MerDer: Make Your Heart Feel

I Would Do It All Over Again

39 weeks

Meredith's POV:

Pain plays one of the most important roles in the lives of humans. The body is incredibly efficient at registering messages of pain, and extremely quick in getting you to perform an appropriate action in order to lessen the pain sensation. Touch an extremely hot object, for instance, and the impulse or message goes from the nerves in your fingertips, along your spinal cord to your brain. It almost instantly, within a fraction of a second, sends back the message to you to remove your finger immediately from the source of the heat. Pain alerts us when to stop doing something dangerous.

However, on rare occasions pain is what alerts us that it is time to do something. At least that's my interpretation as I am awoken at 3:30 in the morning by the most uncomfortable cramps in my stomach. I rub my blurry eyes to wake myself up when I am all off a sudden hit with the strangest feeling of wetness spreading across my side of the bed.

"Oh my god I peed myself" I mutter to myself my mind still half asleep. Red rises to my cheeks as does the realization that I didn't pee myself. Oh my god I didn't pee myself. I look over at my still sleeping husband, and I am all of a sudden hit with an overwhelming amount of stress. I am hit with another cramp, and my mind instantly shifts into overdrive. I take a deep breath, trying to calm the intense amounts of nervousness that are currently coursing through my body. I am not ready, god I am not ready. I shake my head, realizing that there is no reason I should be going through all this alone and turn to wake my husband.

I reach over and give him a hard shove on the shoulder. He wakes with a start, sitting up and looking at me, his face showing no signs that he was just passed out moments before. It is almost as if he was only half asleep his eyes instantly searching mine, like he already knows exactly why I have woken him up. I reach for his hand and he accommodates me gripping it tightly in his own. I take a deep breath before opening my mouth to speak.

"My water broke" I state, my voice shaking both out of fear and out of excitement. I can't help but let out a short exhilarated laugh. We are about to become parents. We are about to drive to a hospital, and we are about to have a baby. He takes a shaking breath, and it is obvious by looking at him that his mind is racing at a million miles an hour.

It is like, for just a moment, we have been sucked into some surreal dream state, like the entire room has faded and I am not currently sitting in a small puddle of amniotic fluid. He reaches up with his free hand to lovingly stroke my cheek. I can't help but relax at his touch, he has such an intense calming effect on me, and I know there is no way I would be able to make through today without him by my side.

"I love you Mer" he smiles leaning in to briefly claim my lips. He pulls back the most loving look of adoration in his eyes as he brushes my hair behind my ear. I am just about to recount to him how much I love him back when another contraction cuts the moment short. I take a shallow breath and the look of concern on his face makes me worried for how he is going to handle it when the contractions start getting really painful.

This contraction seems to have knocked us out of the loving dream state we were so comfortable in, and he releases my hand just for a moment so he can lean over an grab the stop watch that he had purchased specifically for this moment. He reaches for my hand once more, gripping it tightly as he turns the stop watch on.

"Let me know when they start and stop, we will time a couple and then call the hospital" he gently instructs, I just not my head waiting for the next to start so I can alert him. We sit there for what seems like a lifetime, just holding hands and timing my contractions.