Thirteen years ago today our first little girl was born. The Friday before she was born the husband and I went to see a movie (Sinbad's Houseguest, which caused me to decide that I'd never see another Sinbad movie, ever.) The seats were uncomfortable and by the time the evening was over I was not feeling too well. We went home and I was ill. I was so ill I thought I might need to go to the hospital... but a new Star Trek series was starting so the hubby said, "Try to sleep, and if you still don't feel well when this show is over I will take you to the emergency room." My due date was still two weeks away, so we didn't think we needed to rush. After the show, I was still quite ill and we headed to the hospital. We found out I was severely dehydrated and had the flu, so I was staying for observation. At about 1:30 the next afternoon my contractions started. I got a bit nervous: my "hospital bag" that I'd packed was at home, and we didn't have a boy's name picked out! I had felt sure it was a girl, and we had a girl's name picked out, but what if it wasn't?? The husband was stuck on Indiana... yes, like Indiana Jones and the state we lived in at the time. I vetoed and prayed it was a girl! My muscles were so weak from the flu the day before that it took quite a long time to deliver our girl: 18 hours of actual labor. After she was delivered my husband stood between her and I. He said "Ten fingers, ten toes and she looks like E.T.!" I was mortified and had to see our beautiful girl for myself. My brother in law came and was the first to hold her, after us. There was only one other family, an Amish family, delivering that weekend, and they left the next morning, so I had the nurses at my beck and call. :) We took her home two days later and found out she had jaundice, so she was pretty yellow! She got a special light-her glow worm blanket we called it-and it worked within two days.
She has been a joy ever since. Wonderful girl. I can't believe I have a teenager! She started out as a 6 lb. 8 ounce baby and is now two inches taller than me! She is sweet, smart, beautiful, caring, nurturing to little kids, hard working at school and running, faithful and prayerful. She is empathetic and polite, and I'm not just saying that because I'm biased. ;) She stopped in to see the class I'm subbing in today. They asked if she was my sister, if she could drive (how did she get here, then? She walked from her nearby middle school.) and she helped zip up coats, book bags and putting on scarves and mittens while they got ready to go. She is very good with little ones.
Well, that's all. I just wanted to celebrate my girl by thinking back all those years to when she brought us the beginning of our parental joy.
(My oldest is a teenager, now, too, Momo! :))
3 comments:
movies and labor, we have more in common than we know! i have tears in my eyes reading about your sweet girl. we are blessed, aren't we??
happy happy birthday, little one! may your joys be many and your sorrows few!
I haven't been reading blogs much for a couple of weeks because of working too much in the evenings but I've enjoyed catching up. Happy birthday belatedly to your lovely daughter. You don't realise, do you, when you're a child, that your birthday is just as significant to your mum as to you?
Tell her I said Happy Belated Birthday! Oh my goodness, I can't believe she is a teenager! Let the fun years begin ;-P
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