Maxwell's birth

At 11:30 p.m. on Thursday, I started timing contractions. The contractions were regular, but I expected it to be a while before we would go to the hospital, since Penny's labor experience was so long.

At 1:00, the contractions were already averaging 5 minutes apart, but I couldn't believe that it was happening so fast... A little after 1:00 pm, we called my dad to come over and called the doctor to let them know that we were on our way to the hospital.

At 2:15, dad FINALLY arrives and at 2:30 we are on our way to the hospital. Minkz drives like Gran Turismo to the hospital (and later realized that he didn't have his license on him). I was having intense contractions on the way and also getting the shivers. We get to emergency entrance and I am having contractions and slowly walk my way to the birth center moaning along the way. They show us to a room quickly (I think they realized that I was pretty far along) by my loudness... They check me and say something like, "oh my gosh, call Dr. Hsieh 911". Minkz asks what that means and they say I am ready to go. I yell to call the midwife not the doctor and it takes them a while to figure out which midwife is on-call. The contractions are getting very intense and I am on all fours on the bed (the only tolerable position at the time), starting to feel the pressure to push, but they tell me to breathe through it...

At 3:30 my midwife arrives, breaks my water, and I start pushing. About five contractions with pushing later, our baby boy is born at 3:56!

pics of Maxwell and the family

Penny says, "my baby came out!"

"He is a boy and his name is Maxwell"

any day now...

You can follow the progress at my sister's (or brother's) Twitter link here

Penny's Japanese

Penny read me a Japanese book today in her version of Japanese, gibberish. It was amusing and reminded me of the Penny language issue. Minkz and I often discuss how much she is absorbing at this age and how it would be great if she could speak a second language. A lot of people are surprised that we are not teaching Penny a second language, even though both of us speak a second language. There are many reasons that we have ended up not teaching her Japanese.

-Learning Japanese and going to Japanese school was an extremely difficult and, at times, a traumatic experience for me. I can't say that I am not grateful for knowing Japanese now, but I also think that it came at a cost. In order to learn the language fluently, a level of discipline is involved that I am not prepared to enforce with Penny.

-An essential part in the process of learning Japanese in the U.S. was that I spoke only Japanese with my mom. Minkz and I speak English with each other and Penny and I speak English with each other, which is most natural. If I were to try to speak Japanese with Penny, it would be very forced and unnatural for me. My vocabulary is more limited in Japanese, so I wouldn't speak as much and I wouldn't explain everything to her, like I do now. This would limit her understanding of the world, and she would sense the tension/discomfort and associate it with the language.

-We have taught her numbers in other languages, we have Japanese books that I read to her in Japanese, and she is exposed to Japanese TV, games, and culture in other ways. She is aware of other languages; that is good enough for me. Although it may be hard for others to understand (including my husband), I am satisfied with my decision and I'm prepared to defend it when anyone (including Penny later) accuses me of not doing enough.

As for teaching her Vietnamese (or why he is not even though she is half Vietnamese), her dad will have to write a separate explanation about that.

Happy New Year!