I never knew how difficult childbirth was until I had children of my own.  Well, actually, my wife was the one who did the heavy lifting but I did have a ringside seat – four times.
 

Each birth started in more or less the same way.   A few weeks before her due date, my wife would be doing something relaxing, like taking a bath, unwinding from a week’s work, recovering from just having written her last final exam or in one case, sticking her key into the front door after we had just come home from the office and picking up the other kids from the baby sitter together.  She would pause, look at me and say, “My water just broke.”
 

Water being a liquid, the uninitiated may have no idea how this is possible.  You see, it’s not the water itself which breaks, but rather it breaks out of the sheath covering the fetus and it just gushes out.  Very messy situation you might say.  My wife being a well organized person, immediately knows what to do and gets towels from the cupboard.   We end up wrapping her like a baby in towels.  Then whoever is in the house at the time, including me, gets down on their knees and wipes up any liquid we did not catch in time.  The clothes my wife was wearing go directly into the laundry.
 

The first time this happened, my wife had just finished a bath and was toweling dry.  This was convenient as the first towel was thereby instantly available for the wrapping.  There was almost nothing I had to do, except get the pre-packed bag and a book, telephone the obstetrician and family members.  My wife got herself ready, made sure everything in the house was in order, made sure I knew where the food and clean underwear (mine) was and when she was on the front step, went back in to check.
 

Then we were off to the hospital. The labour lasted about 8 hours and since we started about two in the morning, this meant my wife did not get much sleep.  It made it very hard to fight off the nurse who wanted to take her pillows.
 

These were the days when having a father in the delivery room was something new.  The nurse on duty was one who did not really believe in it.  “It’s disgusting,” she explained to me as she tried to chase me from the prep room.  This room had two doors and after she pushed me out one door, I would circle around the end of the hall and come in the other side, usually bringing back my wife’s pillow.   We played this game two or three times.  Finally, after the doctor arrived, she gave up.
 

The doctor wore white cowboy boots a surgical gown, cap and mask.  My wife was wheeled into the delivery room and the nurse instructed to me to stand near the head of the bed and watch the mirror that hung from the ceiling to try to catch a glimpse of what was happening.  The whole thing was confusing.  After some tremendous pushing work by my wife, the nurse whispered in my ear and I turned my head.  Just then I heard the doctor exclaim it’s coming and as I turned back I saw him pull some long wrinkled object out from under the foot of the bed.  “It’s a boy,” he said and I thought to myself, “Where did he get that from?  Was it all a trick?  Was the baby hidden on a shelf at the foot of the bed and he just pulled it out like a magician at the appropriate time?”
 

I had actually missed my son’s birth because I wasn’t looking in the mirror.  And was that really a boy?  How could you tell….Ah, yes, well, now I see.
 

With the second child, my wife was just settling in for a quiet Shabath evening after she had written her final exam that day.  Then it happened.  Her water broke. Talk about perfect timing.  This time of course we had to make sure our eldest son had a baby sitter before we took off.
 

The experience in the hospital this time was, if anything, worse.   Not only did the nurses not listen either to me or my wife but the labour was longer and neither of us had had any sleep.  I was in the room when the baby was born but I recall almost nothing of it except that we had serious words with the nurse and with the doctor when he arrived.  The nurses had done everything we asked them not to.  But we all survived.
 

With my third son, my wife was a bit surprised as her water broke on the front stoop just as she unlocked the door to the house and I was bringing the other two children along.  We were off to the races, doing the wrapping and cleaning, giving supper to the two eldest and arranging for some baby sitting.  But we were now old hands at this.  Instead of rushing to the hospital, I drove my wife to work where she went to the office and meticulously wrote yellow stickies and notes for all the files she had not had time to organize yet.  It was only after she felt comfortable that her replacement would find everything that we drove to the hospital.
 

As we pulled into the lot, she told me she was having regular contractions.  I pulled up to the door and got an attendant to take her in with a wheel chair.  I ran back out and parked the car.  By the time I got back in, they had already rushed my wife up to the delivery room.  I hurried through the registration and went up immediately.  When I got into the room, my wife was already lying on the delivery table.   This time I actively assisted in the pushing and was coaching my wife to blow. The nurse was handling the initial stages of birth and I could see my son’s head emerge.  The doctor had been called but he was asleep.   Would he get there on time? 
 

She could hold back no longer when suddenly the doctor appeared at the door and to me it seemed that he ran across the room and made a diving catch as the baby came out and fell into his hands.   He would have made a great receiver in football.  I saw my son emerge this time and I noticed he had the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck and looked a little blue.   A few tense moments passed but soon, the nurse smiled, the baby cried and everyone heaved a sigh of relief.   All in all, my wife gave birth just about an hour and a half after we pulled into the hospital parking lot and just after the doctor arrived.  Talk about perfect timing.
 

Our daughter was born after a more difficult pregnancy during which my wife had gestational diabetes.  After three boys, this was our last kick at the can.  Most appropriately, our daughter was born on Labour Day, although as with our third son, there was not much labour involved.
 

This time the water broke early in the morning just as we were getting up.  We again did the wrap and clean routine and called the baby sitter.   We were now old pros at this and took our time, making sure everyone had a good breakfast.   My wife had prepared all her files, remembering our last adventure so we had no need to drive to work.  We drove to the hospital and this time, we were welcomed by a new breed of nurse who accommodated our every request.  We were able to use the birthing room and my wife gave birth on the bed instead of on the hard table that been used the previous three times.
 

This time, I was holding my wife’s leg as she gave birth, I saw the head come out and the then the rest of my daughter as the doctor twisted and lifted her.   I was literally nose to nose with our new baby as she came out reached out her hands and as the doctor lifted her in the air, grabbed his face mask and pulled it off.  Talk about perfect timing.   The whole labour and delivery had taken two hours from the time we arrived at the hospital.  Talk about perfect timing.
 

One last thing.  All our babies weighed within two ounces of 7 pounds at birth and in exactly 38, not 40 weeks.   Fantastic organization and perfect timing again.  Do you notice any pattern here?   But though the credit for all this should go to the mother, you must admit, I was clever enough, organized enough and lucky enough to have been the father.