Full Cycle

My son will become a father this year. He is excited and looking forward to it. We have talked about it quite a bit lately and as I listen to him talk about his plans and feelings, I can't  help thinking back to the day he was born. I remember it today, as though it just happened and it was truly a life altering experience. Justin’s mother decided early on that this was going to be a drug-free natural childbirth and we went to Lamaze classes and practiced all of the techniques faithfully and regularly. I was a professional product photographer at the time and knew I was going to document in every detail, the birth of my child.

It was a Monday morning. The sunrise streamed shallow across the living room to the kitchen table where I sat soaking in the morning sun and the front page of the daily news before jumping into the daily routine of getting ready for work.

There I was, minding my own business and Justin’s mother came out of the bathroom standing at my feet. Her look was pensive and a bit dazed. “My water broke!”

I heard “water” and I heard “break”…no association. I thought “Oh crap, I don’t have time to fix plumbing this morning!”. Deep in that thought I did not respond to Justin’s mother. She repeated “My WATER BROKE!” It registered. I thought” Oh crap…call the hospital, call the Doctor, call work, pack the car…no wait…load film in the camera, get my close-up lenses, check the batteries in my flashes…no wait, call the hospital, call the Doctor…don’t forget the light meter…” What I said was, “I’ll pack the car, you call the Doctor, and we’ll get out of here…how are you?” Distilled, her answer essentially was that she was in a hurry to get to the hospital.

Under normal conditions the trip to the hospital was a 35 minute drive. With the encouragement of painful cries from the passenger side, it took 18 minutes. There was a sense of urgency by everyone except the hospital administrator who checked her in…funny thing, painful screams in a hospital lobby can expedite things. We wound up in a staging room where a Doctor examined Justin’s mother and said “You are not dilated enough…it will be a while…get up and walk it off.”

We walked the halls of the ward for several hours and stopped in for updates occasionally. I could not relate to the pain that she must be experiencing, and had my own idea of what it felt like…wrong. A good friend of mine who was about to give birth to number 3 put it into perspective for me years later. I teased her that I had a high pain tolerance, and could take childbirth. She replied “Okay, push an 8 pound ham out of your butt, and then we can talk about pain together.” I have been humble ever since…and I really don’t like ham.

Well, time came to head for the delivery room. I got dressed in scrubs and loaded film in my camera, checked lighting, took meter readings and I was all set. When I showed up in the delivery room equipped with 2 flashes and a very large camera, the Doctor commented “I’ll give you a boy for that camera.” I replied,”You’ll give me a boy…or you won’t get paid!”

I captured every moment of Justin’s birth on film…the negatives are securely in the hands of his mother, and will never see the light of day again. The first push, his head popping out, birth, cutting the cord, cleaning him off and getting Justin ready for the birthing ward, it’s all on film.

I did take time between photos to coach Justin’s mother on breathing, staying calm and concentrating and she did a phenomenal job!

I was SO geeked when it was all over that I walked out into the hall of the maternity ward with my camera and yelled “OKAY, WHO’S NEXT?”

It was truly an amazing experience!

My parents came to the hospital for the birth. My father and I were talking in the hallway when an aid brought Justin by in his cart, headed for the nursery. She [the aid] stopped to let us have a look, and Justin barely 4 hours old lifted his head to have a look around. We both looked on in amazement, and my father looked at me and said “You’re going to have your hands full!”

An amazing young man with an amazing beginning, and I know he'll be a great father. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

I’m just saying.