D is for Delivery Day

When you mention the subject of pregnancy or birth to any woman who has had kids, she is happy to share her story. This true whether she's had nineteen kids or one, or if it happened last year or seventy years ago. I'm no different. Today, I'm going to share the my delivery day story for my first child, Wally. (But don't worry. This is really a story about getting to the hospital rather than the details of the actual delivery.)

23 hours after it all started, Wally was delivered.

Picture it. It was 5 AM on a warm April day in New Orleans. I had just gotten up to go to the bathroom (again) and I seemed to keep peeing even though I was trying not to. Hmm. Maybe my water just broke, but I wasn't sure. My due date was three weeks away and I didn't seem to have any other signs of labor. I woke up my husband, Ward, and we discussed what to do. We were not sure, but decided rather than bother anyone at that early hour, we'd just show up at the doctor's office when it opened and get the doctor's opinion.

However, a funny thing happened on the way to the doctor's office. It was the day of the Crescent City Classic--a large race that had many of the streets blocked including the one that we needed to cross to get to the doctor's office. So we sat in the car, with me looking hugely pregnant, and listened to a police officer tell us that he couldn't let us cross even if I were having a baby. What to do next?

Ward decided to try to figure out a back way to the hospital. I had a breastfeeding class scheduled for there in a couple of hours anyway. We finally made it to the class and at the end, I told one of the instructors that I thought my water had broken that morning. She got excited and told me to go to the maternity ward.

I was admitted but still nothing more than random contractions. The doctor showed up about an hour later. He said he was very glad we called, because he was in the middle of his son's cello recital and was happy to leave. Because of risk of infection, the baby needed to come today so labor was induced. And then the fun began...

I realize that this story is probably of not much interest to anyone but me, but I had a very hard time thinking of anything to write about for the letter D.