Mommy and Daddy officially found out I was on the way on October 6, 2004. Daddy came with Mommy to the Doctors and my nurse, Betty, gave Mommy the good news. They were so very happy to know I was coming. Mommy wanted a little boy, but Daddy really wanted a little girl. I was going to be stubborn from the start, though, and no one really knew for sure until the day I was delivered.
My mommy sang to me and talked to me every single day. I liked it a lot when she would read (she was stuck on the Harry Potter series and even now I can crawl up in her lap and she reads them to me.) Mommy loved to sing and play music on the radio and I got to hear all sorts of things before I was born. I liked Rhapsody In Blue by George Gershwin a lot. Mommy would put the speakers close to her tummy and I would move so I could hear it very well.
Mommy went to see a very nice group of doctors at Cuyahoga Valley Women's Health Center. Mommy liked the Doctor's there, but she really wanted something MORE for when I was born. Then one day, when Mommy went in for one of her prenatal check-ups, she was lucky enough to meet Sue the midwife with the practice. Sue and Mommy hit it off right from the start and they made a deal so Mommy would only visit Sue for the rest of her appointments. Sue was sweet and caring. She was always willing to spend lots of time with Mommy and answer all of Mommy's questions. Sue didn't make Mommy feel silly for worrying about me from the beginning and told my mommy, "When it comes to that baby YOU know best!" Mommy felt at ease right away. And I was happy too; I liked Sue a lot! I would move and squirm and kick whenever I heard Sue's voice.
Mommy and Daddy got their first look at me on October 31, 2001 when we had our first ultrasound. Dr. Stewart was her doctor for the ultrasound and Mommy liked him as well. I didn't like the sound of his voice too much and I would startle every time he talked to Mommy. When Sue got the results of my ultrasound she told Mommy I would be a BIG boy and would be due to arrive on April 22, 2002.
Mommy and Daddy tried out all kinds of names for me. Mommy wanted to name me after Daddy but Dad didn't like that idea. I heard all kinds of names and I giggled to myself when Daddy would suggest a name because of how silly his names were. Mommy never called me "It" or "The baby" though and I was glad. Instead, she called me "Bean." I liked that name and Mommy was careful only to call me Bean and not he or she since I wouldn't let them see which I was. Finally, when Mommy was about 7 months pregnant, her and Daddy decided I would be Avery Baird if I was a boy. Avery means "nobility or ruler" and Baird means "minstrel or musician." But after another ultrasound at 36 weeks predicted I would weight close to 10 1/2 pounds when I was born, Mommy decided I needed a name that would give me a big guy nickname. She talked to Daddy. "Avery is an artsie name," she said. "This will be a BIG baby. Can a boy play sports with a name like Avery?" Daddy agreed and the name search began again. Then one day, when Mommy was 38 weeks along, she told Daddy she had come up with an idea. "I really wanted to name our baby after you," she told him. "Maybe we could use your name as a middle name?" And Daddy said, "And we could call him AJ." But Mommy still liked Baird as a symbol of her and Daddy's love for music. So I became Avery Joshua-Baird.
Mommy visited Sue on her due date and she had a terrible cold. I was still no closer to arriving so Sue sent Mommy home with some medicine and told her to rest up, in case I decided to make my grand entrance. On Sunday April 28, 2002, Mommy and Daddy we're lounging around when Mommy started to worry about me. "Something's just not right," she told Daddy. So she called Sue. "I feel like my heart is racing and I can't catch my breath," she told Sue. Sue asked Mommy to drink some juice and then lay down of one half hour and count how many times I moved. But Mommy was so nervous that her heart beat just lulled me right to sleep. When I didn't move in the half an hour Sue told Mommy to come down to the hospital. Daddy threw Mommy's bag into the truck, grabbed the video camera, buckled my car seat into its base and drove Mommy to Akron General Medical Center.
When Mommy got there Sue had called ahead and made arrangements for Mommy to go onto a fetal monitor. I never liked those things much. They pulled them so tight on Mommy's belly that they pinched me! I immediately started batting it to get it away. Mommy was relieved. She waited and after about an hour a doctor came in and told her that she was 2 cm dilated and that Sue had gotten permission to induce. I didn't know what that meant but I hoped it didn't mean I would have to come out. I found out later it did!
At 1:55 pm on April 29, 2002 Sue had Mommy rushed back to the OR for an Emergency C-Section. I was born, twelve short minutes later, with my umbilical cord wrapped around my body twice like a car seat harness and then twisted once around my arm. The neonatologist declared me perfectly healthy and I got to meet my Mommy as soon as she was off of the operating table. Sue was holding me and placed me on Mommy's chest as they wheeled her from the OR.
A NOTE FROM MOMMY:Avery Joshua-Baird was born via Emergency Cesarean Section on Monday, April 29, 2002 at 2:07 pm, at Akron General Medical Center in Akron, Ohio. He weighed 8 lbs. 11 oz. and was 22 inches tall.~NEXT~ ~Back to the Tree House~ ~On to Pics of Me!~