Saturday, March 14, 2009

Happy birthday, Ben

Ben was born at a civilized time of day -- around 8:30 AM. That's because my c-section with him was planned. The only bad thing was that he was early, like about four weeks early. I'm not sure how long doctors had been using ultrasounds to help determine fetal age, but in my case my doctor told me that the baby's head size meant I'd gotten pregnant a month sooner than I knew I did. Don't ask how I knew, just take my word for it, I got pregnant with Ben on July 17. But I was young and not prone to questioning authority so after offering up my reasons for knowing he was due in April, I did agree to have the c-section on the earlier date of March 14.

Boy he looked awful. His eyelashes hadn't really come in, his fingernails weren't all grown in either, and he looked really scrawny, even though he weighed 7 pounds, 9 ounces. Our pediatrician came in my room the next morning and told me "Benjamin wasn't quite done yet." Boy was that the truth. On the good side (and unlike his brother), Ben slept a lot.

I don't have pictures from the first two months of his life because the place we took our film to be developed lost them all. So instead I've posted a picture of both boys taken in June 1983. Ben is about four months old and he had filled in a lot.

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