We were living in Shanghai, China. Your mother was about 6 or 7 months pregnant when a good friend of mine named Ravi called me. He was working in Australia and wanted me to come to Perth to join him and work with him. Looking back, it wasn’t the right decision but we got our visa’s and was on a plane to Australia. I honestly believed that you being born in Australia would give you the opportunity to have dual Citizenship to both America and Australia. Thats not the case. I believe America is the only country in the world that allows citizenship for those born in our country lines.
When we arrived, everything seemed to be going well but it wasn’t long after that the job became a nightmare. It was costing more to rent a house than the company was paying me and every month. I had to pay, out of my pocket, for the hospital and for us to live. The Australian people were very friendly and treated us very well. They showed us true hospitality that was as good as any southern hospitality. It was very hard on your mother with me working everyday. The good news is that it was a day job. I was always home in the evenings and was off two days a week. We could go shopping and try to do some things with her being so big and pregnant.
The reason why it was so hard on your mother is because her culture is so much different than western culture. In China, the women that have babies stay in bed for 30 days. The families take care of the new baby. They also do everything for the new mother so she can rest and get over the trauma of giving birth. Your poor mother got none of that. She learned very quickly of the western culture of go squat behind a tree have the baby and get back to work in the fields culture.
Your due date was two weeks earlier and the doctor was growing concerned. We went to the hospital in the early afternoon where they were going to induce labor if she didn’t start labor on her own very quickly. We sat in the hospital for a few hours when they moved us into a room.
The nurse was very kind that came into check on us every hour and so. She even broke your mothers water trying to get her to go into labor. It mush have worked because soon after that her labor began and they moved us into a birthing room. Funny thing about a birthing room, it is always pretty quite with a nurse checking in on you every once in a while and then all hell breaking loose when the baby is being born.
So the night drug on and your mother became weaker as the labor pains kept coming. I guess it was around three or four in the morning when the pains got to be really bad. Your mother was such a trooper. I found myself loving her more by the way she handled giving birth to you. Her English wasn’t as good as it is now and at one point she asked the nurse if she could “cut the cheese”. The nurse looked at me very surprised and with a smile on her face and assured her that it would be okay if she passed some gas.
As the night drug on the pains were getting worse. Your mother was so tired she honestly felt like she was dying. Your head finally breached around 5 or 6 in the morning, but it still took a lot of time left before you came out. The told your mother to give one final push and she said. “No thank you, I just can’t anymore”. All of the nurses must have loved her as well. When their work was over they wanted to stay and watch you be born.
With one last push from your mother you finally ripped your way out. I think your mother was in shock as she really didn’t know what was going on at that time. The took you and cleaned you up. I held you in my arms, rubbing my nose against yours and welcoming you into the world. I put you on you mothers stomach. She was still delirious form the 18 hours of labor.
It was about 8 or 9 when everything finally settled down and I decided that I would run down to a McDonalds to get us something to eat. I wasn’t gone very long and when I returned they were stitching your mother up. You had ripped her pretty bad when you came out. Im not sure how many stitches it took, but it must have taken the girl an hour to finish the procedure.
The next couple of months were not very good for your poor mother either. I’m surprised she forgave me for not having the time to heal that her culture would have given her. I worked during the day and you cried all day and most of the night when I got home. You and I would sleep on the couch with me on my cack and your on my chest. Your mother instead on breast feeding you and Im glad that she did. But, she wasn’t producing enough milk ti fill your little belly and you cried all the time. Australia has a mid wife comes to all new parents homes once a week after delivery.
She was always concerned about your crying but never said anything about giving you formula. After about a month or two of your mother eating fish and every other home remedy people would give her to make her produce more milk I talked her into getting you a can of formula which seemed to make things better.
Another month later we were on a plane heading back to china. I needed to make some money. It took me three years to pay off all the debt we had incurred.
And that is the story of what happened on the day you were born.
