9-11 Baby?

When Brian and I arrived at the hospital on July 5th, 2002 a nurse met us and said, "Oh a 9-11 baby, huh?"  I was confused and it must have shown on my face.  She went on to explain that there had been a baby boom nine months after the terrible acts of 9/11 occurred.  I had read articles that talked about this exact thing, but hadn't put much thought to it.  The nurse went on to say that they had seen a spike in births at our local hospitals as well.  I assured her that Jacob was NOT a 9/11 baby.  But then I wondered. . .

Why did we finally decide to have another child?  After all, Zach was already four.  He had a major heart defect at birth.  Why press our luck with another child?  Did we really want to start over?  Yes, we did.  I can't tell you why.  But maybe it DID have something to do with 9/11.  Maybe we didn't want Zach to go through those kinds of atrocities in the future without a sibling, Lord willing.   Maybe we realized that in this crazy, sick world, family is important and if the Lord allowed, we would add to ours.

While I am not completely sure what tipped the scales for us, I vividly remember that day in September, 2001.  At the time, I was doing home daycare.  It was a late start kind of day and I was slowly getting ready while listening to the radio.  When I think of the announcers voice as he broke in and announced that a plane had just hit the Twin Towers,  the hair on my neck still stands on end.  I hightailed it to the living room and turned on the news.  I could not believe what I was seeing.  I called Brian and told him to turn the TV's on at work.  Then I called my dad.  My dad is a news junkie.  I just needed to talk to someone who was watching and could help me process this crazy event.  For some odd reason, my dad had not turned on the news or radio that morning.  When I told him what happened, he thought it was some kind of sick joke.  Then he turned on the TV and saw it for himself.

Within minutes and short hours, the news got progressively worse.  I tried to go on with my day.  I turned off the TV so the day care children wouldn't see it.  I packed them up and took them to story time at the library.  I am not sure I heard one word of the story that day.  My mind was racing.

That evening, after my day care children had left, Brian, Zach and I attended a prayer vigil at a local church where we also watched President Bush address the nation.  At bedtime, I couldn't put Zach to bed in his own bed.  I wanted us all together.  I made a bed for him on the floor in our room.  I put it close to the bed so I could reach over and just touch him.  I did that several times that night.  My mind was racing and I could not sleep.  Brian kept getting out of bed and heading to the office.  He was continuously checking the news to see if anything else had happened.  That night was one of constant anxiety.

I am not sure when that anxiety disappeared.  Quite frankly, I am not sure it ever did completely.  Even today, I don't believe that I feel as safe and as at peace as I did prior to 9/11.

If I were to see that nurse today (which I might since she lives in our hometown), I would have to change that "NOT a 9/11 baby" to "MAYBE a 9/11 baby."

To bring some levity to this post, we all got a good giggle when Jacob was born and weighed 9 lbs and 11 oz.  Yep, he WAS a 9'11" baby!