Welcome to Planet Bethel

Welcome, everyone, to the Planet Bethel blog, our little corner of the online universe. We have had a blog focused more or less on our daughter, Gwendolyn Wren, since her birth in 2008. But now that we have two children, our focus is shifting (and blurring and softening) to the family as a whole--hence the new blog.

And welcome Simon Orion—to the universe!

For those of you who were following on the Gwen Wren blog, we left it like this--Rachel at week 38, and waiting. Because Gwendolyn was born at week 38 of Rachel's first pregnancy, we were expecting another early baby. We had bags packed for the hospital, we had newborn clothes and diapers waiting on the shelves. But there is always more to do to get ready for a baby.

I spent a lot of the week continuing to get things in order, like putting together a Pack-N-Play (or as they should be called, from a father's perspective, Assemble-N-Disassemble). On Wednesday of that week Rachel had a big all-day work meeting in the city. To be on the safe side, she asked me to come too, to be nearby with the car fully ready for the hospital, in case labor started during the meeting. I took the opportunity to see a movie--a rare luxury. (I left my phone on vibrate.) The two movies I recognized that were playing in English (not dubbed in Spanish) were Black Swan and Hot Tub Time Machine. Now, many will question my choice on this. I knew Black Swan was technically the better movie--but I searched within and found that I really wanted to see something light and stupid, so Hot Tub Time Machine it was. It might not be the best film ever, but I'm pretty sure I had more fun than Rachel, who spent all day deciding which research projects to fund with government money that, apparently, doesn't even actually exist.

When week 39 of the pregnancy arrived--on Friday, March 18--the waiting ended. At around 5:00 PM, Rachel's "waters broke." We knew this meant we had only a short time before the birth.

Rachel put in some calls--to the doctor, the doula, Gwendolyn's nanny Graciela. The plan was that Dr. Aybar would come to our house around 7 to make an examination. Gwendolyn's birth had started much the same way, and in that case, Rachel's labor didn't start for quite some time. So, we thought maybe we could spend the night at home, but it would be a good idea to have Gwendolyn's nanny come in the morning.

 We took one more belly photo, to capture its full extent.

Rachel's body didn't wait for morning, or even for the doctor to arrive. Around 6:30 PM, she started having strong contractions! Dads who have been birth partners may recognize the paperwork on the bed: a notebook for timing contractions and a printout of some relaxation methods. I barely had time to take this photo. Rachel wanted me in direct contact with her through every contraction, and they were coming 3-4 minutes apart, lasting about a minute. In between, I was trying to assemble things for the hospital, calling the doula again (come now!), and trying to tend to Gwendolyn too.

Gwendolyn rose to the occasion wonderfully. She was clearly excited, but remained relatively calm, and even came to Rachel's side during contractions to comfort her. Still, a relatively-calm-on-the-surface toddler was proving to be a difficult distraction for Rachel, who wanted complete quiet during the contractions.

Dr. Aybar arrived around 7:30. By this time Rachel's contractions were 2-4 minutes apart, and her focus was turned very inward. "I'll go get my things for the birth and come right back!" said the doctor.

At this point I should explain that throughout the pregnancy, we had been debating about whether to have the baby in a hospital or at home. Gwendolyn was born in a birthing center in Austin, a kind of middle ground--not a hospital, but a place very well equipped for birth, and very near a hospital. We didn't have an option like this in Panama. We knew a hospital would be the safest place if anything went seriously wrong. But Rachel has a strong aversion to all things medical. And when you are trying to give birth, you don't want to be in an environment which causes you extreme stress. It is such stress that causes many of the most common problems in childbirth. So for Rachel to have the best chance at a trouble-free birth, home was the better choice. Add to this, we happened by great luck to find two of the only (THE only?) doctors in Panama who advocate home birth and who have experience attending births at home. They are a husband-and-wife team, and they live on our block in Gamboa! So a home birth was a viable option. In the later months of pregnancy, we more or less prepared for both options, but were more focused on the hospital, since that one actually required more preparation. I was basically acting as if we were going to the hospital—but I think Rachel, deep down, wanted to be at home.

Earlier that day, we had gone to the hospital for a "non-stress-test" (kind of a misnomer). The maternity ward was full and the nurses were very distracted, so much so that they bungled the test—we had to point out that they had forgotten to turn on the monitor, go back and get them a few minutes later because the monitor ran out of paper, etc. In the end, the test showed that the baby was still completely healthy, but did not give us a lot of confidence in the hospital.

So when Dr. Aybar said "I'll go get my things," he was telling us that he now thought the birth should be at home. Because we were mentally prepared for the possibility of a home birth, and not very excited about a hospital birth, this did not seem like a crisis. In fact, I think Rachel was relieved, though I must admit to feeling a mild panic. In between the next couple of contractions, I ran down to the car (still packed for the hospital) and fished out a book to try to reread the chapter on preparing for a home birth. But because I only had intervals of 1-2 minutes free from Rachel's grasp between her increasingly stronger contractions, I quickly realized this was futile. The doula arrived around 8:00, and in between Rachel's contractions we managed to cover the bed with a plastic tablecloth and a second sheet.

Around that time, Gwendolyn started to get a little more difficult. Rachel was less and less available, the house was filling up with strange people, and it was approaching Gwen Wren's bed time. Rachel's phone rang about 8:15, during a contraction, and Wren picked it up and started talking. It turned out to be our friend Daisy (or from Wren's perspective, "Freya's mom"), who had offered to come over to watch Gwendolyn if we left for the hospital during the night. After she and Wren chatted for a while, I took the phone and asked Daisy if she could come and help put Wren to bed. She was happy to, though I got the sense that actually being present for the birth was more than she had bargained for. Daisy arrived at the house around 8:45, and Gwendolyn seemed happy to go off to read books with her.

Now with Gwendolyn taken care of, Rachel was finally able to let go, and the labor took off. Throughout the second stage of labor, Rachel and I were together constantly, Rachel holding (or in a few instances, wringing or clawing at) my hands. Somewhere in there, Dr. Aybar's wife (Dra. Aybar) must have arrived, because I looked over and they were sitting together, watching us--very hands off, but very attentive, and obviously very happy with how things were going.

The baby was born at 10:05 PM. Very shortly afterward--before the placenta emerged--Daisy brought Gwendolyn in to see her long-awaited Little Brother.

"His name is Simon," I told her. We had told her this before, but I don't think she quite believed us. This time, however, she repeated it very seriously, as if imprinting the name on her brain, "Simon." Then she asked, "Does he have hands? And feet?" We lifted the blanket to show her his hands and feet. "So he can play with me?" she asked? "Yes, someday!" I had been telling Gwendolyn for weeks that the baby might not have any hair, "or maybe just one or two hairs" I would say, and she would giggle. I asked her now, "How many hairs does he have?" She answered, with giddy delight, "He has lots of hairs!"

 Indeed he does.

Oh, and for the record, he was born with his hand next to his face--just like the Wren was. He still likes to keep it there when he is sleeping.

Gwendolyn stayed with her mom and brother on the bed until everyone left the house around 11:30. I read some Frog and Toad stories to the family until Gwen Wren fell asleep, then I moved her to her bed. Rachel kept me up, however, until about 3 AM, racing to fulfill her serial requests for various forms of nourishment--gatorade, grapes, scrambled eggs ("With cheese. On a tortilla. Oooh--sauteed in butter."), etc.

The next morning, Wren returned to the family bed, and we continued to spend a lot of time very much like this in the days that followed.

So that's the story of how Simon Orion joined us on Planet Bethel. But for Simon, and for the Planet Bethel blog, this is not the end of the story; it is the beginning!