The Best Day

I don't agree. I don't think it was the best day of my life by any stretch of my imagination. This image, according to me, is just another way of glorifying the whole birthing process. I have delivered two babies. Both the days were MESSY, to say the least. Normal or C-section - it doesn't matter. You are a MESS.  

Read on to get a sneak verbal preview of what happens on that day. 

Doctors (yes, plural) stick their fingers into you, nurses disrobe you, one staff puts a bed pan under you (in case of normal delivery) and asks you to relieve yourself so that you don't shit during the delivery (the truth is, some still do!!), you can feel your stomach and large intestines emptying into that pan and then the staff takes that pan in front of you into the toilet and flushes it and you almost die of shame (if it's your first delivery), another staff comes and "cleans" you. Add to that, your mad-woman like screams during the contractions and unbearable hunger, your body being paraded and handled most unceremoniously and you cannot even protest .... I could go on. 

Point is - it is NOT a pretty sight. 

In India, most hospitals do not allow the husbands into the labor rooms. I don't think it is a good thing. I feel husbands should be allowed to see their wives in their WORST possible avatar and see if they still love her as much.  Indian husbands have no idea what their wives go through, on the D-day, to give them their DNA, in flesh and blood, angelic and cherubic,  wrapped beautifully in softness of cloth and skin.  

And those videos that show the baby and the mother bonding - well, with both my babies (I delivered them in the same hospital, 12 years apart), the nurses took them away almost immediately to be weighed and cleaned and a thousand other things to be done like noting the time of birth etc. The bonding and the skin-to-skin contact that pregnancy websites emphasize so much on happened a few hours later in my case.