Segundo Redux

By hour twenty three, I was getting sick and tired of the whole thing. What bonehead decided to give this no-medication thing yet another go-around? It didn't help to know that I was that bonehead. What was I thinking? If, by some sliver of a chance (and at that moment, the sliver was shrinking like a sno-cone in the sun) I EVER found myself in this situation again, I was going to ask for every drug in the pharmaceutical arsenal.

Hour twenty three and a half--m sluggish cervix finally woke up and started moving into Stage Three. I was so tired I don't remember much about this Stage Three, other than it was thankfully much shorter than Primero's Stage Three. Apparently my cervix decided to follow what all the books had told me.

After a scant twenty minutes of hard pushing with Jack once more hoisting up my back. Doctor Heather, backed up by the nurses doing their baby cheer, hauled out a gigantic head--this time, with no assistance from the Rube Goldberg suction machine and its little metal cup.

I was too tired for the moment of cosmic connection we'd had with Primero (or maybe we had it, but my eyes were closed, trying for a second of sleep). Segundo was suctioned, weighed, APGAR'D, and brought over by the nurse. "He's a big one," she announced. "Ten pounds and half an ounce."

He was a big one--a giant, Thanksgiving turkey of a baby--big head swathed in fat rolls, cheeks that obscured chin, neck and upper chest, downy black hair (not as abundant at Primero's, who'd been the darling of the newborn nurses who tried all sorts of hairdos on him)and the longest fingers I'd ever seen on an infant. These weren't the tiny pink shrimp I remembered circled in Primero's little fist--these were splayed starfish hands--constantly moving in invisible ocean currents.

Childbirth had fooled me again--this one was very different from the first, yet so similar in the pressing contractions, the waves of pain (yes, PAIN, dammit--I consign your discomfort to the ninth circle of labour hell!) There had been a workmanlike aspect to the entire procedure--a "been there--done that--let's get the job done" feel. But the complex and deep joy was the same--here again was a wee, small life breathing our combined air, and he was a baby brother to boot!

Segundo was too big for the newborn nightgowns. The nurses raided the pediatrics ward for clothes that would fit him. When we took visitors (cheerfully encouraged by this hospital) to the nursery window and surveyed the rows of bassinets with their neat little bundles, we would point out Segundo squashed into his.

"Wow, you poor thing!" was the consensus of the female visitors. "Wow, what a bruiser!" was invariably the male response. It is comments like this that lead be to believe (reluctantly) that there really is something to the gendered brain--all my feminist sensibilities bristle at this, and insist it's all about culture and environment. However, years of living with male brains (such as they are) have forced me to concede there may be more to it than conditioning.

Primero's reaction to his baby brother was completely in keeping with his generous nature. He was excited, but a bit disappointed we weren't going to call the baby Poopie.

The day before we left the hospital, Jack and I went out for dinner. The nurses said to have a good time. What a difference from before--this was more like it. At last, a hospital that didn't treat you like a prisoner or a patient--just a mom who needed a babysitter. We were able to get groceries as well as grab a burger--it was all so normal.

And so we were four--if we'd had an ounce of sanity, we would have stopped there--after all, there were two of us and two of them. We'd have had a fighting chance. And for two more years, we did--have a balance of power, that is. Segundo and Primero quickly bonded into a unit of two distinct personalities. Segundo's spectacularly fat cheeks invited strangers to pinch them in grocery stores. He would scowl at them from the cart--skewering them with his glare. "Oh my," they'd say and move off. From an early age, Segundo refused to be pushed around.

Having more than one child taught us a great deal. We soon learned that children with identical genetic makeup raised in identical environments will be anything but identical in THEIR makeup. I'm still gobsmacked by this truism. For me, it suggests that if there is a defining human quality, it is the differences we share. I know, I know--that sounds like a contradiction, but it is profoundly true, and the world would be a better place if we would cherish and nurture those differences and understand that they deepen our essential unity rather than compromise it.

And so for one brief shining moment (to borrow a snippet from Camelot, the musical), things were good--the hell hole was being transformed into something, if not quite heavenly, at least it was heading up through purgatory towards earth. And we had a little time to run the show--two parents, two kids (and small ones at that). They were healthy, we were too. We had friends, meaningful work to do--this was life. It was ordinary, unspectacular, but rich and wonderful, for all of that.