The nuggets ALWAYS ask for a story. Usually while I am driving and listening to Nickleback as loud as I can so that I don't have to hear their shrill little voices. So here's a story they like to hear. It truly illustrates that I am unfit to bear children.......
Once upon a time I was pregnant with my first baby. In order to kill the rumors that I was pregnant when I got married......I waited four years to pop out my first piglet. I had been through college. I had a great job doing fantastically important things. Meh, what the heck, the car seats and strollers were so enticing....and the itty bitty clothes.....ugh, it was all so overwhelming...I was sucker into having my own nugget.
I didn't handle being pregnant very well. Satan's grasp on Reagan from the exorcist looked a lot like...erm well nothing....when it comes to comparing my behavior with hers. At long last the day of doom was impending. Dr. D said it would be beneficial if I would consider induction since my little bundle of joy was due two days before Christmas and I had an hour and a half drive to the hospital. By the end of all of my pregnancies I was like a coyote trapped in a leg vice. I would have ripped off the arm of anyone that came within range of my teeth. So, I declined the offer to willingly subject myself to intense pain. Superman tried his darnedest to change my mind. He is so sweet......and so niave, at least he was this once. He sort of cornered me in the Dr. office and made me schedule an induction. Basically I agreed so as not to cry in front of the office staff.....plus I was really hungry and wanted to go eat. I knew....oh I knew, that I would never acutally go through with it.
The day I knew I would die (which is how I looked at it) arrived. Everyone knew I was going to the hospital. I couldn't take the pressure. I couldn't handle that everyone knew I was about to deliver a baby. How could I possibly preform under such duress? I couldn't. I cried uncontrollably until I was supposed to leave for the chop shop. Then I made Superman call and unschedule my induction. (This is the great thing about being an adult......no one can make you do anything you don't want to!! It's very empowering!) Then, because everyone called to find out about the baby and instead found out that I had a nervous breakdown...continued to call to give me their opinion/support. I admit to hiding in the bathroom......in the bathtub. I threw the phone out and closed the shower curtain. Yes...I am an adult. I made Superman play secretary. I begged him to tell everyone to leave me alone and never, ever speak to me again. They tried to tell me I couldn't stop labor, but haha they don't know me very well. My poor mother, in a state of frenzy, tried to lure me out of the bathroom with a cheese burger. This actually worked. But I made her leave the house before I unlocked the door, stuck out my hand, and pulled the cheese burger into the bathroom.
What I was not counting on was that intense anxiety can put you into labor. Within a very short time I began to feel what may have been contractions. I pretended they weren't happening because.....well, I wasn't going to give birth after all. Superman in all of his duty bound glory, had gone to work when I pretended that I was not in labor. I made the mistake of picking up the phone during what may have been a contraction. By some sick twist of fate, Superman's dad called. I think he could tell I was gritting my teeth. Sensing that things may not have been as kosher as I said they were, he said he felt like I shouldn't be alone. Ah, sh*t. I mean seriously. This was the worst moment of my life to not be alone. I so wanted to be alone. You can really compartmentalize when you are alone, duping yourself into believing nearly anything. So the dad comes and makes me leave my little haven. I have one exceedingly painful contraction infront of a person I don't want to be sick infront of. I could hardly sit on the truck seat.
I am dragged into the in-laws. I am put on display in front of their children, like a sick animal in the zoo. For hours we watch horrible medical mishaps and painful medical procedures on the big screen. The children feed me Pepsi and chocolates as I lie swollen and anxious on the floor. The contractions have stopped, just like I knew they would. No labor and delivery for me! Superman visits. I try to express through gritted teeth and raised eyebrows that I am dying to go home and be alone. He leaves me there. Blah......the hours pass. I eat more chocolate. Finally, out of desperation to hide from the beadly little eyes, I hit the ladies room. When I know that the peeps in the other room are getting nervous about my condition I have to stop inspecting my pores and go back out. Somewhere between the bathroom and the living room, approximately 5 steps, my mental barrier was over ridden by nature, and I went into full blown labor. My little sister to this day will say that I made some awful noises and I may have cried. All I can remember is that those poor children stared at me with gaping eyes as I bit the back of the recliner I had fallen against. Honestly so did the parents. They didn't know me very well and I don't think they had any idea what to do. Finally I had the dad page Superman (The ungodly days of no cell phones. It was like the dark ages. How did we even function?). Didn't work. Superman was working a canyon road. When I resorted to biting myself, the dad finally wised up and called dispatch. That got the cops to roll. Superman busts in, mouth agape, eyes huge. We leave the prison from which I felt I would never escape. We go home. I had secretly packed a bag for the hospital just in case.....I actually had to have the baby. He grabs the secret bag once I tell him there is a secret bag. I lay on the floor by the baby swing, I am sure seemingly like a cow that has been hit by a car and not killed. I assume that looked bad because I ended up in the partol car speeding out of town. Big Guy tries to convince me to stop at the local hospital. No no no!
I am trying to hold my clothing off of my body so that the pressure of the light cotton on my very tight abdomen, doesn't kill me. Superman, although great in any bloody situation, cannot handle his own bloody situation. He will not look at me. He will not speak to me. I am pretty sure he didn't touch me. I beg him not to slow down. I would rather die in a car wreck than have another second of pain. Fifty minutes later I am lying across the nurses station screaming. The heathenous wretch that attends to us thinks I am being a bit extreme when she finds out we are on baby numero uno. I will not allow her to help me change my clothes. After my legs fail me, I am dragged to a bed and thrown up with the finesse of a cowboy tossing hay bales. The nurses evil gargoyle hands prod until they find out ......hmm I think that's a baby head, and ew, golly that was a huge burst of water! She tells Superman he almost had to deliver his own child. He smells blood. He turns white. He runs from the room. In the confusion I still get the drugs. Previously I am convinced that the epidural will climb my spine instead of descend, paralyze my diaphragm, and kill me. I am now willing to risk it. At some point in my screaming and thrashing about, someone has put a blood pressure cuff on my arm. As the numbing drugs begin to take effect, the cuff closes on my arm, cutting off circulation. I screamed even louder to alert the witchy woman to the fact that the epidural was going up, not down as intended, and I was about to crash. With a superior smirk on her face, she pointes out that the cuff was just really tight. Just for kicks my blood pressure crashed anyway because she didn't give me enough fluid. All the hubbub didn't take more than a few minutes. Then nursey recalls that there was a baby trying to dislodge itself from my body. She, ever so kindly, turns on 18 mega watt lamps, rips off the bedding and tells me not to push.
Dr. D makes a quick appearance. He asks if I am ready to have a baby. I am not. Nine months was no preparation. I need to rethink what I am about to do. Dr. D. doesn't really care, considering it is 3 am. He wants to go back to bed. So I try to make a controlled pleasant face, which I have been practicing in the mirror at home. I didn't stop to consider the huge streaks of mascara running down my face may make me look ridiculous. And then before I have time to work up anymore tears on behalf of my own mind numbing fear.....tada......a soggy, loud piglet. A total stranger, in a wee little body, smelling like blood, or Heaven, if you roll like that, is having an angry fit over the bright lights and the big city. My little Christmas present. I swear, as much as I hate being pregnant, I would do it over and over and over again for the kids that I have.
