Our Blizzard of '96 Baby

As I sit at my computer desk, the snow is now close to two feet deep outside my house. Here in the outlying areas of DC, snow fall is either nothing much to speak of or a blizzard. There is no middle ground. Since snow is a once or twice a winter event, the county snowplows can't keep the roads cleared. Driving on the unploughed roads is not advisable due to the lingering snow on the roads and drivers who would be better advised to stay home. So, when it snows in DC/Maryland/Virginia, a snow day is in order.

I can think of one very special snow day.

The Blizzard of 1996 will live in infamy as the time I was almost unable to get to the hospital to deliver my first child. My daughter was due January 3, 1996. Naturally, I was convinced she would come on Christmas Day, New Year's Eve, and surely by the first week of January? But, no luck.

Christmas that year was an icy mess. My last few days at work, my husband drove me to work as I was too large to fit behind the steering (thanks to no morning sickness in my first trimester and a complete avoidance of diet Coke), but more importantly I was petrified I would fall on the icy walkways leading to work. My first days at home were a blur of watching the clock, anxiety about going in to early labor, timing almost non existent contractions, and fielding calls from concerned friends, coworkers, and family..."Haven't you had the baby yet??"

As the days turned in to a week, I resigned myself to waiting. I poured my energies in to several puzzles. Took down all Christmas decorations except the tree. My husband had declared "This baby will come home from the hospital to a tree!" Cleaned feverishly. Towards the end of the week, as the needles started cascading off the Christmas tree at an alarming rate, the snow fall hit in earnest.

At the end of the first day, our driveway was covered in about 6 inches of snow. We had not yet purchased a snowplow so my husband spent hours shovelling only to find his hard work undone as more snow fell. We were looking at the very real possibility of being unable to get to the Montgomery County hospital we had selected from our home in the country...think narrow two-lane roads with intermittent snow ploughing.

An evacuation from our home to somewhere closer to the hospital was our safest option. Once at my parent's house, we played the waiting game again. My husband, a county teacher, was off for an unprecedented four snow days. Stores were closed. Without cars, Rockville Pike/355 became a footpath for people walking to find an open grocery store. In a desperate bid to find an open grocery store, my husband trekked to Safeway only to find it deserted and vandalized.

After another heavy snowfall, the roads were once again unpassable. A neighbor suggested we call the local city government. I knew I needed to get to the hospital...surely, I would have this baby some day? To our utter amazement, a city truck ploughed the cul de sac in front of my parent's house and the access road. My faith in city government was restored.

At the 9-day mark it was obvious that I was not going to go in to labor, so I checked in to the hospital for an scheduled induction. It was about time as I was huge with swollen ankles and the pregnancy waddle walk. After 11 hours with no progress in labor, I *think* I was 1 centimeter. My daughter was delivered by c-section in the early hours of the morning during the height of the Blizzard of '96.

Then the real fun began. We spent the first few days with our newborn in the cozy confines of the hospital while outside the DC Metro area was once again paralyzed by deep snowfall. I pleaded with my husband to sleep at the hospital. I was worried that if he left he would not be able to come back. Sadly, I did not have a private room so my husband had to make do with resting his head on my bed one night and sleeping in a waiting room chair another night. Bad back, stiff neck, unshaven, and wearing the same clothes for 2 straight days, he became a diaper changing and holding the baby champ.

Four days later we left the hospital thanks to a lengthy recovery from a c-section due to a fever. Driving on largely unploughed roads, with snow piled high on the sides of the road from previous snowplowings AND with a newborn in the back seat was terrifying. With every skid or swerve, I would clutch the infant car seat tightly. The Percocet I took before leaving the hospital did NOT lessen the pain from my incision...ouch! It took us over an hour and a half to drive 45 minutes. My daughter screamed part of the journey until we found the classical music station. Music does calm the savage beast...uh...baby.

We stepped in to our house with our newborn daughter...a new family of three...grateful that the past two weeks were over. After a quick photo of the baby under the dead, needleless, partially decorated Christmas tree, we embarked on the journey to raising our daughter. Soon the two weeks leading up to her birth of waiting, snow, blizzards, and icy roads seemed like a walk in the park next to raising an infant - toddler - preschooler - kid - preteen and finally teen!

When not relating her life to weather conditions, Jill blogs about this and that at Musings.

This is an original DC Metro Moms Blog post.