Becoming Yael’s Mom

I

was thrilled to receive confirmation of my impending motherhood, especially in light of dire predictions of fertility issues, and then later, suspicions of a missed miscarriage. My daughter took up residency in my womb, and I loved my new tenant. We never argued about shared space or communal property. I relished each kick and elbow and nudge and willingly gave my body to my growing child.

Apparently, she wasn’t quite as thrilled with her living conditions and decided to vacate the premises after only 32 weeks of occupancy. On October 16, 1982, my beloved daughter arrived in this world, exactly two years after our marriage and one year after we had come on aliyah. We named her Yael.

Yael’s birth wasn’t only early; it was very intense and very rapid. I was hospitalized, but no one believed I was in labor. When a midwife finally checked me, I was ready to give birth, and delivery was immediate. Four hours after I first started telling the staff I suspected I was having contractions, my child was born. My first thoughts were of maternal lineage: A firstborn daughter born to a firstborn daughter had created not only a brand-new mother, but a first-time grandmother as well.

Immediately after her birth, the nurses whisked her away. My dreams of nursing my child upon birth, of bonding skin to skin, of smelling her sweet new-baby smell, all vanished in the emergency-like atmosphere surrounding her emergence.