Special day, special memories

Today is my daughter's birthday. When you have a baby at sixteen, there is just so much you don't know. For example, I didn't know how lucky I was and what a mess I didn't have to clean up when my water broke while I was sitting on the toilet.

After I stopped dripping enough to wear a towel like a diaper, I woke up Melanie's dad. That was the first inclination that the day would be miraculous. He was terrifying to wake up, but that morning, he was great. Next task would be waking up Mary Dunn, my aunt, and a midwife. She might have been even worse to wake up than John.

I called the hospital before waking her up to make sure I really had to do it. The entire staff in maternity gave her a hard time all day that she was so fearsome to wake up I called them first. But the second indication that the day would be miraculous was that Mary Dunn woke up easily and focused on me and my labor.

Turns out, she knew I was in labor when we all went to bed the night before. There is a really good thing about having a baby very young, and that is your body's ability to bounce back. The bad thing is your body isn't quite ready, so labor can be long.

I got to the hospital before five in the morning, and Melanie was born at 4:48 PM. They were about to prep me for a C-section when the labor and delivery nurse checked my cervix one more time and declared me ready to go.

There are no words for the moment I first saw my baby. Back in the old days, we didn't know much before delivery, tape measures of our stomachs and sonograms were about it. The unfettered joy is astounding.

They say that being a mother means that part of your heart lives outside your body for the rest of your life, and that is absolutely true. But the joy, oh, the joy.

During this dark window of my life, today is a special gift. Because today I am awash in memories of the lightest day in my life. The day I finally got to meet my baby in person.