My Birth--Separating Fact from Myth

This Tuesday I celebrate my 44th birthday. As I reflect upon these 44 years, I have asked by siblings to write about events surrounding when I was born. Inland Empire Girl's post is here, and Raymond Pert's post is here.

My assignment is to write down stories I remember from when I was born, and see if what I remember is fact or myth.

Whenever my brother and sister talk about my birth, it is always very positive. They were very excited to have a new baby in the family. They were 8 and 9 years old when I was born, so this was a big change in my family's life.

(I remember asking Mom one time if I was an accident. She very diplomatically replied, "You weren't an accident, but you weren't planned either." I always loved that answer.)

I was born on July 3, 1963. I can't remember what time I was born. Mom had finished up a year of teaching school, and was probably still taking classes to get her teaching degree.

From what I have been told my birth was pretty normal. I was born in West Shoshone General Hospital in Kellogg.

My brother and sister got to name me. I was named after Caroline Kennedy. But I guess they got a little mixed up, because my name is Carol Lynn.

When I was born I had convulsions. This is a hereditary disorder on my dad's side of the family called Benign Familial Neonatal Convulsions. I was put on phenobarbitol for the first year of my life. (I learned more about this disorder after my first daughter The Princess was born, and she started having seizures. She, too, was on phenobarbitol the first year of her life.)

I'm not sure how old I was when I developed pneumonia. But this was a very scary time for my family. I almost didn't make it. I was in the hospital and our next door neighbor Lois was a nurse at the hospital. If I remember the story correctly, one night Lois was the nurse on duty and she turned me a certain way, and the congestion started breaking up, and I started getting better. When I would hear the story, it always sounded as if Lois saved my life.

The first picture of me taken as a baby was when I was five months old. It is a black and white photo of Mom holding me.

I asked Mom once why they waited to take my picture until I was five months old.

"Because we weren't sure if you were going to live or die," was her reply.

I had various nicknames when I was a baby. One was "Pooh". There is a picture of me around my first birthday wearing a red dress and the called me "Firecracker". Maybe because I was born the day before Independance Day.

I may have been an accident, but I was never treated like one. I was always loved, and picked on and tolerated by my older siblings.

And I still am today.