Post-It Thoughts from Addy's birth

When my friend Lara asked me to consider photographing her newborn "right as she comes out" I got a little queasy. I have never been good around blood, hospitals, accidents, cuts, needles, scabs, scars....

I've "seen" birth on video before- first in 7th grade Health class, and then recently while watching the National Geographic Series , but to be honest, the thought of it happening "live" and in person was a little um... gross.

Then I saw JUNO a few days later and by the end of it I'd made a decision to suck it up. I emailed Lara the next day and explained how a silly movie had changed my mind, went to buy new batteries for my camera, packed my purse with a book and my ipod, and developed an annoying habit of waking up every night at 3am to check my phone (just in case I'd slept through the call- yeah right like that would ever happen...)

Last night the call finally came. During the one solid hour where I'd put down my phone and forgotten about checking it. When I got a sinking feeling at dinner that I should check the phone- I discovered I'd missed several calls- THE calls, and a text that said "Going to hospital" from Scott, Lara's husband.

When I walked into the room, Lara was smiling, and Scott was calm. It hit me that very soon, there would be a brand new baby in this room- someone we'd all been anxious to meet for 9 months, and nothing was scary anymore.

At 11:51pm, baby Addison was here, and I'd actually witnessed the entire thing. The "gross" thing my stomach had turned over wasn't gross at all... in fact, it was crazy-cool, and I'll confess, a little hard to understand how it all "worked out".

On my drive home the tears started to flow. I'd been in total shock until I hit the 10west and then the emotions just flooded me- emotions I almost felt funny for having since I'd only been there really as a bystander with a camera . . . and somehow got lucky enough to experience such an intimate thing with this family. Yowza.

My favorite parts (all G-Rated) were as follows:

-The sound of Lara and Scott "awwwing" in unison when the baby first came out. I can't describe how incredible that sound was, but I'll never forget it. No picture I took will have captured that.
-Watching Addison's color turn bright pink instantly when she'd finally gotten a good breath in.
-Her baby cleft chin
-The way she blinked her eyes because of the bright, bright world she was adjusting to.
-Realizing how amazing the body works, and how un-gross it really is after all.