Parents united in time for their baby’s arrival

As they contemplated having a second child, Matthew and Cheryl O’Boyle grappled with a devastating possibility: Matthew, a specialist in the 81st Brigade of the Washington Army National Guard, might never come home.

“What happens if I die?” Matthew asked out loud last year, shortly before his unit was scheduled for active duty.

The couple weighed that tragic prospect against another scenario: that their son, Liam, might never have a little sister or brother.

They decided to have another baby. Two weeks after the First Battalion 161st infantry was activated in October, Matthew received a phone call from his wife in Spokane. “Mission accomplished,” he thought as he heard his wife’s voice filled with both excitement and apprehension.

Not every soldier in Iraq gets to fly home for the birth of a child, but Matthew O’Boyle is one of the lucky ones. Days before Cheryl’s due date, Matthew’s commanders pulled him off dangerous duty and put him on a plane headed for Spokane.

On Friday, the proud father was at Sacred Heart Medical Center, holding his wife’s hand as she pushed Caitlin Marie O’Boyle from her womb and into the world. Hearing his daughter’s first cries at 3:33 p.m. came as a relief. Holding the 6-pound, 12-ounce bundle made him a happy man.

Pregnancy is hard enough for couples who share the same bed. But for Cheryl and Matthew, the distance between them coupled by the hazards of war made the last nine months almost unbearable.

Although Cheryl, who’s 31, received support from her parents and friends in Spokane, she missed her husband terribly. Unlike their first pregnancy, Matthew couldn’t put his hand on her belly to feel the baby’s heartbeat. No one was there to tie Cheryl’s shoes when she ballooned during her third trimester or to help her with Liam, who is now 2 1/2 years old.

Meanwhile, the peril of war loomed over 32-year-old Matthew. His job in Iraq requires him and two other men to drive an unarmored truck along a dangerous 35-mile stretch of highway outside of Baghdad’s Green Zone to deliver hot meals and supplies to fellow soldiers in Jasirdiari before returning on the same road.

Not a day goes by when they don’t hear nearby gunfire. They’ve been shot at on many occasions. Within two weeks of being deployed there, a roadside bomb detonated, shattering the windshield of Matthew’s truck. Broken glass cut the driver’s hands and face, and he became the recipient of a Purple Heart. Matthew left the scene, physically unscathed but emotionally shook up.

“Hi, I’m OK,” Matthew would immediately say during his weekly phone call to Cheryl. Instead of shielding her from the news, Matthew told her every scary detail of his life in a war zone.

“I would rather know,” she said. “We’ve always been completely honest. Some people can’t take it, but it’s more comforting for me to know everything.”

Matthew’s recent homecoming was a godsend. Cheryl, an accountant for Sacred Heart’s Mother Gamelin Center, was prepared to give birth alone, but having her husband by her side eased her anxieties.

Both Cheryl and Matthew now appear stoical about the hazards in Iraq, a reality that Matthew must return to on July 15. To cope, they make jokes about the fact that Cheryl has to take care of the kids alone.

“I’ll be gone for all the midnight feedings,” quipped Matthew, whose unit isn’t scheduled to come back to Spokane until March. “By the time I get back, she’ll sleep through the night.”

“He’ll be back in time for the one’s and two’s,” replied Cheryl with a smile.

It’s a sacrifice to be apart, they said, but it’s one they’re willing to make for their country.

Matthew had previously served in the Army for eight years. The tragedy of Sept. 11 spurred the New Jersey native to sign up for the National Guard. Before his unit was activated, Matthew was finishing a degree in law enforcement at Spokane Community College.

“I want to make sure my little boy didn’t have to worry about terrorists,” he explained. “We deploy for our kids. We’re out there to get rid of the bad guys. So if the nation needs us and the president needs us, we’re going to go ahead and do our jobs.”

Words can’t describe the way he feels now that his second child is in the world, Matthew said. He’s overjoyed, but he’s also worried about a hundred different things.

And again, that gnawing fear lurking in the back of his mind: What if I don’t come home? What will happen to my family?

“I’m very proud of him,” Cheryl said, gazing at her husband from across the hospital room. “He’s completing his mission. He’s trying to make the world a better place.