I was nine weeks pregnant and my own mama was in the ICU the day of my first ultrasound.
I flinched at the cold gel, looked at my midwife and told her “We really need a win today.” She put that probe on my belly and there it was – that reassuring “whomp, whomp, whomp” filled the room, our first precious win in what was quick to become a season of loss.
Carrying our good news, my husband Kelvin and I flew to Washington that afternoon and told our families. My mama was in a hospital bed when I told her, too sick to give me a hug, but overjoyed all the same.
I’ve never met a woman stronger than my mama.
I’m not certain I ever will. Tiny in stature but enormous in hope, she refused to let anything beat her. When I was little, she was diagnosed with sarcoid, an autoimmune disease that her doctors could not make go away. As the years rolled by, sarcoid took a slow steady toll on her body, quietly creeping into her lungs, her liver, and her spleen. She had a lumpectomy, a lymphadenectomy, chemotherapy and radiation to beat breast cancer. She had her spleen removed as a result of the sarcoid. She was diagnosed with “smoldering” myeloma; she and her doctors quietly waited and watched for it to show its true colors.
That day I told my mama I was pregnant, she was in the middle of a four week stint in the ICU, her lungs bravely fighting a dangerous combination of flu, pneumonia, sarcoid and fungal infection. So we talked of death and life, diapers and baby names, fear and hope. We talked of trusting in what we can’t control. And I grieved and I celebrated that Spring, sharing our news, growing our baby, and desperately praying for my mama.
I’m a labor and delivery nurse, both a blessing and a curse when you’re pregnant with your own. I’d seen so many births, had so much time to decide what I wanted, what I hoped it would look like. But I’d also seen every wrong thing that could happen, shed too many tears to count in the OR, and knew every possible pregnancy or birth complication. I shared due dates with mamas who came into our triage, their babies struggling to live while I quietly and gratefully rubbed my own kicking belly.
Knowledge is power, but at times, it can also bring so much fear.
Over the next few months I tried to ride all the waves of worry and elation, fear and joy. Yes, I knew too much to be blissfully naïve, but I was also a first time mama, joyfully marveling over every new thing and scared like (maybe) you of my own unknowns. I wanted what many want – a healthy baby, an un-medicated delivery, the privilege of breastfeeding. I chose to see a midwife, as I had loved the care I had watched them give. But ultimately, like my patients, I knew I couldn’t control much – I just had to trust.
When I was seven months pregnant, my mama was diagnosed with lymphoma. It was cancer number three on a beat-up body and it quickly became clear that my baby would not have the privilege of knowing their Nana the way that I desperately wanted them to, that this was, finally, the thing that would beat her.
It was the most painful collision of two equally hard and beautiful truths. I was losing my mama and becoming a mama at the same time – a roller coaster of emotion unlike any I had ever known. How was I supposed to hold inexplicable joy and inexplicable grief at the same time? How could I be mama without my own mama? Would she meet my baby? Who would I call? Who would I cry to? Would my baby be okay if they only got a broken version of me?
I was staring at mamahood, sure to be the greatest challenge I had ever faced, painfully coming to terms with the likely truth that I was going to have to do it without her. So there I sat, amidst baby kicks and hiccups, a new crib and a guest room we would no longer need, grieving, desperate, grateful – again, I just had to trust.
AND LABOR BEGINS…
I was 39 2/7 weeks pregnant when I went into labor. It was 0226 and aside from my approaching due date, I had gone to bed with zero indication that labor was coming. Contractions woke me, quietly and painlessly, but clearly present. I lay in my bed, contemplating whether to wake Kelvin. I went to the bathroom, drank some water – all the things I told my patients to do, I did. And still they came – 8 minutes, 7 minutes. At some point I got out of bed, doing laps around our tiny house. I labored alone, quietly, for four hours. I walked and walked, making my body prove to my nurse’s head that it was real. 6 minutes, 5 minutes, 4 minutes – my labor pattern, it was textbook. Finally, I woke Kelvin, certain that our baby was coming.
He and I continued to labor together at home, the minutes both short and long as we waited for the urge to head to the hospital. Somewhere in those hours, I stopped thinking like a nurse, instead a woman in labor like anyone else. 4 minutes, 3 minutes. And then there it was, a contraction that felt different, that said, “time to go.” Kelvin questioned me once, as our birth instructor had told him to, but I insisted. “Trust me Kelvin, I want to go.”
I remember no car ride more than I remember that one. My husband’s eyes on me in the back seat, “good job babe, 18 minutes to go.” The seat belt he insisted on, far too tight, “We’re almost there, 8 minutes to go.” We pulled into my hospital, my workplace, at 10:00 am. I ran up the stairs, vaguely noticing the familiar faces sneaking smiles at me.
They placed me in triage and I was angry. I was certain I was in labor, certain I needed to be admitted. They checked my cervix once – I was 8 cm with a bulging bag of water. Things moved quickly then, as they do when a mama is that far along. They placed me on the monitors and my nurse brain briefly kicked back in – the baby’s heart tones were perfect, contractions regular. The monitors came off and we moved to our room. Kelvin and I continued to labor together, 3 minutes, 2 minutes. The room stayed quiet – I had been clear with my coworkers and friends that I wanted no one in the room except those who had to be there.
I remember pain, panic, fear, all emotions I’d been told I would feel as I transitioned, as I got closer. There were brief intermittent checks of the baby’s heart – the rhythm always steady. Hands and knees on the floor, I looked up at my midwife, “I think I have to push.” It was too soon, wasn’t it? I’d only been in active labor a few hours. “Okay, Laura. I trust you.”
My husband jumped up to use the restroom and I asked her to check my cervix. I was 10 cm, with only the bag of waters left. I asked her to break it; I was ready to be done. 12:10 pm – water everywhere, all over the floor, up my back. Meconium too – our baby was ready to come out. My husband came out the door, panic on his face. A lot can happen in two minutes.
I looked at him – “I’m complete. I need to push.” I pushed once on the floor, but I wanted to be in the bed. I panicked with the next push – that indescribable fullness and pain. My nurse, my husband, “Breathe Laura. Trust your body.”
Four more minutes, two more contractions, six more pushes. And then the baby was out and on my chest.
I looked to Kelvin – “A girl,” he said, tears streaming down his face. “We have a daughter.”
The time was 12:26pm. The day, my mama’s birthday.
Welcome Emmeline Jean. It was always supposed to be you for us.
– – – – –
Emmeline Jean, 7 lbs 4 oz and 20.5 inches long, was born at 12:26 pm on November 25th 2016, my own mama’s birthday. She was named after her Nana, Tammy Jean, who passed away five months after Emme was born. These years later, I continue to (try to) trust in what we can’t control. I will always be grateful for the precious gift of their shared birthday.
