Different Circles

Jake, watching this unfold, was suddenly overwhelmed by the strongest outpouring of emotion he had ever experienced in his life. Stepping up on stage for the first time had nothing on this. Getting laid for the first time had nothing on this. Even hearing himself on the radio for the first time could not even begin to compare. It was a mixture of anxiety, awe, excitement, but, more than anything else, a deep, heartfelt sense of love. That was his child that had just come out of his wife’s body. His child! It had his genes and chromosomes, and he and Laura were responsible for guiding it through life. He felt the emotions build to a climax and tears began to run down his face, tears of joy, tears of love, tears of fear.

“She’s beautiful,” he said, wiping at the tears. “Uh ... she is a she, right?”

Dr. Niven opened the squirming baby’s legs just a bit and then nodded. “She’s a she,” she confirmed. “A healthy looking baby girl. What’s the time?”

“One-fifty-five AM,” said Lisa, the newborn nurse. “Already noted.”

“Very good,” Niven said. She now had a blue towel in her hand and was drying Cadence off. “We have a birth APGAR score of one, two, one, one, one for a total of six. That’s pretty normal and she’s already pinking up.”

“Got it,” Lisa said, writing it down on a folding piece of paper.

“Does she have all her fingers and toes?” asked Laura.

“She has all her fingers and toes,” Danielle assured her. “She’s a beautiful baby, Laura.”

“Can I see her?” she asked.

“You can do better than that,” Niven said. “You can hold her. I’m going to put her on your chest in just a moment so we can keep her warm. Just let me clamp the cord real quick.”

While Danielle unceremoniously unbuttoned the sleeves on Laura’s gown and pulled it down to her lower stomach, Niven put two little clamps on the umbilical cord—one just about an inch from Cadence’s belly button, the other about four inches closer to Laura. Once they were clamped, she took the now screaming baby and set her belly down on Laura’s stomach, so her little mouth was near Laura’s right breast.

“Little girls are screamers, aren’t they?” asked Lisa with a smile.

“That’s the truth,” said Danielle, also smiling. It was obvious that both of the nurses particularly enjoyed this moment of their jobs.

Laura beheld the little life now snuggled against her for the first time. She was crying and smiling at the same time. “I did it,” she whispered happily.

“You did it, hon,” Jake said, tears still in his eyes as well. “Look at how tiny she is.”

“She didn’t feel that tiny coming out,” Laura said with a laugh of relief.

“You said you were planning to breastfeed her, right, Laura?” asked Niven, who was opening up another sterile package from her toolkit.

“Yes,” she said.

“Why don’t you give it a shot now then,” Niven suggested. “Lisa will help you.”

“Really? Right now?” Laura asked, excited.

“Right now,” she said. “She should have the instinctive urge to feed. And the suckling will stimulate oxytocin release. That will help your uterus contract down to normal so you can expel the placenta and clamp off anything that might be bleeding in there.”

“Okay,” Laura said. “I’ve never done this before though. Not with a baby anyway.”

“Uh ... yes, of course,” Niven said. “Like I said, Lisa will help you, In the meantime, Dad, how about you cut this umbilical cord for me.”

Jake did not respond at first because he had never been called “Dad” before. It took him a moment to realize that she was talking to him. And then another wave of emotion washed over him when he realized the terminology was correct. He was a dad now. That was his daughter there and someday she would call him that.

“Me ... you want me to do it?” he stammered.

“If you don’t mind,” she said, handing him a small pair of scissors. “I’ll show you where to do it.”

He took the scissors in his right hand. The hand was shaking a little. She pointed to a spot almost exactly midway between the two clamps on the cord. He put the cord between the blades and made the cut. It was harder than it seemed like it should be, but he managed to do it.

“There we go,” Niven said. “Good job.”

He handed the scissors back to her and then looked up at his daughter again. Lisa had shown Laura how to get her to latch on to the nipple and she was now suckling at it, weakly, but clearly suckling. Her crying had stopped.

Celia came over and put her arms around Jake, hugging him against her. She still had tears running down her cheeks. “This is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” she told him. “Thank you for letting me be a part of it.”

“You belong here, C,” he told her, returning the hug. “You know that.”

“I do now,” she said. “I do now.”

Chapter 22: The New Life

Coos Bay, Oregon

December 29, 1997