The Scoop

I know there are some people wanting updates, but the hospital does not have Internet. Made the trip back home today to check on the chickens, clean the house for baby's welcome home party (there will be a TV crew here), and bring Tomoe something edible. Apparently hospital food sucks in Japan too. I am lucky enough to be ineligible to eat it, so I always take a walk to the supermarket.

Since I don't have a lot of time (I still gotta cook up the placenta, but I only have a few hours to look up recipes), I will give the detailed run down in semi-bullet-point format, and is purposely long in order to discourage anyone who doesn't really care from wasting their time :).

Note:Some of the times after 11PM are probably a bit off.

Background: There is more to it than this, but this is the quick version. (and if you are looking for a more detailed background, well... there are other places dedicated to that. After all, this is the Internet.

• Several months ago. We express a rough "birth plan" to the hospital, explain that we want no drugs unless needed, we want to be with the baby at all times (it is normal for this hospital to take the baby for observation for 24 hours after birth), and various other things.
• A Few days Ago. The doctor finally sits down to meet with us, and is angry that we requested so much. He tells us that epsioctmy (I can never spell that right) is required. The baby will be taken for 20 minutes after birth and then for 24 hours, and the baby will be given supplements to compensate for Tomoe's potentially (no reason to believe that) poor quality milk, and antibiotics will be administered copiously. (my translation)
• The night the doctor told us this: Tomoe is on the phone frantically calling the nearest midwife birthing center (2 hours away) to see if it is too late to get a spot there. It is.

Fast-forward

• Morning of the 9th.
  TOMOE:"Ouch!" Ten minutes later "Ittattattaattaa" (Japanese for "ouch"). Ten minutes later. "Oooo".
  ME: This is every ten minutes. Are you sure these are not contractions?
  TOMOE: No it doesn't hurt so much, just a pinch. Everything I read said I wouldn't even be able to walk.
  ME: "OK. I trust you" (As I start shoveling, loading and packing the car.)
• Mid-morning / afternoon of 9th. Nothing.
• Around 11pm on 9th.
  TOMOE:"Ouch!" seven minutes later "Ittattattaattaa" (Japanese for "ouch"). 15 minutes later. "Oooo!". Six minutes later "MmmmmmmM!"
  ME: This is closer than ten minutes. Are you sure these are not contractions?
  TOMOE: No it doesn't hurt so much, just a pinch. Everything I read said I wouldn't even be able to walk.
  ME: "OK. I trust you. But lets call the hospital anyway." (As I start chugging coffee.)
• 1 AM on the 10th. We get in the frozen car with the "Da Yoopers" playing again and again in my head. (for those cultural illiterates out there, song, lyrics)
• 1:01 AM. The car starts fine. There is no fresh snow on the roads, and thankfully we only passed what seems like about 10 cars in the 45 minute drive.
• 45 Minutes later: Arrive at hospital and Tomoe is still smiling. We make our way through the dark corridors to the delivery room where Tomoe leisurely changes and lays on the table while chatting with the hospital midwife, while I am trying to reach the TV documentary camera-woman who, just hours before going to the hospital, we had just told "not for another week". She doesn't answer so I call her producer and wake him, asking him to keep trying her number.
• About 10 minutes later: Tomoe is writing in pain on the table. Contraction are now four minutes apart.
• I forget how long we were there now...
• At some point the TV woman (a friend of ours) and another friend from our village arrive. The hopes were that she could film the birth, but 1) the doctor is a grump. and 2) There is no more time between the contractions for me even to go out and talk to them, so they wait in the hall.
• At some point, the baby's heart rate drops drastically from 122 to 80. This is normal, as it is the most stressful time for her, but usually it goes back up much sooner, so Tomoe is given oxygen and told to breathe more deeply. She doesn't know how to. She wants to die.
• At some point the doctor arrives and is angry at the midwives for not having hooked Tomoe up to an IV and pumping her with antibiotics (they were following our request)
• The doctor puts on some gloves (don't remember if he even said hi to her) Starts pushing on her stomach, trying to squeeze the baby out like toothpaste.
• He says he is going to do an espicotmy. We ask him to wait. He miraculously agrees.
• A few minutes later. DOCTOR: "Your baby will die. I am cutting". (we have no reason to doubt him, but also he was angry at Tomoe for requesting a natural birth. We don't know if saying that was just a way to force us to agree - after all, who would respond with "That's fine" to a statement like "Your baby will die"?)
• He cuts. She is in pain. The friends are listening at the door with the camera's audio running, and the doctor is squeezing the toothpaste tube.
• At some point around 9 AM (I think): Black hair comes out and Tomoe wants to die.
• More black hair comes out and Tomoe wants to die more.
• A crying baby with an umbilical cord wrapped twice around her neck emerges. Tomoe no longer wants to die.
• I don't even remember the rest coming out.
• Tomoe gets a short time to hold the baby, and they take her (with me along) into the next room for a quick exam. maybe five minutes, maybe less.
• I carry baby back to Tomoe, and the camera-woman friend is allowed in, unfortunately Aunt Maiko (our neighbor friend) had to leave earlier to go to work). We sit and chat and get interviewed while the staff prepares our room. Since we insisted, and there is only one more baby in the hospital now, we are allowed to keep baby in the room that night, and she has not been out of our sight since.
• We are settled in the room, and Kemoe is sleeping, and I still have time to get home, print out some photos, and take them to the local festival that is happening that afternoon in our hamlet. As soon as I arrive home, everyone already knows that the baby is born because when our car was missing when he woke up at 4am, the news and speculation spread like wildfire.
• Aside from getting to give the news and show the photos to everyone in the hamlet at once (rather than go house to house), the timing was also fortunate because this is a Little New Year festival where things from the past year are burned, and the ashes are spread onto the faces of certain members of the village, including children born within the year as a wish/symbol of health. Kemoe just made the cut, so they spread ashes on the photo I printed of her, and then on me - they then got the camera woman who came to film it for the documentary.
• I went back to the hospital and spent a wonderful evening with my daughter and Tomoe. We were awake most of the night, of course, but I can't blame it all on Kemoe crying. She actually didn't cry much, but we just couldn't stop staring at her long enough to sleep.

Fast-forward To Day 2

• Tomoe is already giving milk since the day before - apparently extremely fast. It is not enough to satisfy Kemoe's appetite, but she has three day's worth of reserves, so the midwives allow us to *not* feed her supplements. On the afternoon of the second day, her boobs seemed to explode with so much milk that suddenly Kemoe was so satisfied that she was sleeping four hours in a row.
• Kemoe had her first bath. Despite the photo, she likes it.
• The TV woman and Aunt Maiko drop by for a "little" visit that lasted several hours, because they wanted to see/film Kemoe awake, but she was just so comfy...
• While we have had Ben Harper's The Three of US on repeat for most of the time, (long since my favorite Ben Harper song and the first one I learned to play on guitar - can't wait to play it for Kemoe live!) we also find out that she loves G-Love and the Special Sauce.

Fast-forward To Day 3

• Even with the hospital staff loudly coming into the room what seems like every few minutes to offer us tea, or something else completely unnecessary, Kemoe sleeps soundly at my side until past 9 am. Pretending I was asleep while the midwife sighs at the scene is my favorite moment yet.
• The midwives seem very happy that we are here. They all agree with and understand our desires regarding the birth, but hey have no power to change policy, and there are not many other patients to bring the issue up, or if they do, they back down quite easily. It seems that we have become a bit of a hot-topic in the staff meetings.
• Aside from above average breasts, Tomoe is also healing extremely well from the delivery. We successfully avoided being given any extra drugs or hormones to control the bleeding, believing that breast feeding would cause her body to supply what is needed, and she is recovering faster than most people. We may be "allowed" to leave a day early. But the truth is, despite the anxiety we had about the hospital the day before the birth, it is actually a really great place - except for the food, which is why...
• I am now at home cleaning up and preparing for the TV crew and Tomoe and Kemoe, writing this update, and getting some food from our fridge to give to Tomoe instead of the hospital food, including...
• The placenta. Everyone says it is gross, but it is actually not so unheard-of to eat the placenta. It helps stop the post-natal bleeding (which Tomoe's doesn't need to do anymore) and, more importantly from my standpoint, will help to lessen post-natal depression, and hopefully make it so that Tomoe is not mean to me. My sister-in-law sent me this funny and interesting link when she heard about our plans, but we will probably end up making lasagna or soup with it.
• It is getting late, and I want to research more recipes online before cooking it, but I also want to get back to Kemoe, so I am thinking about asking a neighbor if we can store the placenta in their freezer... I'll let you know how that works out...

Well, I gotta go now. Tomoe just called to remind me to bring the rice cooker, and I heard Kemoe in the background crying. I my daughter needs me.