Birth Story: Dog Walker

It was the spring of 1993. I was pregnant with the Dog Walker and my whole life felt broken. I was miserable on so many levels. I was incredibly sick, but way too stubborn to allow myself to throw up (sorry, I mentioned throw up again!). My insurance had changed and I couldn’t visit my OB/GYN that had delivered my last two babies. So I was stuck going to a different doctor recommended by one of my neighbors. 

On my first visit two things happened that made me really not like him. The first was that he told me if he were not the doctor on call when I went into labor, one of his partners would do the delivery. Great, just what I wanted, some strange man I had never met before assisting me with one of the most important moments of my life! The second thing was in his opinion routine, in my opinion absolutely wrong.  Every woman knows that at the first exam you can just expect a vaginal and with every other doctor I knew, a nurse came in to assist. So I am lying on the table, completely vulnerable with a man I’ve barely known for three minutes and he snaps on the gloves. I offer, "Aren’t you going to have the nurse come in?" He looked surprised, then said, "I can’t afford to pay people to stand around." I must have looked shocked because he then grudgingly said, "…but if it makes you more comfortable…" I nodded my head quickly and he opened the door and called for the nurse. After that, no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t trust him. 

 At nearly three months I started bleeding. The doc told me that it was the stress of working full time and having four other kids at home. If I wanted to carry this baby to full term, I needed to cut back. Since I couldn’t give away any of the kids, I approached my boss with my request. For several months I needed to go to part time. This messed up so many things…not just my pay (which we really needed), my 401K, my insurance…you get the idea. But we couldn’t chance losing this little guy because of money. The decreased activity worked and at six months I slowly started working more hours only most of them were from home. 

I loved working from home! As a senior technical writer, almost everything I did was easily done from my computer at home. If I needed to talk with someone I could use the phone or run up to the office. It was so nice to not feel "broken" anymore. I had a friend in my office (still my best girl friend!) who was pregnant with me. I was due a few days before her, but when she delivered her little guy, I was still miserable and huge. My doctor offered to induce, but his free day was November 1, and that was Bossy’s birthday so I declined. The next time he was free was November 4, so we scheduled that day. 

9 lbs 3 oz

We showed up at the hospital at the crack of dawn and they prepped me and we hunkered down to wait. It was slow going for a long time. They kept cranking up the Pitocin and nothing was happening. After many long hours, my little guy finally began descending into the birth canal. The doc showed up and all was ready except that my babe appeared to be stuck. We were already guessing that he was pretty big since we had gone three days past when the doc first suggested we induce. 

When the heart rate started to drop, the doctor reached for the forceps. They looked like two giant serving spoons about the size of a little head. I guess they scared my Dog Walker into crowning because the doctor made some crack about using them to play a tune while banging them together since we didn’t need them anymore. My boy was beautiful, with black hair and huge brown eyes which is a little strange since I have blue and my sweetie has hazel, but Grandpa has brown eyes so we figure they skipped a generation. 

Besides the fact that he was healthy and perfect, my company decided that working at home full time would be fine for me. I only had to go in the office for about an hour a week for a coordinating meeting. And by the time number six came along, my insurance was different again so I could return to my favorite doctor. It’s kind of amazing how life fixes itself and turns out just like it should. 

Clearly getting a lot of work done with Drama Queen and Dog Walker helping.