She Changed Everything.

          I know it the moment I wake up. I lift the covers and peek underneath. My breasts are huge-- full, round, and sore. What were average B-cups yesterday are full-on knockers this morning. It can't have been more than a couple of weeks, but I know. I pee on the stick anyway. It turns blue immediately. I knew it would, but it's still surreal.

            "Do it again," my best friend urges, but I know it's a waste of money. Instead I go to the student health center on campus. I've never even been to a gynecologist before and now I'm here for the "official" test. I pee in a cup and then wait, alone, in a chair in the hallway. The nurse practitioner calls me in to confirm what I know.

            "What do you want to do?" (I want to find a time machine.)

            I sit with my two best friends in a secluded booth at Baker's Square. They buy me lunch. They make me breathe. They make me laugh. They hold my hand and they hug me reassuringly.

            "What are you going to do?"

I know they think this is a question which needs to be answered. I know they think I have options. I don't. It isn't just religion or how I was raised-- somewhere deep inside me I simply know I have no choice. This is what I am meant to do. I am only 19-years-old, but I know.

            I have to tell my parents. I have to tell my grandparents and siblings. I have to tell Him. I don't know what to do first. My mother will hate me. Will my father? Will I have somewhere to live? I tell my dad first. He is surprised. I'm surprised that he's surprised. I can't understand how he didn't see this coming. He hugs me. He loves me. He will help me. I call my mother next.

            "I have something I need to tell you."

            "You're pregnant." She always thinks the worst of me, but it is easier because she took the words away.

            "Yes."

She is uncharacteristically comforting. I guess she just always expected I would end up this way. She is disappointed, but at the same time she is the most humane she has ever been to me. She makes me feel better. She loves me, in her own way.   

Finally, I call Him.

             "Are you sure?"

                                                           "Very."

                                                           "What will you do?"

                                                           "I'm keeping it."

                                                          "You'll change your mind."

                                                          " No. I won't."

I know he believes I will, but I won't. We are not in love. We are not together. We never were. We never will be. I will do this alone. No, not alone. I will do this without Him, but I will not be alone.

            I have to go to church on Sunday. I have to face them; all the people who know, all the people who have known me since I was a baby. I know how they are. I know they will whisper behind my back and judge me. I know they are secretly delighted for the gossip--and because I am not their little girl. I hold my head up against them. My two girlfriends flank me, one on each side. I love them.

             She smiles at me when we offer peace. I hardly know her, this mother whose sons I only recently met. She holds my hand and leans close.
           "Congratulations!" she beams at me. 

I want to cry. Yes! I think to myself. Yes. This a wonderful thing. I'm allowed to celebrate this. I'm allowed to be happy. For the first time I let myself feel the joy I have been hiding.  I love this little woman whose name I barely know.

            "Thank you."

            Everything changes. My skin, my hair, my body, they become someone else's. I am merely the shell for the egg. My body takes from me what the baby wants. It takes my nutrition, my energy and my figure. Everything I am becomes about the baby. Strangers want to touch me in line at the grocery store. They ask me personal questions. Every morning I vomit before breakfast. I vomit before lunch. It becomes my routine, like it is something normal. I eat the same three foods everyday: microwave French toast for breakfast, microwave macaroni and cheese for dinner, a loaded baked potato everyday on the way home from work. I can't resist it. It's what the baby wants.

             I can't even make it upstairs after work at night I am so exhausted. I fall asleep on the sofa as soon as I get home. Sometimes I feel my dad sitting there next to me, eating his dinner and watching TV. My friends don't understand. They want to "do stuff." They want to hang out. They invite me for dinner or to the movies. They think I'm blowing them off. They can't understand what it's like. Even if I could gather the energy to go, it's weird. They are young. They are having fun and being wild like they should be. I am pregnant. I can't be one of them anymore. I am not 19. I am an adult. I am the reality of youthful indiscretion. I am someone's mother.

            I haven't bought anything to prepare for the baby yet. I am afraid to. I am afraid that if I buy something, if I look forward to this, God will take it away, to punish me. One day my father comes home from work with a baby seat. He wants to take me to pick out a crib. He is very excited. I am grateful and I enjoy seeing him this way. I go shopping with my mother too. She wants help picking out fabric to make a quilt for the baby. While I am there, I see the prettiest bolt of material. It is plaid in lavender, yellow, and green. It is soft and I want it. I buy it. It's the first thing I buy for my baby. I wait, but God doesn't punish me. I spend months on a ladder hand-painting carousel horses around the baby's room. My ankles swell up while I am on the ladder. My friends come and help so I will be finished on time. I turn 20. They throw me a surprise party. I am embarrassed by the attention. At least I am no longer a teenager.

            My sister makes me take a walk with her every day on our lunch break. She could be doing a million other things, but she has read that walking makes labor and delivery easier. She is my best friend now, even when she tells me I look "frumpy" and the hormones make me cry. We walk and talk every day. I love this time together. One day at work when I am all alone and it is very quiet, I feel it move for the first time; unmistakable twitching in my belly. It is amazing! It is just the two of us, the baby and I who share this moment.

           My work throws me a shower. My aunt throws me a shower. My friends throw me a shower. My dad's work throws him a shower. I have enough baby stuff to open a store. I am due. Everyone is waiting. We watch a movie. I watch a movie, everyone else watches me. Then they all go home disappointed. My best friend is my labor coach. She stays with me. Midnight. My water breaks. It's painless. I am sleepy and it takes me a few minutes to realize what is happening. Everything is changing. Here in the dark, alone for this moment, I reconcile what is happening, what is about to happen.

            I wake my coach and my dad, so he can drive me to the hospital. He is calm, but I can feel his excited energy barely contained beneath the surface. Grandpa.  There is no pain yet, but I have to change my clothes several times because of the water. No one warned me about this. I ride to the hospital in my dad's midlife crisis--his red Corvette. He loves this car. He loves me more. When we get there I have to roll out onto my hands and knees because the car is so low to the ground I can't get out. A boy I went to high school with is working at the hospital. Awkward. I hope he doesn't recognize me, but I know he recognizes my coach.

             I call Him from the hospital. He doesn't say so, but I can tell he isn't alone. He will come later, after the birth. That's ok. I just thought he should know. I am in my backless gown. I am in my dim labor room. I am breathing like they taught me in Lamaze. It's bullshit.  It's a Catholic hospital. I'm a single teenage pregnancy. My nurse is a bitch. She thinks I should suffer the consequences of my choices. She keeps making nasty remarks to me. I want to punch her in her gum-popping mouth. We go for a walk instead. It's supposed to progress my labor. We walk out to the waiting room where my dad is playing cards with the man who has become one of my best friends.  They look concerned to see me this way. Florescent hospital lighting is not flattering to begin with, but I am green and in pain. They didn't used to let women walk around in labor. This is especially startling for my father, who based on my mother's labor, expected this to go much faster and easier.

             I don't want to walk anymore. I'm tired and it is getting harder to concentrate on taking the steps-- right foot, then left-- it's getting too complicated. There has been a shift change. My nurses are younger and friendlier. They give me encouragement and pain medication. I like my new nurses. My labor is hard now. I want to bite down on something like they do in the old western movies. My mouth becomes so dry it is a distraction. I honestly fear I will choke to death on my own swollen tongue before I deliver. I beg my coach to spit in my mouth for moisture. She doesn't think I'm serious, but I am. The nurse finally allows me to suck on a damp paper towel.

            I can't breathe. I can't remember how to breathe or why. I can't remember to focus, or what the hell my "happy peaceful place" is. My mind is wild. My body is in revolution. I want to go home. I just want to quit and come back another time. I don't want to do this anymore tonight. I am not panicking, I am just done. I want to go home!

            They tell me it's time to push. My nurses sense my desperation and fatigue. They gather around me like a cheer squad. They hold my legs and my head and encourage in unison,

            "PUSH PUSH PUSH," they yell together.  We become a well-oiled machine. Everyone is focused on one goal. I am part of the team although I am also watching from a place all by myself. Far away. The head won't crown. They tell me I can't go to delivery until the head crowns. I think I have been pushing for hours. Hours of "almost, but not quite." Finally they tell me it's time. I have done my job. I can go to delivery. I am exhausted. They push a gurney up to my bedside and tell me to "slide" over. They have to be kidding. I have a head between my legs and they want me to "scootch over."

            Somehow I manage to barely wiggle onto the gurney. They wheel me into delivery. It is a cold and bright place. Everything is stark white tile. I have seen this room in a horror film--covered in blood. The lights are intensely bright, reflecting off the tile and it is very cold. This is a harsh place. I am oddly transfixed by the sterile feeling and smell. My doctor is here. This doctor, who delivered me, will deliver my baby. I wonder if this makes him feel old.

            He makes a cut. There is searing pain. He tells me when to push and when to wait. It all happens so fast. My coach is holding my hand. Overhead on the sound system I realize "our song" is playing. We are both aware of it. She is crying. She is not the only one. There is a baby. She is crying too. She is whisked away by nurses to be "scored." I can see from between my knees, over the doctor's head, parts of her purple flesh turning pink as she screams. My body is instantly freezing as though I have been thrown in a tub of ice. I am shaking and watching from somewhere outside my body. My coach is sobbing--mostly from joy but also because at some point in my feral state I bit her. I feel pressure to feel something too, but I can't. I want to cry tears of joy or pain, but I can't. I am insulated from my emotions. I thought it would be like the movies. It isn't.  My body continues to labor. No one told me this would happen. Someone wraps me in oven-warmed blankets. In my entire life I have never felt this good.   

            "She is beautiful," she keeps saying. "Oh my god. Did you see her? She is beautiful."

I want to hear if she is complete; all fingers and toes accounted for, but I am also removed. I am disconnected from any feelings or thought. I am just in a moment. I'm watching it and I'm all alone. For just this moment I am all alone. I feel nothing. I feel everything.

            I am in my room in time for breakfast. My coach has gone home to sleep. My other friend comes to the hospital and makes me presentable for visitors. She helps me brush my hair and put it in a ponytail. Soon my room is packed, wall-to-wall. The two visitor limit is ridiculously ignored as 16 of my nearest and dearest friends stand shoulder to shoulder and whisper and giggle. There is a mini-party in my maternity room. They make me laugh which hurts a lot but I am so happy they all came. These are the numerous others who love me and now love my baby. They will be her extended family for years to come.

            Finally we are alone. Together. She is perfect. She is amazing. She is the only baby to ever exist on the planet and she is here with me in her clear plastic bassinet on wheels. I just watch her. Like an angel, I am afraid if I disturb her she will vanish. I memorize her. I make her promises I know I will keep. The sins of my mother I will not repeat. She is my entire life in that moment. She is my entire being and purpose. I know I would die for her. I will give her all my pieces. I will love her unconditionally. We belong to each other. I have no doubt. I have no fear. I know. Everything has changed. Everything good in my life starts in this one moment.

            It all happened so fast! On Sunday, this baby is turning 20-- the age I was when I had her. The man playing cards in the waiting room is now my husband. His mother is the incredible woman from my church. The baby was joined, quickly, by three others. One moment changed the entire course of my life. She changed everything, and I am eternally grateful.

Becoming B!