2am, January 4th. Liz' water breaks as the storm intensifies; we leave the house just before a tree falls across our street. Once we arrive at the hospital, the nurse on duty is more nervous than Liz, and takes four tries to get the IV in, despite Liz' quite impressive vascularity (particularly for a mesomorph) additionally, the Doctor on call has obviously never seen a woman's anatomy before. But after the shift change, we get the best OB nurse on the planet, and learn that our Doctor, who had arrived to perform a scheduled C-section on another patient will be able to deliver our twins instead, as elective surgery is not allowed when the hospital is on generator power. Oh, did I mention that? All power in the Bay area is out as well as all major bridges being closed due to 70+mph winds. After Liz gets an incredible epidural from some 20 year old cowboy of a anesthesiologist, she goes to sleep and I go down to the cafe to get some food and make a few calls. When I return, everyone is in scrubs and I am handed a set- Liz has gone from 4 to 10 centimeters while she slept and we are ready to go to the surgery suite. Dr. Galland, our OBGyn, is one of the few doctors who will deliver twins vaginally, we are extremely pleased that his other surgery was cancelled and that the storm kept him from getting his haircut. He is joined by Dr. Branco, our pediatrician who has twins of his own and is also there by chance. Along with our doula, there were about 12 other attendants in the surgery suite, which is where multiples are delivered due to the propensity for complications. Dr Galland immediately set the tone by telling everyone to take their places. Less than five minutes later, Stormy came out on the first set of contractions.
Rocko and his enormous head arrived 45 minutes later. After cutting their cords and handing the new babies to Liz, I was feeling pretty good about how the day was going so far.
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