Tuesday, September 13, 1988, began just like any other day.  I rolled my 38- week pregnant body out of the bed and waddled to the bathroom to get ready for the day.  When the alarm had gone off that morning I had decided to shower later in the day because I wanted to sleep as long as I could.  I was tired all the time … tired of being pregnant, tired of being uncomfortable, and tired of being tired.  So I slept until the last possible minute.  My husband, Mitch, left for work, and after I was dressed I went in to the bedroom where our two precious daughters were sleeping.  Emilie was five, and Lindsey was three.  “It’s time to get up and get ready for school, Sweetie Pies,” I said as I woke them up gently.  The minute their eyes opened the girls were on the go!  Emilie was in afternoon kindergarten, and Lindsey was in preschool two days a week at our church.  They both loved school, so it was never hard to get them moving in the mornings.  Tuesdays and Thursdays were busy days for me.  I had to drop Lindsey off at preschool by 9:00, have Emilie at the elementary school she attended at 11:30, and return to the church to pick Lindsey up by noon.  Lindsey and I would have lunch, rest for an hour or so, and then get back in the car to pick up Emilie.  I usually made appointments with my obstetrician for Tuesdays, and I had one scheduled for 2:00 that afternoon.  I thought that it was going to be another ordinary day.  Boy, was I in for a surprise!

Anyway, that morning after throwing on some clothes and getting the girls out of bed and dressed, I fed them a quick breakfast, we jumped in the car, and I drove Lindsey to preschool.  Whew!  “Now Emilie and I can go back to the apartment for a little while before I take her to school,” I thought.  When we got home I decided I’d better go ahead and take a shower while Emilie watched Sesame Street on television.  I had about an hour and a half before I’d have to squeeze myself into the car again to drop Emilie off at kindergarten and pick Lindsey up.  I had just finished getting ready when the phone rang.  I answered it and a woman’s voice said, “Mrs. Williams?”  I said, “Yes, this is she.”  The woman said, “I am Dr. Mathews’ nurse.  He asked me to call and see if, instead of coming to your scheduled appointment this afternoon, you would like to meet him at the hospital and have your baby.”  “Uh, why sure,” I said.  She told me that the doctor would meet me in the Labor and Delivery Department at Baylor Hospital Dallas at 12:00.  “Okay,” I said.  “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

I took a deep breath and tried to think of all the things I needed to do before I went to the hospital, the most important being to find someone to take care of the girls.  The Sunday School class Mitch and I attended had put together a list of women who didn’t work, and who had said they would be available to watch the girls when it was time for me to have the baby.  So I got out the list and called the first number.  No one was home.  I called the second number.  No answer.  I don’t remember how many ladies I called, but what good was this list if nobody stayed home so they could be available when I needed them?  Finally, I managed to get in contact with a woman in our class who was married, but had no children.  The girls didn’t know her, and I didn’t know if she knew anything about baby sitting, but I was desperate!  Time was running out.

The woman’s name was Linda, and she agreed to meet me at the church so she could take Emilie and Lindsey home with her.  Needless to say, Emilie didn’t make it to kindergarten that day!  By the time Linda and I met at the church, I introduced her to the girls, and waved goodbye to them, it was close to 12.  It was very difficult to hand my baby girls over to someone I barely knew, but I had to trust God to watch over them and keep them safe.  After I finally got the girls taken care of I headed the car towards the hospital.  I was a nervous wreck!  I didn’t want to inconvenience the doctor by being late for my baby’s birth, but it seemed like there was one delay after another.  I had to pull into a convenience store to get gas, because the tank was empty, of course!  I’m sure several people must have thought it was quite funny to see a pregnant woman, who looked like she could pop any minute, rushing around trying to put gas in the car, running inside the store to pay the cashier, squeezing behind the steering wheel, and then burning off in the car like a teenager, leaving tire tread in my wake!  I’m sure it was quite a sight.

As I pulled out into traffic and began traveling down a four lane road with a grass median strip separating the flow of traffic, I began noticing that I was having a few contractions.  “Oh, no big deal,” I thought.  “These are those silly Braxton Hicks contractions that the doctor is convinced I have been having.  He told me that I’d know it if the contractions were the real thing.”  Anyway, I couldn’t think about that because I was already late for my baby’s birth.  As I focused on the street I was driving down I noticed something unusual:  there was a car coming straight at me!  The elderly man who was driving didn’t realize that he was on the wrong side of the street.  I began honking my horn and had to swerve to miss him.  “Now wouldn’t that be just what I needed – to have an accident on my way to have the baby?  I managed to avoid him while trying to show him with hand signals that he was going the wrong way.

I finally made it to the highway and breathed a sigh of relief.  I was finally on my way to the hospital!  I just hoped that the doctor hadn’t gotten tired of waiting for me and changed his mind about delivering my baby.  When I drove up into the parking area of the labor and delivery department I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.  Mitch was nonchalantly standing on the sidewalk eating a hot dog, like he had nothing better to do.  He had it made.  He had taken a bus from his office in Downtown Dallas, which was only a few minutes away, was enjoying a leisurely lunch, and calmly waiting for me to arrive.   And yet, I had to get my suitcase packed, make who knows how many calls in order to find a babysitter, drive to our church so I could introduce the girls to a woman they didn’t know who would be taking care of them while their mommy was at the hospital, put gas in the car, manage to avoid a collision with an elderly man driving the wrong way, continue trying to convince myself that the contractions I was having were not the real thing, and try to drive the speed limit while being worried that the doctor would give up on me and go on back to his office.  There was something very wrong with this picture!  As I got out of the car Mitch asked, “What took you so long?”  That was a dangerous thing to say to a woman who had been through all that I’d been through, and who was about to endure childbirth in order to give him a son!  But I didn’t have time to scold him – I had a date with an obstetrician!

Mitch and I finally rushed through the doors to the labor and delivery department of the hospital.  As I walked up to the nurses’ desk I saw my obstetrician leaning back in a chair, obviously bored and probably a little frustrated because I was so late.  The nurse immediately took me to a room, gave me a gown to put on, and told me that the doctor would come in soon in order to get labor started.  Well, remember the “false” labor I had been experiencing?  Turns out it wasn’t false after all.  By the time I arrived at the hospital I was dilated 4 centimeters and already in active labor! 

After arriving at the hospital things began to calm down.  I might have been about to deliver a baby, but that was nothing after everything I’d already experienced that morning.  My best friend called and told us that she had picked up the girls and they were having a great time at her house.  Whew, what a relief!  My parents arrived at the hospital with time to spare.  My mother-in-law was getting ready to hop on a plane to Dallas from the Chicago area where she had been helping my brother-in-law and his wife with their new baby boy!  Everything was just the way I had hoped it would be – finally!

Spencer Dean Williams was born approximately six hours after my arrival at the hospital.  As I drank in the sight of his perfectly formed little face, I quietly said to him, “Some day, when you are a little older, I’ll tell you all about your “birth” day!