Happiness in this World

My wife and I vividly remember the anesthesiologist’s statement: “You may feel a little pressure.” She spoke the word gently, as if to imply that’s how it would feel, and we believed her.  Epidural blocks, she explained, don’t numb the sacral nerve roots that deliver sensation from the pelvic floor so my wife would likely feel something as she entered the last stage of labor and our son began passing through her birth canal.  But we were both reassured. A mild bit of pressure seemed no threat to our hope of having the same experience my sister-in-law had with her first child: she’d had to be told when to push at the final moments because she couldn’t feel anything at all. Continue reading…