The Baby Story Blog. Part I

Now that I have moment to write, here's Ethan's birth story.

I'm not sure if I mentioned it in any of my previous posts, but since Ethan was resting breached in the womb, Jackie was given an appointment for a scheduled cesarean section. Go time was set for nine a.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 15. Awesome. We would go to bed at a decent time, wake up and casually drive to the hospital. Hell, maybe we'd stop at McDonald's for an Egg McMuffin and hashbrown.

Jackie and I at Bonfire Bistro the night before Ethan was born. I had pizza. Big mistake.

Although we would be missing out on the classic mad-dash to the hospital, knowing that we would be, for lack of a better term, essentially just picking up our kid, was kind of relieving. There had been a boat load of surprises on this pregnancy journey thus far. Having the actual birthday controlled and planned was something of a relief.

That's until I heard these words just under an hour into our sleep:

"Garrick. I think my water broke."

No way. No frickin way. Since we knew we were in for one of the biggest days of our life in just seven hours, we really wanted to get a good night's sleep. For some reason, after she broke the news (no pun intended), I told her not to worry and to just go back to bed. It just didn't seem logical that her water would break just hours before the scheduled c-section. But if there's anything I've learned throughout this journey, nothing is logical with pregnancy.

So, the mad-dash to the hospital did indeed happen. Not thinking, I decided to wear skinny jeans, a dress shirt and my pointy-toed dress shoes. In hindsight, I should have just rocked sweat pants, a hoodie and running shoes. Just goes to show what one hour of sleep can do to your mind.

We got to the Women's Hospital at HSC at 1:30 a.m. (Also, this would be as good a time as any to mention that during our hospital stay, our car was towed. Twice. $105 a pop, plus two 50$ tickets. Find a happy place....find a happy place...)

Now, absolutely everyone we met during our hospital stay were amazing. All top notch professionals. We couldn't have dreamed of receiving better nurses and care staff. They were all health care legends. All of them, however, expect the woman who admitted us. Whoa. I hope for the sake of everyone else who crosses her path that she was just having an off night. For instance, I would ask her the simplest of questions which she would flat out refuse to answer. Just straight up ignored me. No, "good luck, guys!" or "hope everything goes well" types of well wishes. Just pure apathy. If I was running a business (because let's face it, hospitals are businesses) I'd make sure, at the very least, the gatekeeper was friendly. Maybe even the friendliest of the bunch.

But, it's not what happens to you; It's how you respond. So, an overdose of kindness on my part seemed to do the trick.

To read Part II, click here.