Happy Birthday Camryn!!!

Tomorrow afternoon at 1:15 will mark the eighth anniversary of Camryn's birth also known as her birthday. While some days it seems more like eighty years have passed, others I find it so hard to believe that it has been that long. While the birth of a new baby always changes your life no matter who you are, the birth of Camryn changed mine in ways I never, ever imagined. I know I've told the story before about having Mason and then Camryn, but because it's her birthday tomorrow I am going to tell it again in more detail.
Mason was fifteen months old when I walked into the bathroom and saw that familiar second blue line. Getting pregnant has never been an issue for me and I don't take that for granted because without going into detail, I know the hardships and sorrows of not being able to conceive from someone very close to me. Mason was a dream of a baby. Not in the beginning, there was alot of relux, I'm talking alot, as in projectile. There was gas and crying and the whole first month of life issues many babies have. Once we got her straightened out with her formula, she was an incredibly easy baby to care for. She was happpy, alert, slept like, well like a baby and met her milestones like a pro. I enjoyed her so much and couldn't wait to have another baby and do it all again. When I discovered I was pregnant with Camryn,Brad and I were thrilled! I had hoped we might have a boy this time, but when we found out we were having another girl, I immediately imagined my daughters having tea parties and fashion shows and all the things sisters do together and I could not wait for the years to come.
While pregnant with Mason I had horrible morning sickness and why it is called morning sickness I will never know because well after lunch time I was still sick as a dog. Other than that it was an uneventful nine months until the last two weeks when my blood pressure started to get a little higher than my midwife liked and one week before her due date I was induced and delivered 5 pounds and 14 ounces of pink perfection.
Now my pregancy with Cams was a bit different. Because I had such a good experience with the midwife I used with Mason, we decided to use her with this pregnancy as well. She had been around for years and had a great reputation in the area. When I showed up for my first appointment I was greeted by her as well as an intern she was training. She assured me that while the intern would be in the room at all my appointments and sometimes do the exams, she would be there watching and was still the one making the decisions regarding my pregnancy. I really thought nothing of it.
I still had the lovely morning sickness and spent the first four months nauseous almost all the time. I also had elevated blood sugar and had to do the dreaded three hour glucose test where you have to drink what seems like a gallon of this God awful orange syrup every hour for three hours and then get your blood taken to see if you have gestational diabetes. It was dreadful and I prayed and prayed that my levels would be fine because one of the perks of pregnancy is being able to indulge your sweet tooth without the worry your pant's won't button. But alas, when the midwife called me back I knew from the look on her face I had failed and left the office with a script to see a nutritionist who would help me learn how to eat the rest of my pregnancy. I mourned the loss of my chocolate loves.
I got the diet down, though it wasn't easy. Surprisingly when you are diabetic, you have to be extremely conscious of how often you are eating and the amount of carbs, proteins, starches, etc. you are consuming to maintain a safe blood sugar level. I remember thinking there was no way I could eat as many times as they wanted me to,as I was scheduled to eat every two to three hours and I had certain things I could have at certain times. No fruit before noon, proteins before carbs and when eating grapes, only fifteen per serving. I have a vivid memory of being at my mother-in-laws at Christmas and sitting at the kitchen table late one night counting out grapes for my snack. It was a pain, but I actually ended up losing weight during my pregnancy because of the way my body was processing my new diet and how my metabolism had responded. Of course I loved that part! Other than that, I had no other complications until the last two weeks, when just like with Mason my blood pressure spiked. I was scheduled for induction a week before my estimated delivery date and before Brad and I left that morning to go have our second daughter we kissed Mason ,who was now just shy of two and promised to bring home her baby sister that she had been so excited to meet.
At the hospital I slipped into my gown, put on my socks and settled in to the bed. I hadn't even been there twenty minutes when I turned my head for some reason and pinched a nerve on the left side of my neck! I could not believe it! It was the kind of pinch where it radiates all down the side of your neck and into your shoulder and upper arm. And moving your head? Forget about it! I was going to be delivering a baby in the next few hours with a pinched neck nerve. I was so not happy. Just then my midwife walked in along with her intern. She asked how I was doing, spoke with the nurses and then proceeded to tell me that with her assistance,the intern would be handling the delivery! Now mind you, this was 2003 B.C. (before Camryn) and I was alot less outspoken at that time. I didn't like to go against the grain or ruffle feathers and so although I really wished my midwife was the one who would be delivering me, I just said "O.K." and signed a paper. I really was caught off guard.
Like with Mason, my mom, my best friend Anna, my sister-in-law Jackie and of course Brad were in the delivery room. While a bag of pitocin dripped into my I.V., I laughed and joked with everyone while Brad tried to work the kink out of my neck with no success. About an hour after my induction began, the anesthesiologist came in to administer my epidural,or as I like to call it "wonder drug". It didn't take long for my legs to get completely numb and then my midsection. I was wondering if he could shoot just a tad of that stuff into my neck, but it didn't happen. It only took about two hours for me to fully dialate and when the intern told me the baby was in the birth canal and I could start pushing I began to cry. I didn't even know why, but I was scared and I was so tired and let's face it, giving birth is not easy! She told me I could rest for a little bit if I wanted to before I began pushing, so for thirty minutes I laid there trying to relax myself and gear up for the job of a lifetime. I remember thinking to myself "Is it really okay to let the baby sit in the birth canal like that? Isn't she under pressure in there? Is she getting enough oxygen?" I thought for sure I had heard a story somewhere that babies left in the birth canal too long can suffer long term effects. I convinced myself that I had made that up and that this woman was a medical student who knew what she was doing, Why else would my highly qualified midwife let her handle this delivery if she weren't capable? Just then my brother entered the room and it couldn't have been at a better time because I was in serious need of comic relief, which is his specialty. He had bought a Snickers at the vending machine and was dangling it at the foot of the bed as inspiration to push. "As soon as you have this baby, this Snickers is yours." The midwife came in as he was dangling it and overheard my mom tell him I couldn't eat that because of the gestational diabetes to which the midwife responded "She doesn't have gestational diabetes!" What? WHAT???? "What do you mean? What about the glucose test and the diet and pricking my finger every f-ing day to test my sugar???? Wasn't that because I had gestational diabetes?" I was so confused. "Oh no" she replied, "You were just in danger of developing it so I decided to have you continue on as if you did." Oh I was pissed!! I wished I had those frickin' fifteen grapes I had counted out for the past 120 days so I could throw them at her one by one.
 Just then the intern came back in the room and asked if I was ready to start. I nodded and with several good pushes and grunts, Camryn Faith Walker appeared to the world. With her head out, the intern began twisting and tugging to get the rest of her out. I was in a labor daze, but I distinctly remember hearing the midwife say sternly "Do not turn the babys head like that!!" She eventually got Camryn out, we heard a cry, I started crying, Brad was crying, my mom was crying, Anna, Jackie, everybody was crying. The nurse took the baby to the warming table and began suctioning her and doing all the post-birth procedures. Now if you've ever given birth you know after the baby is out, you still have to push out the placenta. That's what I was doing while everyone ooohed and aaahed over Camryn. I was still pretty numb, though the epidural was beginning to wear off so imagine my dismay when the intern informed me there had been quite a bit of tearing "down there" and I would need an episiotomy. Not only would I need an episiotomy,but she would be performing the episiotomy, her first one might I add, while my midwife instructed her how to do it.  Mmmm, hmmmm, yep, you heard me right. There was going to be a sewing class on my vagina while my entire family was present and my epidural continued to fade. I just was speechless, I mean really, what do you say at a time like that? Now mind you, at this time my neck is still stiff as a board, but I was so distratcted by the obvious that I didn't notice. Once I was stitched up and Camryn was diapered and swaddled they placed her in the crook of my left arm and immediately my neck began to pain. I switched her to my right arm but that was the arm my I.V. was in so it wasn't easy to hold her like that. The nurse brought me some Tylenol hoping it might help. I moved into a recovery room and Brad and I began bonding with our youngest daughter. She was much different looking than Mason when she was born. Mason had huge eyes that were wide open and bright. She was bald and so,so tiny. Camryn however had a mess of brown hair and her eyes not nearly as big or alert. She weighed in at 6lbs. 8.oz.,ten ounces bigger than her older sister. It was love at first sight though for Brad and I and we were so happy that we were now Mommy and Daddy to two little girls. I wanted to hold Camryn, but my neck and arm were hurting so bad. Brad was smitten and he took over, changing her diapers, feeding her, etc. I tried to nurse her, but she wouldn't latch on. We had the lactation specialist come in to help, but for some reason it wasn't working so we decided to suplement with formula to keep her blood sugar from crashing. So while I kept trying to stretch my neck so I could hold my newborn daughter, Brad would cradle her or let her sleep in the bassinet in the room. The nurse came in every hour to check on us and the baby,then jot down some notes on my chart at the end of the bed. After a few hours of this I became curious about what exactly she was writing so I snuck a peek and was shocked to see "Mother does not seem to be bonding with baby. Either Dad is holing baby or baby is in bassinet. Mom is never holding baby." I was mortified! These people thought I didn't want to hold my daughter! I made sure to clear that up with the nurse as soon as she came back in. After a day and a half in recovery we were able to go home with our newest member of the family in tow. Mason was so excited to have a baby in the house and she adjusted amazingly well. Camryn had reflux issues like Mace but nowhere near as bad. She wasn't quite the sleeper Mason was and seemed congested alot. But she had a perfect APGAR and just the right amount of digits, so I didn't have any concerns. It wasn't until that fateful day four months later when Anna voiced her concern for Camryn's tilted head that I began to notice that Camryn was not like Mason in ways more than just different hair and eyes. And of course, you all know the story from there. I look back on the irony of it all that as I was delivering her the left side of my neck was so tight and painful, only to discover that she herself had a tight muscle on the left side of her neck known as Torticollis, causing her head to hang to one side and her face to develop assymetry. I couldn't help but think back to the midwife's comment about how the intern had turned Camryns head at delivery. Did she do this to my baby? For the longest time I felt she had. I even sought legal advice so angry that this woman was allowed to perform a delivery when she clearly wasn't capable. Later on when it became obvious that Camryn's issues went well beyond her neck, I had so much anger for mysef for not objecting to an intern delivering Camryn. I just knew that was why she wasn't speaking or rolling over. Surely the reason she arched her back and started at us with blank eyes was due to her lengthy stay in the birth canal. I was so mad!!! It took me several years to stop talking about the delivery whenever we saw a doctor. It was always the first thing I mentioned at every new specialist appointment. And every time the doctor woud listen and then dismiss that it could have anything to do with my daughter's delay. I always assumed they were just sticking with their medical community and continued to believe that my daughter was "broken" because of somebody's malpractice. It took me a long time to accept that this was the way my daughter was, there was no cure and there was nobody to blame.
So here we are, eight years later and wow, so much has changed. Me, my husband, our marriage, our attitudes, our outlooks, everything. Everything has changed. I am a stronger, better woman. My husband is more patient and accepting, knowing he can't "fix" this and that's okay. Our marriage has been tested by the pure hell of Autism and I'm glad to say is coming out stronger than ever. I approach the world with a new attitude and outlook and try my very hardest to take nothing for granted as I once so carelessly did. While raising this child we call Camryn Faith, we still wonder why, why us? When there's screaming and tantrums and aggression I cry and I bargain with God a hundred different things I'll do if he makes this go away. And when I see Camryn tweak so much she can hardly stay still because she is so excited to see me after school I tell God never mind, why would I ever want this to go away?
So today, one day before we celebrate the birth of Camryn, I say this to God - Thank you for blessing me with this child. Thank you for showing me through Camryn's differences that beauty exists in all forms. Thank you for showing me with her frustrations and tantrums that just because she cannot speak like the rest doesn't mean she has nothing to say, a lesson I pass on every chance I get. Thank you for giving my other daughters the role of Camryn's sister as I know they will grow into beautiful, amazing women because of it. Thank you for helping me see to never take even the smallest things for granted and to live life to the fullest despite the challenges it presents. Thank you for showing me through Camryn's laughter that life is beautiful. And thank you for helping me to see that just because my life is not at all how I planned it to be, it is exactly as you had. And when times are tough, the reasons escape us and darkness is all we can see, the light will shine again as long as we hold on, as long as we believe, as long as we have faith. And I do...her name is Camryn.
Happy Birthday Camryn Faith....I love you!