Birth of a child : A new life experience

Fresh from the oven, sent from heaven

It has been 364 days since my life and status has changed. Status from being a hubby 1.0 has been upgraded to hubby & daddy 2.0. And let me tell you that with the application upgrade, there isn't any uninstal or undo features that came with it. In malay they call it sign mati. I would like to share some chronological event that i have gone thorugh from being just a hubby to being a hubby & daddy for the first time.

At exactly 1 year ago last year (10 Feb 2007), i took wifey for the regular medical checkup at APSH with our Gynea Datuk Dr Ashar. The medical checkup was a usual appointment and it seems to be normal as usual except for the day before that wifey showed to me a blood stain on her panty liner. Now, according to an article that she read somewhere, one of the signs of delivery is blood show. Hmmm, for me i thought that it was some sort of a show which means that basically it is more than a dot of blood. So i told her that couldn't be it but i guess that was the peak of the show...hehe...silly me.

She told the doctor the symptoms and as usual, the cool doctor indicated that it is normal. He also asked whether wifey was in pain or some sort but that wasn't the case. So therefore, the doctor just said it is not time yet. The time will come when you are in pain. So ok then, i guess we'll just have to wait until the pain kicks in. After the checkup around 12pm, we wanted to see a movie at MBO, Galaxy Ampang. But for whatever reason, the cinema was closed. So we did not managed to catch a movie.

Our next plan was wanting to hang out at One Utama to enjoy our favorite dish, the TomYam Spaghetti at Old Asia Restaurant. But since it was a hot afternoon, we decided to just eat somewhere closer and later to One Utama on the evening. So we had lunch at Tjampuhan restaurant at Jalan Gurney. After lunch, we head out straight to home. We lied on the bed an eventually we both fell asleep. I woke up sometime around 530 pm and found out wifey was still asleep. Not wanting to wake her up, i went outside to the living room and put on the Playstation Worms Armageddon Cd. That was the last game i played before upgraded to daddy 2.0...hehehe

So around 7pm, wifey woke up and told me she was not feeling rather well. After a while she said, aduuii, sakit. (pain). At that time i was still not sure wheter it's the real deal or not since we have experienced so many false alarm and minor contractions before. So i guess it was time to start the timing. At first it was around 13 -15 minutes interval but mainly constant. Hmmm, so could this be it?? Could this be THE ONE??? So at that time, all we had to to was time it. We had to abandoned the plan to go to One Utama. Nooooooo, the tomyam spaghetti.. NOOOOOoooo!!!! ... we just ordered Dominos Pizza instead.

At around 820pm, wifey received a phone call from a lady from StemCell. She wanted to explain the benefits of Stem Cell etc etc... since her timing was completely off, there were times that wifey had to cut her off for a while and said, "ermmm kak, boleh tunggu kejap. Saya tengah sakit contraction ni".... AAAARRRRGGHHH.... and then continued again with the conversation. Hehehe... the contraction pain was usually around 40 seconds. Also, when she wanted to take her bath, she had to wait till the contraction pain was over and the quickly to the bathroom before the next wave strikes back.

The contraction went on and on that night. According to a Johnson & Johnson's book, usually it is quite a while before the real delivery time. The book advise to relax first at home, try to get some sleep, have a shower before going to the hospital. I tried my best to keep my wifey at ease. Hug her and pat her back, that sort of stuff. All i could do was trying to ease her burden down. If i could take some of her pain, i would have. So the situation continued on till the next morning. Wifey asked me to get some sleep but i just couldn't rest myself down seing her in that situation. She stayed up all night, lying on the bed, standing up, crouching and all sort of stuff. Inspite all that she did manage to finish the movie, Bend it like Beckham which was showing on TV.

Contraction chart shows off the scale

Finally at 5am on 11 Feb 07, i woke up and she agreed that it is time to go to the hospital now. While she was taking a shower, i prepared roti bakar for a light snack just in case if she was hungry. After getting ready and all, we had our last breakfast together before going straight to the hospital. The contraction interval was closer then. Probably around 7 minutes. So with everything ready, i brought her straight to the car and with my luck, all the traffic light was green from Wangsa Maju straight down to APSH. The total travelling time was probably around 10 minutes, which is way faster then the usual time.

Once we reached at the parking lot, it was just our luck. The elevator wasn't working since it was only 615am. Dammit. But wifey said she could walk to the emergency area and so we did. She was taken up to the delivery room on a wheelchair. The nurses there started putting all the sensors on her tummy to measure the contraction level. The machine was like the one used in measuring earthquakes....hehe...Incredible, it was off the scale. I was also asking them for epidural but unfortunately then, the surface was already 5 cm opened which means that if the epidural would only have an effect of 30%. We had already pass the point of no return. One she was settled in, i went down and registered her. Managed to call both mamas to inform them of the situation and asked them to pray.

When i came back, the nurses had already punctured her waterbag. She was already lying on bed helplessly. I was feeling very weak and sad that i could do more to help. If i didn't make her pregnant, none of this would have happened. Once in a while she would put the laughing gas mask when the contraction started. I was feeling rather clueless on what to feel. If i felt sad and breakdown and cry, then it might give a bad impression to her and Melemahkan semangat. On the other hand, if i made some happy and silly jokes to cheer her up, she might get angry. Ermmm hello, i'm in pain here.... So i tried my best to hide my true feelings and was hoping that she would get thru this. It's all in her hands now. All i could do was give her the best support during the time of the contraction.

After about an hour and the surface has finally opened up at 10cm, it was time to push the baby out. Then, there was still no doctor. All there is was the 2 nurse that was attending to wifey. I was feeling rather worried at that time. I was also in the labour room with my dockers T-shirt, jeans and sandals. Isn't that i'm suppose to wear some sort of clothes that you see people wear in TV show??? So everytime the contraction came, the nurse would ask wifey to take a deep breath, and for about 14 seconds, push as hard as you can. It was like that for the few minutes. I could see the baby's hair on the surface but it just couldn't go through. Wifey was also feeling very week at the time. Luckily she had enough energy to push whenever the contraction came attacking.

The famous Phua Chu Kang boot, worn by our gynea

Finally at around 845am the hero of the day arrived. The doctor came with a red t-shirt, brown pants and shoes. In a split second (like Gaban), he transformed himself into a butcher???? Yes, that's right. He strapped on his yellow rubber boots like the one you see in Phua Chu Kang and tied down an apron which looks like a baby's beep. Hmmm, i didn't know that. All his equipments were already made ready. So when the contraction came attacking, i saw him taking the scissors and simply cut open the surface to make a bigger path for the baby to pass through. Strangely enough he did not use any bius and i saw wifey did not feel a thing. Hmmm, it goes to show that the contraction pain was a much more painful then a scissors cutting you.

With the surface finally enlarged, one final push did the job. And there it was, a very tiny human being screaming down her throats. Ngehhh Ngeeehh ngeeehhh. It was grey in colour. It had 10 tiny fingers and 10 tiny toes (kuku kaki). It was the cutest thing ever and all of a sudden it was in the room out of nowhere....hehehe.... There were also tears in my eyes while seeing the baby cry on top of wifey's tummy. The time of birth was 9.05am. The baby had the most beautiful face. Her eyebrows were perfect as seems that it was drawn using eyeliner.

The baby was later put on a special place where it was warmed up. The nurse cleaned her up and used some sort of vacuuming tube to suck down the flames in her mouth and nose. After wrapping her up, the baby finally kept quiet while her eyes were still shut wide. Then it was time. The time for every muslim father to do his obligation which is to Azan and Qamat the baby. The nurse asked me to pick her up but i didn't know how. So the nurse carried the baby for me and put them in my arms. And then there it goes.... Allahuakbar Allahuakbar.... the sound of my voice broke the silence in the room. At that point of time, i swear to myself that i was going to do everything in my powers to raise her and to protect her against all odds. There was also that same feeling like the one in Lion king where Simba was raised by his father. Yeahh, that sort of feeling. Wifey was a very strong and cunning woman. I respected her a lot for her courage, determination and inner strength. I know she was in real pain, but for the love of the baby, she managed to channeled everything out. Tabik springgg.....

Finally giving back the baby to the nurse and the doctor finished sewing wifey back, it was all over. The moment that we were waiting for has passed by and both of us were upgraded to parents 2.0. We manage to overcome it. All the challenges that we face was finally over. No more nausea, morning sickness, worrying when the baby might pop out and all. We went back to our normal lives except for the additional of a very special family member which was later named, Adriana Sofea.