Parenthood Begins

After the birth of our daughter the real work began. For a few days we were in the hospital, it was great because the nurses came in and would take care of our daughter; showing us tips, helping with feeding, bathing her, etc. But once they gave her to us to take home...the real work began!

It was like being placed in a whole new world, waking up for late night feedings, the crying, everything. My fiance (well, now my wife) had a lot on her hands. Although I was there to help I have to admit it was a lot of work. She had to get up in the middle of the night, numerous times, to feed our daugher and change her. By the morning time she looked tired, a bit beat. But after a while we got into the swing of things. I returned back to work, while she stayed home with the baby.

Now don't let her tell it, but contrary to popular belife I  DID help out a lot (lol). In the beginning she only breast fed, so when our daughter would wake up in the middle of the night I would wake up my wife and hand the baby over. Granted many times I may have fallen asleep after giving her the baby, but hey, there was no more that I could do, she had the food (lol).

We both had to learn how to be parents quick. Now once you have a baby everyone under the sun has advice for you. Man it was; do this not that, make sure to use this formula, use these diapers, babies cry but try this. There was just so much to take in! I tell you, someone needs to write a book about this...wait...I think they do...between taking care of a baby and working reading a book was not about to happen (lol). I think the best advice we recieved was from a coworker of my wife's who told her: take it one day at a time, you'll learn along the way. And that is exactly what we do, taking it one day at a time. Everyday is a new adventure, a new day to learn something new about being a parent. Everyday is always new with a baby.

Although my wife spent the bulk of the 8 weeks she was out of work at home, she ensured to take home videos of her experienced with our daughter, making me feel like I was right there with them. It was great.

Being a parent has been an adenture that I am lucky enough to take...despite the crying, the throwing up, the poo'ing, the carrying of the heavy carseat (the bain of my wife's existance...lol), the constant worrying, I would not change being a parent for anything in the world.... And the story continues.

Post Birth!!!

Here I am, as nervous like a cheating wife knowing her husband knows, scared out my mind. There is no hiding from it now. The doctor passes me the scissors so I can cut the umbilical cord, I must say it was awesome cutting the cord, don't ask me why, it just was. There she lay just light as can be with a head full of hair, and crying. I'm just snapping as many photos as my phone will allow me to do. I'm thinking to myself I need to learn how to change diapers fast because I'm sure Caroline won't be changing them all by herself. They clean her up and hand her to me. I look cool, calm, and collected, but inside I am freaking out hoping I don't drop this gift from God. Trying to pass her so others can hold her was a nightmare, I mean she is precious cargo after all. But it was a success.

Now even though this is our first child, I have never heard of something called afterbirth. Let me tell you the afterbirth seems much more painful than the regular birth. For those men or women who don't know what that is, allow me to explain it: Afterbirth is where they remove the placenta from the stomach. Let me say my fiance was a trooper during birth but man oh man I can only imagine the pain that it causes. Caroline was nearly in tears and moaning and aching in pain. If you are squirmish then maybe you shouldn't read further. What happens is the doctor massages your stomach pressing down on it, moving their hands downward. So I am standing there watching this and while they are doing it all of this mucus and blood is gushing out and believe me it is a stomach turner. Then out comes this huge thing that I have NEVER seen, the placenta, it looked so disgusting a little piece actually came close to hitting me, luckily for me being in the fire dept you see a lot of crazy things, but this...coming from someone I know and love...was a bit of another story.

The whole experience was eye opening and educational. I loved being a part of this miracle called life. As a volunteer fire fighter you do many things, but being a part of a birting experience is awesome. My little girl, so small and precious, cute as a button. Still can't believe she is mine. It took a while to see those big beautiful brown eyes of her hers, but when she finally opened her eyes, man oh man, I melted.

My daughter, my life...

This is Just the Beginning!!!

Where did we leave off yesterday? Oh yeah, our daughter had just been born. Now its unfortunate that we couldn't take a video because of hospital protocols, like its our fault they screwed up and it was caught on camera lol, I'm sorry, let me not digress. So here I am in tears at the birth of our daughter, I mean actual tears of joy, I recommend that everyone should experience the birth of a child. The feeling you get is overwhelming, and it does not make you less of a man for crying, if anything it makes you more of a man

As I stood there I was amazed with what women actually have to do, I have a new found respect for them. Let me digress for a second, when you realize that a newborn baby just came out of your vagina it puts sex into perspective lol. Now back to what I was saying...oh yes, respect for women even more...I know as guys we have a high tolerance for pain however, I don't think giving birth is a pain we can handle. There was a reason God didn't give us that one to bare, lets be thankful for that guys.

Our daughter was born 6lbs 2oz, the crazy thing is she was born a month early. Luckily for us, rather for Caroline, because the doctor said if she would have carried the baby the full term she would have been somewhere in the range of 8 to 9lbs, I don't know how she would have been able to handle that! She had enough trouble carrying the weight she already had...lol. But God has a reason for everything. There I was looking at our little girl and saying to myself : I am really a father, I have someone's life in my hands, they are depending on me to know what I am doing, and to lead them in the right path. Is it that much different from the fire deptartment where I volunteer? I mean I am a lieutenant, I have guys under my command and their lives in my hands all the time. Surely if I can lead a bunch of guys, raising a daughter should be a cake walk...at least I hope.....

And the journey continues.....

The Arrival pt 2!!!!

Now I'm more than certain that women didn't have a choice back in the old times to get an epidural shot. They just stuck it out like real women and dealt with the pain. So at about 5pm Caroline gave into the peer pressure from her sorority sisters and family and got the shot, i must say she let me down some lol. Now I must say with this being our first birth i didn't know what to expect or everything i would see. The doctor came in and put what was kind of like a clear balloon inside Caroline and filled it with fluid, which when that came out of her would signify that she has dilated to 4 centimeters (more than certain this wasn't done back then lol.).

After she got the epidural we thought smooth sailing...she would become dialated soon and out the baby will come...but nope, not the case. After about an hour her pain returned and they had to give her another shot, because pressing the button to release more of the meds did not work. At about 7:00 many of her sorority sisters left and a few more arrived,  and I got hungry. The doctors came and measured and  said she was at about 6 and a half centimeters. He said it will probably take an hour for her to fully dilate. One of her close friends and I decided we would go into the cafeteria to get some food. We were there for about 5 or so minutes figuring out what we wanted, and as we headed back upstairs service returned to my phone and I saw the many calls from my fiance. We rushed back into the room and found that it was showtime!  Apparently as soon as we left the room, the doctors came back into the room to measure her again and she was 9 1/2 centimeters. She calmly told them that she would not push until I returned, they were just about to page me when I walked into the room (hey what can I say? i was hungry lol).

Three of her sorority sister's were in the room including myself. One held her hand helping her breath while I held the other, and the others stood back. It was now showtime our little girl was on her way!

We coached her through her breathing and pushing (surprisingly again there were no screams or punches as you see on TV. This girl was calm, I wonder if it was cause of the drugs lol, although they said it wore off so I guess good job to her lol).

One push, two push...come on baby you're almost there. At one point she got a bit tired and stated she wanted to sleep, but no, she was so close. Five push, six...almost there...we saw her head full of hair. Seven push, eight...her head was making it's way out. Finally the doctor's were able to grab and pull and our daughter was here!!! So many emotions ran through me, and yes I cried. I couldn't hold back the tears, our baby girl was here. We were both just so elated. I kissed my girl on her forehead as the doctors laid the baby on her chest. Her first words to our daughter: "awwww hi mama...ooh you need to get cleaned" lol (shaking my head lol).

Our daughter had finally arrived and we couldn't have been happier, our little 6lb 2 ounce baby. I cried more than my fiance (yes fellas I boo hoo'd) It was just a blessing and miracle to see this little girl that we had been preparing for had finally arrived.... And the journey continues.....

The Arrival!

So as I sat at my job trying to stay calm, I realized that my baby was on her way and here I am stuck at work. I needed to call someone to come in and cover my shift so I can go get my fiance and rush her to the hospital. I must say, watching television shows of guys fainting or freaking out made me think that is what would happen to me, but I found myself so relaxed, there was no speeding to get home... OK maybe a little more than i should have been doing.

Finally I arrive home, go upstairs and there is my fiance Caroline, giving birth. OK so she wasn't giving birth yet, she was on the toilet of all places to be in the house. Apparently her water was gushing and she didn't want to get it all over the floor. Talk about a thoughtful woman. Luckily for us we had already packed a bag a few months in advance so all she had to do was put on some pants and we could head to the hospital. I went into our room, grabbed some sweats and helped her in it. I also grabbed a garbage bag, so as to lay it on the seat for her. Although her water was still gushing we knew we had to get to the hospital.

We were both surprised at how calm she was, and wondered where the pains were. All you see in every movie is a pregnant woman being wheeled into the hospital yelling, and screaming because of the pain, yet with her, nothing. She was feeling no pain at this point, except a little bit of pressure. Once we were checked in she was induced and slowly began feeling the pains...every 20 or so minutes, but again, no yelling and screaming as we have seen on TV  Folks do not, I repeat DO NOT believe the garbage we see on TV  its all a lie. There was no yelling, or cussing me out, just a few "ooh's" and grabbing of her bed rail. The doctors checked her every 30 minutes or so seeing how far dilated she was, but according to them she was not far along. Finally one doctor commented "You may just have the baby tomorrow" She looked the doctor straight in the eye, smiled and stated "you better figure out a way, because I will NOT be pregnant tomorrow." We all laughed and they assured her they would do everything they could.

As our friends and family came to visit she was still not too far along. But the pain kept inching closer. Everyone commented how well she was doing, yup that was my girl, a trooper. She was taking the pain well, not crying out, just grabbing hold and shaking that rail with each piercing pain.

As time raged on I let Caroline know how proud of her I was that she did not give up, that she was holding on and not asking for the epidural, but at 5:30 she gave up...smh. She could no longer handle the pain, and asked for that hated epidural. Such a sellout, whatever happened to the natural births from back in the day.... And the journey continues....

4th of July night

Getting blessed with a child is amazing, but once that baby has passed through the birth canal, you realize its a new ball game and life will never be the same. These are the chronicles of my daughter throughout the days of her life.

Kids are so unpredictable, when they are ready to do something they just do it. Whether its pooping when you have taken the diaper off to change it from a wet one to a dry one, or not eating when they should, or going to sleep at night. They do things on their time, not ours. So when you're given a due date always take that as an estimation, not the date, because when your baby is ready to be born, they are ready no matter what that due date says.

My fiance and I thought we had time, a whole month worth of time, but our daughter had other plans. On the fourth of July I went to work as I usually do, leaving my very pregnant fiance at home. She was to join me at work to watch the fireworks before heading home, but because it was so very hot that day we both decided she would go home and relax in our much cooler apartment. After all of the hooplah of the fireworks I called my fiance to see how she was doing. We discussed the fireworks and all the preparations we have to make until the arrival of the baby. She reprimanded me working on yet another holiday...we spoke for about an hour when her water broke! Then started our journey...