Talk about being dedicated to your job! When Buenos Aires, Argentina-based Twitter employee Claire Díaz-Ortiz went into labor in the wee hours of April 5, she decided to document the experience via the real-time social media site. Her first tweets revolved around her water breaking and her realization that she was, in fact, in labor–a fact she emphasized using the hashtag #inlabor. As crazy as this all may sound, I just could NOT tear myself away from her feed!
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After the intial water-breaking tweet, of course, things got interesting. As Díaz-Ortiz's husband drove to the hospital, their car overheated not once, but twice, forcing them to stop at different gas stations to have the vehicle inspected by mechanics. Though the mechanics assured the couple their vehicle would cooperate, the car broke down only minutes later, forcing them to pull over on the side of the road and search for a taxi. Eventually they found a taxi and completed their journey to the hospital, but the live tweeting didn't stop there.
For the next six hours, she live tweeted about everything from wanting ice chips and a copy of US Weekly to her OB resembling Bethenny Frankel. And then, there were the photo tweets: one in which she uploaded a photo of an IV drip going into her arm, and another in which she expressed her desire to keep the placenta after labor so she could plant a tree.
Can we take the placenta? Want to plant tree.(Husband wants no part in this; still focused on lost ukelele).#inlabor
— Claire Diaz-Ortiz (@Claire) April 5, 2014
Each tweet, sent from her @claire account, was eagerly retweeted by her 330,000 followers, many of whom commented on her updates. Even celebrities like model Christy Turlington and actress American Ferrera commented on the live tweeting action. Her last tweet, sent at 5:42 p.m. on April 5, was a photo of her embracing her new daughter, Lucía Paz Díaz-Ortiz. And with that, she concluded her #inlabor saga, and, presumably, went off to bond with her newborn.
Lesson: when you live-tweet your own labor, some will hate. Luckily, your husband will laugh in the corner. #inlabor
— Claire Diaz-Ortiz (@Claire) April 5, 2014
Lesson: when you live-tweet your own labor, some will hate. Luckily, your husband will laugh in the corner. #inlabor
— Claire Diaz-Ortiz (@Claire) April 5, 2014
Claire is interestingly, the woman credited with getting the Pope on Twitter.
Now, admittedly, Twitter wasn't even around when I gave birth to my now 10-year-old son, but I can't imagine having the desire to share such an intimate experience with the whole world. Besides, my contractions were so intense that any Tweets would have contained nothing but rants about wanting an epidural and, quite possibly, an expletive or two … or many. But hey, I guess this could very well become the norm in the social media age!
Image via Claire Diaz-Ortiz/Twitter
