I think there is something to be said for the pregnant woman’s mind. While I have no scientific data to back this up, I have a theory. Pregnant women around the world will argue with me I’m sure. Especially those that were desperately waiting to have their baby and watched their due date come and go, but this is my experience: I think I controlled (somewhat) when I had my babies.
While I write this article with a little bit of humor, I do believe maybe I did have something to do with when I went into labor and actually delivered my children. With my first, I had her 4 days before the due date. While this doesn’t seem too significant, it was a very significant day for me. My husband was in graduate school. He was about to start his medical rotations for the second year of his schooling. His first rotation: Surgery. It was an hour drive one way for him to get there. We had one car, which he was going to take with him. I was terrified. My due date was the 29th, and he was set to start his rotation on the 26th. So, that meant that every day that he was gone, I was home alone, with no transportation, and my husband was an hour away. I was in another state, and while I had a sister semi-close, it was still a 20 minute drive at least for her to get to me. No other family in sight. I made up my mind that baby was coming before he started that rotation on the 26th. I had her at 6:30 in the morning on the 25th. Lucky right?
Well, on to the birth of my second child. We were in a very different situation. My husband was a practicing Physician Assistant now at a VERY busy family practice office. He worked long hours at his first job out of school. He frequently had 12 hour days and couldn’t get away easily. My Mom was luckily very close, but again, I was still scared that he would be working when I had the baby and I wouldn’t be able to get him there fast enough. Every pregnant woman wants their husband or significant other to be there at delivery. I was no exception. The day I went into labor, I labored at home for 14 hours. My husband knew I was in labor, but was stuck at work. Literally 15 minutes before he came home, I started having contractions 4 minutes apart, regularly. He came home, changed clothes, and we were at the hospital 5 minutes later. In that circumstance I think I managed to hang on until he got home.
It’s just a theory, but I think that we have more control over what happens to us than we think. The woman’s mind is a powerful thing!
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