Firsts

On Wednesday June 6th of 2007 I got to wash up, suit up in the purple sterile outfit, and sit in the stool in front of the baby exit for the first time. Dr. Pacheco, was there to guide my hands, tell me what to do, and basically birth the baby, since I didn't know what the fuck I was doing. But he is such an awesome teacher that he did everything while still making me feel like I was doing it (plus, he was wearing a harley davidson head cover and had his scrub sleeves rolled up like a muscle tee - really, what more can you ask for?). I helped bring 2 babies into the world on Wednesday and it was a pretty incredible, shockingly fast, and now somewhat normalized experience. Quite sadly, I have no idea what the name of the mom was, what the baby weighed, or whether it was a boy or a girl. This emphasizes the factory nature of the whole process here- the goal is to make each birth the same in it's procedure and outcome. For the first time in my life, I got to be the first person that holds the baby after it leaves the womb. And at the end of both births I stitched up the episiotamies - it was my first time stitching in human skin.

Here are some things I learned:

1) Babies are slippery little buggers, so hold on tight.
2) Babies have gumby's powers of flexibility and can withstand a lot of tugging.
3) When you cut the cord, look away, they squirt.
4) Birthing is very, very messy.
5) It really doesn't bug me as much as I thought it would to get birthing blood all over my feet, legs, and upper body.
6) Every single teacher - attending, intern, student - has their own highly successful method for birthing babies, removing the placenta, cutting episiotamies, and stitching episiotamies. Who ever is looking over your shoulder has the best method, and they are always right.
7) My adrenaline didn't kick in until the end of the second birth, which was when my hands started to shake.

Early on Thursday morning, during my Guardia shift, I delivered another baby, this one almost by myself, although, again, with some help (I haven't really figured out how to do this whole thing with only 2 hands, but I am learning).


I was very, very nervous about the whole thing, but once I was sitting in the seat, it just became a do or do situation. There was no other option, which is a huge relief, since up until I actually did it, I was somewhat convinced that I would freeze and have to come to terms with the fact that maybe medicine isn't for me. And while I still don't know what I am doing, and I am still not as competent or confident as I would like to be, I am learning (slowly) and I am getting more comfortable making decisions about what to do next. And when I actually understand what people are saying to me and why they are telling me to do certain things, I may actually be able to make the right decisions about what to do next.