PART 2
I asked my wife what was for dinner exactly 4 hours after she came home with 17 surgical staples and our newborn son. When she reminded me about the pain medicine I had forgotten, I told her she had been “resting for 3 days.” She did not yell or argue. She simply carried our baby into the bedroom and locked the door. But just before midnight, I heard her whispering to someone on the phone, and the sentence she said next forced me to confront a truth I had been avoiding my entire life.
My wife’s name is Claire.
Our son, Luca, was born on a Monday at 3:37 a.m. after 22 hours of labor that ended in an emergency C-section.
I was there when the monitors changed. I held Claire’s hand while she pushed. I watched the nurses stop smiling and heard a doctor say Luca’s heart rate was dropping. Then everything moved quickly. A nurse guided me away from the bed while another placed a surgical cap over Claire’s hair. She looked terrified as they prepared to take her into the operating room.
“Evan?” That is my name. She reached for me. I squeezed her fingers and said, “I’m right here.” It was probably the most useful thing I said to her that entire week.
Luca was delivered by surgery. I cut his cord with my hands sweating inside blue gloves. Afterward, I watched Claire shake beneath heated blankets. I saw the nurses check her incision and listened while they explained her medication schedule. Her discharge sheet later listed 17 surgical staples closing the incision.
I knew she had undergone major surgery. I knew she was in pain. So I cannot pretend I did not understand what had happened. That is the part I have to live with.
I stayed at the hospital until Claire and Luca were stable. Then I went home late Monday afternoon, telling Claire I needed to shower, feed the dog, and prepare the house. I returned for several hours on Tuesday and Wednesday, but I slept at home both nights. I told my coworkers I was using that time to get everything ready. I told my mother I wanted the house to be perfect when Claire returned.
What I actually did was answer a few work emails, play video games, sleep in my own bed, and complain to a friend that the chair in Claire’s hospital room had hurt my back.
THE PART 3 IS NEXT 👇
