Nov
17
Obstacle Course
Filed Under Baby Book
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Little Red Submarine
I felt my first paternal pang at twenty nine. Just woke up one day thinking it’d be cool to have a child. My life has been rich in adventure and creativity and I’ve delighted in a posse of family and friends I love more than a fat kid loves cake. But what is getting harder and harder to find is inspiration and surprise. THAT’s why I wanted a child. Fourteen years later that pang was a need. We both needed it.
One thing Jodi and I can be thankful for was our ability to get pregnant. Staying pregnant was another story, but I could whisper the word ejaculation when Jodi was ovulating and it was game on. Five months after the third miscarriage we were ready to try again and got pregnant the fourth time in a year and a half. This pregnancy was different than the others. The high risk fertility docs never landed on a definitive problem so they had us take precautionary measures. Jodi now had the pleasure of sticking a needle into her belly every evening before bed, a blood thinner, in case clotting was the issue.
I injected the first shot, but it stung, so from then on she stuck herself. Just pushed that needle into her middle without hesitation night after night. Sometimes it hurt alot. Often it did not. But no matter how you slice it, inserting a needle in your stomach each night before bed SUCKS.
As she did in all the pregnancies, Jodi prepared the vessel thoroughly. She practiced yoga steadily. No sushi. No stinky cheeses. No deli meats. No booze. Ouch. Swallowed prenatal vitamins and a handful of pills every morning: folic acid, baby aspirin, healthy supplements. We rented a home Doppler heart beat monitor for those ‘more than a few’ times when Jodi just wasn’t sure and had to hear the little gallop right then. When her nerves went haywire it was hard for me not to try to cheer her up, to fix her … because, as I learned, that is what men do, we want to fix it. But the woman just wants to have it acknowledged and lived with. I failed that test repeatedly but, even a chimp learns not to eat poison ivy, and eventually I got it.
At our twenty week checkup the ultrasound tech asked if we wanted to know the sex. I come down on the “prefer not to know” side of this one. It seems to be one of life’s truly profound surprises. But Jodi had to know.
“Well, here are the labia. Looks like you’re having a girl” said the tech, pointing at something pixelated. Could she really see the labia? I guess this was no time to split hairs about plumbing. Wow! A girl. I thought it was a girl. I wanted a girl. Figured I already understood how men worked. I would learn the essence of women from a daughter. For several minutes I daydreamed about daddy and his little girl. And her pigtails and cute little toothless smile. And I’m walking her down the aisle when I hear, “wait, I think I see a penis!” …………………………………………………. Record Scratch!!
We soldiered through steady checkups and the shots and the pervasive angst, and you grew and flourished in your water world, kicking at night like a mini Maradona. At our 28 week checkup Jodi was feeling slight contractions and the high risk doc told us her cervix had shortened which could indicate early labor. We both felt sick in our guts when he ordered Jodi to spend the night at the hospital to run some tests. This could not be happening again!
“Gravity is the enemy,” Dr. McCay told us the following day as they sent us home with instructions that Jodi was not to get up off the couch except to shower once a day and use the toilet. Bed rest until further notice. She was not in immediate danger of labor however everybody was erring on the side of caution based on our history. Further notice ended up being two weeks later when they told Jodi it was bedrest for the duration of the pregnancy. She was 30 weeks. Ten to go.
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Comments
7 Responses to “Obstacle Course”
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I absolutely love these. Look forward to each entry.
Grammie
I’ve been inspired. You’ll see how later, meanwhile, enjoying the opportunity to be the fly on the wall. And I still ache for it.
xxoo
Ditto, Grammie!
I actually HEARD the record scratch! Love it!
Stuart, hon ~ do you want to know how wonderful these stories are? I haven’t seen you in (what??) the 35 years since elementary school, and I have never met your wife; yet I’ve found myself drawn into your lives, your pains, your sorrows and triumphs.
This is great work!!
: Christy
It’s fun to hear about life through your eyes after living it all with Jodi! Now that I’m prego, I can’t imagine being on bedrest that early—yeeks. You guys are anmazing!
Hmmm….a manservant! I like that image! Jodi deserves no less!
It has been fascinating for me to learn your story after the fact, now that you have sweet baby. I wish we could have been there for you both more during the grieving, but I know you both needed to do that in your own ways. Our thoughts were with you constantly, though.