Birth: A Beautiful Thing
December 6, 2005 by joannetan86
5th December/6th December 2005: i shall always remember… the 1st time i became an obstetrician… and also my LAST!
nobody in my house knew when my female dog, Girl was delivering (cos no one took notice the date she mated with Max, also my dog). dogs will deliver approximately 63 days after the mating day. okay, so we lost count and didn’t expect her to give birth this early. but anyway, back to my story about being an obstetrician.
she has been whining and panting the whole morning; scratching the walls and floors and snuggling herself up in every crevice she could find in the house. well, that seemed REALLY AB-normal to me. and so i got more concerned. we built "a nest" for her in my brother’s room (brother’s not in, so we… hehe). we read from the Internet that during pre-labour, mothers will usually find for themselves a place that is dark and secluded or away from the house traffic, that means quiet. so we thought "well, jimmy’s room then." mom suggested that someone be with her just in case, you know, she delivers or something. at that time, my mom and i were the only people in the house. mom had to bring the car to the workshop for a check-up. so if it weren’t her who would be looking out for Girl, who else???
mom went out. this time Girl was panting really hard. i got a lil’ worried and silently told her: "please don’t deliver now. i’ll be the last person on earth that you want for a midwife." but looking at her discomfort and uneasiness, i slowly said: "okay, just deliver if you have to." that time, i felt for her. the way she could hardly sit and walk and pant and and and… *sigh* and then the dreadful thought clouded my head: "what if she won’t make it???" i scrapped that from my head: "Optimism is what you really need now, friend!"
lucky for me, she didn’t deliver during the time of everyone’s absence. after my mom’s return, Girl suddenly turned weird. she started walking out of brother’s room and into my room!!! and landed herself under my writing desk… (okay, i guess she didn’t feel familiar being inside jimmy’s room and so she opted to be under my table cos that’s where she always teman me when i study). hmmm… what’s next??? she sat there the whole night thru; still panting and in difficulties. i got online, hoping to get more information on dog-birthing, printed out a few copies, passed them to my dad (co-obstetrician) and my mom (the nurse). we read and were reading… when all of a sudden, we realised that she was contracting for the 1st time and that took quite a while. she was getting up and down, walking here and there and jumping into my arms. we were also contemplating to call the vet (the time:11.45pm, and vets charge about RM100 for a night-call and extra for treatment). Girl suddenly jumped into my arms (i was sitting on the floor near her nest) and she started to expel a greenish liquid and it flowed down my leg!!! i put her back and she started yelping loudly. suddenly a round head emerged from her bottom and then a few minutes later, we could see the whole puppy - the 1st born (a male) at 12.00am. And then the 2nd one (a female) came at 12.30am and that was the end of it… or so we thought! she licked her puppies cleaned and milked them. it was simply amazing observing what she did to her puppies the minute they came into the world. it was as if she knew from the start what she was supposed to do and no one taught her – they call this: basic animal instinct. my co-obstetrician (dad) and i were busy cutting the umbilical cords, tying them and stuff, you know the surgery thing… and there was blood and sticky substances everywhere. we took pride as the surgery was our first (and my last) and it was a success. at about 1.00am, we were happily resting on our laurels when the next contraction came and the mother started yelping even louder than before. we got ready our gloves and scissors, lotsa cloths and other tools to welcome the next pup. it (male) came out at last with much difficulty. “any more??” was our question. “yes, one more!” we were greeted by another male cute lil pup and that was REALLY the end of it (everything ended at 3.00am). at the end of the day, we got 3 male pups and 1 female pup. words can’t describe how adorably looking they are.
i certainly ain’t going thru this whole process again. not anymore as an obstetrician… there was a lot of pressure in it.
looking at those puppies makes you feel…… happy, contented, satisfied, nice and sweet. it makes you forget everything else that were not so nice. you just feel like you wanna celebrate and have a birthday party for them. and when you see the mother licking and tendering her pups, a warm feeling of contentment develops from within yourself, as if saying: everything is going to be all right…
birth is really a beautiful thing.
