Marlene's GrandsonNote: I will be writing about the last few weeks in snippets as my son sleeps. These posts may not be 100% gramatically accurate, but I think it's important to bring the Marlene to the people by any means possible.For those of you who may have been hiding in a cave for the past three weeks, I finally gave birth to my son, Charles Wallace, on April 2nd. I was in labor for about 10 hours before the doctor decided that Charlie would be born by Cesarian section. Marlene was there with me for most of the labor and for the delivery.
April 2 was also the date of the death of the pope. Right away, my mother said this was "a sign". I'm not sure what this means.
As my mom sat by my bedside, as I weathered contractions, she ate a bag of cheesy popcorn. It was distracting.
My mother also knew half the staff at the hospital. She either worked with them at St. Mary's or, and this is scary, they were present at the birth of my youngest brother. The physician's assistant on duty assisted with the birth of Patrick. The woman was very nice to me. She patiently waited to put me on a internal fetal monitor. I kept apologizing to her because the contractions were so strong that I could not fully cooperate.
When I left the hospital the following Tuesday, the physician's assistant stopped in. She said I was nothing like my mother because I was calm during the labor, surgery and delivery. She told me that when my mom came in for Patrick's birth that she gave the physician's assistant "grey hairs", as well as everyone involved with the delivery. It was one of the worst deliveries the phys. assistant attended. "You fell far from the tree, kiddo," the assistant told me.
I have other fun stories from the hospital. One afternoon, Marlene came up to visit. All the rooms are equipped with these chairs that recline. I think they are supposed to be for the support person to sleep in, if he is staying with the mother. Anyway, my mother sat in the chair and put it in the reclining position. She started to struggle and giggled.
Mom: "Kim, I'm stuck."
Me: "What am I supposed to do?" I think this happened the day after surgery. I was drugged up and wasn't really supposed to be lifting anything, much less my mom.
She wiggled around some more in the seat and tried to reach for the handle to fix the chair. She couldn't get it into the upright position.
Mom: (in distress) "I'm stuck!"
Me: "Do you want me to call in a nurse? She'll come in to help."
Mom: "No! I would be so embarrassed."
My mother struggled a minute or two more. The nurse came in to check on me.
Nurse: "How are you doing, Kimberly?"
Me: "Um, okay." Pause. "Could you help my mom out of the recliner?"
The nurse looked at my mother in disbelief, walked over to the chair and put it back into its upright position.
Nurse: "How's that?"
Mom: "Um, okay."
Meanwhile, I clutched my coughing pillow over my new incision. I thought I was going to burst it open because I was laughing so hard.
My mother should get her honorary degree from clown college for that stunt.
