182 - Induction
182 - Induction
Birth takes a woman’s deepest fears about herself and shows her that she is stronger than them. - Unknown
Summer in the south was hot and humid. Dean had experienced this all of her life. Her mother, Mary, had described it as being a trade off for never really having cold weather.
Never before had Dean hated the hot weather.
As she neared her due date, the days with temperatures above a hundred degrees continued to climb. The Sunday that she went into the hospital to be induced, she wondered if the 104 was still Fahrenheit or if they had moved to Celsius. Either way, the news had already baked cookies in a car and fried an egg in a cast iron skillet left out on the sidewalk all day.
JD and Cooper walked her into the hospital. They flanked her as they typically did and held her hands. She would not tell them that she was nervous. She did not need to. They knew.
They themselves were also nervous. They worried about being good parents. They worried about how the staff would handle a relationship such as theirs.
Having seen the dangers that his mother had with the triplets, JD worried about what could happen. Not just to his wife, but to the baby inside her belly. She had told them that the baby was not as active as he had been and this caused even more fears to bloom in his mind.
Just as Dr. Alberton had assured them, the hospital staff was professional and simply added another chair for the second father. Dean was taken into the private room on the L & D floor while her men were told to go to the waiting room. They gave her quick kisses and followed the directions down to the room where a few other expectant fathers sat nervously.
It seemed like forever before the nurse came back and got them. The other two fathers-to-be had already gone back and another one had joined their little club. Although the new father-to-be arrived with a toddler, a preschooler and a little diva trapped inside a six-year-old body. When the nurse came to get JD and Cooper, an older woman entered and the three kids ran to her.
“I think I just got an image of your mother in a few years.”
JD chuckled at his partner because that had been his same thought. “Except I think that Dean might kill us if we have four kids by the time this one is in first grade.”
“She would not kill you,” the nurse assured them just before she knocked on the door to Dean’s room. “However, she may neuter you the hard way.”
“Please don’t give her any ideas,” Cooper pleaded as Dean called out for them to enter.
“Trust me,” the nurse chuckled, “between now and when the baby is born, she’ll come up with plenty of her own ideas.”
With that warning, she opened the door and took a sharp breath. “Mrs. Reese, can we please get back in bed?”
Dean stood with her hands pressed against the large pane of glass. Her feet were wide apart to accommodate her large belly as she leaned over the room’s air conditioning unit. The thin dressing gown that she wore fluttered as it hung open.
“I’m hot,” Dean objected.
“I’ve requested a fan be brought up for you.” The nurse tried to close the gown, “But you can’t be hanging out for all the world to see.”
The two men behind the nurse chuckled as they both thought about Dean parading around the Private Club in nothing but lace bootie shorts, a collar and her nipple rings. And their shoes. She seemed to know what her men were thinking and grinned at them.
“I don’t think I’m going to be wearing that outfit again for a while.”
Shaking her head, the nurse guided her back to the bed and settled her in with just a light sheet over her legs. “I’m not sure what outfit it was, but I would advise not for another six weeks at least.”
“I would say longer since I’m pretty sure it was the night of that outfit that has landed her here,” Cooper pointed out as he pressed a kiss to her forehead.
Maintenance brought up an oscillating fan and after her first oral dose of Pitocin, Dean drifted off to a light sleep. Her men woke her up when it was time for her to walk around. Nursing shifts changed and she received the next few doses right on schedule. Every hour, Cooper and JD made her get up and walk to help move her labor along.
Early in the morning, Dean shifted uncomfortably on the bed just before it was Cooper’s turn to wake her up. He moved out of the chair and agreed with the other men in the family. It was a torture device cleverly disguised as a chair.
“Hey, baby girl,” he murmured as he brushed hair out of her face. “You okay?”
“No, I …” her eyes went wide. “I think I just peed the bed.”
“It’s okay,” he assured her with a smile and pressed the button on the bedrail. The night nurse came on the intercom, and they told her what was going on.
A few minutes later, the nurse walked in with fresh sheets in her arms. She gave Cooper a smile, “I’ve met the other dad, but I don’t think I’ve met you.”
“Cooper,” he said as Dean squeezed his hand.
“Marilyn,” the nurse turned her attention to her patient. “Tell me what you’re feeling.”
Dean opened her mouth, instead of words, a painful scream was pulled out of her.
“Yup, that’s what I thought that you’d say.” Marilyn moved to the foot of the bed, grabbing a set of gloves from the box on the footboard, she gave Dean instructions on how to slide down towards the end of the bed. After a quick examination, she grinned at the nervous and excited parents.
“Looks like we’re getting ready to have a little one. Your birth plan does have pain meds, now would be the time.”
Dean gritted her teeth and nodded her head.
The nurse nodded as she carefully removed the damp bed pad and putting a new one under Dean. After that was taken care of, she left the room and the three parents. The anesthesiologist came in and with her men’s help, he inserted the spinal block.
Dr. Alberton arrived and told them that it would not be long before their little boy joined them. “I know how big your family is, but if there is anyone that you want here, I would say that now is the time to make those calls. Maybe not the whole calvary.”
“Helen,” Dean pleaded softly and JD nodded as he called his mother. Helen assured her son and his partners that she was on her way.
Returning after a cup of coffee, Dr. Alberton washed his hands and pulled on gloves as the nurses changed the bed into the delivery position.
Grinning at them, he declared, “Alright, let’s get the latest Reese into this world.”