Your Song

Everyone has a story.
Absolutely everyone has something to say or has something that is special about them.
Steve's birthday is peeking at me right around the corner and his story is begging to be told.
So, for you my Sweet Baby Boo, I give you...Your Begining.
And because there is some serious material here, I may hold out on giving it to you until you're 18.

Charlie and I started dating in 2002 and quickly became stuck like glue to eachother, but not the fun purple glue stick kind of glue, the kind of glue that if you don't open doors and windows, it can kill you.
So, we started off on the right foot.
We dated for two years and he got into some pretty heavy drugs so finally after I graduated and he did not, we broke it off.
After a tumultuous drug infested (for Charlie) and an alcohol frenzied (Sara) 2 years apart, I got a phone call on October 7th 2006.
I was with Janet and we were on a plane coming back from a week in Mexico; I was checking my messages and one of them was from Charlie.
It was the whole Justin Timberlake and T.I song "My Love" and at the end of it he said something like "You'll always be my girl." and hung up.
I made Janet listen to it and promptly told her that enough was enough, he has to stop calling me and I'm going to put an end to it.
I never officially got to put an end to it however because that night, when I was coming home to my new apartment that I had just rented by myself, he was trying to outrun the police in a stolen jeep.
While running from the police he crashed the stolen SUV on top of a pipeline, no less.
They pulled him from the wreckage to reveal a bloody, gaunt face, skeletal figure and bright blue hair.
He was booked into jail on October 7th 2006.
He wrote me a few letters, to which I responded to none and I visited him in jail once.
I'm not sure why we kept in contact and why I allowed to be pulled towards him, but I just couldn't help it.
Sometime in late December I got a call on my sweet flip phone at my espresso job in Ballard.
It was Charlie.
"Hey! Im out! Can you come and pick me up?"
"Um, what?"
"Yeah, I'm out! Do you think you could pick me up?"
"I'm working right now, I can't."
Trying to play it cool and keep it together I tried not to think this time would be different, I wanted to keep him at arms length and not get involved because I know how this ends and its probably me with a hole in the wall and a bloody fist.
So naturally I let him stay at my apartment.
It was Christmas, I was in the giving mood.
He was officially charged with a crime he had committed in Skagit County and had the choice to either serve prison time or go Drug Court.
He chose Drug Court.
This is a program that lasts for 2 years and they keep a tight leash on you. You are submitted to random drug screenings; he had to call a phone number for 2 years every day and if they called his color he had to stop what he was doing and go in for a test.
The first 6 months is intensive outpatient treatment so you cannot have a job, the rest of the time, you must have a steady job and live in the county.
In February, I celebrated my 21st birthday and Charlie moved up to Sedro Woolly to be within Skagit County.
The week of my birthday I was violently ill for 3 days. I drank a lot the night of my birthday and remember waking up drunk still, sitting on my couch eating goldfish crackers, watching Point Break and wondering when this would end.
I couldn't even smell alcohol, I was finally 21 and I could barely look at all the booze in my freezer, compliments of friends and customers at work. It was incredibly disapointing, to say the least.
Then I realized a few distinct things that should be happening that weren't.
I took a pregnancy test in my bathroom, in my tiny apartment by myself and sobbed.
and sobbed.
and sobbed.
I called my friend Jasmine and sobbed on the phone so hard she couldn't understand what I was saying.
I thought it was the end of my life. I couldn't believe I hadn't been more careful and smart about my choices. I am such an idiot. How am I going to tell my Dad? He doesn't even know Charlie and I are even talking.
With this sunny disposition I got in the car and drove up to Sedro Woolley, sobbing the entire way.
I pulled up to where Charlie's outpatient program was located and waited for him in the car.
He pulled open the door and gave me a huge cheesy smile.
"Hey! My friend needs a ride, I told him it wasn't a big deal."
Normally, it would have been totally fine but I clearly was not normal. My whole face was swollen and I was visibly crying. Charlie seeing the world out of rose colored glasses at this point in his life did not see this.
'NO!"
Looking crestfallen, he whispered "Its just over next to the hospital. Its really close."
"NO!"
Making apologies to his friend he got in the car and finally realized something was obviously happening.
"I'm fucking pregnant!" I screamed.
Then continued to sob hysterically into my steering wheel.
I remember the look on his face, and it didn't match his words at all.
"Hmmm, well thats not really something we can do right now."
He was fucking beaming, glowing really.
While I'm having the biggest mental breakdown in recorded history, he is sitting in the passenger seat of my car with a smug look of satisfaction all over him; he was absolutely thrilled but didn't want to freak me out.
As I continued through my psychotic episode we decided together, to be parents.
I was sick every single day of pregnancy. Every. Damn. Day.
Looking back on it, I see that I made myself sick. I was worried about everything. I had never changed a diaper. I disliked children. Breast feeding scared me. I don't even know how my body works and now I'm going to be shooting a baby out! I wanted to be Indiana Jones and have adventures and travel the world. I had spent my time drinking like a fish and working and now I was about to start a family with a man in drug court, who was a few months clean, who didn't have a job and lived in a communal house called "The Minkler Mansion" up in some podunk town.
As my belly grew bigger I worked as much as I could and saved up as much cash as I could. I moved in with my grandma to save even more and around 5 months and several pounds later, I decided I couldn't wait anymore and finally told my Dad.
He said a lot of things I'm sure he regrets now and I didn't feel any better about the way my life was going.
Finally, for my Grandpas birthday, Tamara invited me to dinner with them.
I met them at the restaurant and she pulled me into a big hug and said everything was going to be fine.
My Dad looked pretty sheepish and obviously felt bad and gave me a hug too.
I wish I could say the rest of the pregnancy was smooth sailing, it was not. I was overcome with hormones and took it out on every single person in my life.
I am the WORST preganant person and promise everyone I wont ever do it again.
After spending the summer in my espresso sweat box October finally rolled around and with it cooler weather. Charlie and I finally had signed a lease together and I remember he was jubilant, and I was straight up terrified.
We were set to move in October 1st. Plenty of time for the arrival of baby Berlin on November 11th.
The day of October 6th 2007 I worked a 12 hour shift and was looking forward to my baby shower the next day. We were still staying with my grandma because I still worked in Ballard and we hadn't really had time to move at all, so we had been casually taking things out of our storage unit whenever we had time.
Charlie came to pick me up after my shift but he had gone into QFC down the street and the battery had died in the parking lot. So, we walked back over and tried to get someone to jump my car.
It was freezing out and there was a guy sitting in his car next to us and Charlie went and asked him if he could help out.
I was standing behind him, hugely pregnant and exhausted.
The guy looked at me and said, "Man, its cold out there. I don't want to get out." and rolled up his window.
What a gentleman.
I finally called my co-worker, Cory and she happily came down and jump started us.
We then went to the mall and took a dorky picture, that I still have of me, Charlie, Heather and Aidan in a photo booth and went to go see a movie.
In the theatre, my belly was jumping around like crazy.
I could feel little feet and hands kicking and punching all over the place, it was like a circus was jamming out in there.
We came home around 11 and my brother and grandma were still up talking in the kitchen.
My brother made some stupid joke about an ex boyfriend of mine and I laughed so hard I peed my pants.
I ran to the bathroom, ripped down my pants and sat down.
I waited for a few minutes and it just kept coming.
"Oh no. Did my water break?'
I ripped off my pants and smelled them, it wasn't pee.
"CHARLIE!"
I screamed bloody murder until he came running down the hallway.
He opened the door and I shoved my bodily fluid covered pants into his face.
"Its not PEE! ITS NOT PEE!"
A visibly shocked and disgusted Charlie said we should go to the hospital.
I didn't grab any clothes or even have a bag packed to grab.
I still had 5 weeks left to go, surely this was just something weird happening and they would send me home.
I walked into the hospital where they put me in triage with a nice black nurse who was trying to put an IV in my arm.
I was trying to stay still and not flinch, but I hate needles and the thought of someone sticking an IV in my arm was disturbing.
Charlie really wasn't helping the nurse concentrate either.
"I really like your hair." Charlie said, mesmerized.
"Oh honey, this is a weave!"
After laughing awkwardly, she finally managed to get the IV after what seemed like 2000 tries.
They sent me up to a birthing suite but didn't tell me what was going on.
"I still have 5 weeks left. I cant be having him yet. I have my baby shower tomorrow! I dont even have a diaper, or a crib!"
No one would listen to me and finally a few hours later, while I was sitting in the hospital bed terrified out of my mind and listening to Charlies snores on the bed next to me, contractions started.
I tried to wake him up to keep time, because thats what they do in the movies and thats really all the knowledge I had about childbirth at the time, but that was a fruitless endeavor. Charlie was useless and kept falling asleep.
The next morning they said my contractions weren't progressing like they wanted them too and they were going to jump start them with Pitocen.
I didn't really have the option because as they were telling me this she was injecting it into my IV.
I had no idea what it was or that it would make my bearable contractions thus far, utterly horrific.
We had family and friends come and wait with us, dropping off presents and I had to make a million phone calls telling everyone my baby shower was canceled.
We got flowers from the girls at my work and money was delivered in nice little envelopes.
At one point, I was going through a particularly painful contraction, focusing on the ceiling with silent tears on my face and I thought to myself, "Why am I not getting an epidural?"
I looked at Charlie and told him to get someone in here to fucking deal with this.
Someone came in a few minutes later with a giant needle and told me to curl up into a little ball and not move.
I had been watching a lot of TLC's birth story at the time and just watched an episode where a lady had an epidural administered but she kept moving and they kept messing up.
I don't think I've ever stayed as still in my life.
I knew I wanted to get poked just the one time and that was it.
The anesthesiologist complimented me and from there on I was totally pain free and it was awesome.
People filtered in and out all day and at one point there were around 25 people in the waiting room, all waiting on baby Berlin's arrival.
After several hours my epidural was wearing off and I was contracting at 8cm. I begged the nurses to get the guy with the good shit back in here to shoot up my back again.
After what felt like hours he finally got in there, it wasn't working.
"Cant you help her!" Charlie demanded.
"I'm giving her a massive dose, she wont be able to feel anything in a few seconds."
And just like that I was pain free again.
Epidurals are a marvelous thing.
Around 645, blissfully unaware of what was going on with my body, I started to feel a little pressure.
I casually told the nurse as much.
She checked me and proceeded to yell, "Stop pushing! We need a doctor!"
Completely shocked that this bitch would yell at me about something I was definitely not doing, I screamed back, "I'm not doing anything!"
The doctor on call that night came rushing in and to this day, I have absolutely no idea what her name was or what she looked like.
"OK, I'm here. Do you want the baby on your chest when he is born?"
"Um, I dont know!"
"You grab her legs." The doctor pointed at Charlie and he grabbed one leg.
"Now, push!"
I pushed three times and at 7:00 a slimy baby boy was put on my chest.
I looked up and Charlie was crying over me and I looked down and there was this little wailing purple thing on my chest.
I was overcome with calm. Its indescribable. I thought to myself, "Ok, we can do this."
Up until this point I hadn't come to grips with being someones mother. I hadn't thought about what it would be like to hold my baby. I hadn't dreamt about singing him to sleep. Now, this consumed me. The love I felt was so natural and fierce I couldn't help but know that everything was going to be fine with my baby because I was going to be the best mother I could be.
At the time, taking that pregnancy test I thought my life was over and I was ruined. Little did I know that this was the start of my life. I didn't know love until that moment.



Steven Oliver Berlin was born 5 weeks early on October 7th 2007.
Exactly one year since I had been sitting on that plane, exactly one year since Charlie had rolled his stolen Jeep and gotten arrested.
Exactly one year that Charlie had been clean.
I dare you to tell me that's a coincidence. 



Steve was and still is a gift to us. He was specially given to us because we needed him and now this ultra sassy, independent, hilarious gift is going to be 9.
Everyone has a story and Steves beginning is the best one of my life.

Cheers.