My Second Baby- The Birth of Dominic Adam: Planned Repeat Cesarean

 When Luca was nine months old, Adam and I were out on one of our first big nights out as parents at a bar where I used to bartend.  I was new-mom drunk on like 1.5 drinks and I asked Adam how he felt about giving Luca a sibling.  YES! YES? YES!  We were both so excited!  Luca was the easiest baby in the world, we both had good jobs at the bank with benefits at this point, and we were feeling more confident as new parents.  Four weeks later, I snuck into the bathroom at 4:00 in the morning to take a test. Positive.  

This pregnancy was very easy.  I was in school again.  This time to finish pre-requisites to start a graduate nursing program. I was working full time and going to community college at night.  Adam was an amazing father and partner.  We had a home daycare for Luca that we liked.  Since we were on a new private insurance plan we decided to find a new doctor.  I had heard about VBAC and asked about it at our first prenatal appointment.  The MD looked at my husband and said that if I were his wife, he would absolutely not let me do it.  I could die, baby could die, the world would end- all for what?  A “birth experience”?  We looked at each other and the decision was made.  We would have a repeat cesarean at 39 weeks. 

I had a little panic attack the day of my anatomy scan.  It could be a girl.  I can't have a girl, I don't know how to raise girls. My mother and I had an unhealthy relationship and I didn't know how to be a good example for a girl.  The scan was perfect.  Our son was perfect.  Dominic.

We packed our bags the night before our scheduled cesarean.  We showed up at the hospital at 05:00.  It was a beautiful brand new hospital near our new house that we had purchased while pregnant with this baby. They ushered us to our room, started my IV, I filled out some paperwork, and we were escorted back to the OR.  The anesthesia provider placed my spinal and I had a very quick, very easy surgery to deliver my baby.  I was given a little package when I got back to my room. A perfect little boy 8 pound angel with brown eyes and no hair.  We checked out two days later and I went home to suffer from debilitating anxiety for the next three years. 

The whole thing was so transactional.  Get pregnant. Fill out paperwork. Get cut. Get baby.  He was born in the middle of winter and we binged every episode of Rescue Me during our eight weeks of postpartum recovery. I didn't feel very close to this baby. I didn't really know him.  I had gotten to know Luca- he was my love.  This new kid was kind of an interloper. Not that I didn't want him, I loved him.  I just didn't feel the primal pull to him that I felt to Luca. Our relationship grew like a season of the Bachelor and now this kid is my ride or die. We are extremely close 11 years later.  I just felt like I should have been oxytocin bonded to him the second I saw him.  Except I didn't have a rush of oxytocin.  I never went into labor. 

This is also my allergy child.  He never entered the birth canal and I believe he missed out on some vital vaginal bacteria that would have colonized his gut lining instead of the operating room bacteria he first encountered instead. He has had three years of allergy shots and two surgeries to deal with nasal polyps. Not sure if it would be different if he had been born vaginally. 

Adam also had the pleasure of looking over the sheet during the cesarean and making himself sick.  He said it was just so brutal.  I was, once again, so happy to have a healthy baby and beautiful little family but I felt this wrong feeling that made me feel guilty.  

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