Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

I’m Jemima L. Yeggs, a.k.a. Stinker.  Pink Lady Apple Yeggs, my landlady and my auntie, has decided that now that I am not off having adventures by chasing storms, warning people about the storm that is coming, and helping the people who are devastated by them, I should write about my Sunday School Class.  She wants to read about how younger people, especially couples respond to what the Bible says.  And she wants to know how God is at work at Lily the Pink.

B.B. was back.  She was doing my hair and it needed help.  The humidity was thick enough to cut with a knife, as the saying goes, really bad for Tracy in early December.  The storms were rumbling through the city, one after the other.  So, Dr. Ellie drove the Turtle and her husband, Dr. Ben Casey ran the back.  Note to those who have not read earlier episodes, there is a wire mesh cage between the driver and photographer and the rest of the crew.  The idea was that the supervisory team might have a pad of paper or pens on the desk and they might become projectiles in a high speed turn and distract the driver.  Thus, the back of the stretched SUV had room for the supervisor, a radar or video tech, and a back seat for three students to take notes.  Skinny (Kevin Johnson) volunteered to be the cameraperson on the team and the rest of the team were rookies, freshmen who had not done anything like this before.  Even the radar tech seat had someone not trained in studying the radar.  They would have been better having Michael Rowe Casey, a thirteen-year-old, but I made some videos for the education department with Michael as my student.  He was good, but he was motivated to be like his adoptive parents.  Other than possible hail, it was mostly a big lightning show, but the winds might be fun to deal with.  Really, Skinny had little to do.  The city was inside the monster supercell.  From a distance, you might see it spinning, but not when you were inside it.  His best photo ops might be if they see debris.  No tornadoes were expected, but they might happen.  Straight-line winds might blow the roof off a small structure.

But that was their problem.  Because of the weather conditions, I had frizz-city going on from the ears up.

As B.B. said, “You are fixed, girlfriend.  You aren’t perfect, but you are far from the bride of Frankenstein.”

I grumbled, “Shouldn’t that have been Bride of Frankenstein’s monster?  Doctor Frankenstein was the doctor, not the monster.”  Then something happened that I cannot really explain.  There was this pop and then the floor and my legs were soaking wet.

B.B. jumped back, “What was that!”

I moaned, “I don’t think we are having a Sunday school class.  My water just broke.  I am having a baby.”

B.B. asked, “You are awfully calm for someone in labor!”

I shrugged, “I am not in labor.  No pains at all.  I am not sure how to characterize what I just felt.  Just a whoosh!”

B.B. looked and said it must be a quart of water on the floor.  I asked how she knew, and she said that she was very skilled at dropping quarts of milk.

I waddled into the classroom.  “Easy, you and I are going to the hospital.  My water broke.”

Easy asked, “Your what?”

I growled, “Were you awake during any of the training?  My amniotic sac that holds the baby just broke.  We are having the baby.  Now at least get our travel case.  Good grief, I only packed it last night!  Move, lover boy!”

Easy ran from the room, “My wife, the drill sergeant!”

I said, “At least Joseph can teach the class.”

Joseph shook his head, “No can do.  Sorry to renege, but your Dad made me promise to preach a fill-in sermon if you were in labor during the church service.  You aren’t in labor yet, but the doctors may induce with the water breaking already.”

I asked, “But who can teach?”

Emmett said, “I’ll sing the song and then we’ll have a group prayer.  Just know that for the 30-45 minutes until the buses line up, we’ll be praying.”

Joseph nodded, “Thanks, bro.”  Joseph had semi-adopted Emmett since Emmett wanted to be a minister of some sort and Joseph was only a couple of credits away from finishing his masters of divinity.

Darrell Driver said, “You said your water broke.  We just called Mary Jo, and she is bringing the mop and bucket.  We’ll take care of it.”

Sally Mae got to the bathroom door and said, “That’s more than what Mary Jo had.”

I groaned, “Yeah, I’m not due for another month.”

B.B. asked, “Are we calling an ambulance?”

I shook my head, “Let’s take a pink SUV.  Easy can drive.”

Jochebed said, “No.  I am midwife if baby comes along the way.  I sit next to you in middle seats.  Easy sits behind you, coaching and rubbing your shoulders, keeping you calm.  I next to you if baby comes.  B.B. rides in front seat.  She wants to make movie.  I think Grannie Fannie best choice as driver.  Easy is calm and knows driving stunts.  We do not need stunts.  We need calm safe passage.”

Georges said, “Let me drive.  I have a portable gum drop for emergencies upstairs.”

Jochebed, George’s wife, asked with arms akimbo, “Then why are you not running to apartment?”

Georges ran out of the room, nearly hitting Easy on the way in.

Arabella laughed, “This is great fun.  Everybody is going crazy!”

Menzie said, “Wait until you get pregnant.  I’ve been through this routine twice, and I’m only a freshman in high school.”

All this time, people were arriving for class.  Strangely, Michael Rowe Casey was the calmest.  He sat each person down and explained what happened.  There was a honk out front, and Missy held Pink’s office door while Julia held the front door.  I knew labor had to start soon, but not necessarily right away.  The longer the wait after PROM (Pre-labor release of membrane), the greater the chance of infection.  Joseph was calling the church.  Easy called the doctor.  And Zuzka let Pink Lady know, and she was calling my mother-in-law.  They would go straight to the hospital and Pink Lady would take Sophie, Blaise, and a couple of others with her.  Missy was arranging an SUV to take more to the ER.  We were going to fill the waiting room.

Did I mention that it was stormy?  My hair that B.B. had worked on now looked like I had just gotten out of the shower when I stepped into the SUV.  The few feet from the entrance to the SUV was a deluge.

As I sat behind Georges in the middle row, I felt my first labor pain, ever, since this was my first.  It was unexpected and expected, if that makes sense.

Georges had the blue light flashing, but at times, people would see that it was a pink SUV and pull in front anyway.  He nearly hit one driver, and as Georges passed, he flashed his badge, rolled down the window, and said, “I already have your license number!”  But otherwise, he made it to the hospital with no further incident.

Since we did not come in by ambulance, the ER receptionist needed all the details.

Jochebed said, “This young woman is in labor.  She needs to go straight to the labor rooms to be checked out quickly.  Paperwork can wait.  I check while in the SUV.  She may need to go straight to the delivery room.”

The ER Receptionist was not going to move.  “Patient’s name.”

Jochebed shouted, “Please, she is my Sunday school teacher!  She is the Stink!”

Easy calmly smiled and said, “Jemima Yeggs.  Insurance is on file.  Dr. Weiss is going to do the delivery.  And the angry woman here is Jochebed Evident.”

Jochebed yelled, “You get this woman to the birth center now, or I deliver in waiting room!”

The ER Receptionist simply growled.

At that point, I screamed.  It was the worst labor pain yet.  Easy came back to coach me on my breathing, but each method of breathing that he mentioned, I rejected.  The pain was beyond all those.  But the scream caused a nurse to burst into the waiting area, and she checked me out.

The doctor walked up behind me and said, “When Jochebed says this is an emergency, I trust her.  Jochebed is an experienced midwife.  She has delivered many babies in the jungles of Africa with no doctor to help her. Besides, the medical center has given permission for this woman with a camera to accompany us.”

The nurse backed away from my private area that was not very private at that moment.  She said in a device pinned to her collar, “Forget labor.  Prep a delivery room.”

The doctor, the nurse (until she turned things over to the delivery room team), Easy pushing me in the wheelchair, Jochebed, and B.B. with the camera all went into the elevator.  Georges stayed at the angry ER Receptionist to give her all the details she wanted.  When she argued that he was not a family member, Georges flashed his badge.  That really meant nothing when considering the HIPAA laws, but it changed the tone of the receptionist.  (HIPAA, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 – Yes, we’ve been living with the madness for that long)

When we arrived in the delivery room, Dr. Weiss asked, “Has everyone signed the release forms?  If not, sign the forms now or excuse yourselves.  I have been in delivery with Jochebed before.  She does not need any of us, but we have a television show to produce.  ‘Stinker Delivers a Baby.’”

As they were putting me on the table, I said, “How about ‘Stinker meets Stormie.’”

A nurse said, “It sure is stormy!  It’s nasty out there.”

Easy snickered, “And it seems stormy in here.  Stormie must want out so she can see the storm, too.”

The nurse said, “So, you know the gender already?”

I replied, “I had a vision.  And our next will be a boy named Dusty.”

The nurse said, “I’m calling off that day.  I do not like dust.”

Stormie was born soon after, and B.B. had everything recorded.  Her backup crew barely got to the delivery waiting room in time to get the family reactions.

Stormie and I are fine.  She weighs 6 pounds, 2 ounces, and she is 19 and a half inches long.  So, not a premature delivery, just roughly a month early.  And she did not need to rush that much.  The storm was still raging an hour later.

But there was a storm a little later.  As the family gathered in my room, I presented Stormie to them, in a blue blanket.  Everyone went crazy!  They had been told Stormie was a girl.  Now, a blue blanket!  Hearing the grumbling, a nurse came in with a pink blanket.  She said, “For heaven sakes, we delivered a lot of girls already today and we ran out of pink blankets.  We’re not trying to create any gender dysphoria here!”

Credits

There are elements of the births of our sons in this story.  My wife was almost premature with both of them, about a month with the first and a month and a half with the second.  Both were over six pounds at birth, barely, and thus not technically premature, but the second lost weight immediately and dropped below six pounds.  In two days, at the scheduled discharge from the military hospital in Heidelberg, Germany, he was barely over six pounds, a requirement to be released.  His older sibling had newborn jaundice and spent the first week in the nursery at the hospital and my wife had to visit in order to feed him.

With the second baby, my wife’s water broke while she sat at the kitchen table.  We had guests, the third in line of her brothers visited us for his honeymoon.  I got home from work to see them mopping the kitchen floor.  PROM used to be premature rupture of membranes.  Now PROM stands for Prelabor Rupture of Membranes.  I guess this is to differentiate between premature water breaking versus premature baby.  My wife had her first labor pain as the ambulance (a modified quarter-ton military jeep – long before they got hummers), but that was two hours after her water broke.  They were waiting on me to arrive from work – and it was rush hour in Karlsruhe, Germany and the hospital was in Heidelberg, normally a forty-five minute drive, but in trying to follow the ambulance, I was over an hour getting to the hospital due to the traffic, which parted for the ambulance.

When I got there, my wife was 2cm and the move to delivery was 10cm. As soon as the nurse announced 2cm, she said we would be waiting a while, and she left the room. My wife then screamed. I went through 3-4 breathing techniques and my wife grabbed my uniform collar and pulled me close to her face. She said in a low gravelly voice, “forget the breathing, get me some drugs!” The nurse hearing this in the hallway came back in and told me to get dressed in the hospital whites, and a nurse would then show me to the delivery room. So, my wife dilated from 2cm to at least 10cm in two or three seconds. So, I had to put in the Jemima rejected every breathing technique, and Easy being a bit clueless.

With the second child, also, we decided the baby’s name the night before he came into the world.  (Her packing the travel bag the night before). And our second son was delivered by a Doctor Weiss. My wife was his last delivery before he returned to the USA. At least he scrubbed after talking to my wife and went off shift to get some sleep before he went to Frankfurt to the airport. If he chose from any number of different specialties at that point where baby delivery was rare, our son could have been the doctor’s last baby that he ever delivered.

The Mayo Clinic states that the water is about a quart at 36 weeks, but only about a pint to a pint and a half at 40 weeks.  Jemima delivered at the time when there was the most amniotic fluid.

And my elder son was wrapped in a pink blanket upon birth due to a laundry issue.  With my wife being sedated, she wasn’t even sure.  After a little excitement, the nurse got the first blue blanket from the laundry hamper to resolve the confusion.  What do secularists do now?  Demand a purple blanket?

And sorry for the lack of a Bible study this week.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.