Due Date

Today is Kiran's due date. According to the ultrasound technician, today was supposed to be the day when she would reach the magic age to be considered full-term. Of course, I never expected her to come on time. I thought Jackson would come late. After all, I had been told that first babies tended to come late. So I didn't expect him 10 days early, on my last official day of work. But with Kiran, I assumed that she would be early. I just didn't want to repeat the delivering on the last official day of work thing (as I did again).

So we've now had her for 2 weeks on the day she would be due.

I was approaching today's date with trepidation. Jackson's labor and delivery was so hard. I had about 36 hours of contractions before active labor really started (2 sleepless nights), 3 hours of active contractions, close to an hour of pushing, and an hour of being stitched up afterward. I was a bit scared of labor and delivery again. I don't know what made me think of doing a natural birth for Jackson (Becky, Lilia, Kathy M...). I'm a health care provider. We like drugs. So this time I wanted the epidural. If you don't know the story, we got to the hospital too late. Kiran was born one hour after they put that gown on me. I hadn't even consented to treatment. The funny thing is...I was telling Ian yesterday that I can't remember what the contractions felt like. And I can't remember what the delivery felt like either. And after months and months of telling people that we're closing shop after this one, I'm wondering if we should go ahead and let another accident happen.

I was approaching today's date with excitement. I was so curious to see what Kiran would look like. I spent most of Jackson's pregnancy telling Ian how my dominant genes would absolutely wipe out his recessive genes. Then I birthed a blond hair, blue eyed boy. The blue eyes have now become this cool light brown. But the hair is still Ian's exact color. This one seems to be expressing the dominant genes I threw her... although her eyes are also the blue/gray color that Jackson's started out to be. But I have been so curious to find out what she's going to be like. And on the day she's due, I feel like I have an idea. She's fairly mellow. She has a special little yelp she makes when she's ready to eat. And I think she knows me already. As soon as I pick her up to feed her, she stops crying and starts looking at me expectantly.

I just feel blessed. We've had an extra two weeks with our little girl. Now to look forward to the rest of our lives with her.

Clarice