"Your baby is crying so loud she's waking up all the other babies. You'll need to keep her with you."

It was a tumultuous time for our family. We had moved from Hermiston, Oregon 100 miles west to a little town along the Columbia River Gorge called The Dalles, as Gerald began a new job at the newspaper. Our son Luke was only a few months old, and I was already pregnant with our second. I was trying to complete my master's degree at a university way over on the west side of the state, a decade before online classes existed. Everything was hard.

Still, I was excited! You see, motherhood was not something I'd ever really thought about before it was thrust upon me. I wasn't the girl who dreamed of having kids. I'll save Luke's birth story for December, but suffice it to say his birth totally changed my perspective and my life plan, and when I found out I was expecting our second, even though the circumstances weren't ideal, I was thrilled. Another little baby! I could hardly wait to meet him or her.

Because we were new to The Dalles, I didn't know many people, but we met a family who lived in the same apartment complex, just across the breezeway. Their names were Helen and Bob, and they had two little boys. We spent quite a lot of time with them in those early days in The Dalles, and as my baby's due date grew nearer, they volunteered to keep Luke for us when we went to the hospital.

"I sure hope this happens in the daytime," I thought. "I don't want to wake these guys up."
"It doesn't matter," Helen assured me.

Of course, it didn't happen in the daytime.

I didn't know yet that all my babies would take their sweet time hangin' out in Heaven, so I expected this one to arrive around April 23rd, the due date. Each day after that felt like torture, and at my appointment mid-week, my doctor said we could wait one week past the due date, but he was scheduling an induction for April 30th if the baby wasn't here by then. I should arrive at the hospital at 7:00 a.m. that day.

I went to sleep the night of the 29th feeling totally normal (as normal as one can feel at 41 weeks pregnant), with no signs of labor. My hospital bag was packed, and Helen and Bob were expecting Luke first thing in the morning.

Just not quite as early as they got him. I woke up at around 2:00 a.m. with legit contractions, way more intense than the Braxton Hicks variety I had experienced for several weeks. Hmmm, perhaps this baby would take after his or her mother and not like to be told what to do. Or when to be born. By 4:00 a.m., I felt we needed to go to the hospital, so Gerald called poor Helen and Bob: "We have a little boy to drop off, a few hours earlier than we anticipated." They were excited for us and said to bring him right over.

When we walked into the labor and delivery unit and I told the nurse my name, she checked her chart and announced, "You're not supposed to be here until 7:00." Yeah, I'm aware. But I think I'm in labor, so.

Turns out I was correct.

Nurse: "Oh my goodness, we need to call Dr. Mack right away. We're gonna have a baby here!"
Me: "Like I said."

My obstetrician happened to be married to Luke's pediatrician, and because of Luke's intense struggle with childhood asthma, I knew her very well. She told me later that when the hospital staff called their home to tell Dr. Mack I was in active labor and making quick progress, he was taking way too long to get up and out of there. "Get out of bed, and go now, or she's gonna deliver without you," she told him.

He made it just in time, and Shulamith Ericha Webster was born at 6:50 a.m., just 10 minutes before we were scheduled to arrive at the hospital. It was by far my fastest labor and delivery, a wonderful contrast to Luke's birth the year before.

At first I didn't believe my baby was a girl. For real, the first words out of my mouth after she was born were, "Is it really a girl? Like really?" I was totally expecting another boy. No idea why, except most people I knew with two kids had two of the same gender. I immediately called my mom and grandma: "I have a daughter! I really got a girl!" Oh my goodness, I was ecstatic.

About then she started crying. In the 80s, they liked to keep babies in the nursery and only bring them to their moms for feedings. I hated this so much, so I often "forgot" to ring for the nurses when I was done feeding, hoping they'd forget about me and leave me and my baby alone. This strategy actually worked sometimes; however, by nighttime they definitely collected all the babies, mine included. Before long, though, they brought mine back: "Your baby is crying so loud she's waking up all the other babies. You'll need to keep her with you." Well, great! That's what I wanted all along.

I once wrote about all this crying in a post here, so I won't repeat. She pretty much cried for the next nine months any time she wasn't nursing. I was trapped at home with a toddler who couldn't yet walk and an infant who cried constantly. Good times. If we dared venture out as a family, I would ride in the back, on a bench seat, squished between two carseats, so I could hold her hands and talk to her as she cried, hoping she wouldn't think she was all alone or that no one was paying attention. We never went very far.

She came at the most inconvenient time and was by far my hardest infant. And yet, those who know us, know how wonderful she is and what she means to me.

Happy birthday tomorrow!