Here’s what it’s like sharing a bed with 39-weeks pregnant woman. Or, at least, with mine.
Early this morning, I was sleeping peacefully when I felt a tugging on my shirt. I rolled over and Sarah was staring at me, wide awake.
“What’s up?” I asked. “Is it time?”
“No. I’m miserable.”
“What’s the matter?”
“I’ve got a fucking human being in my stomach, that’s what’s the matter.”
“Oh, sweetie. I’m sorry.”
“I’m so hungry.”
“Want me to make you something to eat?”
“I already raided the kitchen. I ate an apple and a bowl of cereal and a couple bowls of chicken soup.”
I looked at the clock. It was 5:30. “Jeez, how long have you been awake?”
“Since 1:30,” she sighed. A few nights earlier, she had awakened at 4 a.m. with all kinds of grand plans: She was going to knit a scarf and finally put photos in our wedding album and watch a DVD. Instead she ate a box of Milk Duds and went back to bed. “Go back to sleep.”
“OK.” I closed my eyes and fell asleep immediately.
“You wouldn’t believe all the shows I’ve watched this morning,” she continued, and I woke back up.
“Huh?”
“Full House. Charles in Charge. Wings, St. Elsewhere. A bunch of stuff. Nick at Nite. I don’t know what I’d do without it.”
“You wanna go downstairs and watch a movie? I’ll come with and fall asleep on the couch.”
“No,” she said, patting my chest. “You’re sweet. I want you to go back to sleep.”
“OK.” I rolled over and fell back asleep.
“You know that song at the beginning of St. Elsewhere?” She started humming it. “Duh-da-da-da, Duh-da-da-da-duh. Reminds me of this girl that Ben went to school with. She was a gymnast and she did this incredible routine to the St. Elsewhere song. Duh-da-da-da, Duh-da-da-da-duh.”
“Hmm.”
“You know what eventually happened to her? She got pregnant when she was 19. The father was the guy whose kid she was babysitting.”
“Honey,” I said, sitting up.
“Yeah?”
“Should we get up?”
“No. It’s 5:32. The alarm won’t go off for another two hours.”
“OK. Then can you tell me about this girl in the morning?”
“Oh, sorry.” Silence. “How about if we’re still awake at 6, then we get up?”
“Great.” I fell back asleep.
Sarah told me later that she fell asleep at roughly 5:55. When I got up to go to work, she was almost comatose, and now that I’m sitting at my desk, I can’t get that damn St. Elsewhere song out of my head.
* * *
Meanwhile, our Bradley class has ended. Of the five couples in there, four have delivered, and, to our dismay, none have done it naturally yet. All four women had long, painful labors that involved all kinds of pitocin and back labor and epidurals and fetal monitors—and none were too pleased about that. Two of them had c-sections. But now that they’ve got their healthy babies at home, they don’t much care how it happened.
We’re still waiting. Last night, we were in the baby room and we looked around: a crib, a daybed, baby monitor, baby clothes. A bunch of diapers in a nice neat stack, waiting on a dresser that I painted, badly. All we need now is the baby.