Katja at 8 months with Jacques
Dear George,
Even though it seemed haphazard at the time, having a child was
definitely the best thing that Katja and I ever did. We got married in
August 1960, then moved the following week to Ann Arbor to begin grad
school. It turned out they’d just finished the first large-scale clinical
study of the birth control pill in Puerto Rico, and Ann Arbor had been selected
as one of the initial sites for the pill’s distribution on the mainland.
Many women were wary of potential side effects, but Katja had no such qualms
and signed up as soon she heard about it. It’s probably not true, but I
like to imagine that Katja was the first American woman to have started taking
the pill. We went once a month to the local birth control clinic to pick
up her supply. It was located in a nondescript second-floor office down a
dark alley off Liberty Street, a few blocks west of campus. We always felt
a little secretive and illicit about our visits, sort of like
spies.
Our years in Ann Arbor zoomed by, and, though we’d get
occasional hints from parents, we were too busy to think about children.
In 1966 we moved to Cincinnati where I’d taken a job at the university.
We were given the option of health insurance with or without a maternity rider,
and we picked the maternity option, just in case. A year or two later we
went to a big party at a friend’s house. In the middle of the evening Katja said she had some news she’d like
to share with the group. Then she announced: “I went to the doctor
today. I’m pregnant!” Everybody broke into applause. I was
stunned. Privately I asked Katja how she could possibly be pregnant since
she was taking the pill. She said that she’d stopped taking it after I’d
asked about getting maternity insurance. She’d interpreted that as a
secret message from me that it was time to become pregnant. Why, I
wondered, had she never mentioned this? Katja said it had been too
embarrassing to talk about. Despite my initial shock, we were both
excited. We bought a book and started thinking about names. There
were lots of good possibilities for girls -- Emily, Kate, Victoria, etc.
If it were a boy, Katja narrowed it down to J***. My favorite was
Barnaby.
Natural childbirth was in vogue in the late 60’s, and we
enrolled in a class at the hospital. The instructor encouraged husbands
to be fully involved throughout the entire process. Along with our
bedside presence and emotional support during labor and birth, our most
important function was to help regulate our wives’ breathing. Katja’s
water finally did break, and we rushed to the hospital. It was totally
scary, and I felt myself breaking into a cold sweat. As Katja’s labor
pains grew worse, I started rhythmically saying, “Breathe…. breathe…. breathe,”
as I’d been taught during our class. Katja yelled back, “I am breathing,
goddammit!” That brought a swift halt to my efforts. Very soon
afterwards a nurse escorted me out to the waiting room. I felt bad about
failing in my natural childbirth husband role, but, frankly, being in the
waiting room was a relief.
Katja was in labor for about thirty-two hours. It was a
long, arduous, and painful process. At one point she became aware that
several women who had arrived after her had already given birth. She
shouted out, “I was here first! It’s my turn!” Nobody seemed to be
listening. Finally they did a C-section. A nurse came out and got
me. She brought me in to see Katja and our tiny baby son. Katja
looked very happy. “J*** or Barnaby?” I asked. “J***,” Katja
said. It was the beginning of a whole new adventure.
G-mail Comments
-Phyllis S-S
(5-18): Dear Dave, ,
wow, Katja told you at a party. What a shock! … See you Sunday at Linton. Phyllis
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