Remembering Rebecca Jane

On this day, November 25, 1970, I held my beautiful, healthy firstborn in the maternity ward of Mt. Pleasant Hospital, Mt. Pleasant, Michigan.

With joy and amazement, I examined Rebecca’s ten fingers and toes. Truly, the travail of childbirth vanished from memory.

As a nurse wheeled me into my room, I saw my roommate smoking a cigarette in her bed. She didn’t turn her face to me.

Thus began two days and nights of separation from my newborn and great disappointment.

Against my wishes, the nurses didn’t bring my baby to me to breastfeed. They provided bottles instead.

Furthermore, against my heart’s desire and expressed wishes, I submitted to the common practice of the time and remained in the hospital overnight with my newborn for observation.

The day before Thanksgiving, my mother-in-law arrived from Grand Rapids to hold her firstborn grandchild. She then suggested my husband join his family in Grand Rapids for Thanksgiving dinner the following day.

Thus unfolded the two loneliest days of my young life in a hospital room with a smoking mother who never held her newborn or made eye contact with me.

My compassion for her infant overwhelmed any mercy I could hold for the mother.

At that time, I’d not heard of the Lamaze Method of natural childbirth that “educated the expectant mother for the demands of labor and delivery.”

Furthermore, natural childbirth included the father as a means of support to the mother during labor.

Seriously?

Indeed, four and a half years later, my husband and I completed a Lamaze childbirth class for our second child.

One afternoon, while I sat crossed-legged with round belly on the living room floor, eyes closed, timing contractions and practicing my breathing, I opened my eyes to find Rebecca’s face sitting before me, her eyes closed.

She smiled as my breath fanned her hair from her face.

Kelly Elizabeth arrived April 5, 1974, delivered in Crittenton Hospital in Rochester, my husband by my side.

On a roll like two pros, a year and a half later, my husband entered the delivery room again while I delivered Ruth Kathleen, our third and last child.

Dear Reader, a bright light quenched much too soon by the darkness of addiction, this splendid memory of Rebecca Jane, eyes closed, my breath upon her face, is one of many I recall upon the day of her birth.

One of many blessed benefits of love and devotion I recall on the birthday of my firstborn.

Contact Iris at irisfarmletters@gmail.com