Hacker News Reader

Comment by lr4444lr | Hacker News Reader

The maternity ward waiting for and after my wife gave birth. Don't judge if you haven't been through it: with real life labor there is a LOT of waiting before the big dramatic moment you see in the movies, and afterward, a lot of sleeping for both momma and baby. You can go a bit stir-crazy from all the excitement and confinement. Gotta calm down the nerves with something.

View on HN

I wasn't coding, but I gave a client presentation with screen sharing while I was sitting in the waiting room at the hospital while my grandpa was having heart surgery. I agree, it was a nice change of pace from the worry and waiting for procedures that can take some time. Best to keep your mind off of it so you don't go crazy.

My wife spent two months in the hospital prior to the birth of our twins (and the twins spent another two months in the NICU after that). I've written a _ton_ of code in a hospital at this point (ironically, that was before I started working for an EHR platform).

I've done it twice, you're wife is a saint to deal with you and your addiction. But they all are because men seem to have zero understanding of how not to be self-obsessed and "in the moment".

Induced vaginal births are horrifically time-consuming though. If she can speak or hold her eyes open, it's not time to go to the hospital (from my experience, i'm not responsible for your baby being born in a taxi, I live in a suburb with multiple major hospitals within 5 minutes. Will Smith is not going to show up and pull that little alien out of you.

"I've done it twice, you're wife is a saint to deal with you and your addiction. But they all are because men seem to have zero understanding of how not to be self-obsessed and "in the moment"."

OP's wife may well be a saint, but you certainly aren't. FYI it's normally a bad generalisation if you're calling half the population of the planet "self-obsessed"

Do you know what "back labor" is? When we showed up, she was 6 cm dilated and in excruciating pain. After a valiant effort to avoid an epidural for about 6 hours with the contractions plateauing, the doctors recommended that she not risk excess fatigue, to stay calm and rest a while before trying again. I was left to watch heart monitors and wait for a nurse who popped in once every 20 minutes.

After it was all over, our bundle of joy was eventually kept under close observation before discharge for a few hours at a time at various points to check on the vitals, and we weren't allowed into those wards, left to do nothing but wait and pull our hair out.

Any more judgment you want to pass on my situation without knowing the specifics, doctor?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com