My baby was due August 17, 1993. The week before I had everything ready. Being my first baby I thought a due date was a due date. I kept my end of the bargain but the baby had other ideas.
I tried everything. I walked around Lake Harriet every day. I had slowed to a 20-minute mile but I thought that was good considering the load I was carrying. Someone told me if I drank a 64-ounce Gatorade that would start labor but that was only hard on me for obvious reasons. Five days later I thought I felt a twinge but I walked around the lake with my friend and her daughter. Then we recovered on one of her living room chairs and ordered pizza. I went home and settled into a nice bath when I thought this might be real labor.
I called my aunt, who was my birth coach. She was out for the evening. This was before cell phones so I had no way to contact her. I started reading a John Grisham novel I had saved for the occasion. Just when I started to think I might be driving myself to the hospital my aunt arrived. I met her in the driveway. I thought I would be nervous but it was all so incredibly calm.
At the hospital I relaxed, read my book and walked as much as I could. I didn’t want medication. I wanted to be alert and aware. My aunt finally talked me into a light pain medication to help. It felt like I drank my first glass of wine in nine months. I asked the doctor how much longer and he said if you get going it could all be over in 45 minutes. I watched the clock like a hawk. I wasn’t going one minute beyond 45 minutes. My beautiful daughter arrived 33 minutes later. (Five days, eight hours and 33 minutes beyond her due date, but she was here!)
I didn’t know if I was having a boy or a girl before the birth so I didn’t tell anyone that I had a preference but I really, really wanted a little girl. I named her Zoe Rae, after my mother. She had dark hair and amazing dark eyes. She opened them and looked right at me. I felt something that was more than love. I was changed in an instant to a protector.
I felt so honored to be trusted with this little life. She became my everything. I was excited by her every move. Her first smile, her first giggle, her first attempt at talking and making sounds. It was as if she was the first baby ever born and I was the first mom ever!
I have now been blessed with two more sons, Jack Louis in 1998 and Ben Michael in 1999. They have grown into amazing young men. My daughter though will always hold a very special place in my heart because she gave me the gift of making me a mom. Thank you Zoe.
“The moment a child is born, the mother is also born. She never existed before. The woman existed, but the mother, never. A mother is something absolutely new.”
– Osho
Taste of Home columnist Sandy (Anderson) Holthaus lives on a farm in South Haven, MN with her husband, Michael, and their children Zoe, Jack and Ben. Her heart remains on the North Shore where she grew up with her parents, Art and LaVonne Anderson of Schroeder. She enjoys writing about her childhood and mixes memories with delicious helpings of home-style recipes.
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