Is the 'I Love You' Worth It?

All I have to say is OW. The pain has begun to become unbearable. They moved me into the delivery room a couple minutes ago. Abby was right, I was almost there. I’m laying here having all these nursed flit around me and that horrible doctor down at my feet. Tre went to call Billie Joe and Mike. I want him to be here, but I know he’s uncomfortable in situations like this. For all the times he’s wound up in the hospital for falling out of or off of or into things, he can’t handle seeing other people in hospitals. I h want him to be in here with me so bad, but it think that I’d rather go in alone than hat him faint or throw up or something. That really wouldn’t help the situation.
The doctor keeps yelling at me to push, even though I’m trying my damndest. I’m seriously regretting not taking those Lamaze classes everyone kept telling me to take. I just kept avoiding them until it was too late. Something about a room full of pregnant women breathing weird makes me nervous. And really, would you take Tre to a Lamaze class? Yeah.
“How are you doing?” Abby says to me amidst the chaos of the nurses scrambling around and that god damn doctor telling at me. Why does she have to yell? And I’m not exaggerating. She must make herself hoarse by the end of her shift.
“Okay I guess,” I say forcing a smile. I guess it could have been worse. For about seven minutes I was thinking that I would have a natural childbirth… yeah. No thanks. I took the pain medications as fast as they could shoot me up. Abby pas my head gently and goes back to her duties. The doctor tells a tm to push again. I am so[i/] tired of hearing her voice.
“I am trying as hard as I can,” I yell back at her, and she looks up at me in surprise. I wonder if she’s ever done this. I doubt it. She’s hardly sympathetic. But then again, there are a lot of women who think you’re not a real woman if you have pain killers, so I guess there’s a good chance she’s one of those. The doctor says something to Abby about crowning and she comes over to my side.
“Almost,” she says touching my shoulder. “One more push then well have you stop and Dr. Murphy will pull the baby out.”
Great. Dr. Murphy will rip her out of me. Wonderful. I nod to Abby and push my hardest. It hurts so much, but if that doctor thinks I’m weak because I took pain meds, then I won’t cry. Just to stick it to her.
The doctor and the nurses all yell at me to stop pushing. Tears streak down my face, but I swear I’m not crying. I’m not crying. I’m not crying. I’m just relieved.
I can hear the baby squealing as they clean her off and I wonder if I’ll ever get used to hearing that sound. The doctor cuts the cord and they whisk her away to table on the far side of the room. In all the baby shows I’ve seen, they always let the mom see the baby before they take it away. Unless there’s something wrong with it. Does that mean there’s something wrong with her? I feel panic rising and look frantically around the room for Abby or someone else who will tell me something, but they’re all attending to the baby. Something in the window catches my eye- Tre, Mike and Billie Joe all with their faces smooshed up against the glass. At first I’m a little mad they were watching that, but I get over myself and am relieved to see familiar faces that don’t know how to use a scalpel.

The three of them rush in at the nurses’ approval, just as the bitch of a doctor high tails it out the door. Tre almost knocks her over on the way in. He and Mike are talking a mile a minute, each ones’ voice growing to compete with the other’s.
“And then the doctor just, like, yanked,” Tre reenacts the motion of yanking a baby out, a look of bewilderment on his face. I look over to the silent Billie Joe. He’s holding onto the side table, looking like he’s going to pass out or heave, I’m not sure which.
“Where’s Adrienne?” I ask him and he looks at me, blinking several times before swallowing.
“Uh, I, uh, she’s coming. Sometime.”
“Why don’t you sit down,” I say pointing to a stool that’s up against the wall.
“That sounds really good,” he says, stumbling over to the stool and plopping down, resting his head in his hands.
Tre’s practically jumping up and down in excitement when Abby brings the baby over. She’s so wrapped up in pink blankets I can barely see her.
“Can I hold her? Please, please?” Tre says pushing Mike out of the way.
“Why don’t you let Lisea hold her?” Abby says avoiding him completely and veering over to the other side of the bed. Tre almost juts his chin out in a pout, but Mike pulls him back over to where Billie is holding his head between his knees. I take the Ramona bundle from Abby and smile down at her. Her eyes are closed and she… well, frankly, babies are kind of ugly when they’ve just been born.
Tre creeps to the side of the bed and peers over at her.
“Babies are kind of ugly,” I laugh, teasing him.
“Well, you would be too if you were just ripped out of some chick!” He says, widening his eyes.