– Isabel –
Sleeping Isabel
Isabel is a bundle of surprises, being a lot heavier than her big brother; Isabel started her life right away, wasting no time at all. The moment she was transferred to Dra. Enriquez and her team she promptly pooped on Dra’s hands, and she immediately informed Dra about her displeasure of leaving mommy’s tummy. So far she has no hesitation letting anyone know how she feels, and loudly at that. One of her nurses dubbed her as a singer, in fact you can hear her singing from down the hallway.
She can also hold up her head, something that her big brother could not do till a few weeks after he was born. She moves her head up and down and though you lay her on her tummy with her head facing left, she can lift up her head and face the other way.
Within a few hours with mommy she latched on and coaxed mommy’s mammaries to give milk. She has pooped three and peed six times since she started breastfeeding.
Isabel holding her head up!!!
Solid 7.9lbs!!
Isabel's first bath
Isabel's first morning
– The Delivery –
Catrina’s delivery started at 6am, when she was brought to the delivery area and anesthetized. She was scheduled for a 7:00am cesarean, but I was only invited into the operating room around 7:45am. Dra. Capistrano, our OBGYN, has already begun by the time I went in. I was surprised to see Catrina’s eyes wide open and looking at me, as if asking me why I took so long to get there. Unlike our first cesarean Catrina remained more or less awake the entire procedure, slipping in and out of sleep every now and then.
Food for thought, the distance of the uterus from your outer skin is about 4 inches (depending on your adipose). In a cesarean section the doctor will cut a horizontal cut just above where your underwear ends, about 5-6 inches long (called a bikini cut, for obvious reasons). The doctor will not cut once, but multiple times, through several layers till the uterine wall. Each cut is done carefully, pealing away layer upon layer of tissue, each layer the doctor will cut and tie up any veins or vesicles that bleed too much. The uterus it self is three layers to cut through until the water bag. Once you reach the final layer everything goes really fast. You can tell when they have reached that far; there is a pause for 3-5 seconds. The nurses behind the doctors start positioning themselves; the baby catching team edges closer, when they were keeping a respectful distance just a few seconds ago. No one says “here it goes” or “get ready everyone”, it just happens and then it’s done. The baby is pulled out, the nurses press down of the upper part of the mommy’s belly, pushing the baby out through the relatively small opening, the baby gets free, the umbilical cord is cut and the hand over to the baby catching team is done. A few seconds later, the baby cries.
Thank you Dra's for bringing Isabel safely into the world
No wonder surgeons have team preferences. The only thing that seems to have no real function is the father and this clerical lady at the corner of the, room literally flipping through some papers. Later on, she gets up, stands on a foot stool at the foot of the operating table, and the nurse handing the surgical tools to the doctor begins (rather loudly), to dictate every piece of item on her table, dictating the type of tool and the count for each (they repeat the process every ten minutes or so). Then I realize, yes, the father is the only useless one there.
The baby catching team methodically cleans the baby, (in Isabel’s case Dra. Enriquez cleans more than the usual: D). Apgar scoring begins, Activity, Pulse, Grimace, Appearance, and Respiration. The scale goes 1-10, ten being the perfect score, but generally 7 and up means everything is okay. Isabel was rated 9.9, I was going to ask by she did not get a perfect score, but decided not to. There was time enough in Isabel’s life to give her pressure to score high in exams, 1 minute after birth seemed a little extreme.
Unlike the last time, when Miguel was whisked away to the nursery right away, this time we hanged around the operating room as Dra. Capistrano finishes closing up Catrina. As I wait for Dra. Capistrano to finish, it is only then do I get the full appreciation of how hard this procedure is.
Everyday people talk about cesarean sections almost nonchalantly; it never occurred to me how extensive a surgery procedure this was. As a doctor has to go through layers and layers to get to the baby, so does the doctor have to try to repair the damage that they do, by methodically stitching up every single layer. And I am not talking of some running stitching either. Think of the old ladies doing embroidery work on fine silk cloth, and then instead of hands, have them hold the needle with a long thin plier. Make the needle incredibly thin, and shaped like a fishhook, and the thread incredibly fragile. After that dress them in thick cotton surgery suits, and layer their hands with two sets of rubber gloves.
Mommy reviews the play-by-play
Now for the final brain twist: women go through this as a choice and in a lot of cases more than once in their lifetime.
– Catrina –
My hero!!
Mommies are heroes by default. Mommies that go through labor and even cesarean should get medals. Mommies who go through 14 hours of labor, cesarean section and the pain of recuperation, and then decide to do it all over again, should have awards named after them. Catrina is my hero, and though I hated the fact that my mother until this very day reminds me of her 22 hour ordeal, I will personally make sure my children hear how much their mother went through just to bring them into this world. How minor and inconsequential fathers are in the magnitude that mommies have to go through just to give us our children. How humbling it is to see my wife, who once cried over a paper-cut, stoically bear the pain and stand from her bed 20 hours after her operation. As I type this, Catrina is trying to walk down the hallway.
Mommies are heroes all, my Catrina is my own personal hero.
Mommy stands up, only 20 hours after her surgery
