1 Year Ago....

My bag was packed. His bag was ready.Mittens, booties, layettes, baby blankets were all nicely folded in his cabinet. I sat down and talked to Josh. I told him that 'mommy and daddy were going to the hospital and tomorrow, he would come visit mommy and baby brother would be there waiting for him.' That thrilled Josh to the bones. We left Josh with our nanny and headed off to the hospital.

In the car, I suddenly missed my mom and dad so much. I remember how excited they were when I was about to deliver Josh.

We got to the hospital and checked in. My nurses told me that my OB and anesthesiologist would be dropping by soon to check on me. I was told to eat my dinner and not have anything else after 12MN as my operation would be at 7am the next day. I started to freak out.

My OB checked on me. Told me everything I needed to know and then the anes came. She was an old doctor who had a very domineering voice. This freaked me out all the more.

I could not sleep. I tried to by reminding myself that this would be my VERY last night of straight sleep in the next 4 years - but I couldn't.

I opened my eyes around 5AM the next day and took a long hot bath. I scrubbed every inch of my body with my favorite body bath. I shampooed and conditioned my hair. I got back into my hospital gown and decided to stress out some more. When I got out of the bathroom, hubby was frantically fixing the baby's clothes. I saw his mittens, booties, tie sides, pants and baby blanket being prepared. And then hubby left the room. After a quick 30 seconds, Jet came back for the diapers. And then he left the room again.

I was about to sit down when hubby burst into the room and said "Oh my God Lou, were going to have a baby." And I was like, "uh huh, I told you about this approximately 8 months ago after I saw the double lines on the pregnancy test."

Boys sure do take a longer time to catch up.

Around 6:00AM, the hospital transport staff came and told me I was ready to be wheeled to the delivery room. At this point, I started to bite on my nails. I was so nervous. This was the first time I was going to be operated on in a normal calm state. My first c-section was a blur to me. I was 40 weeks and 1 day, I was in labor for 14 hours, water bag broke 6 hours before and I was so drugged and groggy from all the pain killers that all I wanted at that point was for them to cut me up and get the baby out.

So yeah, I got on the stretcher - or whatever you call it- nervous as hell. They wheeled me down while hubby walked behind. The stretcher stopped in front of what seemed like the nurse's station, they verified my name, procedure to be done and what operating room I belonged to. Oh my goodness, at that point I was praying for killer contractions. Nada.

They wheeled me into thie very white, tiled room that smelled like antiseptic, nurses in their scrub suites and that very very large bright shiny metal light. They transferred me to the operating table and put my oxygen mask on. I wanted to die right there. They started hooking me on to many other things to monitor all sort of stuff. While waiting there, I was thinking of reasons to tell my OB to postpone the whole big event. I had it all laid out, I was going to tell her to postpone it since I wanted to wait for the contractions to set in until they became killer ones. Then I would rush to the hospital, never mind if there was no room available and go through and emergency c-section just like the good ol' times.

Then the anesthesiologist walked in. She started to brief me on the whole drug package she would be giving me, how she would be administering it and if I may add, assured me my memory would not be affected. And right before I was about to inform her that I was bailing out, my baby's pediatrician came in who happened to be my Mom's bestfriend since highschool and my pediatrician when I was a baby. She held my hand and asked me how I was doing. I could not control myself so I asked her if we could postpone the whole thing. Everyone in the delivery room stopped what they were doing. Looked and me. And stared. Oops. I guess not huh? So I decided to cry. Hah.

Then my OB came. She saw me and asked what was wrong. So I told her. Then she laughed. Then she calmly talked to me and told me everything would be OK. My OB is a very close family friend as well. She saw me through my miscarriage and my first full term deliver. We go to the same church as well. So she asked me if I wanted her to pray with me and I said yes. She asked the nurses to leave first. So we prayed together with the anes and the pedia. And then it was go time.

Still scared, the anes told me to go into fetal position. Then she started to feel certain portions of my spine, then I felt the prick. And then another and then another. Quickly after the 3rd and last prick the nurses quickly helped me get back into the flat lying position and put up my hospital gown just so that it was covering half of my upper body. I was so awake. But my legs were starting to feel heavy. The anes kept pricking me on my legs and then on my tummy and she kept asking me if I felt anything. Everytime she would ask me, I would say that I felt every single bit of it - because I didn't want the operation to start - even if I could not feel it anymore. I thought I was fooling them but I soon heard my OB saying something like "first layer" and then I asked the peed, who was still holding my hand what was happening and she told me to just relax.

While they were cutting me up - eight layers of my skin - the whole operating staff were calmly telling stories. Man, such composure! All this time I was looking at the big round shiny metal lights and could partially see my bloody tummy. And then I heard the nurses go "ahhh, how cute." Oh my gosh I knew he was almost out. Then my OB said "Lou I thought he was a smaller baby than Josh but he has a big head, hold on." And then I felt my body being shaken really really hard. I started to grunt - but no pain. Then my OB told me to breath through my mouth and that I would be feeling a bit of pressure. And then.......

Uuwaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!

Dayshaun Karl, born May 27, 2006 at 7:25 AM.