You will become a good mother

You will become a good mother

 

It was 4 or 5 years ago that I had dinner with my wife and two daughters at a Szechuan restaurant in Philadelphia where my older daughter lived. While we were enjoying the dinner, the owner of the restaurant came to our table and expressed his gratitude to us with courtesy. To see that, I thought it was a special welcome gesture from the Chinese owner since we were Asian like himself. My older daughter explained us why he did. The story is as follows.

 

One day during her first pregnancy, she badly wanted to eat hot food. So she went to the restaurant which was famous for hot food. She tried one hot dish. It was so delicious but not big enough for her. She ordered one more dish, and added one more and one more…four dishes all together. It must have left quite an impression on the owner to see a small Asian pregnant woman eat that much, so that whenever her family went to the restaurant, the owner would go to their table and greet them warmly.

 

During her pregnancy, she asked her mother to make her favorite foods several times. Unlike her sister, my younger daughter was not very particular about food during her pregnancy and she didn’t ask her mother to make any special food. A few months before the childbirth she asked her mother to make cold noodles with assorted mixtures. That was the only special food she requested from her mother.

 

My wife and I did not worry about her pregnancy and childbirth because she had been healthy all the time and she had been apt to do anything for herself with confidence. Even though she did not talk about herself in detail, we thought that she had been taking care of herself very well.

We felt uneasy to hear something unusual happened to the unborn child three or four weeks before the childbirth. My daughter said the child was in breech position in the womb and the medical procedure would be performed on Monday of the following week. However, I felt better to hear her calm and peaceful voice over the phone.

 

It was that Monday afternoon when she was supposed to get the procedure at the hospital that she called my wife and me. She said the doctors were preparing for a Caesarean section because her blood pressure went up suddenly around the end of the procedure and she had developed preeclampsia. They said the baby and mother might be in danger unless a Caesarean section was performed immediately. Hearing her saying, “Dad, things are really crazy right now,” I felt uneasy even though her voice was calm. Why did her blood pressure change suddenly?

 

My wife called my daughter’s parents-in-law living 50 minutes from my home to explain what was going on. When we heard that they were about to leave for the hospital, we asked them to give us a ride. On the way to the hospital in Manhattan, we got a text message from our son-in-law. A photo of my daughter holding the newborn baby was attached to the message. Oh, how quickly he was born! It was much sooner than I expected. I didn’t really feel that I got one more grandchild. I wished she had delivered her child through natural childbirth though she might experience some birth pains. I was a little frustrated about the Caesarean section.

 

Because of the hospital’s rules about visitors, we waited for a long time before meeting our new grandchild. The baby who was born 3 weeks earlier than his due date looked remarkably small. “Why were you so hasty without waiting patiently? Drink Mom’s milk a lot and grow up quickly day by day.” I was sorry for my daughter who looked very tired because her blood pressure was still higher than normal.

 

I visited my younger daughter’s home today with a bottle of holy water to see my grandson who had been born eight days earlier. The outline of his face looked clear. I sprayed the holy water on his forehead and prayed a short prayer. While my daughter was away from us for a moment, I said to the baby, “My dear grandson, I hope you take after only the good points of your paternal family and maternal family. Be smart and bright like your Mom, be tall and strong like your Dad, be handsome like your Grandpa (Is it an exaggeration?), be nice like your Grandma, be good at sports like your other Grandpa and be brave like your other Grandma. Am I expecting too much?” A while later my daughter came back to us.

 

Looking at my daughter holding the baby in her arms, I looked back on her younger days.

She was a happy baby smiling all the time and my wife and I loved her smile. She looked so happy when she walked down the aisle on her her wedding day holding my hand. But my hands trembled…I looked back at the happy moments with her one by one. “Thanks to God, I have been happy with my daughters.”

 

I had a lot to tell her. However, I could say only one sentence.

“I am sure you will become a good mother.”

She smiled a happy smile.

I did too.

 

(July 28, 2015)