As Edwin’s first birthday approaches, I find myself thinking back to what was going through my mind a year ago. I was almost 42 weeks pregnant and more than anxious to get this baby out, already! I felt prepared. Nick and I had gone to birthing classes, breastfeeding classes, and newborn basics classes. The nursery was stocked and decorated, and my hospital bag had been packed since 38 weeks. I had a birth plan, although I had been advised by my cousin, a labor and delivery nurse, to be flexible about the birth process. As it turned out, she was right. My labor and delivery turned out to be my first lesson in parenting, because almost nothing went according to plan.

I was hoping and preparing for a natural childbirth. I’m a strong woman who doesn’t fear pain, and I felt empowered by the base nature of delivering a child. My favorite thing to say to my husband was, “If you dropped me in the middle of a desert island, with no doctors or drugs around, this baby would still come out of me!” Unfortunately, I hadn’t counted on the fact that Edwin would NOT. Want. To. Come. Out. (I should have bargained on that, since I was nearly three weeks late for my own mother, in the days before doctors scheduled inductions.) I was scheduled to be induced at nearly 42 weeks, and though I prayed for contractions to start before then, I did not get my wish. I went into the hospital under my own steam on the night of Thursday, September 6th, and was given the first induction drug while watching Barack Obama’s speech closing that week’s Democratic Convention. This was the first strike against my natural childbirth plan, because once I started receiving the drugs, I needed to be strapped to a monitor 24/7. I couldn’t get up and walk around, so all of the labor positions my husband and I had practiced were useless. The second strike came the next morning, when contractions really started, and the pain got very intense very quickly, even though I still had a long way to go. I’d been warned that the induction drugs make labor more painful. I have nothing to compare it to, but I have a pretty high tolerance for pain, and I didn’t think I could handle that amount of pain for that many hours without the possibility of moving around, so I called for the epidural. That ended up being the right choice for me, as I was able to rest through most of the labor and had plenty of energy when the real work began. Edwin was born on Friday evening, September 7th.

Looking back, that was my first lesson in parenting:

1. A parent is always at the mercy of the child’s schedule and timing. If the child isn’t ready for something, or has a basic need to be met (hunger, sleep, etc.) the parent’s life is on hold until the child is satisfied. Edwin was still biding his time in utero when I learned that lesson.

2. No matter how well you plan, life with a child will never turn out the way you expect. Flexibility is key; being able to adapt and to let things go are necessary life skills.

Also? Children are painful, but there are drugs for that 🙂

Mothers, what lessons did you learn from your delivery experience(s)?