The Pain Hits You Where You Sit

My labor was induced for my second child. There is a moment of panic when the first real labor pain hits. Up to this point your mind has successfully glossed over most of your labor. Intellectually you say, “I know it was painful, but it really wasn't that bad”. This is why we can have more than one child.

However, when the first real pain of the second time around hits, your entire body snaps to attention and screams, “I remember this! I didn't like it last time! What the heck am I doing?” None the less, it is far too late to do anything different.

Air travel to China is like that. It was only a year ago I made the great trek to Beijing. Just under 13 hours of flying time – 90 minutes to Vancouver, a few hour layover and then an 11 hour flight and we were there. I barely remember it as a blip in the holiday. It wasn't so bad and seemed to pass quite quickly in the excitement of getting to China – I mean, “Pinch me, I'm in China!”

This time I conveniently overlooked the fact that the airplane ride was 2 hours longer. Maybe it was subconscious denial, but really, I think I was just too lazy to pay attention. In the past week and a bit I flew to and from Tampa, two short hops each way, nothing over three hours. Easily managed and in fact, I was so sick on the way back, I slept a bit on both planes.

The flight to Vancouver was no problem, I didn't even have time to watch the entire movie I chose. The plane even arrived early. Waiting around in the airport with Leslie was oddly reminiscent of last year, except all the improvements they were making for the Olympics are of course done now.

About half an hour into the flight to HK it hit me. That whole body rebellion when every cell screamed, “I don't like this and I don't want to do it again”. And yes, it was bloody awful. I didn't sleep, watched a bunch of movies, did some yoga in the aisle – it was wide enough for a great up dog and too bad if the people in the row behind me didn't want to appreciate my down dog = sucks to be them. The horror is already fading, mostly because this bit of selective memory will let me get back on the plane when its time to go home.