Hunting Stories Versus Baby Lore

Alison, Vake and Gil Dec. 30, 2011

Well, I have recorded each family hunting story that I know about or have been told. But I just realized that while the men were out hunting, the women were sharing another kind of family lore:  How much morning sickness did you suffer?  You gained how many pounds, and lost how much of it? You were in labor for HOW long? How many stitches? And I have recorded none of it. What kind of equal opportunity story telling is that?

            Let’s make up for missing lore with this short recital from David Sampson:  “Birthing seems to take forever and then it is such a rush that it is hard to even understand what is going on. Geoff’s birth was pretty rough, taking almost 24 hours after the water broke, and I was kind of dizzy when he finally popped out. I was standing up by Bryna’s head, helping her push until the very end, and then there was all this hoopla from the doctors (That is plural; they moved us from Swedish to UW because they thought he was going to be a 2-3 pound preemie and he had 3 or 4 doctors and several nurses to boot!) and then the doctor, who was clearly elated as he could immediately see that Geoff weighed in somewhere between 5-6 pounds and he didn’t have a huge problem on his hands, said to me, “well, come on down her and take your son to your wife!” I was shocked and brilliantly stammered, “Who, me?” to the immense delight of everyone in the room but you-know-who! That was a real double-Phew!”

       Birthing certainly has changed within the memories of the members of our family.  Sofia’s children were born at home. “That’s the house I was born in,” Vake could say, pointing to the house Eli had built in Coos Bay, next to Minnesota Street.

       Sam and I are classical “war babies,” born to fathers just home from WW II (and in my case, mother just home from the military, too.) Patty might be, too—she was born January 4, 1947, so the timing is right, but  she was adopted out of Grants Pass, OR, and I have never heard a word about her parentage otherwise.   Milly had a tendency to faint, perhaps because she tended to be anemic, and she got teased that everybody could tell when she was pregnant—she would look for a place to lie down instead of just collapsing on the spot when she got light-headed. Doctors taught that pregnant women shouldn’t gain too much weight, but Milly got up to 180# before Sandy was born, and said that was her easiest delivery. Vake and Milly had gone clam digging when her labor started, so Vake and Milly toyed with naming Sandy for a song that was popular at the time, “Frieda the Clam Digger’s Daughter.” Milly’s  tendency to faint faded when she had kids to watch, but it hit her one last time when she was pregnant with Mark.  She and a friend, Nell Stoner, had been out conducting some kind of  survey or census, and walked into a greasy spoon café for lunch.  The smell of hot oil almost knocked her out.

By the time my kids came along (1967 and 1970 respectively), we used doctors and hospitals but still had no sonograms, and fathers were not invited to be present—they were sent down the hall to watch commercial television during the delivery process.  Doctors guessed the sex of a baby by listening to its heartbeat with a stethoscope. “Sounds like a boy, but don’t bet the family jewels on it,” my doctor cautioned just before Eric was born.

Each of my boys was born on a dark and stormy night—and old wives tales do say that stormy weather will induce labor.  That was good.  I didn’t have to jump off chairs, swallow cod liver oil, or take any other action supported by urban legend to induce labor when I was ready to get the process over with. Being 20, then 23 years old, I had an easy time of it. Brook arrived “naturally,” without drugs, episiotomies, etc, but not because that was the plan. He just arrived so fast, after less than an hour’s labor, that the doctor came rushing into the delivery room still struggling to get into scrubs jacket when Brook arrived.

Mark and Dr. Sue had decided to let the sex of their babies be a surprise at the time of delivery, but accidentally looked at a sonogram and saw in an instant that Drew was going to be a boy.

   There's planning now, but still surprises.  Eric and Alison knew they wanted a family, but I think they were a bit surprised how fast that happened:  Vake arrived seven days short of their first anniversary.  And they didn't particularly expect to be delivering in the middle of the holidays this week, but like Eric said, "We weren't science majors."

     And now, pregnancies are measured in terms of 40 weeks, not the traditional  “Nine months.” There’s genetic counseling, sonograms, husbands and fathers present throughout,  and if needs be, fetal monitoring—and given grandson Gil’s emergency arrival yesterday, I can only be thankful for that.