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My next assignment was to watch a birth video, but the selection at my local video store was limited.  I cobbled together what seemed like an approximation of the event: "Exercise For Moms To Be" and "Shocking Brain Surgery."  Who knows what sort of kinks the clerk thought I had -- especially when my wife returned the tapes within an hour.  We would see a delivery tape in our birth class, she admonished me, and it would look nothing like brain surgery.

Also Today Hand holding for moms One father's ode to his doula -- the woman who remembered everything he forgot in Lamaze class. By David Brauer

Unfortunately, the birth class was far from reassuring.  Our instructor, despite herself, betrayed misgivings about the usefulness of such things as fathers.  She hinted that, more often than not, we are worthless.  True, some fathers end up being inspiring coaches, but the rest of us are lucky if we can stay out of the way.  I got the feeling that she thought father-coached births, like leg warmers, were an artifact of the '70s -- something that should have been put away as soon as people had come to their senses. 

Relying on the father is a bit like learning to sky dive by jumping out of a plane strapped to a "coach" who has never jumped before and who doesn't even have a parachute of his own.  His purpose -- if he doesn't faint -- is to say things like: "You're doing a great job of falling,"  "Deep breaths, deep breaths" and "I think you should pull the thingy now." 

My wife must have got the same feeling. Immediately after the first class she suggested we hire a professional birth assistant.

I was all for bringing in the professionals.  I didn't care that, in terms of importance, on the salad of our birth I would now be a crouton.  It didn't matter: I had cleverly guaranteed my spot in the birth limelight.  That was the brilliance of my whole fainting problem.  Although Ruth had to go through the agony of birth, all I had to do was remain upright, and I would be a hero.  

It has been five months since the birth now.  I write this with my son cooing and pooing next to me.  In a second he will start crying and I will do anything to make him happy.  I realize now that when it comes to getting attention, I am a rank amateur.  My son, Isaac, has humbled me.  The whole birth has humbled me.  It was the sort of birth that causes women to lie to each other, to give only a tepid smile when asked how it went -- because if the real story ever got out, no one would ever get pregnant again, and the species would die out.

Did I pass out?  As it turns out, my strategy was exactly wrong.  Passing out would have been a good idea.  Through Ruth's harrowing 36-hour labor, not once did I faint, sleep or even blink.  And I tried.  I hyperventilated.  I banged my head against the wall. But, thanks to all my stupid therapists, I was firmly rooted in the world and able to relish every moment of this impossibly protracted and arduous labor.  Ruth was amazing.  Isaac was amazing. But next time I'm just going to hand out cookies.
salon.com | Dec. 7, 1999

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