East Meets West, Part 2

By OldSarge69

“Daddy, I’m pregnant,” my daughter Meili told me.

I knew my daughter was not dating anyone, and in fact had not dated in nearly two years. Not since she had launched her bio-genetics lab. In fact, I frequently complained because she never took time to enjoy herself, instead working 15 to 18 hours a day, six or seven days a week.

Daddy, I’m pregnant, the words repeated themselves in my mind.

Part of my mind just seemed to stop, while another part suddenly started operating lightning fast.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

The words kept echoing through my mind.

Time slowed to a crawl.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

I felt like someone had punched me in the stomach.

I could feel the blood drain out of my face, and for a moment actually thought I would either be sick or pass out.

The one part of my mind that still was working immediately flashed back to the first time I had ever met this young girl I had grown to love so much.

She was only 12 years old at the time and was hiding behind her mother’s waist. All I could see was one jade-green eye, and not quite shoulder-length jet black hair.

She was so shy, so bashful, and it wasn’t until I asked if she would like to see a magic trick that she acknowledged me in any way.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

She said something in Chinese to her mother, who laughed then told me her daughter said, “I’m a scientist, I don’t believe in magic.”

I performed a stupid little magic trick involving a disappearing coin, then asked if she had taken the coin.

The first words she said to me, in perfect English, albeit with a British accent, were: “No, what did you do with it?”

I pretended to examine both sides of her face, then “pulled” the coin out of her ear.

She giggled, then threw her arms around my neck and gave me a hug and kissed me on the cheek. I was immediately lost. I knew I was helplessly in love with this little girl, just as I was helplessly in love with her mother.

I adopted her legally, but had already adopted her into my heart.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

Then my mind flashed back to seeing her in a hospital bed after nearly eight hours of surgery.

The extent of her injuries after being hit head-on by a drunk driver were overwhelming.

She had died twice in the ambulance, but they were able to get her heart started again.

Her blood pressure was almost negligible due to the massive blood loss.

She had compound fractures in both legs, meaning the bones were sticking out, had a collapsed lung, several broken ribs, a ruptured spleen, a broken arm, a fractured skull, a concussion, and swelling of the brain.

One knee had also been shattered in the wreck and if she lived they weren’t certain if she would ever be able to walk again without a pronounced limp and without a cane or even crutches.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

I later found out the doctors, even after the surgery, had given her less than a 10 percent chance of living.

Only later, years later, did one of the doctors actually add they thought the best thing that could happen would have been if she had died, because they were almost certain she would have brain damage if she did live. Luckily that prediction did not come true.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

Three times in the next few days she nearly died again.

Her heart started failing, her blood pressure was dropping and even the doctors and nurses were crying knowing she was dying and there was nothing – medically – they could do to help her.

Twice I was able to bring her back from the brink with my little magic trick.

The hospital staff started calling it “The Miracle of the Silver Dollar.”

Another time her mother, using the ESP (Extra-Sensory Perception) they shared was able to pull her back to the land of the living.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

I remembered once when 13-year-old Meili fell while learning to ride a bicycle and skinned her knee.

She started crying and began running over to where her mother and I were sitting on the ground enjoying a picnic lunch.

Jiao drew herself up to her knees to get ready to offer Meili a comforting hug.

Only Meili ran past her mother and flung herself into my arms.

That was when I honestly felt like a Dad for the very first time, knowing that she now truly accepted me as her father.

I think I started crying harder than Meili was.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

The words kept reverberating through my head.

Another flashback and I remembered the first few weeks in the hospital after she regained consciousness.

She had broken her left arm, and since she was left handed, her mother and I had to take turns feeding her until she taught herself to eat using her right hand, and later taught herself to write also using her right hand.

Today, she can eat or write equally well using either hand.

In fact she can eat with one hand, while writing with the other.

Even more amazingly, she can write in English with one hand, and at the same time write in Russian, German, French or Chinese with the other.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

After well over a month in the hospital, we finally returned home.

At first Meili was nearly an invalid. She couldn’t walk, slept 16 to 18 hours a day, and depended on her mother and me for EVERYTHING.

Jiao had taken several weeks’ vacation, but eventually had to return to work.

I had taken a leave of absence from the college where I taught military history.

I had to help her use the bathroom, and even clean her up after “accidents” while she was sleeping.

I also had to constantly change her position in bed to prevent bedsores, and would spend hours each day massaging the muscles of her back and legs to prevent atrophy.

In the first three months Meili had three different surgeries on her knee, putting it back together.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

After she began to heal, a physical therapist came in every day for over a month to work with her, but eventually Meili asked if I could take over. At first I told her I could not do that. After watching several of the sessions with the therapist it looked more like brutality than needed exercise. During every one of those sessions Meili would be reduced to tears because of the extreme pain.

I finally had to stop watching because I was afraid I would attack the therapist because of how much she was hurting my daughter.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

Eventually though, Jiao and Meili convinced me to try. Actually, once I saw that both wanted me to do this, I knew it was only a matter of time before I capitulated.

Trying to oppose either one in something they were determined to do was nearly impossible, and together ... well it was like trying to oppose a force of nature like a hurricane or tornado.

At first I tried to take it easy on Meili, but she wouldn’t let me.

In one of the exercises I would take her foot and shin and push back against her until her knee was against her chest.

I was supposed to make her push back against me to strengthen the muscles in her thigh.

I tried to just push back a little because I didn’t want to hurt her, but Meili would yell at me, scream at me, even cuss at me until I eventually was using every ounce of strength in my 180 pound body.

The exercise sessions with me were, at Meili’s insistence, even harsher than they had been with the therapist.

Meili would be crying from the pain, but refused to quit.

After each session ... well, I would be crying at the pain I was inflicting on my beloved daughter.

Every day, though, she got just a little stronger.

Soon Meili had me carry her to the heated Olympic-size swimming pool in the back yard and we would spend hours swimming together every day.

Finally, leaning heavily on me, she took her first step some six months after the wreck.

We walked all of three feet that day. Then five feet the next, and seven after that.

Meili’s face would be soaked with sweat from the pain, but she never gave up.

After learning to walk again with my help, she started walking with the aid of a crutch, then a cane, and finally without any kind of aid.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

Most people only notice Meili has a limp if she is extremely tired, but Jiao and I can see it every single day.

And I still can’t help but blame myself.

If only I had been driving that day when the drunk driver crossed over the center line and hit her head-on. If I had been driving, maybe, perhaps, possibly I could have avoided the accident with my much greater experience.

Meili needed to buy some new clothes for her new job and knew how much I hated shopping so she told me she would be fine. FINE!!!

If I had been driving ... THEN maybe she would have been fine.

And I wouldn’t have felt like I nearly killed my daughter because I didn’t like shopping.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

On one level I knew Meili was now 25, I knew she had been sexually active in the past and I knew she could make her own choice about becoming pregnant.

However, when I look at her I am not seeing the 25-year-old head of the most advanced bio-genetics laboratory on earth.

I am still seeing that tiny 12-year-old who threw her arms around my neck all those years ago and giggled and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

I am seeing that young adult who had just graduated from college, and was more dead than alive lying in her hospital bed.

I was seeing that oh so small girl who couldn’t even feed herself at first.

I am seeing that tiny, precious piece of heaven here on earth whom I had to wash after an “accident” while she was sleeping.

I wasn’t seeing an adult, capable of making her own decisions, I was seeing ... my daughter.

My precious, beautiful daughter whom I had nearly lost.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

I had only been home today for a few minutes and when I walked in the house, both Meili and Jiao were waiting for me.

I just had to stop and admire these two beautiful women. My wife Jiao is just a fraction of an inch over five feet tall and weighs a whopping 90 pounds. Her daughter, my adopted daughter Meili is about 5 feet two, and weighs around 105 pounds.

Both were wearing shorts and a t-shirt, both were barefoot and I was once again amazed that at age 43, Jiao looks at least 10 or 15 years younger. Her waist-length hair was still jet-black without even a single gray hair, and her skin and face were flawless.

I immediately thought back to a few months ago when Jiao and I went out to eat. One of the things Jiao was always complaining about was that every time we would go out, if she ordered a mixed drink, or a glass of wine, they would card her. That is, check her I.D., to make sure she was old enough to drink. She really did look that young.

Unfortunately, the last time she ordered wine, the waiter simply brought her a glass without asking for any I.D.

If any guy ever tells you they understand women ... call him a liar.

I thought Jiao would be happy that she didn’t have to produce her I.D. Instead she was crestfallen.

“I look so old,” she said, “old and wrinkled.”

Complete idiot that I am at times, I thought she was joking.

I then made some regrettable comment about, “Well, at least they didn’t bring you the senior citizens menu – yet.”

If looks could kill, I would be dead and buried.

It took hours of apologies before Jiao forgave me for what I said.

And she still reminds me of it every now and then.

Jiao and Meili really look more like sisters than mother and daughter.

Of course Meili still looked like a teenager herself.

Looking at the two, I was once again struck by the similarities ... and differences.

Both have waist-length jet black hair, both have intense jade-green eyes, both have full lips, both have an easy smile. Both have waists that are impossibly tiny, and teeth that are brilliantly white.

Some of the differences are subtle, some not so subtle.

Meili’s face is just fractionally wider, and her nose is a tiny bit wider. Meili has just a little more up top than Jiao does, but I have heard Jiao mention Meili still wears an “A” cup bra, so that might give you an indication of how small Jiao’s breasts are. I still think Jiao has the most beautiful breasts I have ever seen, touched, kissed and sucked.

The biggest difference, I guess, is in their hips and legs. Meili’s hips are definitely wider, much wider than her Mom’s.

And while Meili has long, shapely, well-muscled legs, Jiao’s legs have to be seen to be believed. I don’t think I have ever seen any woman whose legs are as muscled as Jiao’s are.

Meili usually spends at least an hour each day exercising and practicing her Chinese martial arts, but Jiao usually gets up around five, exercises and practices martial arts for an hour, wakes me up, then we exercise together for a while before she instructs me in martial arts. After that, we usually take a shower together, which results in an entirely different type of exercise.

At night, before we go to bed, Jiao will exercise and practice for an hour by herself, then with me for an hour, then we will repeat the shower and the post-shower activities.

Watching Jiao walk is like watching a panther or tiger glide across the ground. She walks with a grace that is incredible, and yet at the same time you can sense the immense power in those legs.

Just a few weeks after we met, I saw Jiao leap straight up in the air, over six feet high, and deliver a killing kick in the Chinese martial art of washu. Washu is usually incorrectly called Kung-Fu here.

As I always do, whenever I see my two “girls,” I smiled, then Jiao walked up to me, hugged me and kissed me and said, “Meili has something to tell you.”

I turned to my daughter and waited.

And my life changed.

“Daddy, I’m pregnant,” Meili said.

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy ... I’m, I’m, I’m ... pregnant, pregnant, PREGNANT!

Finally, time seemed to speed back up. I realized that probably only a minute or two had passed while I was thinking about the past 13 years.

Then a father’s righteousness and anger began to show itself.

“Who?” I yelled at Meili, “Who is the son-of-a-bitch?”

Meili turned pale.

“Tell me who it is that got you pregnant and I will kill the bastard,” I again yelled.

I honestly can’t remember ever being as mad in my life.

Jiao tried to grab my arm, and God forgive me, for the first time in my life I laid a hand on Jiao in anger.

I shoved her away, not gently, and again demanded that Meili tell me the name of the miserable son-of-a-bitch who got her knocked up.

For the second time in her life, Jiao laid a hand on me in anger.

She slapped me even harder than she had that day on the porch.

Stunned, I turned to Jiao and her next words hit me even harder than her slap had.

“You are the father, Jack, and I am the mother. Meili is the surrogate mother. Meili is carrying our child, Jack. Meili is carrying OUR child,” she said.

I heard the words ... but they made no sense.

I knew, because of the forced sterilization in China, that Jiao could not have any children, could not be a mother.

And how could I possibly be the father of Meili’s child?

By now Jiao had her arms wrapped around me, and I was desperately clinging to her, like a drowning man would cling to a floating scrap of lumber.

I can only imagine what that would have looked like to an unbiased observer.

I’m five feet, nine inches tall, weigh about 180 pounds and keep myself in great shape. A few pounds lighter than my “fighting weight” I had in the Marine Corps, but still very muscular. Jiao is just a fraction of my size, and yet I am holding her as though my life depends on it.

Meili slowly, cautiously, walked up to me, put her arms around my shoulder and kissed me on the cheek.

It almost killed me to see her afraid to approach me.

“I love you, Daddy,” she said. “I love you and this is my gift to you and Mom – the two people I love more than any other.”

Meili and Jiao each grabbed a hand and led me into the living room where we all sat down on a couch.

Mother and daughter began to explain.

When Meili was only 12 she told me she was a scientist and didn’t believe in magic.

Jiao is also a scientist, while I am a simple history professor, but their explanations over the next hour or so sounded a lot more like magic than science.

I can only hope I do justice to their words.

Meili began by explaining she had always known how desperately her mother had wished she could have more children... “especially your children, Daddy.”

I could only nod my head, then grabbed Jiao’s hand as I looked at her.

“I’ve seen you ... I’ve seen you when you stare at some young mother with a newborn,” I tenderly told Jiao, “and I knew what you were thinking. I’ve also seen the tears in your eyes knowing that you couldn’t, and how you would try to hide those tears from me.”

Jiao squeezed my hand tightly.

“Did you know that Mom would sometimes get up in the middle of the night and cry?” asked Meili.

I had to admit that I didn’t.

“Because of this ESP that we share, I always could feel what Mom was feeling, I could always feel Mom crying, could feel how sad she was,” Meili said, “even when I was not here but at MIT, I could feel her tears and feel how sad she was.

“When I first woke up in the hospital and you were both standing there, I could feel your incredible love for me ... and each other ... and I decided then that I would devote the rest of my life to finding some way to make Mom’s dream come true.

“That’s when I decided I would go back to MIT and get my degrees in biology and genetics, and open my own bio-genetics lab. I thought the project I was working on, the ability to give you and Mom children would take 10 years ... but it only took two.”

Meili went on to explain how her research team had perfected a process where they could take a female egg, and fertilize it in a test tube with male sperm.

I immediately interrupted: “Whoa, whoa, whoa. You said I am the father? (Meili nodded yes.) Then how did you get my sperm?”

Meili looked at her Mom, Jiao looked at her daughter and both turned red.

“You know Jack, I have a PhD in nuclear physics and I only understand part of what Meili is doing,” Jiao said, “but getting your sperm was the easiest part of the whole process ... the only part we were a little concerned about was possible contamination ... contamination with my ... with my saliva.”

Mom looked at daughter, daughter looked at Mom ... and both blushed even more.

Up to that point, I would have said that Jiao ALWAYS swallowed. But apparently not, if I was hearing what I think I was hearing.

After a rather awkward silence, Meili resumed talking.

“Anyway, fertilization in vitro is nothing new, people have been doing that for decades. Our breakthrough came after impregnation. That’s where the real magic began.”

After hearing Meili use the word, “magic,” I raised my eyebrow and said I thought I remembered hearing a certain beautiful young scientist once say she didn’t believe in magic.

Meili grinned, then said “Well, I’ve learned a LOT since then. And I remember reading English physicist and science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke who said, ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic’.”

Then Meili leaned over and kissed me, very softly, very gently on the lips.

“And I know this guy ... who does a magic trick with a silver dollar. In fact, doctors and nurses swear his trick was REAL magic because the ONLY thing that kept me alive was his magic trick.

“Every few months I’ll run into one of those doctors or nurses, and they still talk about ‘The Miracle of the Silver Dollar.’ Whether it was a miracle, or magic, the only reason I am alive now is because of you. I love you, Daddy.”

I had some tears in my eyes, and it was all I could do to keep from crying.

Then Meili stood up before both Jiao and me, and took a hand from each of us and put it on her abdomen.

“I’m doing this for you, Daddy, and for you, Mom. I would be dead if it weren’t for both of you.”

After that ... well, I lost it. Then both Jiao and Meili were hugging me, and I was hugging them. We were all crying.

After about 10 or 15 minutes, we had all recovered enough for Meili to continue.

“Look, Daddy, you are one of the smartest men I have ever known (that REALLY surprised me), but like Mom said, even she doesn’t understand exactly how I do my ... magic (big grin). Let me just shorten it some. We take an egg, fertilize it, and then replace the nucleus with DNA from someone else. It isn’t exactly a perfect clone of the person whose DNA is now inside the fertilized egg, but close.

“In this case, it was my egg, your sperm and Mom’s DNA. Then I had the egg replanted inside my womb. I had to wait for a month to be sure my body wouldn’t reject the egg.”

“Wait,” I said hesitantly, “are you saying that you are ... are going to give birth to a ... a clone of your Mom? You are going to give birth to your own Mom?”

“That’s an oversimplification, but close. We also mixed some of your DNA with Mom’s, but the baby will be about 90 percent Mom, and about 10 percent you,” she added.

“God, I hope she has Jiao’s brains and looks,” I muttered. “Wait, is it going to be a girl or boy?”

“A girl,” Meili said. “While it would have been possible to manipulate the DNA to produce a boy, it would have involved more risk. It is easier, since it is mostly Mom’s DNA, to leave her (and Meili rubbed her abdomen) as a girl.”

“And you are okay with this, with your own daughter being a surrogate mother?” I asked Jiao, somewhat stunned.

“When Meili first approached me a couple of months ago and explained the procedure, that they had perfected it, and that she needed your sperm, that was one of the first questions I asked: ‘Who would be the surrogate mother?’” Jiao explained.

“I questioned her about who would be providing the donor egg and who the surrogate mother would be.

“That’s when I found out that she really is as much your daughter as she is mine. The classic nurture versus nature debate.”

I had a very puzzled look on my face as I looked at Jiao.

“She lied to me,” said Jiao with a big grin as Meili cracked up. “She told me she had found someone to serve as the donor and surrogate, someone from China who really needed the money.”

“Now wait a minute,” I started saying in protest using my most injured tone, “Yes, I will admit that I sometimes stretch the truth a LITTLE about anniversary and birthday presents and where we are going on vacations, but I don’t really lie.”

“Oh, yeah,” Meili piped in, “stretching the truth like telling us we are going to spend a month at a dude ranch in Wyoming riding horses when you have a private jet waiting to take us to Italy for a month. I felt like a total idiot having a suitcase full of western wear and cowboy boots when we landed in Naples. The customs people looked at me like I must be a total fool after going through my suitcase.”

“What about the time he told us we were going on a month-long cruise to Alaska, but instead we found ourselves in Tahiti?” Jiao added, “With suitcases half-full of winter clothing (and here both Mom and daughter recited in unison) ‘because it still gets really cold at night in Alaska’?”

“Daddy, you are such a dork at times!” laughed Meili.

“Or remember the time he told us we were going camping in the Ozarks, only we ended up in New York for a month in the Presidential Suite at the Waldorf-Astoria? All we had packed was blue jeans and shorts,” Meili added. “That was a great trip though, with lots of shopping!”

“Okay, okay,” I admitted, “sometimes I do slightly more than just stretch the truth a little.”

Mother and daughter didn’t say anything, but both started giving me the Chinese evil eye.

“Okay, sometimes I lie,” I finally admitted.

I had a lot more questions that night, which Meili and Jiao answered, although a lot of those answers involved words I had never heard before. Words like oocyte, which is actually the proper name for the egg that was taken from Meili and fertilized by my sperm.

The egg, or oocyte is actually called a zygote after fertilization.

Other terms were cellular differentiation, which apparently was the biggest stumbling block to producing a baby from Jiao’s DNA. I still don’t have a clue exactly what Meili was talking about there. Also nucleated cells, totipotent, DNA, RNA, etc., etc.

I can only tell you one thing for an absolute certainty.

Eight months later Meili gave birth to the most beautiful little girl in the whole world.

I actually held her before either Jiao or Meili did, and was completely lost when I looked into her eyes.

She had been screaming her head off after the birth, but as soon as I held her against me she stopped crying and looked at me and smiled.

I have been told that newborns can’t actually see, yet I knew that this little girl could see me and feel my love for her.

She only weighed six pounds at birth, but as I held her my arms started trembling at the thought that this was OUR child, mine and Jiao’s.

I can’t even imagine how difficult it must have been for Meili to step aside and give up this little tiny person she had been carrying inside her for nine months, but she held her for a few minutes, kissed her forehead and then put her in Jiao’s arms.