Kittens and Butterflies and Breastfeeding

You might be forgiven for thinking after that last post that having a baby was all kittens and butterflies. Um, it wasn't.

And so to the tough aftermath I alluded to. Man, having a baby is hard. It demanded a total readjustment of the way I thought. It reminded me of doing the Coast to Coast (well, a bit of it) last summer and having to have a word with myself about the fact that all I had to do every day was walk. That was it. After a busy summer term at work my mind struggled with that comedown from firing on all cylinders (IB MADNESS! BOOK WEEK! SCHOOL MAGAZINE!)' to 'Oooo....pretty mountain...and another...and another...' And in those crazy early days after five weeks of babyless maternity leave, I needed to have a similar mental pep talk with myself, i.e. "ALL YOU HAVE TO DO TODAY IS LOOK AFTER A BABY." That's it. Anything else achieved - reading a page of that heavy grief memoir, a shower, standing up for a period longer than five minutes - is a bonus.

And so to Belgian hospitals, which are feckin marvellous in my humble opinion. OK, there were a few weird bits (the leg massage from the physio the day after giving birth was a touch awkward, and the baby photoshoot on the day we went home - "Does 'ee 'av a leetle teddy? Does 'ee 'av a pyjama weeth a leetle beet of colour?"- was on another level of surreal Belgian comedy). But I also remember looking at the clock 12 hours after delivery thinking 'If I was in the UK, I'd be home by now.' Sobering stuff. I mean, I didn't feel dreadful but by God I didn't exactly feel wonderful either and the thought of going home and NOT having a big red shiny button to press to summon a jolly trilingual midwife wasn't a particularly pleasant one.

Because breastfeeding? Jesus, of all the hard things in the world (PhDs in Chemical Engineering, understanding income tax, scrubbing dried-on porridge offov a bowl)  it was the hardest man. Even with the phalanx of midwives and the big red shiny button. Too hard, as it turns out. Big baby = super-hungry baby, and that + a tongue tie + conflicting advice from midwives + there-are-different-types-of-NIPPLES-in-this-world?! shock revelation + mastitis + 40 degree fever + antibiotics depleting my already crappy milk supply (see 'conflicting advice from midwives' for further details) = no more BF for me. I've made my peace with it I suppose, although I would like to say to those over-ardent Advocates Of Breastfeeding that every time you cheerily say, 'Well, never mind, you can always try again with the next one!' to a woman who's given up with a heavy heart all she hears for the BILLIONTH time is 'Breast is best!' And, actually, she doesn't have to look very far for that message - it's projected from every parenting manual and every desperate Google search that the aforementioned poor sod of a mother is scouring at 3 o'clock in the morning for some kind of reassurance that formula isn't going to turn her baby into an obese allergy-ridden dolt while the aforementioned hangry (not a typo) baby screams and screams. What might be more sensitive is, 'Formula is fine, you know. It's not poison. It exists for women who choose not to breastfeed, but also for those like yourself who struggle with feeding, or who have to go back to work very quickly or have a baby with a medical issue.' Or 'You managed x days/weeks/months with a hell of a lot of obstacles  - bravo.' Or something. THAT'S the message she's struggling to find in a book or on an online forum and could really do with hearing.*

Or perhaps I was just so miserable and hormonal and therefore so prone to taking massive offence that nothing anyone said would have suited me.

ANYHOO. Onwards and upwards. 'Life is a roller coaster,' as a wise man once mused, 'just gotta ride it.' Baby update, yeah? Well, apologies to the women of the world, but I Got The Best Baby. And now that he's smiling, oh, my heart is BURSTING every time I wake him up (and he smiles!) or put him down to sleep (and he smiles!) or I shove my face into his and sing a stupid song about his burps (and he smiles!) And when he looks across at us through the bars of his cot with a little dribble of milky sick escaping from one side of his mouth and I reach out to wipe it I feel like I've uncovered the Meaning of Life. It's this. This is what it's All About.

And I can't decide whether I should laugh or weep a little bit. This is what parenthood has done to me (and, to a lesser extent, Adam, although he still has to function at work and think about things other than baby vomit like, umm, electronic sheep tagging). I'm losing my mind over baby vomit and sending him photos with comments verging on 'OMG he is SOOO SUPER-GORGE look at his ICKLE FACE! LOLZ' Jesus.

OK, a tiny bit more of babybabybaby and then I'll rein it in (for a bit). As well as smiling and sleeping like a pro he's growing like a beaut. Since he was tinywee old women of Belgium were peering into the pram to compliment him and saying things like, 'Il est trop mignon!' (oui, oui, merci!) and then 'Trois mois?' Err, non. When he was born he was like a skinned rabbit (even though then people were still saying 'he's HUGE') whereas now he IS actually huge, like a seal pup - all lovely big eyes and lashes and ponderous weight. Oh, his thighs. His little wrists. His fat hamster cheeks.

To. Die. For.

Now that the feeding issue is sorted and I can take him places (as opposed to sitting stripped to the waist in my front room with the lights down low and Elliott Smith playing wanting to die - is listening to Elliott Smith and wanting to die actually the same thing?) we've been travelling all over fair Bruxelles. We've been into school to show him off. We've been to cafes and parks. We've run the gauntlet of teeth-sucking harridan disapproval in Pain Quotidien. The other day I took him to Zara and managed to TRY ON and then BUY some clothes which was rather exciting. I also took him to the physiotherapist (who was very nice if a bit stern and said that she could tell my abdominal muscles were still 1cm separated - what voodoo is this? All she did was feel my gut for a nanosecond! - and I should NOT be running yet, oopsy) and he charmed the pants off everyone in the waiting room.

And to wrap up here is a darkly funny photo I took in the hospital on my way to the physio room:

Full marks for forward planning, that architect.

I'll try not to become a massive baby bore (try - can't promise owt). Back soon to bang on about some stuff what I have read (possibly) and my new pink coat (definitely).





* Disclaimer: I did get that message, eventually, from a couple of lovely souls who very generously offered up their time and expertise to speak to me at length and tell me repeatedly that Everything Was Going To Be OK. Big love, people. 

Having a Baby - Part 2

I suddenly need to know everyone’s name - I’m ready to shake hands and kiss people and write thank you notes. The anaesthetist is already out the door but I ask the midwife what she’s called anyway. ‘Tell her thank you!’ I say, dizzy with joy. ‘Really, you must tell her thank you. Tell her I said THANK YOU SO MUCH.’ Everyone’s smirking yet I’m completely earnest. God, I feel amazing! Totally AMAZING! Look at me - painfree, contracting like a boss, teeth chattering, arms and legs shaking, shaking quite a bit actually - Jesus, hang on, am I having some kind of fit, is this normal, FFS…?

‘Totally normal,’ says the midwife. Ah, OK. Best find something new to worry about. ’Will the drugs wear off?’ I ask anxiously. ‘No,’ she says, busying herself with buttons and drips and clips. I have a peculiar need to Be In Charge despite clearly being in a situation where I am most definitely Not In Charge. ‘Are you sure? What if I labour for 24 hours? Do I need to warn you when the bag looks low?’ ’No,’ she says. ‘Your baby will be here before I finish at seven.’ It’s perhaps 1am. Woah. 6 hours tops. Countdown. 

Now that I’m no longer completely absorbed by pain every few minutes I can take in the room properly for the first time. There’s a stainless steel lamp the size of a dustbin lid fixed to the wall with an anglepoise arm.  Directly opposite the bed there’s a changing station with an overhead heat strip and monitoring equipment where the baby will be checked after it’s born; clean towels folded, a quiet altar, waiting. A red LED flickers like a sanctuary candle. Everything’s so quiet and still. It’s also, I suddenly realise, horrifically hot. Adam tries to open a window but they’re nailed shut. He’s gutted. “Change into your pyjama bottoms,” I tell him with sudden clarity. Minutes ago I couldn’t speak, never mind suggest sensible courses of action such as changing into cool cotton pants. Hmm. Interesting.

I have what I think is a Deeply Profound Thought about some women being intimidated by an overly medicalised environment, hence all the focus in the antenatal class on doing things naturally and challenging all suggested medical interventions; however, I am a Completely Different Kettle Of Fish and find all of the equipment and drugs the most reassuring thing in the world. I tell Adam about this Deeply Profound Thought. He finds it less profound. In fact, now that the ‘Oh my God, this pain is HORRIFIC’ panic is over, he’s trying to go to sleep on the floor. 

Zainab - the healthcare assistant, we’re all on first-name terms now - wheels in a fold-out bed and Adam lies down. The ‘relaxed’ playlist I composed in a panic in the days before my due date (and totally ignored until now) purrs in the background. ‘Do you have children?’ I ask Zainab dreamily. My right leg, dull and fizzy, keeps slipping off the bed and she lifts it gently back onto the mattress. I’m not so out of it that I’m not a little bit embarrassed by the hole in my sock. ‘No,’ she says, and her smile implies ‘As if!’ Instead though she says, ‘I’m only twenty.’

And so we lie there talking until Adam drifts off to sleep. I could be pissed off, but actually it’s lovely to lie there quietly for an hour or so, thinking about the pulsing in my stomach and my body doing what it needs to do and the baby on its way. I can’t remember the last time I lay down, listening to music, thinking, doing nothing else with no distractions - I can heartily recommend it. I’m thinking about us and the baby, unsurprisingly - no great epiphanies, just vague drifting thoughts, and it’s deeply pleasant albeit in the most pedestrian of ways. 

Midwife Adele (see, we’re practically best friends) and Zainab appear and disappear at intervals. Zainab, then Adele, then Zainab, then Adele again. She still smells of cigarettes. Night shift sucks, eh? She scrutinises the machine and whatever’s happening down there and then she speaks. 

‘OK, I think we start to push soon.’ She looks at the clock. ‘Around 4:30, yes?’ 

HOLY WHAT NOW.

Adele is required to shift into super-patient, super-reassuring mode again. Yes, there will definitely be a feeling despite the epidural. No, it won’t hurt. It’ll feel a bit like needing the toilet. Yes, there will be a doctor, he’s on his way. 

Nothing happens for five, ten minutes. Fifteen minutes. Adele has disappeared. She’s wrong, I think. Nothing to see here, no urge to push, categorically nothing. Almost simultaneously I feel a bearing down; a sort of painless pressure. Bloody hell. Shall I? There’s only me and Adam in the room. I push, tentatively, feeling like a naughty schoolgirl about to be caught out at any minute. The sensation returns minutes later, and I push again. 

A doctor breezes in - not my doctor, but a man - removes his coat and rolls up his sleeves. Literally. I don’t think to ask where my doctor - cheerful Dr Inge with the jazzy shoes - is. ‘So we are pushing?’ Um, yes. We seem to be. Suddenly the room seems very busy, what with the doctor, his assistant, Adele and Zainab and Adam and me. The bed has been hoisted up and the doctors sit on stools. Adele and Zainab hover in the background. 

Things are speeding up. Push. Don’t push. One big long push now. Little pushes. Pushpushpushpushpushpuuuush. And rest. It’s like you see on the TV but there’s no pain, making me feel like I’m an actress in a crappy daytime soap. I’ve got no idea how hard I’m pushing on account of not being able to feel anything. Everyone seems pleased with my efforts, mind, so I can’t be doing too badly, I rationalise.

After what seems like a ludicrously short space of time someone announces that they can see the head. Oh God, this is actually happening. Empty cliche alert: I can’t believe it. But I actually CAN’T believe it. Apparently it has hair. Then the head is out. Oh God. It feels like I’ve been doing this for fifteen minutes. It’s actually been forty. Still, ridiculous. I can’t believe it. THE BABY’S HEAD IS THERE.

Zainab is suddenly at my shoulder, tugging at my gown. ‘What are you doing?’ I ask, thinking OK, I liked you, but now you’re violating me. ‘You will want skin to skin, yes?’ she says. What? I can’t believe we’re so close to the baby being born. ‘Is it ready?’ I ask, which makes everyone laugh, like he’s a microwave meal.

And then it happens. 

‘Ooooh!’ cries everyone, collectively. 

He’s hot and hollering and livid on my chest. I’m not sure how he got there. I say ‘he’ - I knew he was a boy before we even thought to check. 

‘Oh my God!’ I say. I say very little else for the next five minutes. ‘Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!’

It’s 5:30am and I’ve just had a baby and I feel like a bloody champion.  

(all the hard stuff came later)

Having a Baby - Part I

pic

Because another birth story is just what the internet needs, yeah?

***

It’s 11:15pm when Adam calls the taxi. The taxi driver looks from our bags to my belly. “C’est un cas d’urgence?” Oui. St Elisabeth, s’il vous plait. Vite. I knew it would happen at night.

It’s taken three hours of puffing, panting, standing up, sitting down, a phone call to the labour ward (“Maybee ‘av a bath, no?” Maybe feck off with your fecking bath), burying my face in the duvet and a TENS machine ribbitting away uselessly on my back for me to concede that This Is It. But as the driver hits what feels like every speed bump and red light between Woluwe St Pierre and Uccle, fear rises. What if it isn’t? What if they laugh in my face? Go home, little girl. And when real labour hits it’s going to hunt you down like a DAWG. 

We arrive at the emergency exit, the normal entrance for women in labour arriving after 8pm, which is pretty grim despite St Elisabeth’s fancy private hospital credentials. Plastic chairs, scuffed walls, a mother hushing a toddler wrapped in a blanket, two policemen and a German Shepherd, a vending machine. My panting and gurning gets us to the front of the queue and we’re directed to the second floor. The midwife - the one I’ve spoken to, the one who suggested a bath - is younger than me, has beautiful cheekbones and smells faintly of cigarettes. I want to say this to Adam - ‘She smells of fags!’ - but can’t - a contraction gets in the way. I’m instructed to pee and strip in that order; then she straps me to a monitoring device and leaves the room. The machine tracks the baby’s heart rate but as a contraction rises I have to - categorically MUST DO THIS RIGHT NOW - get up and move around. An alarm sounds and the midwife reappears, panicked. I try to say sorry (not sorry) but find I can’t speak. In fact, I can’t do very much at all; I can’t focus on anything other than squaring up to the wave of pain heading my way. And yet it isn’t frightening or even, strictly speaking, painful - it’s intense, I suppose, and absorbing rather than simply ‘painful’, which suggests something trivial and day-to-day like, oo, stepping on an upturned plug.  Adam tries to talk to me but I can only put my finger to my lips. Ssh, stop, don’t you know that my head is FULL OF CONTRACTION? I live inside it for a full minute; then it ebbs and I spend the next four or so preparing myself to meet it again. I bury my face in the mattress and my knees tremble. The pain is the only thing in the room; it's the only thing that matters. 

Somehow, despite my cavorting, the midwife manages to examine me. “Seven centimetres,” she announces, smiling. “I suppose we’ll let you stay.” A stab of triumph: this IS it. Oh yes. Oh Jesus. 

And so there is a decision to be made. “Would you like an epidural?”* Yes, I say, and afterwards I’ll laugh at the decision made just like that after all the antenatal hours (mis?)spent reading and researching and discussing. I’m not desperate, mind, but I think a shot in the spine right now would be very nice, very nice indeed. I’m just starting to feel a bit mad, a bit like I’m losing control, and that is not a happy place to be. Again afterwards, I’ll describe it as feeling like an animal, although I’m not exactly sure why - maybe because I couldn't talk, was reduced to mute desperation? Or maybe because the pacing up and down reminded me of when our family dog went old and senile and wandered around the house shaking and staring at skirting boards? 

When a midwife asked my friend how she felt as she approached delivery she replied, 'Like I've got a wardrobe between my legs.' It was the biggest thing she could think of, she said. And that’s how I felt - like an old, senile Jack Russell. Does that make sense? Probably not. Childbirth brings about some interesting analogies is my point. 

And then comes the crushing blow, just as I’m envisaging a seamless transition from pre-epidural on-the-edgeness to post-epidural serenity and I’m mentally patting myself on the back for having this giving birth thing totally sussed, the midwife speaks. “OK,” she says, still smelling of fags, still young and beautifully-cheekboned. “I’ll call the anaesthetist. She’ll be half an hour.”

Oh. OK. I had visions of her sitting in the corridor, masked up, needle in hand, awaiting my feverish call. How stupid, I think, of course she isn’t, it’s after midnight, it’s a tiny maternity unit and I’m the only woman giving birth tonight. Half an hour, right. 

I do the maths. Seven contractions? Eight? Oh God.  

And so this was the part of labour which really wasn’t All That Pleasant. HoooEeeee. Hoo hoo hoo eeeeee. Everything's gone a bit blurry. Please live nearby, I think, and please hurry. Please, please, please don’t have a cup of tea before you leave home. Please don’t have a car accident and please let the lift be on the ground floor when you arrive.

In the end, she only takes 20 minutes, although I’ve been acutely aware of every single one. She breezes into the room, smelling of the cold. She speaks in French to the midwives but she’s too quick and accented for me to understand. A blue paper screen is stuck to my back and I hold Adam’s hands. He looks anxious but I’m not worried; I just want it done before the next contraction hits. HURRY UP. There’s fumbling and some comment about my skin. Another attempt to get it in, then another. Adam says afterwards that there’s a lot of blood but thinking about it, it was probably iodine, wasn’t it? Then she speaks in English, leaning over my shoulder. “Do you ‘av a special feeling in your leg?” she asks. Eh? Special feeling? “Do you ‘AV a special FEELING in your leg?” What are you talking about? I feel like Bill Murray in Lost in Translation when the escort commands him to “lip" her stocking. Lip? Special feeling? And then it hits, third time lucky, the ahhh Bisto moment, and my legs fizz (special feeling!) and I watch the numbers rise on the monitor. Contraction coming. I brace myself. Can’t feel a thing.

***

* in Belgium, there is no gas and air. No pethidine. It's all - epidural - or nothing. Hardcore. 

Something Changed

Things people say to you on having a baby:

"He's gorgeous." (Yes. Yes, he is).

"You did brilliantly." (Yes. Yes, I fecking did). 

"Life will never be the same again." (This is true).  

***

So we have our baby. Il s'appelle Patrick. He has completely rewired my brain and my heart. Everything is so different, and yet at the same time it's like everything has fallen into place. Turns out all the cliches were true. Who'd have thunk it?

***

I have lots to record here, but it'll have to wait until I'm capable of looking at him (or him and Adam -DOUBLEBRAINLOVEEXPLOSION)) and articulating my thoughts with a more intelligible and lucid vocabulary than 'Nnnnnnggggghhhhh!' So eighteen years, yeah?

Back soon. A bientôt. 

Whassssssup? Ahem.

Whasssssssup? That's a little joke, by the way. Bedders' cousin has just downloaded WhatsApp and I've been tempted more than once to send him a message saying 'Whassssssapp?' before I'm reminded that he is merely twenty three, Australian and the Budweiser Whassssssup advert is therefore Not On His Cultural Radar. Unlike me, who stuck a load of Frankie and Louis the Lizard stickers all over my Year 13 school planner. Why? I didn't even like beer. At the time. Right now, I'd kill for one. 

So I'm back at work and a little bit wide-eyed, as predicted. The plan I'd formed of getting into the groove of next September's daily routine in readiness for when I do the afternoon creche run requires Herculean levels of self-control. I had this golden vision of front-loading my days from 7:30 then trotting out of the door at no later than 4:30. So far the 7:30 thing's going OK but the 4:30...well, today I left at 6:37, which is exactly 17 minutes after the creche shuts 45 minutes of public transportness away. Brillo. I wonder, does it actually shut? With the baby locked inside? If the driver of the 44 tram takes the fancy to declare 'Terminus!" at the Musee de Tram as he did tonight and I'm stuck 25 minutes walk from the bairn, what happens? The answer is simple, I know. I just need to leave earlier. Work smarter. Make every second count. Work out how to use the new learning platform. I'm pretty sure it could revolutionise my working life if I allowed it. 

Next week my 'How To Not Freak Out About Giving Birth' course begins, so there'll be a night or two a week where Bedders and I go to sit in a room with other expectant parents and learn how to breathe and say no to an epidural politely in French* from half seven until TEN O'CLOCK AT NIGHT. SERIOUSLY. This is a course for women who are at least six months pregnant and they're KEEPING US AWAKE UNTIL 10pm. 

(*PS I might not say no to the epidural. I might say HELL YEAH. It is entirely one's own choice as to whether one has an epidural or not, obviously. I'm just conscious that, in Belgium, about 99.9999% of women have one because "it's the norm" and if I decide I want one, I want one because I'm reaching cross-eyed levels of agony and begging Adam to finish me off with a spade like a hoary TB-ridden badger - not because "it's the norm.")

I haven't even had a proper week at work and I'm STILL moaning - I was in the Hague for two days visiting a school and was astonished at the utter professionalism and enthusiasm and DAZZLING TALENT of the Head of Department there. He's in charge of Drama, too, and he's directing the school play this year which is - get this - a musical version of Measure for Measure, played as a straight comedy with no tricky questions about Isabella's victim status or anything else but in a rather avant-garde twist each of the main characters has their very own disco anthem. The Duke's is Could it Be I'm Falling in Love?, apparently (how completely fabulous is this song?) The man is a genius. So I left there feeling very inspired and a little bit sleepy (actually fell asleep on the train, woke up, saw I was in Antwerp, thought I was back in Holland and snorted in panic before I realised Antwerp is in Belgium, doh) and a teeeeeny bit inadequate.  

BUT IT IS FAR TOO EARLY IN THE TERM FOR ALL OF THIS NONSENSE. Let's look on the bright side, eh? Tomorrow is Friday. I will do better at leaving earlier. And sometimes kids leave nice things in your classroom just to say 'Hi' and 'Welcome back' and 'I like Tracey Emin too.'

This is what it's all about, no? 

I got my hair did, in the words of Missy Elliott

Hiya. It's been hot, hmm? Stinking hot. Oh-my-gawwwd-get-those-patio-doors-open-hot. No-duvet-on-the-bed-hot. I-cannot-physically-bear-to-do-the-ironing-hot. Various appellations, one particular breed of muggy Belgian airlessness. Pregnancy may have assaulted my skin (I'm a red-chinned hormonal mess at the minute), robbed me of some fairly major independent memories (Adam: "You used to live with a girl called Jenny. She was a nurse. She lived in your house for four months." Me: "I have no idea what you're talking about." I am GENUINELY FRIGHTENED that my brain is about to DISAPPEAR) and I have a furious hunger that CANNOT be sated no matter how many ricecakes with peanut butter I gorge upon, but by far the most noticeable side effect is that before I was always cold. Now, I'm always hot. I have my own personal central heating system and it's the size of a canteloupe, apparently. 

Anyhoo. I'm researching creches since I was openly laughed at for not having found one yet. I cannot believe that this child is still in utero and I'm browsing websites depicting arty 50mm shots of fully-grown toddler cherubs with golden curls and gap-toothed smiles having a wonderful time shaking tambourines at their weekly 'La Boite a Musique' class and scoffing organic mid-morning snacks. Yerr whaaaat? And it's all taken on a new urgency since it turns out that the childcare option I sort of had my eye on charges 100 euros per day. PER DAY. Or, in alternative fiscal terms, two grand a month. Hahahahahahaha. Hahahaha. Ha. 

Ahem. And so we will be pursuing other avenues. 

OK, that's my scintillating pregnancy update rant over with. You're welcome. 

So today I had my hair copperfied/de-greyed in Belgium for the very first time. Yes, I have lived here for over two years. No, it is not at ALL preposterous to go back to the UK every time one needs a haircut/colour. My big fear was the language gap: that I would explain in halting French that I wanted a shaggy fringe and my layers tidied up and that somehow that would translate into, 'SHAVE IT ALL OFF, BIG BOY!" Anyway, turns out the owner of the salon is from Manchester and everyone in there is trilingual (of course they are) and the girl who did my hair was actually so chatty I could hardly finish my slutty hairdresser novel. Although she was Spanish (I think), she'd definitely picked up a trace of trademark Belgian directness: "No, we must use permanent colour, the semi-permanent will not cover the grey." Thank you. "And I will not use a toner or an ammonia colour because your hair is dry and in bad condition at the ends." And again, I thank you.

Anyway, it turned out nicely. Gratuitous selfie:

Voila, no grey! And ze hair is in much better condition. Merci, Desiree. 

And this is the slutty hairdresser novel:

There is an apple sticker in the groove on the floor - I am a slattern. 

Everyone reads shite at the hairdressers: it's international law. Plus, in my defence, the choice was this or Cosmo which actually had a two-page spread on 'Decode his Emojis!' BUUUH. Anyway, you've probably heard the premise: mid-20s newspaper hack is paid to have a sexy social life by The Telegraph; it all goes a bit Pete Tong in a sex-and-drugs-and-misery kinda way; but then JUST as she gets herself a prescription for some anti-depressants she meets a fella and has a baby and life becomes all rainbows and kittens and bucolic idylls. As frustrating as it sounds. Yes, I am a prude and a bore. Whatevs.

Wit and wisdom on having a baby

1) My sister: 'Your days become three-hour Groundhog Days. Feed, wind, sleep, change, repeat.' 

2) My mother: 'I won't lie, Laura, childbirth is horrific. If someone had offered to put me out of my misery when I was in labour with you, I'd have gone for it. What can I say? I wasn't in a rational place.'

3) A friend: (incredulous tone) 'You need a creche for September 2015 and you haven't started looking yet? Good luck with that.'

4) A friend's mother: 'When I had David he just booted his way out!' (uncertain pause) 'It'll be different for you, I expect.'

5) A colleague, in response to my lament that I'll have nothing to wear in September: (helpful tone) 'A tent?'


I'm trying to have more thoughts, more words. Maybe it's a school holiday flash-in-the-pan type thing. And I'm about to go on holiday, like - oh, you know, Capri, sun, a pool, a hammock, forty seven books. Oops, mustn't dribble) - but after that, mebbes. 

What's the best* thing anyone's ever said to you about having a baby?

* by 'best' I do, of course, mean grossly insensitive/unbelievably doltish.

picture, also on my baby-related pinterest board 'paddy' (it's just a nickname, allreet?)

**Clears throat**

Hiya. 

This is my face right now. 

It's a face that says, 'Hello, beautiful world! Hello, sunshine!'

It's a face that also says, 'Bedders bought Hobnobs! I haven't had a Hobnob in years! Hobnobs in Belgium!'

And it's a face that says, 'Oh, IB and A level; I have felt your keen whip for nine months, and now I revel in the blessed relief of study leave.'

School is nearly out for summer. We have three weeks left, one of which is a trip for all students to an age-appropriate destination and activity. Year 9 go sailing in France (staff sleep in tents - SHORT STRAW), Year 8 go to some kerrrazy-action-adventure-monkeybars-wonderland in Kent (staff have to swing about on highwires/monkeybars - SHORT STRAW) and Year 7 head to Albertville in the French Alps. 

I mention this purely for the gratuitous purpose of telling you about MY trip to Albertville when I was in Year 8. What's that, Laura - you went on a trip to Albertville when you were in Year 8? Why yes, I did! And I don't know what the staff did on it, really - swilled wine and sunbathed, I reckon, while we visited every slightly shabby swimming pool within a 60 kilometre radius. And poor old Gary Scott was allergic to chlorine, so every time we visited a different slightly-shabby pool, Mr Mulholland would saunter in, ask the spotty teenager behind the desk a few chlorine-related questions in his Frenchy-via-Northern-Ireland accent, and then reemerge with a shrug to say, 'Sorry, Gary. Chlorine.' And in we'd trudge, the wretched swimming cap would go over the previous day's thick red forehead welt, and we'd be entertained for the subsequent three hours by Peter Cantwell diving down to touch the bottom of the pool and then breaking back through the water's surface with arm outstretched shouting 'Two times! Two times!' in the manner of Wyclef Jean (Killing me Softly was the song of that particular summer).

God knows what poor Gary Scott was doing. 

Sooooo anyways. What's the shizzle? Well, my mum and dad and my sister and my nephew (now two! not a baby! how did such a thing happen?) came to Belgium, so that was all rather busy but super-fun. Retirement has turned my charity-and-pawn-shop-obsessed mother into even more of a magpie and we spent a productive morning in Troc, which is basically an second-hand furniture emporium catering for all tastes, with everything from beautiful G-plan teak sideboards to fugly Footballers' Wives-style diamante-encrusted pleather sofas. We bought the green chairs above (TWO FOR FORTY FIVE EUROS! Sorry, I hate it when people do that - but seriously! TWO FOR FORTY FIVE EUROS!) and brought them home on a trolley, navigating roundabouts and dog sh*t - which was a larf. So we had a Sunday Swaparound - hence the photos. 

We spent a morning in Brussels Toy Museum for Theo's sake. The guidebook describes the owner as a "lovely man" who "can't say no" to the hundreds of donations he receives each year, and so result is a "slightly ramshackle but rather quaint" mixture of traditional displays in glass cases and "interactive areas". Reality = the girl on the door announces on entry, 'Everything you can touch, you can catch' (sic). This means TOYS EVERYWHERE. THEO EVERYWHERE. NO HEALTH AND SAFETY CONSIDERATIONS. THEO, DON'T PUT THAT IN YOUR MOUTH DARLING, IT'S DIRTY - IT'S BEEN ON THE FLOOR AND ACTUALLY IT'S A CHOKING HAZARD...OH, AND NOW YOU'RE CRYING, YUP, COME HERE, WE'LL GIVE YOU A CUDDLE...  Repeat to fade.  

Also, it was mint.

Oh, and I'm having a baby. Yah.

Admittedly, this is bigger news than buying some green chairs (however lush they might be) or visiting a mental Toy Museum, but I've never been particularly skilful at this 'got something to tell you' business. So. Yes. So far my thoughts are alternating between 'Arrrrrrrgh!' and 'Ooo, these baby bloomers are delightful - PIN!' 

Please tell me it'll all be OK - that the responsibility of growing and caring for and raising a tiny human being with a HOLE IN ITS SKULL is not really that big a deal and definitely not something I should be having hormone-soaked nightmares about. Seriously, I could do without the nightly horrorscapes re: being an alcoholic country and western singer and losing the plot at a high-profile festival or the one about my teenage nemesis ringing me up about the fact I've missed my piano lessons for three years and Mrs Walker is really annoyed with me. I need reassurance. At the moment, I'm taking the fact the hospital smelt of croissants on my last visit as a good omen, but I could do with something a bit more rational, you know. 

Go on, tell me - it'll be fine, yeah?


***

picture above - yes, I have a pinterest board entitled 'Woof'. What of it?


  

Beauty Incarnate.

My dad. My nephew. Beauty incarnate.

And at this point, that sound you can hear is me sobbing. From Belgium. 

Babynaming: Would a Kevin, by any other name, smell as sweet?

My sister has entrusted me with quite a responsibility. Yesterday, when she called around with mild labour pains - in the early stages of LABOUR, yes - yes, and she WALKED to our house - mentalist! - presented me with her Babies' Names books and asked me to 'make a list' of the ones I liked. 

It's not completely out of the blue - I am admittedly MAD on names. Mad, I tell thee. The disappointment I felt when my mum revealed they were going to call me Eilis when I was born, (then I actually remained nameless for 6 weeks, THEN they called me Laura - I mean, come on, mum. There were TEN Lauras in my year at school. It was THE name of 1983) still eats away at me. Well, I say eats - I means nibbles. But it's still there.

And, being a teacher, I see the fashions in names changing. Names trending and falling out of favour. Names that are over popular to the point of saturation - enough with the Jacks already! Unusual names that work - and those that really don't, eh, Chandler? 

My friend once bought me a Babies' Names book for a birthday present. I was thirteen-ish and wasn't remotely interested in babies - I just loved names. I went through and starred the ones I liked. That same book is now on my sister's nightstand and the names I picked then - well, the less said about that the better. Which is a worry, is it not?

These are the babies' names rules as far as I'm concerned:

1) Nothing too trendy. That means nothing in the top 30 (or the top 32, the way class sizes are going) - you don't want the '10 Lauras in a year group' issue. Well, your child doesn't. And you might send your child to a single-sex school, where the numbers of Avas and Graces and Charlottes will inevitably double. So that means if little old lady names and flower names are trendy for girls, operate on the edge of that trend. Don't go for Lily, go for Violet. Don't do a David Cameron and go for Florence - try Fleur instead. Pretty, non?

2) Nothing too 'out-there'. It needs to be clever and cool, but tradition must be observed somehow, even if it's just on the birth certificate. Well, in my OCD book it does. Would Katherine Duchess of Cambridge have made it to the Buckingham Palace Balcony if she'd been christened 'Kate'? Or, worse, K8? 

(one of my former colleagues had a primary teacher friend who took on a new class with a little girl called La-a in it. Uncertain as to how to proceed, she called her 'Laa' - like, as in 'The Sound of Music 'Laa'. The mother rang up the school. 'Why are you calling my child Laa?' 'Ummm...' 'It's LA-DASH-AH!' Oh my Actual God. Urban myth or reality? You decide). 

3) Don't land your kid with a complex. I spent my whole life with people mis-pronouncing and misspelling my surname. I was a total arse about it. Not everyone will have the strength of character to be like that. And when it's your first name, I imagine it's even worse. Be kind when it comes to spelling.   

Anyway, the book that she's given me is one that she and Krish bought and it is BRILLIANT. It's the Collins Brilliant Book of Baby Names. Have a look. Ignore that there's a picture of a baby wearing a feather boa on the front. If you're having a baby/know anyone who is, I thoroughly recommend you get them this bad boy - they'll thank you profusely. And what I REALLY like about it is this: it gives you the history of the name, but also an opinion of it. There's no pussy-footing about. Have a look at these:

NOVA - Astronomical term for a star that suddenly increases in brightness, then fades; probably works better for a TV science show than a child. 

PENELOPE - Image of elderly gardening lady in large-brimmed hat has of late been counterbalanced by the dramatic sensuality of Spanish actress Penelope Cruz. Chosen for his daughter by Taylor Hanson, of the group Hanson. (WHAT? TAYLOR HANSON IS OLD ENOUGH TO HAVE A CHILD?! More celebrity baby naming madness here). 

DEMOCRACY - Righteous brother of Peace and Justice - all of whom might have a hard time during playground recess.

And so on. They do like some names, by the way. The bad ones just make for better reading. 

It also has regular selections of 10 names under different headings - obvious ones, such as 'Celebrity Babies Beginning with B', for example, but others that appeal to prospective parents' personal preferences, such as 'Short and Strong Names', 'Names That Sound Creative', 'Names Headed for Oxford' and 'Names That Are Trendier Than You'd Guess'. 

Have you heard any interesting names recently? Do you have names picked out for future use? I'd love to hear them.