Birthday
Written in January 2008, updated in January 2020.
We had a lot to look forward to on the eve of my thirtieth birthday and so much to be thankful for. We had a healthy, happy four year old son, the light of our lives, and I was seven months pregnant with our second child. Other than the horrendous nausea that had dogged both my pregnancies, this one had proceeded smoothly. When you have a lively toddler to keep you occupied, you tend to take pregnancies in your stride, unlike the first time, when I pampered and cosseted my self beyond belief. Not this time though.
My birthday arrived. The morning was busy as usual, getting my son ready for school and making plans to celebrate that night. Another thing that kept me preoccupied was my new passport, which I needed to pick up from the post office. Since I had nothing else to do that day, I went out to collect it. When I got there, I was told to climb up five floors to the passport department. By the time I arrived, I was close to tears from exhaustion. The postmen were very sweet. They offered me a glass of water and began to hunt for my passport. It turned out that I had gone to the wrong post office. My passport was at another address, not two minutes from my house. The tears did come at this point, but I huffed and puffed my way down and via the second post office, back home.
That evening, we had a lovely time. We had dinner with my in-laws. We dropped our son off to spend the night with them, and then met up with our close friends to go dancing. We had a great time, with everyone, excluding me, egging each other on to drink the longest Long Island Iced Teas in South Mumbai! We staggered into bed around 1 am and at 2.30, my water broke and I felt a contraction. It took a hard nudge to wake my husband up, then he announced blearily that I must have had an ‘accident’ and advised me to try and go back to sleep. I kicked the man for the first and only time in my life. Anyway, we were off to the hospital before long, terrified because the baby wasn’t due for another seven weeks.
My gynaecologist was waiting for us. They rushed me to a room and gave me an injection to slow down the contractions. Because my water had already broken, they couldn’t stop the labour but they needed to delay it long enough to help the baby’s lungs develop. This they did by injecting a drug through a drip. Once all the excitement died down, the terror began. I just couldn’t stop thinking that something might go wrong. I’m still working my way through the trauma of losing a sibling to suicide twenty years ago, so all I could think of was that I just couldn’t handle a death again. In spite of my gynaecologist’s assurances to the contrary, my mind became caught up in a miasma of ‘what if’’ and ‘could be’’. At one point, I was close to a panic attack.
The next twelve hours were hell. Alternating between comforting each other and breaking down in tears was exhausting. Our second son was born the day after my birthday, and given the circumstances, I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday gift! The same friends that we had partied with the night before now showed up, shell shocked and bearing the best gifts – pampers and onesies for this baby who was not meant to have arrived just yet. Amazing women, you know who you are and how those days bonded our friendship.
He was rushed off to the Neonatal ICU where we were told that he would be fine, except for an enhanced susceptibility to infections. Somehow, the news still hit me like a sledgehammer. I, who pride myself on being a rational, logical human being with a deep faith in science, simply fell apart. I was convinced that it was my hectic day that had caused everything – the premature birth, the resulting vulnerability.
My gynaecologist, bless the woman, really worked to dispel these notions, at one point snapping at me to stop feeling sorry for myself and get on with life! I spent the next eight days in hospital, waiting for the baby to stabilize so that we could take him home. In the NICU, I would cheer up when I could hold him and feed him. But once I was back in my empty room, I’d just lie there, imagining the worst possible scenarios and crying. Post partum depression, I think now in hindsight.
After 4 days, the doctors allowed the baby to stay with me in my room. This helped us a lot. I could cuddle him as much as I wanted, sing to him, and talk to him. I guess that’s where he picked up his current taste in music – eclectic, to say the least.
We came home eight days after his birth. It’s been six years since that eventful birthday of mine and he’s a lively, energetic and (nowadays) cheeky little 6 year old boy – who loves his big brother, noodles and swimming – and makes our lives complete. He struggles with more colds and coughs and fever bouts than other kids his age, but we are slowly seeing an improvement as he grows older. I’ve learned never to take life and health for granted, to have a little faith in the universe and to be grateful for all the good things life has chosen to give our family.
Post script: January 2020: Today is my son’s eighteenth birthday. He’s just another teenager (oh, who am I kidding? He’s an amazing human being!). And me? I’m just happy to have this piece of my heart living outside of my body.