Page 83 of 7+Us Makes Nine

“Sweetheart, your body can’t handle the size of the children any longer. You’ve done so well. But your health is at stake here,” he said.

“Don’t let them do it. Please, Jace. I can do this. It’s only six more weeks.”

“Your body can’t go six more weeks, Catherine. You know this.”

I watched tears of fear stream down Catherine’s cheeks. She was in so much pain and her body had gotten so big. Our vacation together as a family had been wonderful, but the second we got home she started experiencing complications. Shortness of breath. An inability to lay down because she couldn't breathe. She even had problems keeping food down because the kids were so compressed and so tight for space that they were pressing against her stomach.

The doctors were worried. So we were at the hospital trying to convince her to induce.

“There’s no cesarean. The doctors are almost certain you can do this naturally once you’re induced. But you can’t keep going like this, Catherine. You stopped breathing last night.”

I choked back tears as the memory came flashing back to the forefront of my mind. I’d woken up with a start because Michaela had been crying. I figured she’d had another nightmare, but when I found her standing on Catherine’s side of the bed trying to wake her up, I turned on a light. And what I found made my stomach plummet through the floor. Catherine’s lips had turned the lightest shade of blue and her skin had become pale. Michaela came in wanting to cuddle with us, but in trying to wake up Catherine she’d made herself upset.

She had worked her way down onto her back and stopped breathing in the middle of the night.

“I don’t want to do this with medication,” Catherine said with a whisper. “You know all the side effects that come with that stuff.”

“And the other option is all of you suffering more than you need to, Catherine. That isn’t an option here. It never will be.”

She closed her eyes and her lip began to quiver. But I still had my hand out to the doctor. I wasn’t doing this without her consent, but if she really didn’t want to induce then it was going to be a long hospital stay. I wouldn’t make her induce, but I would make her stay in the hospital until her body went into natural labor itself. I wasn’t risking another episode like that. I wasn’t risking losing the woman I loved and the four children she had grown for me over something as stupid as her wanting to lay down to fucking sleep.

“I really stopped breathing?” she asked.

My eyes fluttered up to hers as I started wiping away her tears.

“Michaela found you,” I said. “Her crying was what woke me up.”

I saw a determination in her eyes. I watched something flicker behind them that I’d never seen before. She closed her eyes and tilted her head towards the doctor, then I watched her nod her head.

“They’re not going to see me like that,” she said. “Not on my watch. Start the Pitocin, doctor.”

I stepped out to notify her family of what was happening before I gathered my kids in the waiting room. Her pregnancy had been such a whirlwind that we hadn’t stopped to figure out our nannying situation. I held the kids and comforted Michaela, telling her that ‘Miss Caffy’ was all right. And I was relieved when Catherine’s family showed up.

They shooed me off so I could go be with her during the rest of her labor.

It was a long, grueling process. But the strength that poured from Catherine was unlike anything I’d ever seen. We sank ourselves into this in-ground jetted tub the hospital had, and I rocked with her while she gave birth. I massaged her lower back and kissed her shoulder. Massaged her legs and pulled her hair back. Anything she needed from me while working our children from her body, I did. It was the most intimate experience of my life. My body against hers as our children slid from between her legs. Each time, we reached down and helped them out. Each time, I got to feel her body give birth to my children.

Tears were rushing down my own cheeks by the time it was all said and done.

Our children cried out healthy cries that filled the room as Catherine collapsed. She was soaked with sweat and shaking from the exhaustion of her twenty-two-hour labor. I rested against her. Cloaked her with my strength and felt her trembling against me. I threaded our fingers together and laughed through my tears of happiness as our children screamed and cried into the room. The nurses cleaned them up while I took care of Catherine, helping her out of the tub and washing her down so I could get her into some more comfortable c

lothes.

After all the commotion was settled and the nurses had looked over our children, they handed our bundles of joy over to us. I held my son and daughter as Catherine hoisted our other two girls to her breasts, and I watched as they instinctively latched onto her. I bounced my son in my arms, watching his tongue lick his lips as he rooted around. He was hungry, too. I knew he was. My finger slid along his cheek, taking in the softness of his skin.

All of them had that wispy brown hair that matched their mother’s.

“How’s everyone doing?”

“Dad?” Catherine asked.

“There’s my girl,” he said as he came into the room.

“Can we come in?”

“Mom,” Catherine said with a smile.

Tears rushed her eyes again as her mother and sister walked into the room.

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