Thursday, March 18, 2010

Stardate 63676.1 (Yes, I googled that)

In 11 days Mercedes will celebrate her 11th birthday. My water broke 2 days after her due date. (The longest 2 days ever!!) I was stashed away in a make-shift closet room that just fit a bed, an IV, and a chair. They could not give me the pitocin yet to get things going because this closet room did not have the proper monitors to watch how me and baby girl were doing. I was in there for almost 2 hours. The good nurses there at Good Samaritan Hospital apologized and informed me that it was a full moon that night and there always seemed to be more babies born during full moons. This was the topic for Mercedes' 5th Grade Science Fair project.
We called 6 hospitals but only 3 were willing to be included in the nightly phone calls. We asked 3 labor & delivery nurses their opinions on the matter and ALL 3 of them felt that the moon definitely makes a difference. They even look up at the moon when working night shifts as an indicator of how their shift will go. Interesting. (Note: The moon looks completely full for several days before and several days after a true full moon.)
Mercedes' hypothesis was "More Babies Are Born On a Full Moon". In the end, the hypothesis was wrong. The moon didn't seem to affect anything. More babies were actually born 6 days later. However, we didn't omit any scheduled inductions or C-Sections so who knows? The outcome might have been different if we had thought about that beforehand.
I, for one, would like to think that the reason for my being stuck in that room anxiously awaiting the violence & beauty of childbirth was because of something cool like it being a full moon.
After 2 gluesticks, 5 styrofoam balls, 56 tiny plastic baby bottles, and lots of black, white, pink and blue cardstock a 1st Place Ribbon winner was born. Now it's off to the County Science Fair to see what will happen next.
Good luck, Baby Girl and good job!! Full moon or not, I thank my lucky stars everyday that I have you.









2 comments:

Annette said...

THE MOST CLEVER Science fair project EVER!!! And so cute the way it is displayed Mercedes! I clicked on the picture and read all that you wrote and saw all the cute bottles and moon balls. You completely and totally earned the Big Win!!! You've got my vote for the County Fair all the way! Great job :)))

Lydia said...

Great job, Mercedes! Your display is so beautiful, and I can't believe you went to all that work!