Colevault.com

OK, so if the birth of my daughter isn’t enough to spur me to write a blog post I might as well give up and shut this thing down right now. So here goes. After writing in my most recent post that I would be posting more often, and then not posting anything for 11 months, I am finally putting fingers to keyboard again. And the reason is Chelsea Naomi Cole. She was born on Memorial Day, May 28, at exactly 3:30 in the afternoon. She could not have chosen a more convenient date and time. Susan’s parents own a small grocery store in San Francisco and they are closed about 8 days of the year, Memorial Day being one of them. So Susan’s Mom was able to meet us at the hospital right as the labor was ramping up. And because of the holiday we were able to initiate Plan A for taking care of Justin during the birth, which was Uncle JJ, who had the day off work. (Plan B was to drop Justin off on Telegraph Avenue on the way to the hospital with $10 and a sippy cup of milk.)

Susan’s water broke at about 2:30 in the morning and 15 minutes later Susan is kicking me. But not to tell me her water had broken. Justin had climbed out of his crib and was standing in the hallway outside our bedroom door. (Did he somehow sense that the baby was coming?) Susan was awake because she was enjoying a pleasant soak in amniotic fluid, so she heard Justin open his door, and since I am the official “put Justin back to bed when he climbs out of his crib” parent she woke me up so I would handle it. Apparently I wasn’t too happy about being woken up and in my comatose state I told her to “stop it” and “leave me alone”. Once I figured out what was going on I took care of J-Bug and came back to bed. That’s when Susan told me that she “thinks” her water had broken. Not very interested, I went back to sleep.

Fast forward to 7:00 am, I wake up and Susan is breathing heavily. “Are you having contractions?” “Yes, quiet, don’t talk to me!” OK, it’s go time! Time to mobilize! Email to Jason telling him to call me as soon as he wakes up. Email to work saying I ain’t coming in this week. Phone call to the doula telling her to cancel her Memorial Day plans. Emails to family letting everyone know today is the day.

It turns out Susan never went back to sleep after the water broke, even though the contractions didn’t start until around 4:30. She was too excited and not terribly comfortable. But she let me sleep while she was starting to labor. If the roles were reversed I’m sure I would have kicked her and/or moaned loud enough to wake the neighbors, while screaming “Help me! I’m dying!” Thankfully, unlike me, Susan is not a complete coward.

Anywho, Jason calls at 7:40 after getting my email. He has inexplicably woken up early after a long day at Sam’s in Tiburon and a late night out in SF. Needless to say, babysitting a 2 year old all day is not on anyone’s short list of favorite hangover remedies, but Jason valiantly arrived by 10:00 to whisk Justin away. Justin was already getting anxious seeing Susan in pain during the contractions so we were happy to know he’d be blissfully unaware of the day’s events while enjoying a fun day with Uncle JJ. They ended up going on a hike in the Oakland Hills and enjoying a pediatrician-recommended lunch of Nation’s cheeseburgers, fries, and a milkshake. Thanks Jase!

Our awesome doula Virginia arrived shortly after Jason left, which meant that I was suddenly good for nothing other than making sure all our stuff was in the car. I had been timing the contractions and by that point they were pretty consistently 5 minutes apart and getting stronger. Virginia was here for less than half an hour before we decided we had better head for the hospital.

We arrived at the hospital around 11:00 am and by the time we were through triage and in the delivery room it was 11:45. The labor was obviously difficult and painful for Susan, seemingly more so than with Justin, possibly because it was much shorter and therefore more concentrated, but like with Justin Susan again did it without an epidural or any medication at all for that matter. It’s tough to see your wife in extreme pain but we had the same team in place as with Justin (sans Auntie Loraine) and I knew we were going to get it done and I knew Susan was going to do it completely naturally again, despite the one moment when she looked right in my eye and said “I need help, I can’t do it, I want an epidural.” I asked her if she would regret it later and she said yes, and then I joked that if she really wanted help we could wheel her right down to the OR for a C-Section. At that point Jeri the midwife was not in the room and we had to frantically track her down in order to get the ball rolling on the epidural, but by the time she returned that particularly bad contraction was over and Jeri’s presence and confidence-instilling coaching was enough to get Susan back down off the ledge. We continued without drugs. And I’m pretty sure my C-section crack did nothing to help the situation.

So there was some more pain, more contractions, a long hot shower, some pushing, some screaming, more pushing, more pain, the appearance of some baby hair, more pushing, excruciating pain, then a head, then one last big push (and scream) to get the shoulders out, and finally a slimy Crisco-covered blob lying on Susan’s chest. Hours of intense pain were instantly wiped away and replaced with a huge smile and tears of joy. We had a daughter!

As with Justin I cut the cord, gave her her first bath, put her on the scale, and put her first diaper on. She weighed 7 pounds 15 ounces and was 20 inches long, the IDENTICAL measurements as Justin two years previous. They were also both born on minor holidays (Justin on St. Patrick’s Day) and Chelsea looks a lot like Justin did at birth, but with less hair. (Although it’s fairly universally agreed that Chelsea is cuter than Justin was at birth. )

If you’re having a baby and are on the fence about hiring a doula, let’s just say that hospital food sucks and after a long day (or night) of birthing a baby everyone will be very hungry, and guess who volunteered to run over to Whole Foods to pick up a bunch of deli sandwiches and salads for everyone? Thank you Virginia!

And of course between the doula and me, about 400 pictures were taken. Check the Chelsea gallery link at the top of the page, and don’t worry I’m not posting any of the nasty ones, though I did get some nice ones of the midwife holding up the placenta if anyone wants to order an 8 x 10. Mmmmmm, yummy!

So just another day at the office for the Cole family. We’ll remember Memorial Day 2007 forever. Big thanks to Virginia, Jeri, Grandma Park, Uncle JJ, and all the nursing staff at Alta Bates in Berkeley who helped us bring this baby home. Susan and Chelsea stayed two nights at the hospital and now we’re all home and the baby is eating and sleeping very well.

And Chelsea, welcome to this crazy thing called life. Susan, Justin and I will do everything we can to help you through it and make it fun and fulfilling. We are so glad you’ve joined us.