Day 274 of Self Quarantine      Covid 19 Deaths in U.S.:  293,000   GA Vote!!

Many moons ago when we were living in Charlotte NC and awaiting the birth of our first child, we went to dinner with my boss – Gerry Bryant.  I was 30 at the time and he was an ancient 50.  He shared that the only piece of advice he would give us about parenting was about the after math of the birth.

He asked us if we were going to use the Lamaze natural child birth method.  I said that we were.  However, I couldn’t believe that he had any idea what natural childbirth was about since he was so ancient.

Gerry shared that after the baby is delivered you are usually taken to a private “bonding room” area.  He said whatever you do make sure you make full use of that 30 minutes with just the father and the mother and the baby.  He encouraged us to make sure that we looked carefully at the facial expressions and body movements of the baby for as much of the 30 minutes as we could.

He said you won’t believe how those facial expressions in the first 30 minutes will be with your child for the rest of their lives.  We laughed and thanked him, but thought he was a bit crazy.

After a long and tiring labor process, we were able to get the 30 minutes by ourselves with our darling daughter.  We still see the facial expressions 40 years later that we saw in those first 30 minutes.

Gerry also said not to really take photos or videos during that 30 minutes.  Just spend the time imprinting the baby in your mind and helping the baby imprint the sights and sounds and smells of the parents.

For all three of our children, we still see those expressions.  Many times I have to stifle a bit of laughter when we see those early expressions emerge in our day to day interactions.  Each of our three kids had a different set of expressions that were uniquely theirs.