While I had high hopes the delivery of my son would be much different, I couldn't help but have more than the normal amount of trepidation when I went into labor with him. Hubby had urged me throughout the pregnancy to commit to a 'natural' childbirth, and though he tried to hide it, was resentful that I would not do so. And I felt guilty that I wasn't willing to make that commitment. Because of my age, it was considered a high risk pregnancy, and that gave me an excuse to opt out of home birth or a birthing center. Several of our friends were lay midwives and had offered to attend a home birth. They truly respected my decision not to go that route, but I still felt pressured and cowardly.

When my contractions were close enough to call the nurse to get the go-head to go to the hospital, Hubby asked me to wait a few minutes for him to walk the dog and call a friend with whom we had prearranged to come and get the get dog when we called. Hubby was gone for more than an hour and I got freaked out. By the time he came home from the dog walk I was hyperventilating. He called the nurse for authorization and we headed for the hospital. An hour later, when I was finally up in labor-and-delivery, the first thing I did was ask for a paper bag to breath into and an epideral. Then I lay there for 8 hours, completely disconnected from the lower half of my body except by watching the monitors that showed the contractions and the baby's heartbeat. I felt so disconnected, so dissociated from the main event, here in these final hours of what had been 9 months of feeling like I was one with the Goddess.

Finally, the monitors, my sudden nausea, pressure on my bowels, and an examination by the nurse that indicated the baby's head had crowned solidified into a call for action. I was called on to be a participant again, and not merely an observer of monitors between naps.

Push! Push! Push! The epideral is starting to wear off, which is good - makes it clear it is not interferring with the pushing.

Ain't nothin' happenin'. I overhear discussions between nurse and doc. Baby's unusally big head. Mother's 42 year old, rigid bones. Hear the doc wondering if the epidural is keeping me from pushing hard enough. Hear the more experienced nurse tell him she thinks I'm pushing just fine, and the epidural was scheduled to have been renewed over an hour ago.

They begin to talk c-section. I ask to be included in the discussion.   Hubby, who has been dozing in a recliner, gets involved. He has more than his fair share of testosterone under normal circumstances. Toss a little stress into the mix, and he can seem very hostile and aggressive. Sometimes that's good. Sometimes not. Now it is not. Seeing what is coming, I ask nurse to call a close friend of hubby's who lives near the hospital. She does so and puts phone to my ear. I ask friend to come poste haste to help Hubby calm down so I can have this baby.

Pains are becoming more intense by the minute as the epideral fades into history. Hubby talks over me, insists that he and the doc confer out in the hall. I tell Hubby to shut up and sit down, I need him to help me focus to manage the pain. Hubby sits down briefly to try to function as coach. I ask questions as I am able, trying to sort out risks to baby if I hold off on c-section, if pelvis won't give, if forcepsae an option, etc. etc. Hubby is too stressed to contain himself. He starts shouting at doc. Doc takes him out to hall. Overhear doc tell him if he doesn't calm down doc will have him removed from premises.

Friend arrives in record time. talks to doc and Hubby, takes hubby aside and gets him settled down some. By now,epidural is completely worn off, the baby hasn't budged. I ok the c-section.That long awaited moment that I have fantasized about for so long, when he is lifted in the air, emits his cry of life, and then is gently handed over to my maternal care, is not going to happen quite like I had planned.

But the rewards for my compliance and good behavior come quickly, and are three-fold. A nurse anethesist appears from nowhere. Had Harry Potter been around in 1992, I would have sworn she apparated. The epidural is replenished and a fast acting pre-op sedative are administered before I am even wheeled across the hall to the OR. And hubby appears at my side, restored to his senses just as I am losing mine. Dopely, I wonder out loud if this meets the DSM-III criteria for a folie-a-deux.

The OR is freezing-cold. I'm starting to cry in disappointment and shame as my arms are stretched out to either side and strapped to boards. Am I being crucified for caving in? for taking what might be viewed as the easier, softer way? Hubby and nurse assure me it is not so. the drape and barrier go up, so I am again dissociated from the part of my body wherein dwells new life. Hubby is cautioned not to watch the proceeding on the other side of the barrier, lest he faint from the sight of blood and his wife's guts. But his primal rages are accompanied by the primal urge to provide meat for the table of his family by his own hand. He is a serious woodsman and hunter, not for sport, but for food.

Besides that, he was curious. So he watched with great interest as his wife's belly was slashed open and his son was lifted out from the wound. The doctor raised the baby high up over the barrier for me to see, then held him out to the nurse who brought him up close for me to see. I watched with some jealousy as he was handed over to his father. Saw how safe and protected he was in the gentle embrace of that fierce man, then dropped like a rock under the sudden dose of morphine.

Janie