Even though our parents did not have high expectations of my sisters and I, and actually set the bar quite low in terms of careers, they did sit me down at one point after high school and said “we know that all you want is to get married and have kids but please find something to do with yourself first”.
That was the pep talk. But they were right. All I ever wanted was to get married and have kids. I had always loved kids and especially babies. I was baby-sitting babies by age eleven and loved every second of it.
Having my first baby and becoming a parent did live up to all of the hype and expectations I had dreamed about since I was playing with dolls. I know that to men especially, these birth stories are boring AF but I’m telling it anyway, in a condensed form.
My water broke at home while at the supper table, eating fried chicken around five pm. Fifteen hours later I had a C-section. I was exhausted and confused but also dizzy with excitement. She was almost a ten pounder and beautiful.
When you have a C-section, of course your body is numb from the waist down but you can still feel the tugging as they’re stitching you up and it’s a gross feeling. That, combined with the anesthetic was making me vomit right there on the operating room table. And I was strapped down so all I could do was turn my head and throw up into a kidney basin the poor anesthetist was holding for me.
In recovery I was still pretty nauseous. The baby had been whisked to the nursery to be assessed. But I needed her. I needed to feed her. It was the most strange but natural urge I’ve had in my life. I’d obviously never breast fed anything ever before and wasn’t even sure how but I needed to do it.
So I asked them to please bring her to me. They did and only then when I put her to my breast was I able to relax. I don’t know why, I guess it’s just nature.
And that was my first day being a parent.
bloom.planted.north 
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