It's time

to tell you the story of Maiya's homecoming. Three months have past, and I can laugh about it without crying. Again.

Throughout my pregnancy, I looked forward to the hospital stay that would follow Maiya's birth. I longed for the three or four days of rest. The image of the nurses at my beckon call and the plan to stay in bed kept me going on some of those hot summer days. I was ready to live up my hospital stay. Yes, I thought it would be like a vacation.

Maiya's birth was smooth. The c-section was painless (unlike Haven's) and I was so calm that I watched the doctor stitch my incision in the reflection in the operating room light. She came out, cried, was healthy and Dave accompanied her to the infant room as I recovered. I watched the clock for the hour I had to sit in the recovery room, and then pestered the nurse until she brought me my baby. She was amazing, tiny, and precisely what I wanted in my arms. Beautiful. Haven and my sister came later to meet Maiya, everyone was happy and lovey. That was Wednesday.

Thursday was holding Maiya, a few visitors, resting, eating and a walk to the bathroom.

I cannot explain what hit me on Friday, but I decided I had to go home. Had to. Hospital Vacation was over. I asked the doctor if I could leave. Lucky for me, he said, "In my country some women go home two days after a c-section. You have to promise me you won't do anything but lay down for a couple of days if I do release you." Yes, of course, yessir, you got it. He signed my release papers. Truth be told, I could have used another night in the hospital. I missed Haven and Dave, though, and I wanted to be together. I didn't just want to be together, we had to be together. I guess I can tell you what hit me on Friday: hormones of the post-pregnancy type.

It was about 6:00 PM and Dave came to the hospital with Haven for what was planned to be a brief, pre-bedtime visit.

"Let me just see if they'll let me go now." I got out of bed, which requires the upper body strength of a he-man after a c-section, and limped to the nurse's desk. When I got to the desk I asked if I could leave. I realized then that I had failed to mention to anyone except that one doctor my plans to leave two days early.

"Oh, really? You can't stand us anymore?" Her attempt at a joke was lost on me.

"I just miss my son."

"Aw, how old is your son?"

"Seventeen months." And the waterworks came then. They were unstoppable, and apparently motivating. It was like with my first sob the entire office was moved to action.

"Okay! We'll get you out of here. Let us just do the paperwork we need to do..."

I cried my way back to the room. The nurse came in a moment later to say they would do a blood test on Maiya before we could go.

Haven was ready for bed. The crankier he became, the more Dave held him, and then, the more an odor began to fill the room.

"Oh my gosh." Dave set Haven on the floor to find poop on his own shirt and up Haven's back. "Great." He settled in to clean it all up and discovered we had no diapers. We asked the nurse for a diaper and about fifteen stinky and sticky minutes later they produced a few diapers from the pediatric ward. Unfortunately, they had no clean t-shirt for Dave. So, as we waited for Maiya's blood test results Haven ran through my hospital room in a t-shirt and a borrowed diaper, alternating between crankiness and abundant curiosity. Maiya slept soundly in the little crib.

Dave packed up all of our things, not quite sure why I had to go home tonight, but wise enough to not question it too much. I limped around the room picking up a couple things to give the impression that I was helping, but mostly, the tears continued to flow and blocked my view. I saw Dave dressing Maiya and realized she was not going to wear the coming-home outfit I packed for her. This made the crying worse.

A nurse came in, and with one glance at our little guy, at me, (and probably one whiff of Dave) she said, "I'll see if we can get those results quickly."

Maiya was finally released and Dave hauled everything out to the car. When we were all finally in our seat belts and ready to leave, I was still crying and Haven was whining. "Can we just have fun, please?" Dave said.

This image of us will stay in my mind. It's funny. Well, it's funny now, now that my emotions are slightly less eruptive.