Eight is Enough

The right mix of laughter, frustration, love and exasperation apparently makes time fly, since it seems like only yesterday when David made his dramatic entry into the world. I'm a firm believer in documenting memories, so just to make a short story long:

12:00 PM
Angie had been given a cocktail to help induce birth. THE BABY was already three weeks overdue, so the doctors had finally reached Angie's level of impatience.

2:00 PM
Angie and I were allowed to walk around. Actually I did the walking and Angie kinda waddled around like a duck with a bum foot. We stopped for a coffee, only Angie drank water and kept muttering threats to her belly, prompting strange looks from, well, pretty much everyone, myself included.

6:00 PM
I had dinner with Angie, only I didn't eat because I gave up hospital food directly after my birth. Eat up, sweetie!

8:00 PM
I went home to relieve Barbara, who was watching Peter.

8:30 PM
I called Barbara, who was almost home, and apologized. I then told her that I had a bad feeling and asked her to drive back to watch Peter again. Unlike Angie, she did what I asked and I left for the hospital.

9:00 PM
I got to the hospital and two minutes later, Angie's legs started shaking uncontrollably. This happens from time to time, but since she wasn't on a dance floor, I decided to call for the doctor.

9:30 PM
A rather annoyed white coat arrived and attached what looked to be jumper cables to Angie's belly. After monitoring THE BABY's vital signs for five minutes, the doctor deemed everything to be normal and disappeared.

10:30 PM
Angie told the nurse that she felt strange and tried convincing her to call the doctor again. The nurse heard Angie, but didn't really listen. Instead, she repeated that the doctor had deemed everything to be normal and then she also disappeared.

10:32 PM
Angie begged me to chase after the nurse and drop-kick her in the teeth. I briefly entertained the request, but then I remembered that I was wearing sandals and I have very fragile toes.

11:30 PM
A nurse called Karin came in, explaining that they had just had a shift change. She then asked how things were going and again, Angie told her that something was simply not right. Karin then reassured us that she would check back in every fifteen minutes, which Angie appreciated.

11:45 PM
Karin came back in to check on Angie, who started explaining yet again that something was not right. At exactly that point, Angie pulled back the white sheets, which had suddenly turned red. Karin immediately sprang into action, hitting an emergency call button next to the bed. Within 30 seconds, Angie was whisked away by three other nurses. A fourth one stopped me and told me that I would need to stay in the room.

11:50 PM
After five minutes of pacing, yet another nurse came up and explained to me in very broken English that 'You must here... big problems... maybe your baby is retarded...or dead.'

11:51 PM
A much freaked out father started freaking out on the nurses at the head station, shouting threats at them that may or may not have involved drop-kicking and dental references.

12:04 AM
After an emergency C-section following a placental abruption, THE BABY says Hello World.

12:30 AM
Angie is brought to the room, drugged to eyeballs and completely out of it. Shortly after, Karin brought in THE BABY. Since I hadn't been planning to spend the night, she brought in a cot and let me hold my second son.

4:45 AM
Angie's drugs started to wear off and she woke up asking if she was dead. I told her that I was no doctor, but that I was pretty sure that she was not dead. She then asked if THE BABY was dead. I explained to her that I was holding him and held him up for her to see. The problem was that whatever they had doped her up on was affecting her vision, prompting her to ask me if THE BABY had five eyes. I, of course, told her that no - our newborn did not have five eyes; he had six. I know, I'm an ass. 

05:00 AM
I relieved Barbara for a second time. I then face-planted the sofa and started snoring.

05:01 AM
Peter woke up crying. I shoveled baby food into him until his belly finally fell asleep again.

10:30 AM
Peter and I went to visit Angie. We went to her room, but Angie was in the bathroom. I chatted up her roommate, who eventually asked me what we called our baby.

'Well, we were thinking about Finn, but that means "light-haired" and our son was born with dark brown hair, so come on, how stupid would that be? What about you? What's your baby's name?'

She then pulled back the covers and revealed a shiny new baby with jet-black hair.

'Finn.'

10:33 AM
I politely excused myself from the awkward confrontation that I had just initiated and asked Finn's Mama if she could simply send my wife to the coffee corner when she was done in the bathroom.

11:30 AM
Angie and I were enjoying a coffee and had just agreed on naming THE BABY David Dylan when Karin walked by. She was just finishing her shift, so we gave her a big hug and thanked her again.

We didn't find out until later how serious a placental abruption is, but you literally have minutes and Karin's quick reaction most certainly saved David's life. We have since become very close friends, so thank you again, Karin!

Flashing back to this morning, I'll simply continue with the minute by minute recap.

5:00 AM
David danced into our room singing 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MEEEEEE!'. I explained two things to him. First, you don't sing the birthday song to yourself. Ever. Second, birthdays are never celebrated before 7:00 AM. I then told the birthday boy to go back to sleep. We compromised and he snuggled into bed between Angie and me.

6:30 AM
David shook me awake to ask me what time it was. I told him to look at the clock on the wall and tried to go back to sleep. Then David shook me awake again and asked me if the batteries in the clock on the wall were working. Rather than respond, I dragged myself out of bed, made a coffee, and released the birthday boy into the wild.

6:31 AM
David raced over to open the one gift that had the same size and shape as a Nintendo DS game.

6:32 AM
David opened his new hockey bag.

This is a special sports backpack that has a side strap designed specifically to hold a hockey stick. David has wanted this for the past two years, but I refused at the time, mainly because I wanted to see if he stuck with the sport long enough to even make a goal. In the meantime, David is totally obsessed with field hockey and has developed into one of the best players on the team. Yes, I do realize that I may be slightly biased.

6:33 AM
David opened 'the frog' that he had so desperately wanted when we visited Sea Life last month.

6:34 AM
David was so happy about finally getting the orange frog to match Tommy's purple frog that he love-tackled Mama. 

6:35 AM
Tommy didn't have a gift for David, but his 'Happy Brother Day' apparently moved Davey.

6:36 AM
David opened one of Peter's many gifts. I don't pretend to know what a box full of Yu-Gi-Oh cards is, but apparently David does.

7:15 AM
With the early morning gift frenzy out of the way, we could also focus on how crappy a Monday should be. So yeah, Peter and David went to school; Tommy went to Kindergarten; I left for work; and Angie left to go play with a bunch of kids.

7:16 AM
On my way out the door, I saw this chalkboard greeting, which is normally used to coordinate the soccer tournaments with Mile, who lives upstairs from us and challenges the boys to a match once or twice a month.

6:10 PM
I came home from work to find all three brothers huddled around David's new Yu-Gi-Oh cards. After the second 'hello', I gave up on getting a response and grabbed my camera instead.

9:00 PM
My last gift to David was to give him an extra hour on their normal 8:00 PM bed time. In that hour, Peter, David, and Tom had organized a comedy show. I walked in on Tommy's story about a rabbit with a farting condition.

The right mix of laughter, frustration, love and exasperation can definitely make time fly.

Laughter could clearly be chalked up to the flatulence coming from Tommy's funny bunny.

Frustration would be me trying to get wound-up boys tucked in.

Love was the full circle of hugs and kisses from all family members, except me, who had apparently been banned from Angie's kissing club.

Exasperation came around the 8th time that David came out to, um, yeah, um, ah, 'use the bathroom'.

'David! Eight is enough!'

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Ladder Talk: 
1) What was the best part of your day?
Peter: That Davey had a birthday.
David: That I get so many cool things for my birthday!
Tom: That David had his day today.

2) What was the worst part of your day?
Peter: When I fell and hurt my leg. 
David: Come on, it was my birthday! Nothing was bad.
Tom: When I was so itchy.

3) What would you like to do tomorrow?
Peter: To play with all of David's new stuff.
David: Play Yu-Gi-Oh.
Tom: To play with Lauri cars.