Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

Great Thread. 2 children for me and two stories.

My son was born in 1981 (yah, I'm old) and my wifes doctor was leaving on vacation the following week so she was induced. Pictocin is a very powerful drug and my wife was having a pretty hard time of it. She was in very hard labor for a number of hours. The nurses were not being very responsive at all and hadn't even checked on her in awhile. Finally, having had enough of the BS, I called the Dr. myself. It helped that his son and I were classmates. About a half hour later the Doc comes in, takes one look and then just ripped into the nurse. Come to find out that my son was breach and the Dr. actually had to use forceps to deliver him. The nurse ended up leaving the hospital and my son was fine. However, during the delivery my wife was squeezing my hand and broke my index finger. So there we are, my wife laying there with the Dr. delivering our son and a nurse applying a splint to my finger.

My daughter was born 5 years later. No real drama there except for the point where my wife cusses out the Dr. (different Dr.). My wife is in pretty hard labor and was being quite vocal about the whole ordeal. The Dr. told her to be quiet as it shouldn't be that painful. My wife turned her head, looked at the Dr. and said..FK you, it's not hurting you. The look on the womans face (the Dr.) was absolutely precious.

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

I might post a trip report October 24, 2006. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

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My daughter Rachel Michelle was born March 30th at 9:54 pm

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Your daughter and my son Benjamin Harold share a birthday. Let's arrange their marriage now. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

My wife had been dialated about 3cm for weeks. When the girl came she came quickly.

Doctor was out having coffee and it was time for the epidural. My wife's freaking out; nurses assured her doc would be back from break in plenty of time.

Doc strolls in. How much is she dialated? She's not 'dialated' at all, there's no cervix left; she's all the way gone. Doc administered epidural in a hurry.

Now we're working with a great delivery nurse. There's a problem: every contraction is causing baby's heart rate to slow. There's a problem with the cord, wrapped around baby or wedged somehow.

Everything is happening too fast for my wife's OBGYN to make it; so we get an 'oncall': burly, surly, bull dyke. No offense to OOT's bull dykes, if any.

I overhear her and the delivery nurse arguing in the corridor, delivery nurse is pushing for an emergency C-section.

Nurse: Heart is failing when baby tries to drop.
Doc: It's OK, don't worry about it.
Nurse: This baby's crashing! (I start to freak)
Doc: I'm the doctor, don't tell me my job.

So they call for the C-section; I get gowned and am told to wait outside the delivery room door. And I wait. And wait. And wonder what the [censored]'s going on. Finally a harried nurse opens the door and beckons me in; they'd forgotten about me.

The incision is made, and this burly doc pushes down as hard as she can on my wife's belly. *Squelch* out comes baby girl. Quietly. Wife is freaking: What's wrong with my baby?
I check out the cleaning table; the nurses are working on her and discussing what they'll have to eat during their upcoming break. I relax; if they're talking about that all must be good. Baby girl is just a quiet one.

I cut the cord, they don't offer up the placenta and it doesn't occur to me to want a bite.

Regarding bonding, it's hard to say. I didn't feel any kind of epiphany or anything; yet my daughter and I are very, very tight. I talked with her a lot when she was en utero so maybe I'd already bonded with her; I dunno.

We find out the sex of upcoming baby in about a month.

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

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I might post a trip report October 24, 2006. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

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Dude, sweet! Oct. 20th here.

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

I hesitate because Im sure 2+2 doesnt want everyone to post their "shes so cute" pics, but this pic is part of the story:

Wife went through hell with all the the processes for IVF. It is a medical miracle, and when I took this picture, I couldnt believe that the tests, manipulations and clinical crap resulted in this little thing in a car seat in my car.

Could be an "Ask Me" thread if anyone wants to know about the whole IVF thing. Its a trip, man.

http://img216.imageshack.us/img216/5...ride3sp.th.jpg

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

Middle of the night, probably 4AM. I woke up to my wife moaning incoherently and mumbling nonsense. I woke my mother-in-law who was also staying there and we hustled her over to the hospital, which was about a five minute drive. We bypassed the ER and took her straight up to Maternity. By this time she was pretty much out cold but they had her resting comfortably and the baby was being monitored.

Shortly after that I was watching the monitor and the fetal heart rate crashed from 140 or so to 30 in the space of less than a minute. The attending nurse caught it as well and all hell broke loose. The OB was behind the counter at the nurse's station and literally jumped over it to get to the room, barking "Get the anaesthesiologist - now!" They were swabbing my wife's belly with iodine as they wheeled her out of the room. Within the space of 5-10 minutes - minutes that lasted an eternity from the viewpoint of a very frightened first time father - they had the baby out and I was the proud, scared father of a healthy baby boy.

It turned out that the placenta had separated from the uterine wall. We were extremely fortunate that we were already in the hospital because if the placental abruption had happened at home it's fairly certain we would have lost the baby and there's a possibility I would have lost my wife as well. I'm just thankful it all worked out.

Second time around was a routine c-section. My wife didn't enjoy it very much but I had a grand time, no doubt due to the relief of it not being a life and death emergency.

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

Mine is 5 now and I remember pretty much everything about those days. The thing I find amazing is, he is pretty much the same kid as the one we brought home from the hospital. You wouldn't think babies have personalities, but they do, and they pretty much don't change.

Before he was born, he kicked and kicked, so much so my wife was on Darvocet the last two months. It was constant, like he would never sleep. We bring him home, he's asleep in the crib, and there goes the right leg. Kick, kick, kick. You feed him, there goes the right leg. Kicked his right big toenail off by the time he was 6 months old. We finally figured out he kicks when he's happy, and he kicks to this day if you read him a story or give him one of his favorite foods.

He's going to be the worst poker player in the world if anybody bothers to look under the table.

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

I wanna say that I enjoyed this thread a lot. One of my closest friends is having a baby in a month, so reading these stories is kinda cool.

Re: For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?
 

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Anyway my son's earliest memories are of a pirate chantey.

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The kid is gonna turn out fantastic!

I sometimes sing 'Farewell and Adieu' to my little girl at bedtime, till she tells me to shut up, at least.