelf, grab it, give it to me." I pass it back to Mark. "Here, you sit on this -- spread your knees apart -- good --" and I try to sit back into Mark's lap, leaning on him, a supported squat with my knees wide apart. I still feel kind of unstable but I am almost in the same position as before, and it seems to work okay. But I can't seem to trust that Mark won't drop me, and I give up after just one or two contractions and go to hands and knees.
To be continued...
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