Today is Moss' due date, and since he was kind enough to grace us with his presence ten days ago, I guess it's time to get my version of the birth down before it becomes too hazy to reflect properly.
For me, things started on the morning of July 15. I was getting ready to head to Mountain View for Google breakfast with Calla and then up to San Francisco to hand off my work in anticipation of Moss' arrival when she informed me that I should probably stay home. Little did I know, she'd been having contractions since 10 PM the night before. I was aware of the Braxton-Hicks contractions she'd been experiencing the week or so prior, but was kind of taken aback by the fact that she'd chosen not to share the early onset of labor. I can't say I didn't appreciate her reasoning: at least one of us would be well-rested for the hours ahead.
We headed to Bay Area Maternity for an early check up. Calla had been scheduled for her weekly exam Tuesday, but things were happening and it couldn't wait. We went thought the normal set of tests -- finding Moss' heartbeat, taking blood pressure and weight, etc -- but when Maria Gruelich, our midwife, did the cervical check, she discovered that Cal had already dilated to 3-4 cm and her cervix was 90% effaced and "paper thin". It was official: this kid was coming in a matter of hours whether we were ready or not.
We weren't... at least not the way we'd hoped. For the previous several days, we'd been doing all that last minute staff that we'd been putting off for days or weeks: hanging pictures, cleaning up rooms, trashing stuff we didn't need, and getting Moss' gear ready to go. We hadn't even packed our go bag until the night before. Calla's sudden interest in getting the nest ready was certainly an indicator of things to come, but we figured we had a little more time.
Driving back home from BAM, the contractions continued to come every 6 to 15 minutes. While uncomfortable, things weren't yet intense. Having been up most of the night before, Cal decided to lie down for a bit. I joined her and together (through her continued contractions) we slept soundly until a little after 2:30 that afternoon. I have no doubt her body, anticipating what was to follow, let her get some rest with the knowledge that it would be sorely needed.
That was the last time were just a pair in no one's but our own company. We were hours away from what we knew would be a permanent change in our relationship, our lives, and our responsibilities. It was a quiet afternoon, regularly punctuated by Cal's contractions, and I couldn't help but feel, when considering whether there were things I needed to do for myself or us before becoming a father, that if there were any things I'd felt really strongly about I would have done it by then. It was a very peaceful feeling.
We called our doula, Heather up and she joined us for the remainder of the day. We haven't been alone since.
Things progressed smoothly if slowly for the rest of the afternoon. Heather was instrumental. She was able to suggest what we should do to keep things moving and Calla comfortable. I admit I was a little skeptical about how useful she would be. Her classes were very informative, and despite the fact that I fell asleep in all but one of them, I kind of figured I'd gotten what we needed out of them. I was not correct. She had Calla walking when she needed to walk, working on the exercise ball when that was more helpful, and changing positions to help move things along. Her being with us made it possible for me to be more attentive to Cal's needs as she took the lead in guiding Cal through many of her contractions. As I took a more active role throughout the afternoon, her earlier actions gave me a solid model from which to work.
The contractions continued regularly but at shorter intervals until 8:30 that night. Calla's discomfort was picking up, and then suddenly she informed us that her water had broken. The fluid was thankfully clear, continuing our remarkably good luck with this pregnancy. This was a major turning point. As Heather prepared Calla for the upcoming sharp increase in pain and uncertainty, I got the car ready and the house prepped. We hit the road three or four contractions later.
The drive to El Camino Los Gatos hospital took about 25 minutes. Things were getting increasingly intense for Cal, and as we found out later, Heather's admission that it was going to be harder following Calla's water breaking was a calculated understatement. Calla had gotten pretty good at vocalizing her discomfort by this point, and between clenching her teeth and driving her nails into me, herself, and the car seat, she even had time to bite my hand. I was keeping calm for both us in the meantime and doing my best to continue her breath coaching as best I could. Heather tailed us in her van all the way there, and despite my being terrible at caravaning, we got there together without any problems. Contractions were only three or so minutes apart by this point and Cal was starting to look worse for the wear. As I parked, Heather took Calla through the ER to get her admitted. It was a little before 9:30.
I hit the lobby of the ER in time to walk to the maternity ward with Cal and Heather, carrying the suspiciously heavy go bag in anticipation of a long night. At that point, I didn't realize that it probably wouldn't be necessary. Heather had done her job well and kept us at the house as long as was safe. By the time we got Cal to her room, out of her clothes, and into her bed, things were happening very quickly. The contractions were even closer together and our nurses, Erica and Sharon, were getting the room set up and Calla on the monitors.
Maria arrived shortly thereafter and checked Cal's cervix again. At 9:30, she was dilated to about 7 cm. I figured that since she'd only opened up three or four centimeters over the course of the day that we had a while. Ann was still nearly two hours away, and I was hoping for her and Calla's sake that she'd be be able to make it in time. Just hours earlier, my mother had effectively pulled Ann off a mountain from a wood gathering trip and arranged to have her on a plane. It seemed a shame that she might miss it. Right about this time, Amanda Leitner arrived with her generally calming influence and we got the birth plan distributed to the participants. We gave her the camera and asked her to start taking photos. Heather pointed out that she should snap as many shots as she could, since we could always pare down and there wasn't much time. Calla was yelling every few minutes as her contractions continued to hit her in wave after wave.
Following another pelvic exam, Cal's increased fussiness over her monitors and heightened pain was pretty well explained: she was at 9+ cm. She'd flown through transition in a matter of minutes and it was time to deliver. Maria started working on perineal massage and the nurses buzzed about the problems with the monitors and some increasingly concerning readings. Cal remained poised and fairly composed given what was happening as Heather continued to guide her through breathing, but that composure started to flag as things progressed.
She was moving faster and experiencing more pain than we'd thought she would in so short a time. Only a few minutes earlier, we'd asked the nurses to prepare the bathtub for pain relief during a much longer transition. She desperately wanted to push that baby out of her, and, stationed at her feet prepared to catch our newborn child, I was almost immediately treated to two things that will stick with me forever: the hair of my child's wrinkled scalp, visible for the first time to the world, and my strong, capable wife at both her most vulnerable and most powerful moment up to that point. That first little glimpse of our child really drove home the irrefutable fact that I was going to be a father very, very soon one way or the other.
The rapidity with which Cal had moved since arriving was unnerving to the attending nurses and even Maria, whose practice has a remarkably low episiotomy rate, was concerned enough to call for an episiotomy kit. I'm still not sure if she was actually anticipating needing it, since she said explicitly that she had no intention of using it a few minutes later; I kind of imagine she was giving the nurses something to do as much as anything else.
Calla had had several contractions without clearing the baby's head. The nurses were calling for a transfer to the ICU and an immediate C-section because of the baby's fluctuating heart rate and Calla's BP. The most important item in our birth plan for Cal was having a natural birth. Going under the knife was a last resort only, and none of us wanted it to come to that. As Calla strained and screamed, Heather looked her square in the eyes and informed her that what she was doing was wasting valuable energy and time. She had 2 choices: breathe or push; Cal chose the latter.
The heightened concern of the nurses was not shared by Maria. She correctly intuited what would ultimately turn out to be the problems with Calla's efforts: our baby was posterior and had its umbilical cord wrapped around its neck. She continued on, wiping away the various fluids and emissions and preparing for the last pushes.
I wasn't sure what was happening. I could hear the delivery room chatter, and combined with what Calla was obviously going though, I was pretty nervous. I was also completely locked in on the action at the foot of the delivery bed. Cal was on her side as she put everything she had into some of the longest minutes of my life. With every contraction, I found myself sympathetically tightening up, my blood pressure skyrocketing, my pulse rapid, and sweat pouring down my face. My only thought was for Cal and our child to come through this experience safe, healthy, and without complication.
I'm still in awe of what she managed to do.
I know I was shouting words of encouragement, probably on the mostly deaf ears of a human being living through that primal, life and death inner struggle of a real experience. The preparatory massage we'd been doing for weeks combined with Maria's expertise and a healthy helping of oil poured over Calla's increasingly wide birth canal suddenly yielded real results. Out popped our child's head, a sickly purple due to the cord wrapped tightly around its neck and again about its body. Maria's suspicions proved correct and the heart rate issue was explained, but action needed to be taken and quickly. Maria attempted to unwrap the cord, but because of the extra convolution still inside of Calla, it was time to cut the cord and yank that kid out. Maria deftly snapped on the hemostats and cut the cord then and there. We'd hoped for a delayed cord clamping, but the situation would have become grim quickly were it not for her experienced decision. Another push and my son flopped into the world, a pale, sticky, and limp creature splayed on the table.
Nurses rushed to clean him up with gloved hands. I hadn't actually gotten to catch him as I'd hoped due to the minor complication, but moments later, he was in my bare arms, the first skin he'd ever touched. Calla's trial was nearly over, and I brought our beautiful boy to her as Sharon gave him a bit of a "polish" and Heather got her gown open so he could feel the warmth of her body and the beating of her heart from the outside for the first time.
Cal was too dazed, I think, to know what was happening at that moment. Tears flooded my eyes. It was only 10:15. She'd done everything she'd set out to do: a natural birth, without medication, without tearing, without surgery, without any unnecessary medical intervention whatsoever.
She was back with us by the time she delivered the placenta (which plopped out unceremoniously a few minutes later) and our child was cleaned and pinked up a bit. I put on his first diaper and got him outfitted in a hat and shirt to keep him warm.
As he lay on her chest, we started dealing with the fact that we had a healthy baby boy, name as yet undecided, and our family was officially a little larger.
The exact sequence of events after the birth is a little muddled for me. I was so elated that everything went so well that I got kind of lost in it. I think Amanda, having provided amazing support for Calla and done a truly wonderful job as a fly on the wall photographer on basically no notice left the room around 10:45 to collect Ann from the airport. There were various bits of paperwork to do that we'd skipped upon admission due to the pressing nature of our arrival less than an hour earlier.
Calla and I must have chosen our son's name sometime after the forms and before Amanda returned with the new grandmother, since I recall the nurse telling us we could fill in his name on the forms later. We were down to two options thanks to my frankly horrendous problem with almost every name we'd come up with: Moss and George. We more or less put it to the boy. Calla said "I think he's a Moss, not a George", and Heather, who was holding him at the time, reported that his face lit up in response to his soon-to-be name. That was enough to clinch it for me. We greeted our son by his name for the first time: Moss Teshub Trofatter.
He was small and increasingly pink, with thick patches of fur still in some places, traces of vernix in his armpits, and a mousy squeak, all topped with a full head of hair. His slate colored eyes were attentive and constantly scanning the room. I couldn't stop looking at him or hold back the tears of joy and relief and possibility.
Ann arrived and met her first grandson shortly thereafter. The placenta was dropped into a waiting cooler for encapsulation, and we shared an hour or two with our present family and friends and made phone calls to update parents and siblings who couldn't be there. Calla and Moss managed to figure out the all-important latch and we spent the rest of the night, completely exhausted, in our new parent glow. Eventually Amanda took Ann back to our place, leaving me, my beautiful wife, and our perfect (in all the ways that matter) baby boy.
I was already feeling like a good dad.
