Pardon the Expression

I was exhausted the night of April 5th after spending the day "getting ready for the baby" by doing a lot of irrelevant things. I wanted to leave a very clean house (I used a q-tip to clean the dust from our AC vents). I wanted to leave a prepared meal or two for my brother, who would be staying with the big kids while I was in the hospital. I wanted to have a long shower and shaven legs and straight hair. In hindsight, I can see that I wanted some semblance of control. Sure, I nested before my first two children were born, but this time was different—more frantic, more obsessive, almost desperate. At my last OB appointment before surgery, I had been given a cleaning kit to use the night before birth. Instructions were to shower without conditioner or body wash, use the enclosed disinfecting cloths to wipe my body down afterward, and wear no makeup, lotion, or deodorant. This protocol would reduce my risk of infection, and the kit included a paper to sign and bring with m...