Just coming out of the post-general anesthesia/day of painkillers haze; I stopped the painkillers (anyone want a month’s supply of Vicodan?) before I went to bed because they make my brain turn into sludge and make me want to throw up…I’ve broken my nose before, so it’s not all that big a deal.
Started me thinking about the Dawn/Eric Olsen dialog about their child’s birth and the hassle they had between them. First, I think it’s amazingly cool that partners can sit down and be so publicly honest; something tells me that’s a very strong relationship.
My take on the whole childbirth/drugs thing was settled during the Lamaze class I went to with my first wife for our Biggest Guy’s birth. The moms were all talking each other up about ‘making it through’ drug-free as we husbands all looked nervously at each other in the background. Then one mom…a pert young actress we called ‘Annie Hall’ at home, looked around the room and explained: “most of my adult life I’ve been trying to get good drugs. Now, the first time I really get to take them for any kind of a reason, you’re telling me I shouldn’t?”
Biggest guy was with an epidural; Middlest Guy was born so damn quickly the OB never even got there…the nurses delivered him without drugs or complications. Littlest Guy was induced after about twelve hours of desultory labor, so epiduraled there again.
Fundamentally, childbirth is amazingly physically and emotionally stressful; I give incredible honor to the women who go through it, and I’m jealous at the same time. I can’t imagine what it must be like outside a modern hospital…
Notice that I didn’t try and talk the surgeon out of giving me a general yesterday…but believe me, I felt miserable yesterday, and the pain/discomfort today is much less than the nausea-stupidity/discomfort yesterday.
BTW, the war on drugs is a farce. I’ll add that to the in-box and see what I can do.