sophomore
1688, "student in the second year of university study," lit. "arguer," altered from sophumer (1653, from sophume, archaic variant form of sophism), probably by influence of folk etymology derivation from Greek. sophos "wise" + moros "foolish, dull."
Sophomores are considered “wise-fools.” They have had one experience of something and think they have it all figured out. There is, at times, arrogance from sophomores who think that their previous experience qualifies them to be an expert in that area…like school, or having a baby.
Amy and my “sophomore” birth experience was…not what we had previously experienced nor prepared for.
Amy was pregnant for the second time. It was May and we started anticipating that short labor, quick birth, and easy recovery. Amy had a new doctor and we were at a new hospital (Centennial Medical Center in Nashville
Sometime on the 21st of May, 1994 Amy began to have contractions. They were slow in coming and in the middle of the night, we drove to the hospital.
We got settled in the room and we waited, and waited, and waited. The contractions were inconsistent and not really progressing. This is pretty typical, but not in our experience.
The Doctor eventually brought in a ultrasound machine, lubed-up Amy’s belly, and wha-la, discovered Jaron was now breach…and big.
We were undeterred. “I’ll just push him out breech!” Amy declared. “AMEN!” I daftly concurred. So she proceeded to push. That didn’t work. Then she got an epidural, and though the pain went away, Jaron made no progress. Finally Jaron’s heart rate would dip during the contractions and the Dr. looked at me and said, “This is now becoming dangerous and we need to do a C-Section.” I nodded my head and the Dr. turned to Amy and got directly in her face, “We need to do a C-Section right now.” Amy blearily nodded and off we went to the surgery room.”
I hadn’t been doing anything and I was exhausted. It was now the middle of the day on the 23rd and I was in scrubs standing in the hallway outside of the surgery room. It was eerily empty and quiet and I began to privately freak-out a little. Then a masked surgeon waved me into the room.
It was bright and there was lots of movement in the room. Amy was strapped onto the bed with a sheet dividing her top half from her bottom half (like a cotton Great Wall of China .) She looked alert and had this look of “I’m just layin’ here” on her face. There was an anesthesiologist and an attending nurse on the north side of the wall, but on the south side of the wall there was a platoon of people. There were two surgeons, two attending nurses and a nurse assigned to Jaron when he was…extracted.
The anesthesiologist (wearing an orange and white University of Tennessee
Ø BARNEY FIFE : Have you seen that movie “Maverick?”
Ø NURSE: No.
Ø BARNEY FIFE : Like the old TV show with the James Bond guy, remember?
Ø NURSE: Sean Connery?
Ø BARNEY FIFE : No, Roger Moore. Anyway, Mel Gibson is in this movie “Maverick.”
Ø NURSE: And he plays Roger Moore?
Ø BARNEY FIFE : No. he plays James Garner.
Ø NURSE: I thought James Garner was in “Maverick.”
Ø BARNEY FIFE: He Was Maverick in the TV show but now Mel Gibson is playing Maverick in the movie and James Garner is in the Movie playing Mel Gibson’s dad….(etcetera after inane etcetera)
I look down at Amy, helpless. Then the Surgeon looks at me and says, “Wanna watch?”
At that point I could have stayed north of the wall, in safety and gazed into my beautiful wife’s face and comforted her and whispered how much I loved her and was proud of her…
“Sure!” I responded, and south of the wall I went.
Although I only took one step to my left, it was as if I had entered an alien world. I glanced to my right and there is the love of my life, lying there. I glace to my left, and I’m on the set of The Discovery Channel.
There is a mound of sheets with an orange rectangle in the middle (self-absorbed UT Doctors.) I quickly deduced that the “orange rectangle” was in fact, Amy.
I had seen many movies where people had been stabbed with knives and it seemed that in those cases the blade would slip into a person like that first butter knife into the margarine tub…in reality, not so much. Surgeon #1 took the scalpel and began to saw, like someone cutting into a rare T-bone. It took him awhile. Then there was a layer of sub-dermal fat that had to be cut through, then the muscle. This all took (from my perception) forever.
Ø AMY: What are they doing, Chris?
Ø ME: Uhhhh, you don’t want to know.
Then Surgeon #2 pulls out what looks like a soldering iron or wand from a Wood Burning kit and begins to cauterize, or sear the capillaries. There was smoke rising from the incision.
Ø ME: Is he searing the edge of the incision?
Ø SURGEON #2: Yes.
Ø BARNEY FIFE : Like I always say, if you smell something burning, that’s you! YukYukyukYuk…
Surgeon #1 then reaches into the crevasse and pulls out…Amy’s bladder. He wraps it in (what looks like) The Tennessean’s funny papers and lays it on her belly.
Jaron’s attending nurse comes to my elbow and said, “Because he’s been developing breach in the womb, his legs will likely sick straight up when the Dr. pulls him out. This is normal. I didn’t want you to be alarmed.”
Meanwhile, Surgeon #1 is rooting around in “the orange rectangle” up to his elbow as if he’s feeling around for his car keys in some twisted Carol Burnett Show skit with Tim Conway & Harvey Corman (obscure reference, but accurate description.)
Ø AMY: What are they doing now, Chris?
Ø ME: I think the Dr. is looking for his wallet.
Finally, Surgeon #1 yanks out Jaron.
True to the prediction, Jaron’s heals pop directly to each of his ears as if they were spring loaded.
Surgeon #1 hands me the scissors and I snip the umbilical cord. The Nurses immediately take Jaron to a station and make sure he’s suctioned out (the birthing process naturally squeezes most of that gunk out.) They cleaned him off (he was super cheesy) and they laid him across Amy’s chest.
He was over 8 lbs. He was long. He had a perfect little head. And he was perfectly content.
Amy and I had our 8th wedding anniversary meal in the hospital that next evening. We couldn’t have had a better gift!
chris
(Happy Birthday)
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