It started one December morning. The sheer excitement even pronounced by the chill that tickled and teased deep down inside the blanket. My wife got up early. She had just taken a test more scary than your first board exams... and the results were due in 5 minutes.
I lay frozen in bed. The lingering bubbles of sleep being pricked away by the unforgiving signals from the brain. After what seemed like an eternity, I heard her calling out for me, her voice uncomfortably neutral. I turned towards her, our eyes met, and that was it...the journey had begun !!!
37 weeks later, it was my turn to wait for a result. Only this time, I was spared the torture of being all alone as I was surrounded by family. The medical staff had taken her into the operation theatre where she would be anaesthetised and would undergo a lower uterine caesarian section surgery. The baby would be pulled out of her mother's womb any moment now. A boy? A girl? It didn't matter to me... I so wanted to see her again....
Minutes passed as I found myself pretending to be the epitome of "courage under pressure" (that is how Hemingway defined "grace") . Then suddenly I heard someone calling out my name and the surrounding just erupted. I climbed two floors up the stairs to the O.T and somewhat symbolically took one giant step in life... I was the father of a baby girl !!
But hey... I was not thinking of writing all this. I was about to tell you how miserable I felt at the last bit of freedom being confiscated from me. About the zillion calculations I did in my mind over those 9 months. And how the same me fought tears when the little one had a fever just 4 days into her life and the doctors said they would make a puncture in her spine and draw fluid in a syringe. They wouldn't allow anyone near her and I had to watch her from behind a glass partition till the nurses would mercilessly pull down the curtains !
Having gone through all this, it really feels good to hold her in my arms now. I selfishly have the privilege to call her "Steffi" even though people around me find it hard to digest :) .
And do you know what my wife said to me when I met her again in the recovery room...
She said "We did it !!"
"We sure did !!" -- I replied
I lay frozen in bed. The lingering bubbles of sleep being pricked away by the unforgiving signals from the brain. After what seemed like an eternity, I heard her calling out for me, her voice uncomfortably neutral. I turned towards her, our eyes met, and that was it...the journey had begun !!!
37 weeks later, it was my turn to wait for a result. Only this time, I was spared the torture of being all alone as I was surrounded by family. The medical staff had taken her into the operation theatre where she would be anaesthetised and would undergo a lower uterine caesarian section surgery. The baby would be pulled out of her mother's womb any moment now. A boy? A girl? It didn't matter to me... I so wanted to see her again....
Minutes passed as I found myself pretending to be the epitome of "courage under pressure" (that is how Hemingway defined "grace") . Then suddenly I heard someone calling out my name and the surrounding just erupted. I climbed two floors up the stairs to the O.T and somewhat symbolically took one giant step in life... I was the father of a baby girl !!
But hey... I was not thinking of writing all this. I was about to tell you how miserable I felt at the last bit of freedom being confiscated from me. About the zillion calculations I did in my mind over those 9 months. And how the same me fought tears when the little one had a fever just 4 days into her life and the doctors said they would make a puncture in her spine and draw fluid in a syringe. They wouldn't allow anyone near her and I had to watch her from behind a glass partition till the nurses would mercilessly pull down the curtains !
Having gone through all this, it really feels good to hold her in my arms now. I selfishly have the privilege to call her "Steffi" even though people around me find it hard to digest :) .
And do you know what my wife said to me when I met her again in the recovery room...
She said "We did it !!"
"We sure did !!" -- I replied
