May 16, 2008

Aditi - birth story - II

Continuing from here

I drove to work everyday. I never felt uncomfortable after my initial sickness. Despite people advising me not to drive, some in fact warned me of after effects too, I enjoyed driving – even in Bangalore’s horrible traffic. Whenever I had to speed brake, or when I unexpectedly drove into pot-holes, I apologized to my baby. I sang to her then. It was our time. It could sound all clichéd, but I thought I was making up for all that time I lost throwing up. By the way, during the entire period of my pregnancy, I’d wanted the baby to be a girl, my companion. I have grown up with a sister; I do not know how a guy grows up. I thought I would be comfortable bringing a girl up, than a boy. Maybe, now I am confident……then, I wasn’t.

In a way, ignorance was bliss – I never researched extensively as to what should happen to me when, what should I be feeling, how should I prepare myself, and most important of all, how is the delivery going to be. It was all word of mouth – what my mom, m-i-l and my close friend, who was just a couple of months ahead of me, told me. In fact, I was pretty upset when the baby didn’t start kicking inside as per my friend’s schedule of things!

I had nearly 6 ultrasounds during my entire period….first two for viability of the fetus, as the doc thought, during the first scan the heart beat could not be heard and she wanted to be sure. Third one in the third month, fourth in the sixth month, fifth during eighth month before the doctor here in Bangalore could let me go to Chennai for delivery and one final one in Chennai, about 2 weeks before I delivered. I was also worried about the number of scans I had. Once or twice during the time, I also braved myself for expecting the unexpected – provisioning for other than good news. I tried to talk to Sri (hubby) about all possible outcomes of a delivery, but he just encouraged me to be positive and told me that we will evaluate things when we had to. I felt more than comfortable to leave it at that. Didn’t want to trouble myself any further.

I had my baby shower in the first week of November. My father (one extra-protective type) wanted me to come off to Chennai right away. I was due on December 25th. My mother in law was with him on this. She had nightmares about me getting sudden pains when driving et al. In toto, they bundled me off to Chennai, close to 8 weeks before I was due. I had wanted to work….but my doc didn’t want me to travel in the last few weeks. I was rock solid….but no one would want my opinion on that. I was delivering my first baby – I shouldn’t take chances. Having this been thrust down my throat, I spoke to my manager for an extra month’s leave without pay (boo-hoo) and left for Chennai.
Will be continued....

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