Cheaper By The (Half) Dozen

In the wee hours of the morning on May 25, we had a wee baby:

Margaux Julia VT was born May 25 at 2:27 am, weighing just 5 pounds 7 ounces - tiny but perfect!

I had hoped not to go into labor before school ended, with all of its attendant little events and administrative chores; and I had also hoped she wouldn't come before our neighborhood's School's Out Pool Party - why?  Because no child should miss out on a free sno cone because of the birth of a sibling?  I don't know, people!  But lo, right after I got the children to bed after the pool party - BOOM.  I started having contractions, rather intense ones, about four minutes apart - there was no gradual crescendo here.

So PVT and I launched out into the night to the hospital.  The nurse checked me; I was only 2 cm dilated, and my water was still intact, but they decided to keep me because "after 4 C-Sections, you're in a whole other realm."  Right.

After what seemed like hours of worrisome digging, moaning, griping and sighing on the on-call surgeon's part, we finally heard Margaux's lusty cry.  If there is a more glorious sound on earth to a pregnant woman, I don't know it.

Then I heard her weight - just 5 pounds 7 ounces!  I fretted about this while I was being reassembled:  why so little?  Surely it wasn't my nightly meth habit?   Nah.  My diet?  Not perfect - there were chocolates and cookies in there, but surely God doesn't require sainthood from pregnant women, suffering so much as they do from various indignities already.  But I ate plenty of greens, vegetables, fish, cheeses and nuts, so that couldn't be it?  My only theory - that the surgeon corroborated - is that my uterus is slowing disintegrating into a big mess of scar tissue (it was apparently transparent in a few places).  The fact that I keep producing smaller and smaller children may not be coincidental.

Fortunately, though, her wee-ness is only a footnote; she is healthy in every way - already a champion eater, pooper, pee-er, and listener, fascinated by voices.  Her siblings adore her.  We are all rather smitten with our new little girl.

And now I am home, happily on Percocet, my leg and horrifying veins slowly improving, and I find myself with all this post-delivery adrenaline:  I should be doing something great!  Writing a book?  Remodeling the house?  Tonight, however, I came to my senses:  that "something great" will be recovering well from my fifth C-Section, feeding and nurturing my newborn, and keeping the rest of the clan reasonably happy, healthy and alive.  That will be pretty freaking great enough - the rest can wait. 

For a very long time, if necessary.