Birth of the Bean
Many fathers, young and old, intending to be sympathetic but sometimes a bit too gleeful, had advised me, 'Your life's about to turn upside down' in the final weeks of Mo's pregnancy. I thought I had an inkling of what they meant but, as with all life's fundamental experiences, you can never really know what it's like until you do it.
Mo woke me up in the early hours of Thursday 19th April. My sleeping brain, free of toxins etc, had been staging some rather vivid and horrible anxiety dreams but I'd been deep under that night. But my lady gently woke me to tell of the cramps and the show. Despite all our classes, books and gear, and mo's meticulousness, I suddenly felt terribly ill-prepared. I kept panic at bay performing a couple of small tasks while Mo became giddy with excitement. As I attached the electrodes of the TENS machine to her back she sought reassurance that I'd hurry home when she called. I was touched by this rare vulnerability. I hurried to the train. On the platform, I met M, a guy I sometimes chat with about bands. Interacting with someone dispelled any calm. I was fizzing, my body apparently releasing dad-to-be chemicals.
We called and texted through the morning. The pain wasn't too bad and Mo went to the supermarket, napped, wondered if it was going to happen. The pains slowed down and disappointment set in. This anti-climax after the adrenalin hours left me frazzled. I continued to carry out my blah office duties and hurried home at 5pm as per Mo's request. Walking brings on contractions, Mo said. So we went walking. Classic Mo: she'll work this baby out of the womb. We went for a cuppa at a cafe on Duke Street. Home then and sleepy at midnight.
At 4.15 am on Friday, Mo woke me to say rather more earnest-feeling contractions had been going on for an hour or so. She was breathing through them, still calm, but they weren't as easy as before. Acting calm, I busied myself putting on some soup and moving furniture so Mo has space to get into comfortable positions. Oddly, that Proclaimers song about being "...on my way/from misery to happiness/uh-huh" was on loop in my head. i made myself tea and toast, and more oddly still, the Proclaimers were replaced by 2 Live Crew's 'Me So Horny' and then with an unlikely, inner-ear mash-up of the two. Was I going mad?
To our immense frustration, things slowed right down again after 5am.
We went to the hospital later on Friday morning to get Mo and the elusive Bean checked out - all was well and the midwife who examined her told us Mo would probably be back by evening, though contractions had died down a disappointing third time. Mo was finding this stop-start business difficult, and the toast n adrenaline diet wasn't doing me many favours either. It felt like the aftermath of a night on the pills.
Another evening and night of timing contractions, massage, resting, snacking and napping, to the gentle music of Massive Attack, the Clientele, Witness...
In the morning, the pains had slowed yet again and Mo was concerned about a little bleeding. To hospital again, where another midwife disagreed with all previous assessments and told us Mo was barely dilated and might not go into labour for days. she threw in a couple of confidence-sapping jokes for good measure.
Back home, Mo was pretty crushed, both by the prospect of more days of pains, waiting and uncertainty and by the fearsome prospect of serious labour pain after contractions that had been becoming less and less of a picnic as it was.
We were both dejected. I quit timing pains but tried to be attentive. Mo tried to sleep. Her pain was increasing but we had ben assured labour was way off. I went out to return a dvd, do a little food shopping, call briefly on our friend Agent S, whom we'd put on a casual alert days previously to drive us to hospital in the event the taxi firms refused, which is far from unknown.
Back home, Mo seemed in ever more pain. She took a bath and I poured warm water down her back, which afforded a little relief. She lay on our bed with the TENS and groaned in pain while I sought a little relaxation in the bath. After I'd soaked for ten minutes I hear Mo calling. She's been making unfamiliar, low noises of pain and now called for me in a strange, deep and breathless voice. I came to the bedroom and tried to help with the pain, rubbing her, boosting the TENS, reminding her about the breathing. We wanted to call the hospital and i wanted to time the contractions but it swiftly became apparent there was barely any time between them now. Mo announced, in an agonised voice between bellows now, that she needed to push. There followed one of my life's more stressful five minute periods as I, still naked from the bath, tried to help my beloved to the toilet, pull some clothes on her and myself, call Agent S to see if he was still available to give us a lift, call the hospital, get us out and downstairs and keep the cat indoors, hoping all the while that my groaning, lowing Mo could be persuaded to keep going to hospital and that Agent S would be here with his car by the time we got down three flights of stairs. The Agent, may he prosper, was waiting. Mo climbed in and sat on all fours facing the rear window. I advised her to try and sit in the usual fashion for safety's sake and she told me to fuck off, or words to that effect. The Agent toed the pedals and we hared down the road, ignoring police vehicles and disputing the correct turning. At the Maternity entrance minutes later, Mo seemed barely able to take another step. She hauled herself inside the building and grabbed a laundry trolley, about ready to squat on the floor. I yelled into the intercom but the voice that came back didn't seem to hear my note of urgency. As luck would have it, a midwife ending her shift stepped out of the lift and I begged for help. she took over, using the right words to get Mo in the lift and on the last short leg of the journey.
On the third floor, the staff still didn't seem to get how close we were until one calm, clear-eyed woman took things in hand, spoke soothing words to Mo and examined her. There was a sudden, perceptible shift in the staff's approach as our clear-eyed midwife looked down and saw how close we were. A plan to take Mo to the Birthing Unit upstairs was abandoned and we formed a mad caravan to a delivery room, Mo trying to hold together on a trolley wheeled by two midwives, a third pushing another trolley laden with gear with charts and cotton wool balls flying from it and myself picking up the rear, laden with bags. Three women surrounded Mo, who was now in another place altogether, and made room for me. I looked down and saw Mo's pelvis bulging from within. The midwives made ready, and within moments the top of our baby's head appeared. 'Father, check the time,' a midwife advised me. I stared stupidly at the clock and looked back down to see our baby's head fully emerged, wrapped in membrane. Another effort and Mo pushed our purple, bunched-face child out into the world. The cord, thick and slick, was tight around the neck and was swiftly dealt with. They placed our squalling baby on Mo's breast, in her arms. The new mother had already forgotten all the pain and panic. My eyes misted a little but i was also gripped by a strange hilarity. This was all entirely new. I was offered a pair of round-bladed scissors and, perhaps with a slightly trembling hand, cut the cord on my third or fourth go. Mo held her daughter for five or ten minutes while the midwives, now just two, calmly made ready for the next stage and I stood nearby, grinning. (The placenta, in my opinion, was not a pretty sight.) When Mo passed me the baby, who'd been given a bit of a wipe to remove some of the blood and slime, I thought foolishly, how amusing that I had sired a scarlet frog. Mo took the baby into the bath and I sat by them, mostly unable to process what I'd just seen and in which I'd in a small way participated. In time we moved up to a quiet ward. i fetched Mo a phone card and she called her family in Ireland. Her father picked up at home and began to cry on hearing he had a granddaughter. The receiver buzzed in Mo's hand. We spent some time gazing on the baby until I left for the night and went to make some calls of my own.
Eleven days have passed but it feels like years. There followed: talking to some of my jubilant family on the phone, sending texts and emails all over the place while reeling from a rim-hanger whisky and the buckets of endorphins my body had been pumping out (and continued to do for a rather generous while), hospital visits and falling completely for my new daughter who, tiny and helpless though she is, imparts to me a feeling of friendly invincibility; a mutual surge in the love between me and m'lady (when was there ever so much laughter and tenderness?), a stepping-up in apparent status in the eyes of family, neighbours and strangers in the street; a sense of joining a club whose existence one was always aware of but whose benefits were never known til now. A week after the birth I told my friend Miss C I could talk about the previous week for the rest of my days, and that was true at the time. Every hyper-real detail from the birth on - every cherry-blossom petal that fell to the ground as I ran my errands, buzzing like mad, and everything else - seemed etched in my mind. But I know now I'll remember a version of events. I've left out so many details here. I'll quibble with Mo in the future about the order of some of the things that happened, and friends will have to remind me of other things I babbled about to them.
But this has been the happiest time of my life.
Mo woke me up in the early hours of Thursday 19th April. My sleeping brain, free of toxins etc, had been staging some rather vivid and horrible anxiety dreams but I'd been deep under that night. But my lady gently woke me to tell of the cramps and the show. Despite all our classes, books and gear, and mo's meticulousness, I suddenly felt terribly ill-prepared. I kept panic at bay performing a couple of small tasks while Mo became giddy with excitement. As I attached the electrodes of the TENS machine to her back she sought reassurance that I'd hurry home when she called. I was touched by this rare vulnerability. I hurried to the train. On the platform, I met M, a guy I sometimes chat with about bands. Interacting with someone dispelled any calm. I was fizzing, my body apparently releasing dad-to-be chemicals.
We called and texted through the morning. The pain wasn't too bad and Mo went to the supermarket, napped, wondered if it was going to happen. The pains slowed down and disappointment set in. This anti-climax after the adrenalin hours left me frazzled. I continued to carry out my blah office duties and hurried home at 5pm as per Mo's request. Walking brings on contractions, Mo said. So we went walking. Classic Mo: she'll work this baby out of the womb. We went for a cuppa at a cafe on Duke Street. Home then and sleepy at midnight.
At 4.15 am on Friday, Mo woke me to say rather more earnest-feeling contractions had been going on for an hour or so. She was breathing through them, still calm, but they weren't as easy as before. Acting calm, I busied myself putting on some soup and moving furniture so Mo has space to get into comfortable positions. Oddly, that Proclaimers song about being "...on my way/from misery to happiness/uh-huh" was on loop in my head. i made myself tea and toast, and more oddly still, the Proclaimers were replaced by 2 Live Crew's 'Me So Horny' and then with an unlikely, inner-ear mash-up of the two. Was I going mad?
To our immense frustration, things slowed right down again after 5am.
We went to the hospital later on Friday morning to get Mo and the elusive Bean checked out - all was well and the midwife who examined her told us Mo would probably be back by evening, though contractions had died down a disappointing third time. Mo was finding this stop-start business difficult, and the toast n adrenaline diet wasn't doing me many favours either. It felt like the aftermath of a night on the pills.
Another evening and night of timing contractions, massage, resting, snacking and napping, to the gentle music of Massive Attack, the Clientele, Witness...
In the morning, the pains had slowed yet again and Mo was concerned about a little bleeding. To hospital again, where another midwife disagreed with all previous assessments and told us Mo was barely dilated and might not go into labour for days. she threw in a couple of confidence-sapping jokes for good measure.
Back home, Mo was pretty crushed, both by the prospect of more days of pains, waiting and uncertainty and by the fearsome prospect of serious labour pain after contractions that had been becoming less and less of a picnic as it was.
We were both dejected. I quit timing pains but tried to be attentive. Mo tried to sleep. Her pain was increasing but we had ben assured labour was way off. I went out to return a dvd, do a little food shopping, call briefly on our friend Agent S, whom we'd put on a casual alert days previously to drive us to hospital in the event the taxi firms refused, which is far from unknown.
Back home, Mo seemed in ever more pain. She took a bath and I poured warm water down her back, which afforded a little relief. She lay on our bed with the TENS and groaned in pain while I sought a little relaxation in the bath. After I'd soaked for ten minutes I hear Mo calling. She's been making unfamiliar, low noises of pain and now called for me in a strange, deep and breathless voice. I came to the bedroom and tried to help with the pain, rubbing her, boosting the TENS, reminding her about the breathing. We wanted to call the hospital and i wanted to time the contractions but it swiftly became apparent there was barely any time between them now. Mo announced, in an agonised voice between bellows now, that she needed to push. There followed one of my life's more stressful five minute periods as I, still naked from the bath, tried to help my beloved to the toilet, pull some clothes on her and myself, call Agent S to see if he was still available to give us a lift, call the hospital, get us out and downstairs and keep the cat indoors, hoping all the while that my groaning, lowing Mo could be persuaded to keep going to hospital and that Agent S would be here with his car by the time we got down three flights of stairs. The Agent, may he prosper, was waiting. Mo climbed in and sat on all fours facing the rear window. I advised her to try and sit in the usual fashion for safety's sake and she told me to fuck off, or words to that effect. The Agent toed the pedals and we hared down the road, ignoring police vehicles and disputing the correct turning. At the Maternity entrance minutes later, Mo seemed barely able to take another step. She hauled herself inside the building and grabbed a laundry trolley, about ready to squat on the floor. I yelled into the intercom but the voice that came back didn't seem to hear my note of urgency. As luck would have it, a midwife ending her shift stepped out of the lift and I begged for help. she took over, using the right words to get Mo in the lift and on the last short leg of the journey.
On the third floor, the staff still didn't seem to get how close we were until one calm, clear-eyed woman took things in hand, spoke soothing words to Mo and examined her. There was a sudden, perceptible shift in the staff's approach as our clear-eyed midwife looked down and saw how close we were. A plan to take Mo to the Birthing Unit upstairs was abandoned and we formed a mad caravan to a delivery room, Mo trying to hold together on a trolley wheeled by two midwives, a third pushing another trolley laden with gear with charts and cotton wool balls flying from it and myself picking up the rear, laden with bags. Three women surrounded Mo, who was now in another place altogether, and made room for me. I looked down and saw Mo's pelvis bulging from within. The midwives made ready, and within moments the top of our baby's head appeared. 'Father, check the time,' a midwife advised me. I stared stupidly at the clock and looked back down to see our baby's head fully emerged, wrapped in membrane. Another effort and Mo pushed our purple, bunched-face child out into the world. The cord, thick and slick, was tight around the neck and was swiftly dealt with. They placed our squalling baby on Mo's breast, in her arms. The new mother had already forgotten all the pain and panic. My eyes misted a little but i was also gripped by a strange hilarity. This was all entirely new. I was offered a pair of round-bladed scissors and, perhaps with a slightly trembling hand, cut the cord on my third or fourth go. Mo held her daughter for five or ten minutes while the midwives, now just two, calmly made ready for the next stage and I stood nearby, grinning. (The placenta, in my opinion, was not a pretty sight.) When Mo passed me the baby, who'd been given a bit of a wipe to remove some of the blood and slime, I thought foolishly, how amusing that I had sired a scarlet frog. Mo took the baby into the bath and I sat by them, mostly unable to process what I'd just seen and in which I'd in a small way participated. In time we moved up to a quiet ward. i fetched Mo a phone card and she called her family in Ireland. Her father picked up at home and began to cry on hearing he had a granddaughter. The receiver buzzed in Mo's hand. We spent some time gazing on the baby until I left for the night and went to make some calls of my own.
Eleven days have passed but it feels like years. There followed: talking to some of my jubilant family on the phone, sending texts and emails all over the place while reeling from a rim-hanger whisky and the buckets of endorphins my body had been pumping out (and continued to do for a rather generous while), hospital visits and falling completely for my new daughter who, tiny and helpless though she is, imparts to me a feeling of friendly invincibility; a mutual surge in the love between me and m'lady (when was there ever so much laughter and tenderness?), a stepping-up in apparent status in the eyes of family, neighbours and strangers in the street; a sense of joining a club whose existence one was always aware of but whose benefits were never known til now. A week after the birth I told my friend Miss C I could talk about the previous week for the rest of my days, and that was true at the time. Every hyper-real detail from the birth on - every cherry-blossom petal that fell to the ground as I ran my errands, buzzing like mad, and everything else - seemed etched in my mind. But I know now I'll remember a version of events. I've left out so many details here. I'll quibble with Mo in the future about the order of some of the things that happened, and friends will have to remind me of other things I babbled about to them.
But this has been the happiest time of my life.