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Happy Birthday
Sunday, April 14, 2002
Jean and I both woke up early on April 4. I usually get up around five or five-thirty, but Jean usually sleeps as late as I can let her go. We talked for a while -- who knows how long -- and Jean told me she was feeling labor pains again. She'd felt them off and on over the last few weeks, so we weren't alarmed. But after a few contractions, we decided to start timing them. Nine minutes apart. Regular. The clock had begun ticking. With Colette, Jean went 30 hours from the first regular contractions to birth. We knew with baby two things would progress quicker, but with no real way to know, we both decided to take the day as a normal one until circumstances changed. I told Jean she should call her doctor to let her know things appeared to be starting; Jean didn't think that was necessary yet. I persisted, and Jean agreed to call once she was in the office. We got up when we heard Colette. Jean went down the hall first. When I came in, Colette was excited. "Happy Birthday Daddy!" Throughout breakfast, conversation with Colette went back and forth between her excitement about our birthday and our review with her about how we might not pick her up today, that Brian or Alice might, and that she would play with Madelyn and Griffin at their house until I came to pick her up. Colette acknowledged the plan, but was much more interested in my birthday. Once we were all settled at work and school, Jean called to tell me that she'd contacted her doctor, that they were glad she had called, and that they wanted her to come in (they want to check you once you have regular contractions in 9 minutes or less). Unfortunately, Jean's doctor was off for the day, so we made an appointment for 2:00 with another doctor at Henrico Doctor's Hospital. With that in mind, we both got back to work. Jean's co-workers were amazed that she was working through labor, but that's just Jean. We arrived at the doctor's office on time, and were quickly taken to a room where we waited in the heat for more than an hour. When the doctor finally saw us, Jean's contractions were seven minutes apart. The doctor confirmed that Jean was in early labor, but he told us that the hospital's Women's Pavillion was full up. He suggested we go home and rest until contractions were four or five minutes apart. So we went to Colette's day care and picked her up. We came home and had my birthday dinner. Or at least we tried. As dinner went on, the contractions were more painful and getting closer. By the time we'd finished pizza, Jean was having a rough time. I told her to call the doctor again, but she insisted we have the cake and open presents before she call. I pulled out the cake, we sang happy birthday, and Jean started to cry as the next contraction hit. That was it, I told her. We're going to the hospital. She insisted that Colette get a sliver of cake (which she did), and I gathered our stuff. We were on our way. We called Brian, who agreed to meet us at the hospital. We let Jean off at the entrance to the Women's Pavillion, then Colette and I parked the car. On our way into the Women's Pavillion, I spoke with Brian again briefly. By the time we got inside and to Labor and Delivery Room 10, the hospital staff had already gotten Jean hooked up with an IV and had broken her water. She was four centimeters dilated, and hoping for an epidural soon. Unfortunately it was more than an hour before she had the epidural, and a little longer than that before the pain backed off. With Jean stabilized, we agreed I should head outside with the cell phone to call her family and mine. I called Jean's mom in Virginia Beach and gave her the details, then did the same in a call to New York, where my mother was staying with my sister Colette and her twins (Aidan and Liam, born March 20). One last quick call to Brian, who was just leaving the grocery store where the four of them (Brian, Madelyn, Griffin and Colette) had gone after leaving the hospital, when I went back inside. When I got back to Jean's room, she had the telephone in her bed. She'd been trying to call me: it was time to have the baby. In less than half an hour she'd become fully dilated. Good thing we got the epidural in! The doctor arrived, and after only ten minutes of pushing, we met our daughter. Lela Backes Creamer, named after her maternal great-grandmother, was born at 8:40 PM on April 4. She weighed seven pounds, ten ounces, and had APGAR scores of nine and nine. Unlike her sister, Lela had only peach fuzz for hair, but it was distinctly strawberry blond. Just like her mother. In fact, as much as Colette bears a resemblence to me, Lela looks like her mother. Since we've come home, we've looked at Jean's baby pictures and it appears the infant in the images has been transported through time and into our arms. We made our phone calls to our family and to Brian and Alice (Alice had taken Colette back to our house to watch The Little Mermaid). We spent the rest of an hour or so getting to know our new little girl. Because she was delivered so quickly -- two hours from our arrival at the hospital -- her head remained round. Her feet aren't big, but they're long: I suspect we've got another tall baby on our hands. She keeps her arms close into her chest most of the time, but loves to stretch them high every so often; she keeps her legs still balled up. Now, more than a week later, she's waking once or twice each night, falling back to sleep after a quick diaper and bottle. During the day she wants to be held all day. She looks around as far as her little eyes can see, soaking up all the sights. Colette adores her sister. We'd prepared her for months, but it all clicked for her when I brought her to the hospital on Friday. We let her hold Lela, and she kissed Lela on the forehead. Now, when there's a diaper to be changed, Colette wants to watch if not assist. She loves to play around Lela, and continues to bring balloons over to her sister's Moses basket. Jean is recovering well. Short births apparently make for quicker recoveries. She takes Lela (and Colette when she's home) for walks around the block, and we sit in the back yard and watch as Colette plays Star Wars or Peter Pan. I can't believe she's here. The birth was so quick, which is great, but the event itself passed so quickly that we seem to have gone from pregnancy to baby in a flash. I also don't think I've absorbed that she shares my birthday. With a due date of April 7 (April 13 by ultrasound), I'd known that it was possible for her to be born on my birthday, but I just assumed the odds were against it. Even when we were going to the hospital after my abbreviated birthday dinner, I assumed labor would take until sometime in the early morning of April 5. Life happens at its own pace, though, and Lela is the best birthday present I've ever had.
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