*Hint, If you’re just joining, please read the first 5 parts before continuing!
Finally, I could rest. After my mom picked me up from the Lacy home, I was so thankful to leave the depressing life I had been living for only a few months. Chris had drained the life out of me. I didn’t know who I was anymore. I just knew I wanted to be Carly’s mommy, and I knew my own mommy could lead the way. For the next few weeks I slept in the bed with my mother- a 17 year old girl, pregnant with her second child, and I needed my Mom.
When I got home, it was a breath of fresh air. Mom took me shopping for proper maternity clothes, I remember specifically this brown corduroy coat mom bought me, and I thought it was huge because I was getting so big, but boy would I give my left boob to be that small again, even in pregnancy! We started to decorate her room in vintage Winnie the Pooh decor. I couldn’t have gone home at a better time. I started to get excited at the prospect of having my sweet baby girl.
Mom threw me a shower, and more people showed up than would fit in the house. I bet there were 60 people in that house that day. I felt so loved, but also quite pitied. That was the first time I’d felt like people looked at me like a sad, helpless, hopeless little girl. I suppose my personality hardened a bit at that point, I didn’t like being looked at in that way. It wasn’t that the ladies that were there even meant to do it, I am sure they were saddened by the entire situation. At the time, I couldn’t see that part of it. Only their little head-tilts and half-smiles as I opened up each present. But looking back now, I know each of those ladies would not have been there loving on me if they didn’t truly care. They were so sweet to me. I truly was a kid, a self-involved little girl that couldn’t even appreciate these wonderful women that had joined together to shower me with gifts. So, if you were there that day, as many of you were- Thank you. So very much, for being there for me when you didn’t have to be. Thank you for taking time out of your life to get together, pool your money together, get me amazing gifts like strollers, car seats, clothes, diapers, (OH SO MANY DIAPERS!) and even wonderful surprises like gift cards to continue the help on after the baby would arrive. I am so very thankful to Chris’s family for being there for me, they bought me a stroller and car seat combo, some of their family was there, and ALL of my family was there, along with many of my mom’s friends from church. You all just rock my socks off.
So fast forward a couple months, I am prepping for baby, graduating from my senior year of home school, and getting more swollen by the day. We have Christmas, I’m huge and pregnant, AGAIN. But this time, Christmas goes smoothly. New Years is calm and feels like a fresh start. January rolls around- time to have a baby.
I spoke with my doctor about inducing my labor after the first of the year, if she had not come on her own by that time. She had indeed not come on her own, and I was tired of being gargantuan. They scheduled my induction for January 8th, and when the day arrived, I can tell you I was so ready. I remember that then it wasn’t as common to get a French Pedicure, and the doctors saw my feet in the hospital bed and were duly impressed. I have a picture of the doc and nurses holding my feet up, with a genuinely confused but impressed look on their faces. Ah, the good ole days.
My induction had begun, Chris was nowhere to be found. Chris had been harder and harder to get in touch with over the last few months. We were not together anymore, but I still wanted him to be a part of the entire process. I wanted him to get to be a dad, as he so desperately seemed to want to be before. His family was there, my mother and other family was there, and my dad generally has no use for hospitals and as far as I remember he was not there, but I do know he would be there to pick us up and bring us home later.
Induction didn’t seem to help little Carly along, I had been having contractions for hours but was not getting any closer to pushing. The doctors were afraid it would damage the baby if we waited any longer. They decided the reason it had taken me so long with little Hailey before was that my pelvic bones were not aligned in the correct position to give birth. Most women’s hips spread throughout pregnancy, and mine had not done this through either birth, and so I was too narrow to push any sized baby through. This explained why it took 2 days to have even a small baby like Hailey, much less a full term baby. So, with this decision made I was wheeled to the emergency C-Section room and prepped for surgery quickly.
My mother was by my side the entire time. She was my rock throughout the entire process. She even had a little button recorder to put in a baby book, which she would record our precious angel baby’s first cry on. We got to the surgery room, and of course I was very nervous. I had already been shot with my extra strong epidural to numb any possible pain, but I was so scared because of what happened the last time. I was so excited that finally, even with all the pain, that I would get to take a baby home. I would be “Mommy”. My mom was very excited, she was watching the doctors and looking at me, telling me it was all going to be okay. I would nod my head but the tears were flowing. I was becoming so emotional, and then…. a cry. A beautiful babies’ cry. It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard in my life. I was so filled with love, with happiness, with joy… in that moment, on the table, I told my mom, “Her name is Carly Joy.” They showed me my big blue-eyed screaming baby girl, pink and purple and full of life. I couldn’t help but be elated. Then they swept her away for tests, bath, etc. In those days it was not common to ask for skin to skin contact, or to see the baby right after delivery. You just did as they told you because they are the doctors. I was very groggy and passed out for a while.
Not long after, I woke up surrounded by close family, and it was time to nurse. I remember that she did so well, she latched on like a pro. I was the amateur. I remember, when they wheeled us back into the recovery room that Chris was there, standing with his mom. He looked like a scared little boy, I will never forget his helpless face. He seemed again to have regret all over his face. Regret I suppose that he hadn’t been there for the birth of his daughter, or for me at all.
I was in the hospital a couple days as is customary for a C-section birth. We were given the all-clear to go home, and my dad brought the car to the hospital and helped load us up. All I could do was stare at that sweet little Carly Joy. Play with her fingers. Kiss her forehead. The entire car ride home I just stared at amazement in what I had made. In those first days, in the first moment I heard her cry, she became the only thing. My sweet girl was the first real love of my life. She is where my joy comes from. She will always be my salvation.
Thank you Carly, for showing me what true love is.
Stay Tuned for Part 7!
MorningLori 