Countdown
In the first of what I’m sure will be a lifetime of instances of these children disappointing their parents, our twins have decided that they will not be turning around, thank you very much, and so both remain in the breech position. This is a problem for two reasons:
First, Rachel is walking around with two human skulls under her ribs. I’m given to understand that’s as uncomfortable as it sounds. Secondly, it means that the twins are no longer eligible for a conventional vaginal delivery. (I know that some of my friends have expressed discomfort about using a simple medical term like “vaginal” to describe childbirth, and so to them I say: get over it. Vagina vagina vagina.) Most doctors give up on attempting a vaginal delivery if even one twin is breech; ours, because he rocks, was willing to attempt a vaginal birth if Twin A was in the vertex (or “head down”) position. But at this point, the game’s up, and we’re (mostly Rachel) having a Cesarean section.
This has its upsides, though! For one thing, scheduling a C-section means that we can be sure the birth will be attended by our doctor and our midwife, both of whom we’ve really come to like and rely on. Secondly, it means we know the date our babies will be born, which makes planning a lot easier.
So, the countdown to October 26 has begun.
Having a date makes this thing super real. Now, of course, these little guys could always decide to come early, resulting in a scramble to get to the hospital, a delivery by whichever doctor is on call, and, quite possibly, a short stay in the NICU. (If that happens, they are so grounded.) But we know the latest possible date they’ll arrive. It feels like that’s both no time at all and also ages away.
And as weird as becoming a parent is in general, a Cesarean delivery is particularly surreal. They estimate about fifteen minutes, tops, between the time they get Rachel on the operating table and the moment we’re holding babies. That’s a pretty sharp transition from not parents to parents. I suppose, though, that whether the transition is accompanied by twenty hours of screaming labor or twenty minutes of antiseptic surgery, it’s something you can’t quite imagine until it happens. Not for lack of trying: we spend a lot of time talking about how excited we are and what we’ll do when they arrive, and I spent at least a few minutes every night before we go to sleep trying to picture what our babies will be like when they arrive, how I’ll feel about them, and how our lives will change. How can I imagine what it will feel like to wake up at 3:00 A.M. to change a diaper, or see an infant seat in the rear view mirror, or to hold a tiny, helpless baby and know that it’s my responsibility? I can’t imagine, yet; it’s a hopeless task.
And a pointless one! Since they’ll be here in 18 days! To help us count down until the arrival, Rachel regressed to childhood undertook a craft project. We’ll remove one link each day until we’re left with a sad little paper bracelet that, on Sunday morning a few short weeks from now, just before we get in the car at 6:00 A.M. to go to the hospital and meet our babies, we’ll toss reverently into the recycling.
