by Judy Baer
Mitzi was about to attack when, much to everyone’s relief, a competent-looking woman with short gray hair breezed into the room. The tension leaked from Arch’s body, and I saw his lips form the words Thank you. His reprieve had arrived.
“Hi, Mitzi,” the woman said pleasantly. “I see you got started without me. How are you doing? What can I get you?”
The atmosphere in the room changed instantaneously. The thunderstorm abated, and the sun came out.
“I’m Ellen,” the woman said by way of introduction as she busied herself rearranging Mitzi’s pillows. “I’m Mitzi’s doula and birthing coach. Looks like you’ve been doing a fabulous job here, but now I can give you a break. Arch, you look a little pale. Would coffee help? By the way, if you think you need reinforcements, I could introduce you to my friend, another doula. Her name is Molly Cassidy. Her client’s baby came so fast that she’s available.” Ellen glanced at Mitzi. “You know, just in case.”
In case Mitzi’s even harder to handle than they imagined, I presume.
Now that she was here, I could squirm out of Mitzi’s grasp. I was happy to hand Mitzi off into such capable hands. Arch appeared overjoyed to hand Mitzi off to anyone at all.
“I’ll check on you later,” I told Mitzi before I left the room. “I’ll be praying for you.”
Mitzi looked at me with genuine consternation in her eyes. “Do you think I’m dying, Whitney? I never expected it to be like this.”
“Mitzi, you are fabulous. I know this is harder than having your teeth cleaned, but you did live through that.”
Her expression cleared. “I did, didn’t I? I hate having my teeth cleaned. Owww…”
By the time I walked from the hospital to Chase’s office in the adjoining clinic, my back ached and my legs felt watery. The baby was pounding on my insides as if I’d handed it a sledgehammer.
When I reach his office, I staggered in and slumped into the closest chair.
He looked up from his desk and smiled at me. The angles of his face are sharper now, and the absence of his golden tan makes his eyes seem even bluer.
“You look good sitting there,” I commented, “where you belong.”
“It feels good, Whit, to be on this side of the desk. I don’t want to spend anymore time being a patient, if I can help it.”
“Are you tired?”
“A little.” He studied me. “You, however, look exhausted.”
“I should be. I’ve been in a birthing room helping Mitzi through labor.”
“What?” He nearly bolted out of his chair.
“She went into labor while she was at the office. Arch insisted I go with them in the ambulance, so my car is still at Innova.”
“What made you call an ambulance?”
“We couldn’t carry her. The woman weighs a ton, and she was out cold.”
I related the whole story, and it was all he could do not to laugh out loud. “Arch ranks somewhere lower than dirt right now, but the doula she hired is amazing. Maybe I should consider someone like her. What do you think?”
“Will you let me take pictures of you in labor?”
“Not on your life.”
“Touch your hair?”
“The jury is still out.”
“Then maybe you’d better hire one for me. If I can’t stay busy, I may need her more than you.”
I moved close and stroked his cheek with the back of my hand. “Want to get a bite to eat? Maybe I can ask Harry or Bryan to give us a ride. It will take them a little time to get here.”
“Cafeteria food? That’s the only thing I haven’t missed while I’ve been away. Let’s go.”
I stirred my straw in the dregs of a strawberry shake and watched the people at the tables around us. “I wonder how Mitzi is doing.”
“We can check on her before our ride gets here. I’m surprised you caught both Harry and Bryan working late.”
“Neither of them goes home much before eight or nine these days. The office has exploded with business while Mitzi and I are just plain exploding.”
When I was born, Mom said the doctor wasn’t all that happy to have Dad in the delivery room. Now entire families visit the lucky lady in labor, as casually as if she were demonstrating the best way to fold a veggie wrap or entertaining them with magic tricks.
Chase rapped on the door of her room, and when Arch answered, he invited us in to see the show.
“She’s doing great,” Arch said. “We’re hoping the babies will be born naturally. The doc says they’re all good-sized, and he thinks their lungs will be fully developed. Amazing, isn’t it? Mitzi was born to give birth. No complications, and bringing them in close to term. What a girl.”
He sounded like a sportscaster praising a quarterback or a winning racehorse.
By the look of her, though Arch might be willing, Mitzi didn’t appear ready to do this again any time soon.
She’d forgotten all about her hairdo. Her dark hair was plastered to her skull, her makeup had disappeared, and she was chewing on ice chips like a beaver in a hurry to shore up a dam. While her eyes rolled in her head, her doula calmly rubbed her back and told her what a good job she was doing.
I took Chase’s hand. “She’s busy. We’ll stop back later. Besides, this is too close for comfort. Maybe I don’t want to know everything that happens in labor. It will spoil the surprise.”
Chase clapped Arch on the back and I waved at Mitzi and gave her a thumbs-up. She either smiled or snarled, I’m not sure which.
My cell phone rang in the elevator.
“Hey, Whit, it’s Harry. Bryan and I are in the lobby.”
“We’re on our way down. Why did Bryan come with you?”
“I didn’t dare leave him at the office alone. Once he heard Mitzi was in labor, he fell apart. I thought that if I brought him along with me, he wouldn’t pass out and hit his head on a desk or something.”
“You could check him in,” I offered. “I think there are some rooms open in obstetrics.”
“Ha, ha. Very funny.” Then Harry’s phone clattered to the floor and I heard him yell, “Don’t you dare faint, Bryan. I’ll fire you if you faint!”
“Oh, dear. I think Bryan’s giving birth in the lobby.”
“That will draw a crowd,” Chase said with a chuckle. “I’m sure glad I’m well enough to be here to enjoy this.”
“When you married me, you married into a bunch of loonies, didn’t you?”
He pulled me toward him. “I love loonies. Don’t you know that by now?”
When we reached the main floor, Bryan was sitting in a lobby chair, panting. Harry was sitting by him, fanning him with a five-year-old hunting magazine.
“Pull yourself together, man. You aren’t the one having the baby!”
Bryan didn’t look convinced.
“Mitzi is doing beautifully,” I assured him. “You’d be proud of her.” No need to alarm him with details. “Thanks for coming to get us. I need to get home and put my feet up. My back is killing me. Oh!”
My knees nearly collapsed under me. Chase, Bryan and Harry all reached out to catch me. Even Bryan forgot his own troubles for a minute as the three of them eased me into a chair.
“I must have put my back out,” I assured them. “Strange. I’ve never had anything like this happen before.” I rubbed my lower back to ease the pain, but it didn’t relieve it much. “Maybe an ice pack would help. Or heat. Which is it, Chase?”
My husband stared at me strangely. “Whit, are these pains steady, or are they coming and going?”
“Coming and going, I guess. I haven’t been paying much attention. Why?”
“You may be having back labor, honey.”
“Labor? I’m not due for three weeks yet. Don’t be silly.” Then a cramp wrapped itself from my spine to my belly button. I panted until it passed. “Or maybe you’re right.”
Bryan whimpered and tipped sideways in his chair.
At that moment, Dr. Steele strode through the hospital lobby and
headed directly for Chase. “What are you doing here? You should be home resting.” Then he looked at me as another cramp rippled through me. “Oh. So that’s why you’re here. Have you called a nurse?”
“It just started,” Chase said, “but it seems to be moving fast. I’ll find a wheelchair….”
“Oh, no, you don’t. You need to be in one, not pushing it. You look exhausted. Frankly, you all look exhausted.”
Dr. Steele was right. I don’t know who looked as though he needed attention more, Chase or Bryan.
“I’ll push you in a wheelchair, Chase,” I offered. “I’m fine, really.”
Now four pairs of eyes glared at me. “Okay, I’d love a ride.”
Dr. Steele called a nurse to take me upstairs. Then he forced Chase to sit in a wheelchair, as well, and took the helm of that one himself, leaving Harry to push Bryan’s chair after us as Bryan moaned and clutched his stomach.
Chapter Forty-Two
Giving birth is one of those things that sounds good in theory and can be remembered fondly in retrospect but cannot be enjoyed while it is taking place. Under the best of circumstances—dim lights, soft music and a tranquil environment—it might be pleasant enough…if one enjoys being ripped part by semis pulling in opposite directions. But mine weren’t the best of circumstances.
By the luck of the draw, I was assigned the birthing room next to Mitzi’s and had to put up with her alternating invectives and endearments toward Arch as her labor progressed. Not only that, I could hear Bryan’s whimpers and moans as Harry walked him back and forth in the hallway to keep him from curling into a fetal position on the tile outside my door.
Dr. Steele knocked on my door and stepped inside. “Sorry to bother you, but I have a suggestion I’d like you to consider. Chase isn’t ready for any marathons yet. To give him a break, I’d like you to meet Molly Cassidy. She’s a doula. Would you mind if I asked her to assist you? She can run for ice chips and rub your back, Whitney, so Chase can sit down if he feels the need.”
Chase opened his mouth to refuse, but I beat him to the punch. “I think it’s a great idea. That way, I won’t have to spend energy worrying that Chase is doing too much.”
Dr. Steele beamed approvingly at me. He stepped into the hall and came back with a pretty red-haired woman.
“Hello, I’m Molly Cassidy.” She shook my hand, and I felt comforted. Here was someone who knew the ropes of this baby-birthing thing. I liked her immediately.
Then my entire cheering squad arrived to join the fun. Harry’s wife brought Betty with her. My parents broke away from a dinner party to come and greet their new grandchild, who was, unfortunately, hanging on to one of my ribs and refusing to come out. Jennilee arrived to help Harry with Bryan. By the time everyone arrived, the only ones missing were Kim and Kurt and Chase’s cousin Adam and his wife, Cassia, who surely would have been there if they hadn’t been on a plane to Africa.
“Whatever happened to completely unnatural delivery? Drugs? Painkillers? Unconsciousness and ‘wake me up when it’s over?’” I hissed to Chase as he held my hand and timed the contractions, which were quickly building up steam.
“You wanted a natural birth, honey. This is it.”
Molly chuckled sympathetically and managed to find that muscle in my back that desperately needed massaging. “Look at it this way. Women have been doing this for centuries. It’s the most natural of acts.”
“I had no idea,” I panted. “When I think of nature, I think of flowers budding and soft rain. I’m going to write a letter to the nature channel and complain about false advertising as soon as I get home.”
“You forgot about volcanic eruptions and flesh-eating plants, that’s all,” Chase said. “You always look at the bright side of life. Lots of pregnant women forget that ‘natural’ and ‘easy’ are not always the same thing.”
He stood up and offered me some ice chips. I’d been begging for an iced cappuccino for an hour, but no one had paid any attention.
“Chase,” I gasped between contractions that were less than two minutes apart, “I want to take this opportunity to tell you how much I love you and to ask you to ignore anything I might say later as these contractions get stronger. I mean, you can still live in our house and everything.”
He laughed and kissed my forehead. “Don’t worry. I won’t take it personally. I’ve got Arch as a role model. He’s been holding up pretty well, considering that so far Mitzi had fired him as her husband, banished him from her life and asked for a firing squad.”
I was pulled into another contraction then, one harder and longer than before. Chase glanced at the fetal monitor and whistled. “Your seismographic readings are getting stronger, honey. I think something may be happening.”
“You think?” I panted frantically. “You should try being me.”
I felt like a pastry tube being squeezed dry, but didn’t have the breath to say it.
“I think we’re making progress,” Molly announced brightly. “We should have new baby Adams pretty soon.”
For some reason, that surprised me. “We will? Soon?” Molly smiled and started moving things around in the room, making way for the carts and trays and people who would be arriving. Soon my room, which had appeared to be a small suite in a decent hotel, would become a regular emergency room.
A knock on the door drew Chase away. When he came back, he was shaking his head. “Bryan heard Mitzi’s first baby cry, and he passed out. He hit his head on the lunch cart an aide was pushing by and cracked open his head. They’re wheeling him off somewhere to sew him up.”
“Mitzi’s first baby?”
Chase picked up my hand and held it to his lips. “A little boy.”
“And the others?”
“Still coming.” He grinned wickedly at me. “If you hurry, maybe you could beat her.”
I opened my mouth to tell him what a ridiculous idea that was, but a crushing pressure around my midsection took my breath away.
Chase’s eyes widened. “Hey, I was just kidding, honey.”
“A couple more like that and we’ll be meeting our newest citizen,” a calm voice said from behind me.
“Hey, doc,” Chase said. “Welcome to the party.”
“Quite a party it is.” A kindly looking man in his sixties with twinkling eyes above his face mask came into view. “How are you, Whitney?”
“Busy.” It’s hard to talk while I’m gritting my teeth, I discovered, grateful to see that my physician had arrived. Things were getting a little out of hand, as far as I was concerned.
“I see that.” He glanced at the monitor. “Looks like something should be happening here soon…”
I was gripped in a cataclysmic spasm that knocked everything out of my head but the pain itself. I clutched Chase’s hand and wondered if it was possible for me to break his bones if I squeezed too hard. He didn’t even flinch. As the pain subsided, I heard Dr. Johnson’s calm voice. “I think we’re going to let you push pretty soon, Whitney. I’ll tell you when.”
Push? Push what?
Oh, push that…
Friday, January 28
“She’s perfect, isn’t she, Chase?” I stared at the pink-and-white bundle in my arms. I couldn’t get enough of that sweet, tiny face. It was after midnight, but I had no desire to sleep.
“Couldn’t be more so.” He sat at the foot of my bed with such a loving expression on his features that it made me want to weep.
The baby, all six pounds two ounces of her, squirmed, stretched and wrinkled her face into a funny little grimace. I watched in fascination, now able to pick out those parts that had been kicking and punching at me from the inside these past few months.
“How can people not people believe in God?” I murmured. “Especially after seeing this.”
“I haven’t figured that out,” Chase admitted. “My job is to work with the human body, and every day I am amazed at its intricacies and complexities, its ability to heal itself and to adapt. To think that this—” and
he reached out to touch Miriam Joy “—was all unplanned and not an act of the divine is beyond me.”
Miriam—the name is the Hebrew form of Mary—was the sister of Moses and Aaron. In scripture she had her ups and downs, and she had the funkiest babysitting job in all of history, but God loved her. The joy part speaks for itself.
“And Mitzi has this times three.”
Chase chuckled. “I’ve never seen a more stunned set of parents than those two were when the nurses handed them all three little boys. Arch looked as though he’d had a door slammed in his face, and Mitzi held one in each arm and tears ran down her cheeks until the babies’ blankets grew wet. It was quite a sight.”
“I’m surprised. I thought she might have had a hard time accepting all boys. She desperately wanted a girl, you know.”
I could almost hear her yelling at Arch, “But I asked for girls!”
Shopping Queen meets Monday Night Football. I could see the problems already. Frogs in their pockets. Runny noses wiped on the sleeves of small designer rugby shirts. Three against one.
Mitzi named the babies Ethan, Andrew and Oliver.
“By the way,” Chase commented as he stroked Miriam’s downy head, “I overheard Mitzi tell Arch that she would be picking out the boys’ wives. Miriam and Kurt and Kim’s baby are already prime candidates. If you don’t want Mitzi to be Miriam’s mother-in-law, you’d better start campaigning against the idea early.”
Already the trauma of motherhood has begun. Mistakenly I’d thought I’d have a few years before I had to worry about boyfriends.
“I suppose I’d better go home, feed the cats and let you rest.” He yawned and stretched. “Harry drove your car to the hospital so I could drive it home.”
“How’s Bryan?”
“Other than a headache from knocking himself out on the food cart, he’s fine. No more pains or nausea. I think he’s going to recover from the births a lot more quickly than you and Mitzi.”
He took our sleeping baby from my arms and laid her in the bassinet beside my bed. “And now it’s your turn to sleep.”
I lay awake long after he left, remembering the gentleness of his lips against mine and giving praise for the cluster of miracles I had received.
