Two Sisters, Four Females
Never use confetti or glitter in the theatre. Much like mouse poop in the back of your high school memory box, it keeps showing up after you thought you got it all. Mouse poop is the worst of the poops. And with two kids still in diapers that’s saying something. Mouse poop explodes on you like, “Hmm I’m going to look for my old journal in the back of my closet (not because I want to understand my 11 year old self again, but because I want to understand my 11 year old self again) and as I turn a page, MOUSE POOP!
While I picked the tiny poop out of my hair and journal, I was reminded that my sister Laura and I had always wanted kids. In fact, what fell out was a form for new members I once completed at my childhood church. Not a new member but always bored at church, I filled it out with my fake family of six children and all of their names (I had two Josh’s because I couldn’t think of a second boy name I liked as much). I wanted kids like cabbage patch dolls. Perpetually smiling and very still.
Way back when my sister and I were young enough to believe in the food group of hotdogs, we sat on the floor of our kitchen rearranging cabbage patch dolls on our stomach’s in makeshift bed sheet baby carriers (I’m currently writing this with a baby in a carrier on my stomach...she’s much heavier and sweaty than my doll). I wrote down the number of children and their genders that I thought my sister would have. She did the same for me. Then we hid our papers somewhere in our house on Atlantic Avenue. The second part of the game was begging the other to tell where she hid it.
I can confidently say that on that day as kids, neither of us thought we would have the mirror of the other’s family. I think I put four sets of twin boys for my sister. My dad is a twin. So. You know. And at the time I thought little boys were easier because you didn’t have to cram their screaming bodies into tights.
On September 27th 2017 I became an Aunt to my sister’s son Calan. And six months later on March 21st 2018, she to my son Solly. The two boys who would be the same year in school! We are both subtly/overtly competitive so somehow we recently topped the age distance with baby girls due only three months apart. My due date was March 3rd and hers was May 31st.
My labor lasted forever and I had to have a C Section because I couldn’t get past five centimeters. I had gotten past five centimeters in a lot of other ways like bringing chocolate from my hand to my face, so why not my cervix? Neither of our childhood visions of pregnancy, birth, and postpartem (a word I still don’t know how to spell and that is devastatingly not taught to girls and women) were accurate. This shit is HARD. REALLY HARD. What if writers’ rooms equated this pregnancy stuff with superhero plots?
“Okay so Spiderwoman works and doesn’t sleep and is 9 months pregnant. Now let’s say she has the baby but it doesn’t go great...she labored for two days and he got stuck so we’ll just cut open her stomach to get him out. THEN, let’s put her in charge of the new baby who needs care 24/7 when she hasn’t slept and has a load of physical injuries and a crazy hormone hell tornado. THEN we’ll heap on the self doubt society sprinkles on like a nice evil ice cream topping.”
The 2020 sequel to this movie with protagonist sisters:
“A second baby (aka all of the above plot plus a screaming irrational toddler)”
Tons of guilt comes with pregnancy and birth. I felt it for having a c section and an epidural. The false female narrative to present a happy face perpetuates staged glorified pics on social media of the fourth trimester while well meaning but overworked hospitals and doctors send you into post partom unarmed for one of the most difficult times in your personal human herstory. So you have no tools to combat the self doubt, while trying to stay awake for late night feeds staring at the false feeds glowing from a phone full of crap.
Our culture doesn’t do a good job elevating the fact that differences are good, fine, even beautiful. As is the way with things that are broken and infested with fear and shame, we see pregnancy/birth/motherhood as a one size fits all because that’s less work for us. But the truth is that the differences are meaningful and lovely - including adoptive parents, foster parents, and parental units that fall anywhere on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum. And more men and women and doctors should recognize and promote this.
Just as shiny balls on pedestals in outdoor midwest gardens elude me, so do superstitions around pregnancy and birth. I had some hesitancy to look forward to my second childbirth experience after the first. So when my husband Rob first told me that a student of his had a recipe to kick start labor and it was eggplant parmesan from a restaurant that boasts 300 plus baby pics on the walls from labors begun after the dish was eaten, all I pictured were baby faces coming out of eggplants like the iconic 80s cabbage patch brand image. And I laughed, “Okay! But I doubt that’ll work.” But laughing felt good. And so did this goofy idea.
On March 5th, two days past due and getting anxious that I might have another c section if I didn’t go into labor naturally by 41 weeks, Rob made me eggplant parmesan from this special recipe. He’s an incredible cook and husband and father. The eggplant parm was funny. And yummy. And took the edge off my worry because the thought of this working was insane and kind of a great diversion.
Imagine my shock when the next morning I felt tiny contractions. I was thrilled because I’d never experienced my body naturally starting this process. I had always had this secret dream to labor at my job (early stages not a lot of pain) and it was happening!!! We went to the hospital that night. Nothing sped up. We came back home Saturday, defeated, and I ate more eggplant. This time it was more in desperation. Eggplants are great but people are much better and I had a vulnerable moment in my bedroom with my sister standing near me where I was confronted with the extreme fear of having another C Section. I hadn’t realized there was some trauma there till faced with the possibility again. My sister lovingly stood by as Rob and I reluctantly went back to the hospital without any change in contractions but did so because my doc wanted me close by since there was some risk trying to do a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean). As we drove, the contractions sped up! Laura waited outside the triage room and by the next morning I had actually dilated 8/9 centimeters!!! I’d practiced eating chocolate - stretching those important ten centimeters from bowl to mouth for the two years since the last birth and I think my cervix had been taking notes! No induction, no c section, YES epidural, and I started pushing around 1:30pm on March 8th 2020. By 2:35pm I had that moment I had longed for and didn’t get to have last time. This baby came out and was placed on my chest and I was aware and able to be present and kiss my husband and sing “Tomorrow” from Annie because I love musicals with my name. Laura was there moments later to see Maya Bee for the first time and love on us.
Then corona virus reality struck mere days later. All the stuff that was hard got harder. No support from family (except my mom who had to stay away and quarantine for a while) or friends. No hugs. No trips to target where strangers coo at your new baby who you are thankful to be reminded isn’t a monster due to lack of sleep. No break from an almost two year old and newborn. Rob thought he had the virus so we lived with my mom when Maya was three weeks old for a couple weeks to be safe.
I spent post-partumme overwhelmed. My sister and I couldn’t see each other or hold each other. We were stuck in little boxes on our facetime screens.
When my sister hit week 39, she had had enough of being pregnant. That girl needed to come out! Rob sent Laura the eggplant recipe and it again provided a bit of levity to the difficulty of all things birth and post birth during a pandemic. There was no way it would help Laura too, we all thought! But for the fun and yum of it, she ate it … and Lainie is here and perfect and arrived on May 28th.
We are both still struggling with postpartum and toddlers who have meltdowns during a global pandemic and no childcare while working from home. It’s really hard. But we ate our eggplants (shout out to Rob!) and we have each other. And both are quite magical I think. And we have four cousins who are now very close in age and who I hope will love each other as much as I love my sister and my sister loves me. Differences and similarities and all.