Read Online Whatever...Love Is Love by Maria Bello - Free Book Online Page A

prepared. We took Lamaze classes. I learned hypnotherapy. I even had a mantra: “I am opening. The baby is coming. All is well.” I had a poster board that my sister and girlfriends had painted with calming dolphins and positive messages. I was ready when the time came on March 4, 2001, and I went into labor.
    When my water broke, Dan and I went to breakfast at the local diner and down to the beach for a walk. We saw dolphins and knew it was a sign that our little Jackson Blue was on his way. Within an hour I was doubled over in pain at the local mall where I went to find my “delivery” outfit. We ditched the dressing room quickly with the only nightie that fit my 192-pound frame: white jersey with red and pink hearts on it. Why we did that, I have no idea. But Dan indulged me. I needed a “look.” I think I was already out of my mind.
    Within two hours we were back at home and a thunderstorm had started outside that matched my insides. I spent 22 hours in that thunderstorm, with only a glass of wine to sedate me and Dan walking me up and down the stairs of our home while the bitchy midwife rolled her eyes in boredom. The candles were lit and Enya was playing. My two dearest girlfriends were there with us. One of them, the most adamant supporter of the natural birth method, made curry soup with garlic for some reason, and I threw up from the smell. By the time my mother arrived, I was 18 hours in. I had been puking and screaming, and was so bloated that she told them straightaway I should go to the emergency room. I didn’t want to give up, but I couldn’t wait to go into “transition.”
    It was perhaps the finest word I have ever heard when it finally came. “You’re in transition!” “Thank the fucking Lord!” I screamed. But I remember thinking, “If you don’t get this baby out of me soon, I will find the strength to get up and strangle you with the sheets.”
    But after an hour and a half of the worst pain of my life, my transition still didn’t end. We thought I would have to be rushed to the emergency room after all. Then the midwife told me to put my hand between my legs and feel the baby’s head. And I could feel it and immediately felt so much strength that in a moment I dilated fully and could start pushing. I started screaming, “Come on, Buddy, we can do it! Come on, Buddy!” And we did it. Together. I pushed down and he pushed out. And within minutes he was lying on my belly and Dan was cutting the cord. It was the greatest moment of my life. It was also the scariest moment of my life. I was so happy and so present, and so was Jack. He was so aware, so alive. He just looked around the room at my mom and his dad and my friends and me as if to say, “What’s up, guys? Why are you all looking at me like that? Did something happen I don’t know about?” And we laughed and cried and within an hour, he was swaddled between Dan and me in the dim light of our bedroom and we all fell asleep.
    Transition is good. It means the process or a period of changing from one state or condition to another. The transition felt like the worst part when I had Jack—but the worst part led to the best part. It was painful beyond words and I thought it would never end. But it did. And the most wondrous thing happened. My boy. The pain no longer mattered. I think sometimes if I had been in a hospital with an epidural and some Valium, it would have been easier on my son. I definitely have questioned afterward the choices I made. But it was the perfect birth for him and a perfect birth for me.
    I’ve had many instances of becoming a butterfly, but somehow I would always find myself back on the pile with the caterpillars—other mothers who question themselves as well. Some of my fellow mothers, who had been on the pile but now are flying free, have shown me that it’s okay to go back and forth from the pile to the sky. To