Last night at around 8:30pm, I told Molly and her posse of bright and beautiful galpals, that fifteen years ago at that very hour I had just puked a entire meal of grilled salmon, pasta and salad.
"EEEEEEEE-uuuuuuwwww, Mom/Grace!" they responded, completely grossed out.
Their horror pleased me, thus I was motivated to regale them with an hour by hour recounting of Molly's birth, fifteen years ago that night.
"...after I puked, I got this weird calm feeling...then, at around 10 o'clock, I went to the bathroom and wiped, then I freaked because it felt like MY WHOLE CROTCH WAS BULGING OUT...I yelled for Molly's Dad, and I made him look between my legs and he said HOLY CRAP, EVERYTHING IS BULGING OUT..."
(big time giggling about making Moll's Dad look between my legs) "Euuuuuuwwwww! Mom! Stop it!"
"...then at 2 in the morning, my water broke and I couldn't tell if the water bed had leaked or if you were trying to bail out, so Moll's Dad and I reached for our pregnancy/baby books and looked it up..."
"Oh. My. God. The water breaking thing sounds soooo gross!...I know! It happened to my mom in a restaurant....EEEEEEUUUUUUWWWW, a restaurant?...Cool, you guys had a water bed?"
"...yeah, then we figured out Moll would be born pretty soon so we thought it would be a good idea to get some sleep, but then I woke up at 6:30 in the morning with some bigass contractions and for some reason I thought the right thing to do was to sit on the toilet bowl..."
"OH. MY. GOD. Mom, I could have been born in the toilet!"
"...but you weren't because at 10:30 your Dad drove me to the birthing center and I went into full blast labor wearing your Dad's Boston Red Sox tee shirt..."
"Ohmigod, how cool is that? No wonder you totally love the Red Sox, Molly!"
"...and you know what, you guys? Labor wasn't really that bad for me. I didn't have any drugs or anything. It just felt like a big old gnarly case of constipation, like I had to take a major crap..."
"Mom? I? Totally don't want to hear? About the labor part? Okay? Please?"
"...my God, you're such a wuss. Well, I'll just skip over to when you were born, which was exactly 1:30 in the afternoon. You guys, Molly was so perfect and beautiful, the most perfect and beautiful thing I ever saw in my life."
"AWWWWWWWWWW!"
"...then I made Molly's Dad go down the street to this fancy grocery store and he brought back a roast chicken, and I ate the whole damn bird by myself..."
"WHOAAAAAA!"
"...you guys, it was the best day of my entire life."
"AWWWWWWWWWW!"
The girls were spared the truly gnarly details, like when I hemorrhaged profusely immediately post-partum and my doc had to manually compress my uterus to stop the blood flow. You all know what I mean when I say "manually compress". Shudder.
I'll save that for the posse when they're in their late 20s. Remembering how nice I was to chauffeur them around Santa Cruz, they will scoop me up, pop my walker in the trunk, and take me to the nearest Margarita watering hole. Over salted rims and chips and salsa, I'll give them the full thrust of the labor and delivery story. I'll even do a demo of what it meant to be "manually" compressed.
But I will end the story, as I will always end that story, by saying that the day Molly was born was the best day of my entire life.
Happy Birthday, my precious girl.
Happy birthday to the beautiful young lady, and congrats to her kick-ass mom for 15 years of awesomeness.
Posted by: Mir | June 16, 2006 at 09:49 AM
Seriously Molly, you are so blessed to be born of Grace. You don't know me, but I'm very proud of you, and inspired by your mother. Blessings to you!
Happy Birthday beautiful!
Posted by: Daxohol | June 16, 2006 at 11:07 AM
Wishing you a happy day and a wonderful year Miss Molly.
And Grace, go you for no drugs. I walked into the hospital and immediately requested an epidural. Further proof that you are made of tougher stuff than I.
Love to both of you.
xxb
Posted by: beth | June 16, 2006 at 11:57 AM
What a great story, happy birthday Molly!!!
Posted by: Janet | June 16, 2006 at 12:42 PM
Happy Birthday, Molly!!!!
Posted by: Crystal | June 16, 2006 at 01:01 PM
Happy birthday, Molly. I am so glad that you are going to be at BlogHer this year. It has been a privilege to get to know a bit about you through your fabu mom. Have a great day!
Posted by: Janeen | June 16, 2006 at 01:24 PM
Happy birthday, Molly! You have a very cool mom. Grace, did you name her "Molly" because June 16 is Bloomsday?
Posted by: Elayne Riggs | June 16, 2006 at 01:25 PM
ooof, what we go through to have those happiest days of our lives! Happy Birthday!
Posted by: kelly | June 16, 2006 at 05:18 PM
Happy Birthday, Molly!
And happy anniversary of being a mom, Grace.
Posted by: elswhere | June 16, 2006 at 06:56 PM
1. happy birthday, molly!
2. grace, you can't count: you'll only be in you early 60s!
3. but already you're getting forgetful: they read your blog
4. what was 4, again?
Posted by: e | June 16, 2006 at 07:35 PM
Yay!!! Happy birthday Molly!
I agree with you completely on labor feeling like having to relax to take a big crap. It was exactly like that. Or, well, like... other kind of similar things.
Posted by: badgerbag | June 16, 2006 at 08:12 PM
Yeah. like crapping a basketball. (Through a tiny lil' ol' hole...) Eeeeeeeuuuuuu.
Anyway, I am blown away that Molly is 15. She was JUST 13. (Which is only a year above 12!!!!). And 15 and 13 are poles apart.
My God, time just blows me away.
Posted by: Tonya | June 17, 2006 at 12:06 AM
Molly was almost born in a toilet? EEEUUUWWW! Good thing her dad steered you to the birthing center, Grace.
Happy Solar Return, Molly!
Posted by: Heidi | June 17, 2006 at 07:08 AM
Happy birthday to Molly and sorry that I didn't wish you a happy one recently as well.
Posted by: Dave | June 17, 2006 at 09:47 AM
What a beautiful story - I am in tears. Happiest Birthing Day, Mama. And Happy Birth Day, Molly.
Posted by: chasmyn | June 17, 2006 at 11:13 AM
Molly, May this be a fabulous, joy-filled year for you. What a lucky girl you are to be so very, very loved and cherished by your terrific Mom. Happy Birthday!
Posted by: Lin | June 17, 2006 at 02:17 PM
Much love and happiness to Miss Molly.
May I come live with you, Grace? I don't take up much space at all. I'm tall, but I curl into a ball when sleeping and you'll never notice me. Then, I can hear all this kind of stuff on a regular basis.
I'll bring Twinkies. Think on it.
Posted by: Mocha | June 17, 2006 at 08:46 PM
Good golly Miss Molly. Fifteen is a magical age, enjoy it.
Bwahahahahaa Grace! Way to go, love the birthin' stories. I distinctly remember after the birth of my youngest, it was breakfast time. Since I was cleared to eat, the nurses brought me a glorious tray with pecan pancakes, maple syrup, butter, sausage, scrambled eggs, OJ, and hot tea.
My doctor chose THAT moment to enter my room, hang out, and TALK. I sat, propped up in bed, salivating like a dog while my food was cooling off by the second until he finally noticed, and said, "oh, you're probably hungry, aren't you?" "Well, I'll see ya later" and strolled out. At LAST! I've never had a better breakfast in my life.
Posted by: Leslie | June 17, 2006 at 08:56 PM
happy birthday Molly!!!!
Posted by: cmhl | June 18, 2006 at 08:52 AM
Happy Birthday to Molly.
I didn't eat chili for YEARS after the labor and birth of my first child.
Posted by: chris | June 18, 2006 at 10:30 AM
Happy Birthday Molly!! And *I* loved reading the birth story, especially because I had my kids without drugs, too. ;)
Posted by: panthergirl | June 18, 2006 at 01:53 PM
Happy birthday Molly Rose. Nice birth story. You trying to enforce teen birth control on the entire high school? Good job!
Oh, and I LOVE that you gave birth wearing a Red Sox shirt. I KNEW you and I must be kindred souls!
Posted by: margalit | June 18, 2006 at 08:16 PM
They are well worth the labor, but oh, OUCH. Both of mine hurt like crazy, and took forever trying to get out my narrow pelvis. (well, it used to be narrow!) Happy Birthday to both of you.
Posted by: Margaret | June 18, 2006 at 09:05 PM
Happy Birthday to Molly.You are so blessed to be born of Grace. Wishing You Good health and success.
elizabeth
http://www.voiceofusa.com
Posted by: Elizabeth | June 19, 2006 at 10:23 AM
YAAAA!!! Happy 15th Molly!
...love, love, love the birth story.
Posted by: Vicky (Desperate to be a Housewife) | June 19, 2006 at 03:43 PM