26. Camden #3
“I hate to interrupt, but you are officially ten centimeters, Erika,” Dr. Cosgrove said. “I’ll have you start bearing down during each contraction now and we’ll go from there.”
“I’ll go get Isaak,” my mom said. “Love you both.”
Ten minutes later and she was close.
Cam: GET THE FUCK IN HERE!
“Alright, Erika, this may sound weird, but I need you to relax as much as you can. At this point, the baby is close enough to come out when he’s ready. Pushing can do more harm than good right now, okay?”
Erika nodded, then hissed, “Where the fuck is he?”
“I texted him, but I can go look-”
“No!” She grabbed my shoulder with her other hand. “You’re not going anywhere!”
“Alright, Erika, he’s crowning. I’m going to need you to push gently, until you hear me ask for suction.”
Erika nodded, but I could tell she was fighting back tears. “He’s going to miss it,” she whispered to me.
I leaned forward, touching our foreheads together. “He’ll make it.”
As if summoned, the door opened and Isaak was finally here.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I went down to get everyone some coffee and snacks. I just dumped everything when I got Cam’s text and ran.”
I could tell. He was out of breath. Isaak dashed to the other side of the bed and took her other hand.
“Suction!”
“He’s almost here. He’s almost here,” Erika panted.
“Thank you for doing such an awesome job for our baby.”
Erika flinched, her hand crushing mine and I reminded her to stop pushing. “Deep breaths, deep breaths.”
“Fuck, I wanna push so bad. It’s like fire.” I saw her glance down, between her legs, then she clamped her eyes shut and threw her head back.
“Okay, Erika, one last push.”
Erika exhaled like a dragon and screamed. I was about to ask if everything was okay, but I heard the crying.
Dr. Cosgrove said, “Four minutes past two. Looks and sounds perfectly healthy.”
“Congratulations, you two.”
Erika had tears in her eyes and was at a loss for words, but she pulled my hand up to her mouth and kissed it.
“Thank you for being here, Camden,” Isaak said.
I watched as the doctor passed the red, slimy, crying bundle into Erika’s arms. Of course, his parents were enamored, while the nursing staff kept busy, coming in and out to clean him up. I took a few photos of them all together, and a few minutes later, I heard the placenta was delivered.
“No circumcision, correct?”
“Correct!” both Erika and Isaak said in unison.
“Less work for us.” The doctor laughed, then asked, “Dad, would you like to cut the cord?”
“Su-sure,” Isaak answered. “Just tell me what to do.”
While the nurses helped Isaak, Dr. Cosgrove spoke to Erika.
“Just continue to relax. The contractions will still be coming, but they’ll be less frequent and less painful.
Your body is recovering now, and the whole process went great.
Whenever you’re ready, the nurses can clean him up a little better, weigh him, and a few other things, then we can get him back to you and you can try to nurse if you like. ”
A few minutes later and a nurse was back with the little guy, wrapped in a clean white blanket, his little hands covered in tiny mittens. He was precious. Erika let go of my hand to receive him in her arms.
“You don’t need to officially name him right away, but we do need something to put on his tags and crib,” the nurse explained.
“It’s okay. We already have the name,” Erika said. “Johan Camden van der Berg.”
“Very well, thank you.”
Through the tears that had started, I could see Erika had looked my way. “Seriously?” I asked.
“The first name was always going to be Dutch, so I said I had to pick the middle name.”
“And you picked my name? Why not a family name?”
“You are family, Cam.”
I cried some more, took a few photos, marveled that the little guy knew where to find milk already without making a joke about Erika’s boobs being the largest they had ever been - she pointed that out, not me - and said my goodbyes.
It had been more than a long day, and I still had two event finals later. Luckily, they were in the evening.
Despite needing a shower, washing my hands would have to suffice for now.
After changing out of the scrubs and into my street clothes, I made my way into the waiting room to deliver the good news.
Luke went to wake up Austin, Orion and Erika’s parents for me, so it was another hour before Luke and I were able to get out of there since everyone wanted all the details.
A nurse came out to tell us that Erika was being transferred to a more homey location where more people could visit her, and didn’t need to change their clothes.
With the news of her progress, it didn’t take much to convince Luke to take me to the hotel.
I was pretty sure Woodward would understand why I hadn’t kept an eye on Ezra or Miles today.
They were likely already asleep and if they somehow did something wrong tonight, Woodward could be mad at them, and not me.
I wasn’t going to miss Johan’s birth to babysit an immature new adult that couldn’t take the responsibility of being an Olympic athlete seriously.