Dim Sum Diaries
It was the final, critical moments. She lay back against the hospital bed, tired and weary. Yet a thread of hope remained in her heart because she knew it almost over. Her eyes were closed, her breathing was shallow. The room was quiet, except for the steady beep of the machines monitoring her progress.

A nurse moves into the room. She checks the the machines. Alarmed by the readouts, the nurse takes an oxygen mask and slips it over the face of the woman laying in the bed.

"Breathe deeply," the nurse says urgently. She walks quickly out of the room and summons the doctor. The doctor comes flying back.

"Its bad," the doctor tells the woman on the bed. "You have to push now."

Clamping down on her rising panic, the woman on the bed bears down with all of her might. A few seconds pass. A baby's head appears. His vitals are down, so the doctor uses forceps to grasp the baby's head and quickly pulls him out. The woman in the bed has been badly torn, but feels nothing thanks to an epidural. The babe is placed on her breast and she marvels at the miracle that is her second-born. He lays quietly, blinking with sleepy eyes.

Three years later, after countless diaper changes, colic, and engaging in the appalling habit of emptying the contents of shampoo bottles and entire rolls of toilet paper into the toilet, this boy still manages to alternately amuse and baffle his parents with his antics.

Happy birthday, my baby boy. Mommy loves you.

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