Feb 20

Yang’s cell phone rings. It is 8am and we are asleep in our hotel in Jakarta. Aidan is on the line from Beijing. He’s crying. Today is his seventh birthday and Yang’s mom has told him he cannot buy any toys. His cry is not that of the spoiled whine (although to say he is not spoiled is not accurate either) but one of genuine hurt. Yang tells him he can spend 100 RMB on a toy; after all he only spent 159 RMB of his 400 RMB budget when celebrated his birthday last week. As we fall back to sleep I am trying to remember the day Aidan was born. Memoires fade and merge and I wish I could remember more. I try to remember what I was doing that morning. Which causes me to think about who I was working for at that time. Hmmm. Feb 2003. Could either be contracting for the bank or at MechnicNet, but I think I didn’t join MechanicNet until that May, so it would be while I was still making a decent income contracting.  It was two weeks before Aidan’s due date (or more properly called Yang’s due date?) and Yang asked me to work from home. Seems there was some sign. She made an appointment with her decrepitly old – I mean experienced doctor – who examined her which resulted in her water breaking. We then checked into the hospital, Yang at first feeling happy and ready. After a few hours no contractions so labor is induced with a drug called pitocin. I remember thinking this was a little quick – we had read induction would be within 24 hours of water breaking – but ok. They hook up Yang to the monitors I am watching them closely for signs of baby distress. There appears to be some, so i mention to the nurse who says it’s not for this room. The nurse also adds that I must be a first time dad.

Labor progresses and Yang quickly abandons any thoughts about having the baby unmediated. She wants that epidural and she wants it now. The anesthesiologist comes in and he is very formal. One would say anal. Puts up a big sheet between himself and everyone else, including Yang. Seems people freak out when they see the size of the needle and he freaks out when that happens.  (17 months later Lydia’s anesthesiologist would turn out to be the complete opposite -- happy go lucky chatty guy -- but he didn’t do as good of a job). He gets the needle in and the pain is lifting. The next several hours are filled with Yang sleeping off and on, waiting for her body to be ready to give birth to Aidan.  Yang seems to be making good progress but not fast enough for her doctor who seems impatient when he stops by. Mainly, I think he wanted the nurses to increase the rate of pitocin earlier so that Yang’s contractions would have been more intense and Yang would have been more ready by now. The nurses on the other hand felt Yang was making fine progress and that any increase in pitocin would mean a corresponding increase in pain. More time passes and the doctor comes by with his forcep kit and makes sure we see it. I think it was supposed to put some pressure on the nurses and Yang to move faster and indeed the nurses did work harder on getting Yang to push. This was about the time the epidural stopped having any noticeable effect and Yang was in a lot of pain. A lot of pain. She would do just about anything for it to be over. When it was time to push, a bunch of nurses – five or so – came in and encouraged her. I hovered around with the cameras. Yang pushed and pushed. Yang pushed and pushed. And the doctor pulled. And Yang pushed. And then Aidan’s head was out. Then one more push/twist/pull and Aidan was all the way out.

Aidan then on Yang’s chest. Mother and son face to face for the first time. A look of awe – which trust me does not occur often – on Yang’s face. Aidan’s eyes open and looking alert even though newborns can’t see. Then they whisk Aidan away to the crib next to the birthing bed, clean him, measure him, test him, and give him the standard medicine (eye drops i think). Aidan back to Yang. Mother and Child both exhausted and soon fall asleep.