Telling

So we told the in-laws a few days ago. The wife did manage to give a slight sense of dread by asking for her niece (still at her grandparents' for American Thanksgiving) to leave the room. Though once she was gone we quickly announced we were expecting before they could imagine what horrible things it could have been.

Today we got the letter from UCH giving us the appointment date. No preliminary appointment this time, just straight to the 12 week scan in 3 weeks. L and I discussed if we should take the girl, since she'll be on school holidays by then. L was inclined to do so, which I can understand. Keeping the huge secret from the girl is not particularly nice. On the other hand, I don't want to involve her and get her hopes up until we're sure the pregnancy is all good. I suppose, in part, I'm falling back to my role in the last pregnancy of being paranoid and looking for anything which can possibly go wrong.

Unsurprisingly, we've taken down most of the childproofing and given away all the tiny baby reusable nappies, and the drawer of bottles and pumping equipment is now the girl's craft drawer. Can we get back all the stuff we gave away? When R was 6 months old I honestly thought I'd never be doing this again, so passing these along was the best way to get rid of the clutter. Will the people we gave it to still have it? Do we have to buy it afresh? For that matter, where in the bloody house are we going to put this stuff?

Right, time to start the ebaying and throwing out of stuff we know we don't need (see above to see how comfortable I am with that idea).

Ouch

Yesterday was my second hospital visit with the girl. But this time it was me that was injured.

Our flat is in a bit of a state. Boxes moved from the nursery where L started, but did not complete, putting up rails and things (drill bit broke in the middle). Luggage still unpacked from our recent seaside holiday. All together it makes for a cluttered place not completely safe for a little girl. Which means we have to keep an eye on her when she's playing to make sure she does not stray or play with inappropriate things.

I was in the office working on the PC trying to psyche myself up for doing a bit of taxes. The girl was in the next room with L occasionally running from one room to the other. At one point L said she's heading for the stairs!

I leapt off my box toward the door to catch her, with visions of her tumbling down the stairs and ending up in A&E again.

Instead, I put my foot down on the luggage which slipped from under me, sending me falling to the floor. I came down hard on my left arm and right knee. And slightly less hard on the rest of my limbs. I just lay there on the floor while L spirited the girl away to her cot and fetched some ice for my injuries. Two year old broadbeans, to be specific.

A bit of I think I broke my arm, followed quickly by a Actually no, I'm fine, I'm fine, followed a few minutes later by a OMFG OW! and I declare we're going to UCH for a bit of X-rays before in the influx of Saturday night injuries start.

This time we get public transport to hospital. L's got the girl all bundled up in the sling, and I'm limping alongside them. It was slow, but all was fine until the queue at A&E. I arrived at the magical time where there was a queue, but appear to have been the last person top show for for at least half an hour. I assume I came at the cutoff time after which people should sleep on their injuries rather than face the Saturday night crowd.

When I finally go the the head of the queue I could barely stand. Which meshed well with the receptionist who had reached the end of her shift and could barely think.

Who is your next of kin?

My wife over there [I point to L who is walking the girl around the room].

Okay. Did you come with anyone today?

[Long awkward pause] Yes.    My wife.    Over there.

Oh, you're married now? Congratulations.

[and so on]

I got seen by a doctor who ruled out a broken elbow, but decided my knee needed X-raying. They gave me a handful of painkillers and sent me to the X-ray queue. 45 minutes later a new doctor sees me and says nothing is broken in my ever-swelling knee, but my arm might not be not-broken after all, and it now needs X-rays. I think Whatever. I'm not planning on having any more kids.

More queuing and waiting, and by now the girl is asleep in the sling in L's arms. The doctor says Nope. Not broken. Keep things elevated, get some rest, but move around. And you're not excused from carrying the baby. – a mixed blessing that.

I get out 3 hours after arriving, starving for some food. It was 11, so we'd pretty much missed any decent restaurant in the area (the main reason I decided we'd go to UCH) and also would miss any decent take-away by the time we got home.

Fortunately the girl sleeps all the way through the trip home and being put in her cot. Meanwhile I make us adults a pasta dinner followed quickly by collapsing in bed.

Not the best end to the day, but it at least was only a few wasted hours followed by random pain and discomfort. So I decided to pretend we just had a bad night out at the pub.

Birth story, part 5 (final)

5 weeks later and we're… doing as well as can be expected. She's at the point where she hates being held while I type. So it's really hard to do updates. So I'll take this moment of quiet to finish off the birth story.

All told, the birth went off quite well. No real complaints from me – only minor ones. I really liked the fact that our midwife, after it was all said and done, told us how much she appreciated and was just plain honoured being there at this very special moment. I found that to be be rather sweet and made up for any of the minor grievances I had. And I really appreciated it, since she got to find out the child's name before anyone, including her grandparents. The staff were certainly good at what they did, and I've no complaints about their skills. The only real issue I had was them not understanding/believing when we told them it's likely to be a quick birth. Given how rare that is, I'm not too surprised.

The birth plan

I'll end this chapter with a record of what we'd planned and what actually happened. Just an aside, this is my first time re-reading the plan after the birth.

Turns out, anything that actually followed the birth plan was more coincidence than actual design. I don't the midwives think ever actually read the plan, but I don't really blame them too much, since I'd much rather they did the really essential bits of ensuring the baby came out properly than memorising our wishes – which they could (and sometimes did) ask us about at any point.

First off, we'd planned for a mutual friend and experienced mother to join us at the birthing centre to make sure everything went smoothly and to keep us company during a prolonged birth. The tag-team concept came from experience with tattooing. It seems to help distract the tattooee to just have conversation they can drift in and out of, rather than involve them directly. A friend and I did this with L's last tattoo, and I did that a couple of weeks before the birth with another friend. I figured, long continuous pain is long continuous pain – how different can a tattoo be from labour?
Well, the baby was born the one weekend our tag-teaming friend couldn't make it – she was camping out of mobile reception. So all plans involving extra support were out the window. But, then again, the birth can hardly be considered prolonged, so the help was thankfully not needed.
Outcome: inconsequential fail.

Please knock on door before entering — I have't the faintest idea of they did or not. I don't recall ever being surprised at someone walking in.
Outcome: incidental win.

In case of unexpected problems calm and full information with time to make choices — the only thing unexpected was L started crowning while the midwife was out of the room. It was more us not providing them time to think.
Outcome: win by circumstance.

Pain relief of TENS, breathing, massage, birth pool, gas and air — All except the birth pool, which means we hit that on the head. That said, there was no time at all to get any stronger pain relief if even if we wanted it.
Outcome: accidental win.

Call hospital in advance, request birthing pool — No answer when we tried calling before coming in. They finally understood we wanted the birthing pool maybe 5 min before the birth started.
Outcome: full on fail.

Notify immediate family on way in — oops. We did tell the in-laws after the water broke at least. Perhaps I should have read the birth plan while in the waiting room.
Outcome: fail.

Lighting as low as possible — I don't think the room even had a dimmer.
Outcome: hardware fail.

Music system set up — no iPod doc as expected. Turns out there was an unused one in room 2, where we'd spent 5 minutes after we came in.
Outcome: facilities fail

stay as mobile as possible — she ended up giving birth lying down.
Outcome: failure of possibilities.

Offer father to feel head as crowning — Oops. I forgot we'd planned that. Well, I've cuddled her head enough since then, so I don't see any loss only behalf. L got to feel the crowing head though. I was too busy finding and hitting the Call button.
Outcome: fail.

Foetal monitoring without lying down — nope. The last monitoring of the baby was why L was lying down for the birth – she was unable to get up after that.
Outcome: fail.

Keep vaginal exams to a minimum — Just the one (the can't find your cervix one), so that at least was followed.
Outcome: win.

cord not cut till done pulsing — I'm pretty sure it was pulsing a little, but I've no real basis for comparison,
Outcome: probably fail.

Father to catch baby — forgot about that one too. Oops. I was too busy staring in astonishment. I can't believe I thought I'd be on the ball enough to manage this. I'm glad I didn't – the midwife was very good about the catch-and-put-on-chest motion.
Outcome: fail.

skin to skin immediately after birth — got that one spot on
Outcome: important win.

no wiping or cleaning off of vernix — nope. We'd read shortly before the birth that a study showed that leaving the vernix on means the baby is less likely to suffer dry/peeling skin shortly after birth. turns out the only parts where the vernix wasn't removed, the hands and feet, are the only ones that ever really peeled. No idea if it's a coincidence or not.
Outcome: fail?

no interruption of contact — yup. they were very good about leaving her with us non stop till we left. She was out of our hands for a few seconds while being weighed. Then for a bit while she slept overnight (a few inches from my hand). And once more when the doctor was checking her out.
Outcome: win.

…intervention… — nothing to intervene.
Outcome: win.

placenta to come out naturally, no pulling — "plop" it fell right out. No special convincing needed.
Outcome: win.

Oral only vitamin K — they did try to use scare tactics to get us to take the injections. But it's such a tiny chance of needing it, and generally only if there is a traumatic birth or bruising. So we at least stuck to our guns on this one. I'm still dubious it's needed at all. Regardless, we finished the last oral round a few days ago, and she's still alive.
Outcome: win.

No observing students — I suppose they were all in the labour ward, which was completely full that day.
Outcome: win.

…induction… — she came out nicely on her own. No inducements necessary.
Outcome: win.

avoid formula — she managed to latch on during the first night, so no need to provide other food.
Outcome: win.

All in all, it seems there are more wins than fails. Though most are more wins due to the complete lack of complications to sort out. As I was told, a birth plan just gives the midwives something to ignore. The most important thing is we gave things some though in advance, and that nothing in the birth process came as a shock to us. Well, except (ironically) the startle reflex...

Sunday, 31 July. Most of that morning was spent doing incidentals like holding the girl and taking pictures and sending SMSs and announcements online. And drifting and and out of sleep. My plan of taking chilled coffee and storing in the fridge proved to be a brilliant idea – ice coffee kept me on the ball nicely and let L recover a bit while I watched the girl.

We got though a couple of nappy changes (chocolate-coloured meconium is surprisingly innocuous looking, though rather hard to wipe off), and puzzling at the right level of clothes that would keep her warm, but not too warm. We settled on a onesie and swaddling blanket. Eventually they told us all that was left was the paediatrician and then we could go. So we packed our stuff, readied the girl and waited. Like four hours. Which we spent taking photos, sending more SMSs, and arranging with my in-laws for take-away dinner at the flat.

Apparently the paediatrician saw everyone on the very full labour ward before seeing the two people in the birthing centre. At just before 6 the midwife took us to see the paediatrician. She asked is there anything which concerns you? – something I wasn't quite ready for, or I'd have made notes. She did a bunch of tests. She even checked to make sure the left eye (which I was curious if it was alright) was responding to light ok. Then she did the startle test, which involved her dropping the lass a tiny bit (over the cot) and catching her to make sure she reflexively stuck out her arms – which she did perfectly. The paediatrician told us she was the first infant that day to not cry at this – which made us quite proud of our wonderful child already outdoing her peers.

That and the startle reflex is really neat to look at. I still really have to stop myself from trying it. I'm sure that would be a great way to make the kid hate me.

After the paediatrician, the midwife handed us a shedload of pamphlets and paperwork, including the red book, which is the born-baby equivalent to the pregnancy notes they kept (we made a photocopy of them in advance since we knew they'd not let us leave with them).

L wrapped up the girl in a sling for the trip home. The midwife, in a bit of security theatre, then walked us out of the building, telling us security'd stop anyone with a newborn who wasn't accompanied by a midwife (which I doubt, but I appreciate the chat and company on the way out).

The walk from the exit to the taxi rank on Tottenham Court Road was the longest it had ever been. Such precious cargo, and every step a sort-of first for us, and certainly a first for her. L waited outside the Sainbury's while I looked for an available taxi to hail. A few minutes later we were on the way home. The driver dropped us off and congratulated us on the newborn, which made us both smile.

We arrived back at home at 6:45ish. Fifteen minutes later, we had barely just enough time to settle in before the in-laws showed up with chinese take-away. And thus began the wonderful madness of living with our baby girl.

The birth story. Part 4

Saturday, 30 July 7:05pm. A sense of reality starts to return a bit and the midwife mentions the placenta and having to wait for it or taking drugs to get it out sooner. L says she wants it to come out on its own. So they bring in a birthing stool (a chair with a hole in the seat) for L to sit on. I ask about weighing and the Apgar test. They say they can wait for the measurements and she's clearly fine so doesn't need poking or testing.

We look at the umbilical cord, which is a pale organic-looking tube – reminds me a bit of a pulsing sausage or something. It's nice to finally see it, having been so dependant on it working for so long. I wonder what it's providing to the baby now. Is it just topping up her air and nutrients? I mean, it was working full force just a few minutes ago, and it's clearly still running. The baby can't go long without oxygen, so it must be providing at least some of it, just in case the birthing takes a while. I'm just curious what it's doing and how the mechanics of it shutting down work.

L tells the midwife to wait for it to stop pulsing before cutting it. I've no idea if the midwife did or not, but she eventually clamped it in two places and asked me to cut it. this couldn't have been more than 10-15 minutes after the birth. I specifically mentioned in the birth plan that I had no desire at all to cut the cord, but there I was, handed the scary scissors and in a state of massive suggestion. (now I know why the neighbour named his 3rd child after two of the midwives). So I cut the cord, and a splatter of blood comes out and onto the towels on the floor. The midwife asks if she can take the cord blood for testing. Again, yeah, whatever. It's there. Help yourself.

So the baby is finally free and her own entity for the first time since she was a bouncing ball of a few dozen cells trying to find a nice place to attach to. She doesn't seem to notice, so we don't make a big deal of it. We're just staring at her and smiling.

She's this wee tiny thing with an elongated misshapen head and greyish blue skin with a fine down of dark hair on her arms and back. Her head has dark hair with drying bits of goo in it. It's lighter than mine and L's, but not a lot. She's got a V-shaped widow's peak line of light-coloured hairs at the edge of her hairline which I still don't know what's going on with. Her nails are long and rather sharp. I guess she did get my nails in the end.

Her eyes are still a bit bulged out. She favours her right eye, and is not opening her left much. The blood vessels in her left eyelid are quite visible and I wonder if she scratched it in the womb or hurt it on the way out (turns out there's no persistent problem – she's using both eyes just fine now). She has golden eyelashes. Far blonder than the rest of her hair. Rather odd – normally people have dark lashes and light hair, not the other way around. So I can't tell if her hair's dark and going light or light going dark. With that combination people might think she dyes her hair :)

She has L's nose – I was right about the 22 week scan. (turns out, looking back at the 22 week scan, it looks just like her. We couldn't guess what she looked like at the time, but looking at the scan now, it's clearly her forehead and nose and lips and chin). Her cheeks and mouth and nose look a lot like a baby picture of L taken when she was 5 hours old. She's much thinner in the face, but the resemblance is clearly there (and has been getting stronger as her face fills in). I love the fact that she's me from the side and L from the front.

Around now, the original midwife comes back from her break. She's rather surprised to have missed it all: Wow. That was fast. I'm glad it was so easy. You should consider doing a home birth next time.

After some more gazing at the child the midwife points out that L's feet have turned blue, and asks if this is normal for her. No. No it's not. So she goes to sit on the toilet instead. They take this time to finally weigh the girl. I stand next to her while they put her on the scale. 3180 grams (7 pounds) and 49 cm long. They put a nappy on her (she's already passed some chocolately-looking meconium) and hand her back to me wrapped in a hospital towel. I hold her and stare at her and smile and walk around. She's soooo light, and the first baby that I ever held that didn't melt down after a few minutes.

I say she's very light, but I weighed over a pound less when I was born. L weighed over a pound more. So my family thinks she's a large baby and L's family thinks she's so very small.

I hear a plop from the loo and L says that the placenta has fallen out. This is 40 minutes after the birth – another textbook figure which encourages me. L comes out and picks up the camera and starts taking photos of me holding the baby. It's the first photos of the child and I'm beaming at her in all of them.

L convinces me to give her the baby back. I use the lull to tell a few people about the birth. I send my inlaws an SMS saying It's a girl, but of course you knew that already – what else could I say as tersely? SMS the sister-in-law to let her know she's an auntie. And I phone my parents (curse their lack of GSM phones) and am finally able to say yes, you are grandparents now (the answer to the first question out of their mouths every single time I've called them for the past month).

Meanwhile they check L for damage. Turns out she has class 2 tearing, which the midwife explains that class 1 is minor, class 2 is deeper tear and could need stitches. Class 3 is a nasty tear, and class 4… you don't want to know. Given how nasty she described class 3, I really don't what to know about 4. They initially want to stitch up L, but the midwife who comes on after 8 (when they change shifts) says it's better to just leave to heal as is – which L is fine with.

Things start to quiet down a bit. Around 10pm I start telling non-family people about the birth. I completely forget that we made a list, and just pick a few seemingly at random (a few days later I find the list and realise that I can't be trusted to do this from memory, since I'd still not told them). I joke with L that we should call the people who gave us a lift to hospital and ask if they could pick us up on the way home from the party.

I finally turn to the bag we brought. Three bags, actually. One an insulated bag of food. Still full of all the frozen smoothies we'd planned to keep L going though the long labour. I give her one – may as well not go to waste – and put the ice coffees I brought into the kitchen fridge. I try to eat some of the emergency rations I brought. Turns out they're terrible. Note to self: don't make emergency rations in a hurry, just make your usual tasty food.

It's cold in the birthing centre, so we dress up the baby in pyjamas and a hat and gloves and socks. L is very cold due to the loss of so much mass and fluids, so we wrap her up in blankets so she can doze off. Around midnight I take a picture of the baby and try to upload to Facebook, but the phone fights me and refuses to do so. L goes to sleep on her bed-thing, I lie on the fold-out futon and we put the baby in the cot between us, all wrapped up. I keep a hand on her while I sleep.

Stuff happens with L and the midwife during the night. Something about breastfeeding. But I am oblivious to it while I "sleep".

I wake up at about 5am, and finally get the other phone to upload the baby's photo (I've been carrying around two phones for a couple of months, with SIMs from different operators, just in case one has no reception or conks out or something), though it required ages of fiddling and some annoying app updates to finally get it to work (grrr).

We realise later that, while it's cold in there, we've probably overbundled the wee lass. So we remove the overlarge clothes and just plunk her down on my chest, skin on skin, and I put a towel over us. I have the cutest sweetest most precious thing in the world sleeping on my chest and I am in bliss. I lie there with her for hours.

The birth, part 3

Saturday, 30 July, 6pm. We arrive in the birthing centre, wind our way through the halls, luggage in tow, to reception. The midwife at the desk is the one we'd spoken to on the phone earlier. Rather chipper and likeable. I bitterly wonder why she hasn't been answering the phone for the past hour. We explained the situation and she immediately steps out for lunch. Or so the wife (L) tells me later. All I saw was that she disappeared just after I gave her the hospital notes.

At this point things get a bit mad so I may have a few of the details wrong. I asked L to edit this to make sure I got it right.

They put us in a room with an unmade bed while they prepare a real room for us. We slightly settle in for about ten minutes. Then another midwife comes along to check out L, so she's moved to room 4. I grab all the stuff and L shuffles in, the TENS machine still dangling from her back, and switch in hand. The floor's still wet, so we leave muddy tacks all over the floor. Great, that's sanitary, I think, but at least the midwife cleans it up. I help L out of her pants, and she lies down on the bed to be checked. I notice there's nothing to plug the iPod into. Great. They told me they had docks for those. Grumble.

They check her blood pressure and the baby's heartbeat, which are doing just fine and not noticeably different from that morning. That's one worry smoothed out for me – having just read a story about a woman whose baby went into distress from just the contractions (how annoying is that? I mean being distressed by contractions? That's what being born in all about). Then came the first big check – how dilated is she?

For me, this felt like the first real big moment. For those who don't know, the cervix is what opens up to let the baby out (or stays closed to keep the baby in for most of pregnancy). As a general rule, it opens up to 10cm slowly over the course of labour. When it hits 10cm, then there's enough room for the baby's head (the widest part of the baby) to come out (which is usually around 10cm across, though ours was 11), quickly followed by the rest of the baby. So when I say this was the first real big moment, I mean this is what determines how long the labour's going to take. If the cervix is closed or just a couple of cm dilated, then we're likely in store for one of those 20+ hour labours, punctuated with lots of helping L focus on getting the contraction muscles to work together. On the other hand, a larger dilation means baby comes sooner, usually a few hours of hard contractions. Given L and her sister's births, I imagined the latter (L's sister was born 5 hours after contractions suddenly started. L was born in an ambulance outside a petrol station 10 miles from hospital) and expected maybe 6cm dilation and maybe some notable birth and transition stages. I was wrong.

So, the midwife waits till the current contraction is done before sticking her fingers in and says something like I can't find the cervix. It's got to be in there somewhere, so it must be in an unusual place. So I'm going to guess you're about 8cm dilated. then she left to sort out the room. While she was gone L and I discussed how that was, of course, crap. L's cervix has always been in the usual cervical place – at the end her uterus. It was just so fully dilated that the midwife could find no trace of it. So now we knew. We were in store for a quick labour.

The TENS electrodes have been slipping over the past few hours. I've had to adjust them a few times, but at this point L is sweaty enough that they just keep slipping out of place. I'm wondering if they're actually doing anything for her anymore. The midwife asks would you like some gas and air to which L responds Yes, please or at least would have if she'd have had time to before covering her face with the mask and breathing deep. At this point we'd been in hospital maybe 20 minutes.

We're left alone again for a few minutes with L intermittently breathing the nitrous. I tell her comforting platitudes about how everything is going well, and she gets annoyed about how I'm just saying platitudes about how everything is going well. The midwife comes back and L she says she has to go to the loo. I know it's just the baby's head putting pressure on the rectum. The midwife knows it's just the baby's head putting pressure on the rectum. Even L knows it's just the baby's head putting pressure on the rectum, but if it makes her comfortable, what's the harm? So into the loo she goes.

She sits there around ten minutes. We briefly discuss getting in touch with family, at least L's sister, to let them know labour's begun. But things just got out of hand. The midwife comes back and says she wants to check the baby's heartbeat. She tries, but couldn't do it with L sitting there, so L comes back and lies down on the bed-thing, and the heartbeat is found (all good).

Quick aside. The bed-thing is a curved bed with a giant bean bag chair as the pillow. So it's not very straightforward to lie on.

At this point L points out to the midwife she has the urge to push. She's not very convincing in the it's coming now front. So the midwife interprets it in a isn't that interesting to note kind of way. L is lying on the bed, which is just about the worst position possible for birthing. L just can't get up – which is going to be a real bother for the birthing. I tell the midwife we'd like to use the birthing pool. She says it'll take an hour to clean and fill up. I don't bother mentioning that we'd asked for it when we came in. L and I just look at each other and share a knowing glance of we've not the slightest chance, do we? and L asks, with just a hint of futility, can you start filling it now?

Another aside. I don't know anyone who has successfully used a birthing pool in hospital. Everyone seems to be talked out of it or given some excuse for for why they can't use it. Why do hospitals bother having one? Just to tick a box?

We need a backup to get L into a better position. I ask if we can get a birthing ball. That the midwife can do. So she leaves to get it. I have no idea if she even tries to get the pool cleaned and ready. While she's gone L lies on her right side and tells me to hold her left leg up. The TENS electrodes are still attached, clearly all migrated to the wrong positions. L has the gas in hand to hopefully take the edge off the pain, but I can't recall how much she's actually using (and she has no idea if the gas actually helped. At times it just made her nauseous). Then I see something coming out of her. I just think WTF is that? Is that a placenta? a millisecond later I realise I'm really stupid and that is a gooey matted bit of hair. Before my eyes can pop out of my head I exclaim She's crowning! to L and dive for the call button. Maybe 20 seconds later (though it felt like much longer) the midwife comes back into the room with the deflated birthing ball. well, that's not going to be of much help, now is it? I don't say. Instead She's crowning! comes out of my mouth.

The midwife replies with simply Dear sweet jesus christ!, puts down the stuff, fetches a coworker, starts putting on the blue gloves, and settles in at L's business end.

At this point the midwife says to L In a second I'm going to tell you to pant and not push, and starts adjusting L's bits to not break when the baby comes out. Then the head starts coming out for real this time and L says It burns!

The matted hair is visible again. On an elongated alien head. Which kind of answers the how can an 11cm head come out of a 10cm opening? I was asking the day before. Another contraction and the head is out. It's grey – something I was a little prepared for by all the BBC documentaries on birth I'd been watching. But it's still weird. I look closer and I say That's my ear! On the side of the baby's head is clearly my ear. I'm astounded.

Then the grey torso slides out at the next contraction. There's a face and a body. With limbs. In one move, the midwife scoops her up and onto L's chest. It's less than an hour after we got to UCH.

She's breathing – I can hear her breathing. Several breaths later she cries. Not for very long, but enough to make it clear she's ok. She settles back down to gentle breathing again. She's belly down on L's chest and L is cooing at her and telling her she's so sweet.

I ask the midwife It's a girl, right? I'd not seen the baby from the front yet. Just her face and back. She quickly checks and says, Yes. I've known it was a girl for about 30 weeks, but still, part of me didn't entirely believe it.

The midwife takes a towel and starts brushing her off, she claims it'll get the blood flowing to the skin. I say leave the vernix on, which she promptly ignores and says I am, even though she's clearly not. Whatever. The baby is safe and here and clearly alive and well in L's arms. I'm grinning like a madman. At this point I see the midwife taking note of the time and writing it in the notes. I'm distracted when I look at my child's feet and say to L I know those toes! Those are your toes!

To be concluded...

Birth story, part 2

Saturday, 30 July, noonish. We arrive back home after the being checked out at UCLH. We decide to take things easy and just sit at home watching movies all day.

After a bit of hemming and hawing we decide to bail on the 1:30 meeting of the NCT group. It was at a nearby pub, so we could easily get there – and it would be better than sitting an waiting for the other baby shoe to drop. But quiet and at home won out – mostly due to the fact that all but one couple had emailed saying they couldn't make it. We found out later that one couple had just given birth a few hours previously, just didn't have time to send apologies in advance. Which made me quite glad we decided to stay at home.

The wife was starting to feel unidentified twinges. She had no idea if they were contractions or not. She just kind of guessed they must be since what other uterine twinges are you likely to get the day your water breaks? To be safe, we attached the TENS machine. It's supposed to not work if you start too late, so starting early felt like the best way to go. We put on My Big Fat Greek Wedding and had a light lunch. It's not a great film. But it's a fun film, and a mindless film. We tend to watch it when we need an amusing distraction from the world.

The wife started contractions around 1:30 pm. 5 minutes apart, no pain at all. At the time it wasn't clear if that means the TENS works or the contractions weren't real yet. At this point we were pretty sure that these were not fake Braxton-Hicks but that the baby was coming that day.

When the movie was over we debated if we had time to watch another full length movie, or stick to something shorter in case we're interrupted. We decide on something shorter. She has her first real contraction at 3. At that point it occurs to me then that this is real and we can actually handle this.

The wife phones UCH again. They say to sit tight. At home.

So we sit down to watch the episode of V with the birth of the alien baby hybrid. It nicely set the mood. Over the course of the show, the contractions got stronger, but not too bad and not regular. By the time the show is over we're both having a hard time focussing on it – her with the pain, and me with the concern. When it ends, around 4:30, we give up watching things and just concentrate on the contractions. They're irregularly every 3 minutes or so, but skip every now and again, and are strong enough the wife tells me to note that they're strong. The wife phones UCH and tells them this. They focus on the skip every now and again instead of the every 3 minutes which we found to be the important part. They say to not come in yet.

It's getting awkward calling her "the wife" all the time. I'll switch to "L" from here on out.

Eventually I remember we have music for this. We made a Labour playlist. I start to get out the iPod to play it, but L just says we're going to hospital. Now.

So at 5:00 I start calling UCH to tell them we're coming in. No answer. Over and over again. For 15 minutes (FFS). I can't call both a taxi and the hospital at the same time. Ok, technically I can since we have more than one phone, but I can't focus enough to do it. So I keep trying to call the hospital – especially to let them know to get the birthing pool ready. And while it's ringing I use L's phone SMS some nearby friends and ask if they could give us a lift.

They're just about to head out to a party, so they're happy to stop and get us on the way. At 5:30 we're in the car and on our way. L is in the front seat still timing contractions and making smalltalk. I keep saying potentially unhelpful things like don't go anywhere near Arsenal. Around now contractions are coming every 2-3 minutes and lasting about a minute. Still, L keeps up polite conversation, and stops bothering counting contractions. I am impressed. Later she tells me what is wrong with the contraction timer app she was using and what a good one needs to do. If anyone wants a collaborator for writing one, I can put you in touch.

We get to UCH just before 6, pile out of the car with our 3 bags, and say very brief thanks and goodbyes. We head up to the birthing centre on the 3rd floor. Fortunately we've been there before and can easily find it. Unusually, the lift is there, so there's no where's the sodding lift panic.

Since I was never able to get through to them, the midwives are not ready for us. L sits in reception having contractions while I give them the pregnancy notes and our birth plan. They say thanks though I clearly see that they don't actually read out birth plan – they just file it in with the notes. They start cleaning a room for us, and take L to another room to wait.

To be continued...

The birth story. Part 1

Saturday, 30 July, 5:30 in the morning. I woke up to go to the loo. I came back to find the wife was awake. Both of us could not sleep. The baby was wriggling a bit. The wife played games on her PDA while I tried to get back to sleep. Eventually we both dozed off.

8:30 exactly. The wife taps me on the shoulder twice. Annoyed, I thought This better be important.

My waters just broke

Oh

And, to myself, I thought damn, I was enjoying that sleep, I guess I should get up. I mean, it's not like she was having contractions – water can break at any time, but we should probably do something about it.

So, after a bit more harsh wakeup, we get up. I check the heartbeat – it's just fine, and she's definitely still moving. Now that water is going the wife's belly is all solid. Which is an interesting change from its previous fullness. She asks me to check the colour of the water. To which, in my colourblindness, I respond I am not going to be able to differentiate a subtle green tint. Use your magic colour vision to tell.

After a bit more blather, we eventually call birth centre. There's a nice person on the other end who had a calming effect on us. She redirected us to the foetal assessment unit (MFAU). They are not nearly as friendly. They start out by asking if I'm calling from within the hospital. No, I'm at home. I was transferred on the phone to you (from someone who seemed to have more of a clue, to my annoyance). They don't want to speak to me, they'll only speak to the wife. I say fine, and in a great relief, hand her the phone, saying she'll only talk to you and walk off, relieved that I don't have to deal with that call.

I go off to put the dishes in the dishwasher. I don't want to come home after a week to moulding dishes. I finish as the wife gets off the phone. They say come in for a speculum exam. Leave the bags at home and just come in, she tells me. But without any contractions to go along with it, I figure we have 92 hours max, 48 most likely. So we will see the baby soon. There's no need to rush now. I wonder if we have time to make the NCT meet at the pub later.

Our roles seem to have reversed. The wife is panicking and worried about foetal distress. I'm calm and don't see anything untextbookish or worth worrying about. The heartbeat is solid. She's moving a bit less – but there's so little room for the wee one to move around in. I suppose the foetal assessment unit put some panic in the wife by implying she was out of the midwives' hands and now only fit for the labour ward. I figure it must be the clueless person on the other end of the line confusing the matter. Water breaking is hardly a birth complication.

So at 9:30 it's not-very-rushed breakfast of smoothies for everyone. I bathe, since this could be my last time for days. The wife doesn't since she thinks she's guaranteed to get messier from here on out.

We pack an ipod, camera and the pregnancy notes. Neither of us have any cash, so no taxi for us. So we take the bus which miraculously comes soon. We transfer to the tube at Finsbury Park. It looks like it'll be an Arsenal game later, so it could be very hard to get home afterwards. I push that to the back of my mind for later.

On the tube there are plenty of seats, but the wife makes a man move out of the priority seat anyway. I giggle. I'm guessing it'll be her last chance to do this and it gives her some sense of control. This, of course, was violated by london transport inspectors accosting her and demanding to see her card on the way out of the station. Bloody twats. She's clearly very pregnant and exiting the tube at a big maternity hospital. The these two London Transport idiots surround her, stopping her from going anywhere and don't let her say more than Do we have to do this now — before cutting her off and demanding ID. Really uncalled for and certainly did not help her mood.

After that unwarranted attack from London Transport, we make our way to the UCLH MFAU. When we arrive there just after 10am, there's no one there. A nice very pregnant woman sitting in the waiting room lets us in. People with appointments start showing up, and we let them in. Eventually some staff show up just as we started regretting not making pancakes for brekky.

We're finally seen at just before 11. The midwife is very friendly and bubbly. Thankfully – our mood had been slowly darkening since that fist phone call at 9. The midwife spent most of the time chuckling. Everything is fine. The waters are clear, her blood pressure is fine. She decided there was no point checking dilation or anything since it's just a question of waiting for contractions to start. We're now at 80% chance of a spontaneous labour in the next 7-10 days. She asked us to come back Sunday morning (the next day) after the morning shift change at 9ish. They'll check the state of the baby, and if there's no strong need to induce, they'll start the wife on antibiotics (since once the waters break the risk of infection goes up) – though the midwife was rather keen on inductions. After that morning I had not intention of putting any effort into making it there on time. I figured if we did need to go back, we'd have a proper leisurely breakfast first.

So out we go, and back home on the tube. We stop on the way to pick up some cash so we can get a cab next time.

So very different

I was talking to my parents over Skype a bit ago and my father mentioned that things have changed since they were new parents. I agreed and pointed out that we were chatting overseas over video for free. Since then I've been thinking about all the ways things are so very different now.

Birth philosophy has changed, making it far closer now to how it was in the grandparents' time. Except there's far more washing of hands. For a while everything was clinical with mothers giving birth on heavy drugs on their backs and feeding the kids of this highly artificial but easy to store cow's milk product. Now we know on your back is probably the worst way. The coccyx just blocks the whole exit making things much harder. Birth positions are quite varied – under water, on a bouncy ball, leaning against the wall, etc etc. Drugs are still strong, but much more targeted to avoid affecting the offspring. Breast feeding is still a bit awkward in the UK, with about 20% of children still getting breast milk after 6 months – but at least medicalness and legislation is trying to make it easier.

Nappies. As far as I can tell, there are like 30,000 alternatives for nappies. At least we've got velcro now, and don't have to deal with pins.

Information is soooo much easier to come by. The wife posted a comment about how the baby seems to have engaged, and she got lots of replies saying things like my baby dropped 2 weeks before I gave birth and other really useful things. It's like having the joint experience of all your friends and relatives, and a few strangers on tap. I can hardly imagine how hard it must have been just not knowing and not knowing you didn't know.

We've known the sex of the child for about 26 weeks now. It makes picking names much easier. And we've already got a bunch of clothes. Not that getting unisex clothes would have been so hard – I have no idea what people used to do. Just do the bulk of the shopping after the birth?

I don't know what they did in my parents' day when it came to exposing children to music. Especially while they're still in the womb. Put on record after record? Put on the radio and hope for something good? The wife and I put together a playlist of 3200 songs combining our favourite appropriate contemporary music and a huge chunk of classical music. We just hit play and let it go until we need to turn it off. The other day work gave me an iPod nano as a baby shower present. Quite nice of them – I really appreciate it. I've whittled the playlist down to the 2500 songs that fit on it. We can now play it all day at a fraction of the power consumption of the PC we used to use. Plus UCLH apparently has iPod docks, so we we can have music for the birth without needing to being a laptop (no wifi, what's the point?).

Some months ago I made a list of things cultural things I wanted to export the kid to. A fair chunk of that was meant for when she's older and can read herself or watch TV, but one thing I really want to do is use Skype video and get her grandparents to read to her. I really want her to get to know them, and them living on another continent would otherwise make it hard. But as long as they're comfortable reading to a small camera… I just have to figure out where to position the camera so it looks like they're making eye-contact.

Remaining NCT classes

I've been quiet for a bit. It's a combination of the job and getting the house ready. She's not popped yet. Anyway, I never wrote this bit up, so I may as well do this now while I have time...

The second NCT class was a few weeks back. It went well and was a reasonably productive use of time. It was unusually hot for England and I seemed to be the only one not boiling in the room. I don't see how they could all be hot and me not - though I was sitting under the air conditioning for part of it. None of the pregnant women seemed to believe me when I said it was the coolest spot and they could have it.

The updated expectation count is 2 known girls, 3 known boys and one guess of each. I'm a little let down that we don't have the drama all the books prepared me for. I can't see how any of these couples will break up between last week and next week – perhaps the people in the book took courses longer than 3 days over two weeks? We were supposed to have eight in the class, but one couple gave birth before the first class. I'm curious if their experience will differ from anyone else's. I mean, will going on the course have made a difference?

For one of the sections we split into preggos and partners. The partners' group focussed on fatherhood and the role we'd play. The women's group more focussed on squidgy things. One father mentioned his concern with gang culture, and how he was afraid of his son being drawn in. One of the fathers was a teacher and said that it was easy enough to stay out of the gang culture as long as you didn't actively try to be part of it – which is a mixed relief.

There also was a bit of discussion in our group of how to fix all the things our parents did wrong. One person mentioned his insufficiently affectionate father, and how he wanted to change that. I mentioned how my parents told me once they were trying to fix all the things they saw wrong with how their parents raised them. I, similarly, am going to try to fix all the things I see my parents to have done wrong. I said at the time Either we will slowly move to perfection, generation after generation, or, more likely, each generation will just repeat the mistakes their grandparents made.

One couple were both women. The non-pregnant one was convinced they were having boy, and was a bit worried about the impact of not having a male influence. I mentioned that it's generally not an issue and that there's plenty of cases of men raised by one or two women who turn out perfectly well. Or at least no more screwed up than anyone else. Every family is going to be missing some aspect of some gender role. You do the best you can between you, your friends and family. I'm pretty sure someone quoted a few lines Philip Larkin's famous poem at this point, but that may have been later.

I was reminded of Patrick Macnee who was raised by two lesbians in 20s and 30s, and spoke well of the experience. From what I understand, he seems to be reasonably well adjusted. That and I'm impressed that they managed to get away with such a relationship back then.

I'm glad to see that all the group pregnancy events we've been to so far has had at least one lesbian couple. Admittedly the Meet the ISIS Midwives event at UCLH may have just had two friends rather than a couple – it's hard to tell when there's no signs of affection between them. Anyway, it's nice to live in a place where the only issue is that the course leader has to remember to say partners instead of fathers.

The next weekend was the breastfeeding workshop. It was a more air-conditioned venue, but otherwise wasn't as nice. I learned stuff, but it felt rather rushed. The course leader wasn't as friendly or forthcoming with personal anecdotes. The most interesting part was watching the video of newborns being placed on their mothers' torsos and crawling slowly by themselves into place to feed. Instincts are nice!

On a separate note, the wife is getting close to the end. A bit irritable due to all the discomfort – swollen painful hands and feet, back pains, etc etc. I don't know if that means she'll go into labour soon, or it just means she's reached the end of her tolerance. We'll see in a few days.

A day at NCT

Today was the first NCT class. For the uninitiated, the NCT is the National Childcare Trust a charity which, amongst other things, runs antenatal classes. First off, a whinge from me about while they have student rates, they're only for students under the age of 22. Why even bother having a student discount at that point? why not just call it a young person's discount? How many 21 year old pregnant women do you know that are flush with cash because of they have full-time jobs?

Ok… that rant over, it was an interesting class. All the women were first-time mums-to-be around 34-36 weeks along and seemed to be in the 30 to 40 year old range. It was good to see I wasn't the oldest partner there, and the wife wasn't the youngest or oldest either. I'm assuming the matching up of people in similar circumstances was intentional. The first thing I noticed was how very pregnant all the women looked. I'm used to be around a single rather "full" looking woman, but the extra 6 made for an exercise in comparing bump size and shapes. Some carried small or hid it with their clothes rather well, but most were in the tight or flowy attire that emphasises them as eye-poppingly wow-that's-pregnant. It felt a bit leery to look around and judge everyone like that, but it's really hard to not be amazed at how the body transforms.

A lot of the day was nicely informative. There was stuff I'd not come across before in books or in documentaries. So it was helpful going (still undecided if it was worth going – I'll wait till it's done to decide that). Chatting to a nice sample of other couples who are facing the same issues also helped (Oh, you've not packed a bag yet either, I feel better now). I suppose that's one of the main benefits of the class. So, of the lot of us, there's 1 girl, 2 boys, 2 who don't want to know, and 2 I didn't get around to asking. Most people have decided on at least one name, and no one wants to say what that name is (though people are happy to say what names they've ruled out). There's a roughly even split between the Whittington and UCH, plus one planned for Homerton and one debating between home birth and Homerton.

The bits of the day that felt most awkward for me were the breathing exercises. Partly because I won't be doing it – she will. And partly because I kept having to stop myself from dozing off (see last night). I question the wisdom of, right after lunch, asking everyone to close their eyes, imagine a relaxing place, and breathe slowly. They also suggested trying to match breathing between the two of us in order to be a calming influence. That so can't work for me. I've tried it before. My lungs are literally (according to the peak flow meter) twice the volume of the wife's. So if we try to match breathing I start to suffocate due to lack of enough oxygen.

We're back again tomorrow to learn about pain relief, drugs and suchlike.

Home Stretch

From today we have 4 weeks to go til the due date. The wife's doing well, though the hardcore pregnancy effects are starting to take hold. Especially the feet swelling. I doubt we'll be doing much in the way of marches anytime soon. Milk production seems to be kicking off. Which means I expect more and more achey breasts.

We saw the midwife today. The wee one is head down, but not yet engaged (thank sod). Heartbeat's doing fine, she's the right bump size. So all seems good.

I'm adjusting my life a bit too. No more work travel. I'm also hoping to get my big work project done before the birth. Due date's the 22nd. Project completion on the 27th. So there is a chance. But I'm also worried that during some important meeting or workshop I'll get a phone call saying "birth in 2 hours" and I'll have to drop everything and run. We're also trying to get all the work on the flat done in time. At least get the home into a liveable state so we can fill it with baby things and stuff. In the meanwhile we're living in the dining room until all the bedroom floors are done. Fun! I've been moving all the furniture in the flat from room to room. Each time I move things I seem to be clumsier and clumsier. Cursed narrow Victorian hallways.

I keep being shocked to realise it's four weeks left. I keep thinking it's five, which is just fine. But when I remember it's four, I kinda head to panic mode. I just need to make sure I don't actually panic.

I do look forward to the kid being around, but also I do like her where she is. It's fun having a mystery wriggle-beast in the wife's belly. Plus no nappy changing yet – I'm not looking forward to that, tho I suppose I'll just deal with it when I can. I've got the intensive NCT classes starting tomorrow. I hope they do actually prepare me for what's in store. I'll be really annoyed if they're no better than reading a selection of books - they're not cheap.

Meet the midwives

Today was the week 34 midwife appointment. Each one seems to be less milestonish than the one before. Today they took blood and urine and blood pressure. All seemed perfectly normal. They didn't bother with weight or anything. They did a quick palpation for the little one's position: head down, back to the right side. Then checked for the heartbeat. Barring the confirmation that she's head down, nothing was particularly interesting there. I can hear the heartbeat myself at this point – so nothing new for me.

Though, now that I think of it, I suppose the wife would like to get to hear it too.

Last week we went down to the open house "meet the midwives" day they do at UCH for people in low risk pregnancies. If you are low risk you can use the birthing centre and are generally just attended on by midwives, seeing a doctor only if things warrant it (and to be discharged). They have the open house so you can get to know them. Or perhaps so they can get to know you and treat you less like an ungrateful incubator when the time comes.

I noticed a few things. First, most of the blokes there looked really uncomfortable. The wife pointed out that none of the other couples did anything like holding hands or showing signs of affection. Another thing – about half the people were late. I shouldn't judge people on things like that, but it annoyed us that we sat through the same questions more than once. FWIW, I was pleased that when the 2nd midwife answered the same thing as the 1st one.

We weren't the oldest ones there. The youngest looked in their late 20s (though it's kind of hard to tell). But it makes sense if you think that only the older 1st time people really care to go out of their way to plan every detail of the birth. I can see how a 20 year old wouldn't be arsed.

Anyway, I am glad I went. I got my tedium questions answered How is parking - Hard. Just pay for a nearby car park; Is there Internet access - No. That sort of thing. And at least none of the midwives give me the creeps, which bodes well.

As a side note, somehow, not long ago, babies became cute instead of annoying. I now go over to friends' places to see or play with them. I'm not quite sure when that started. I know that anytime I see a small child and parents in public I observe them - that I know started after the pregnancy. But it doesn't feel any different than when we were looking for a flat and I noticed and observed every estate agent and for sale sign I saw.

I feel like I'm testing myself. Watching children to see what behaviour I can tolerate and what I still think is inappropriate (and avoidable to a good parent, I'm sure). I do believe I can do this and actually enjoy it, all the while not messing up this girl too terribly.

Now we are reading

Quiet. It's been a while since I’ve posted. I've been rather busy. The job ended up not going all wrong. I was at risk of redundancy, but ended up moving to a completely different business unit that has nothing at all to do with the pit of despair my old job had become. The new job actually means doing things I'm good at and enjoy and seeing what I do have positive results.

The downside is that, by the time I get home I’m knackered, and have no interest doing anything with a computer. So blogging has kind of fallen by the wayside.

That and this bloody cold which won't end for two months now. It's faded out and come back so many times now. I'm finally on antibiotics, and I appear to be getting better now – we'll see if it keeps this time.

For the first few weeks of the cold, I tried avoiding the wife so I don't pass on my cold. But after I while I realised that if she's not got it by now, she's not going to. So I'm a bit more comfortable being around her, but I'm still a bit wary.

By the way, it's a girl.

We found out in week 12 and got confirmed in week 21. But I never go around to posting about it. I don’t see any reason to keep anyone in suspense anymore.

In other news, I've taken up reading to the wee one. I've figured that babies-in-utero have ears, and they should work. And I'd like mine to recognise me at least a little. The baby is bound to bond with the wife – everything about her is familiar. I'd like some baby-bonding with me, and the only way I can think to get through is by talking. So I read. Mainly fairy tales. It's practice, you see. However, with the cold, reading hasn't been so easy, so I've not done it much lattely.

Last night the wife pointed out research that says exactly what we thought and that babies do recognise sounds from when they were in the womb. So, with my cold at a lull, I started reading again. But this time I decided to be practical and read sections of the UCLH guide to their pregnancy services (a booklet in dire need of a copy editor – there are soooo many grammar and stylistic errors in there). After all, we're going there so we need to know what's in store for us.

Since I was reading mostly for the wee one's benefit, decided to change all the pronouns and read directly to her. Stuff like:

You will be thoroughly examined by a paediatrician or midwife or neonatal nurse skilled in examination of the newborn infants, to ensure that there are no unexpected problems and you have adapted to life well. This usually happens before you leave the hospital and is done in the baby clinic on the ward. If your patients choose to go home before you are examined you will be given a time to return to the hospital to be examined, this should normally occur within 72 hours of your birth.

After all, the little one needs to know what she's getting in to.

Ten weeks to go.

The next scan

The twenty week scan (done at week 22-and-a-bit) was not as exciting as I'd hoped. The baby is too big to see all at once, so the whole process is a bit of here’s a cross-section of the head, here's the heart… kidneys, leg, other leg, toes, arm, hand, fingers. And spine. Lots of time going up and down the spine. All very useful and quite telling for a medical technician. But for a parent it's not so much a baby as a guide to its organs, like an X-ray on an adult. I had to just visualise in my head what the baby as a whole looks like: in foetal position, hands in front of face, sitting on my wife's cervix.

They did tell us the sex, though. It was the same thing we were told last scan, but with more certainty. So even that didn't phase us much – which I think disappointed them. Lots of it's a… and pauses for dramatic effect from the technicians , with just a slightly interested Oh, that's nice from us.

Also they kept saying things like do you want to know the baby's gender. I kept have to stop myself from correcting them No, I want to know the sex. I'll let the baby choose their own gender when they're old enough.

Starting to show

She's starting to have actual signs of pregnancy. The bump is starting to show – though you'd not tell if you didn't know her. The one thing that really makes it clear is that her navel is getting shallower. We didn't expect that to happen until near the end, but apparently it's happening now. This is making it obvious she's not just getting fatter – that would just make the navel get deeper. But now it's shallower. I can see the bottom of her navel for the first time. Neat.

One thing I find odd is that the uterus is hard. It's not like palpating the belly, which is soft with firmer muscle underneath. The uterus actually feels like a bit of armour under the skin – which kind of makes sense, since the foetus does need to be protected. I just always assumed before that, if people can feel their child kick, it must be soft. It's definitely not soft.

---

In other news, I did what felt to be the weirdest announcement of the pregnancy so far today. We had some friends over for dinner. One of them brought up the difficulty of finding their way in a hospital. I, of course, was immediately reminded of our attempt to find the right department at UCH at our first appointment. It being a fitting anecdote, I wanted to bring it up, but needed to give that essential bit of context. I ended up saying On that note, I have an interesting story. But first, she's pregnant [much congratulations and suchlike follows] So anyway, we were at UCH trying to find the right pre-natal department…

At this point keeping it quiet is actually getting in the way. Having to delete the occasional Facebook wall post, hiding books when people come over, etc. I really do need to make a public announcement, and soon, before someone else lets the cat out of the jar for me.

Seeing the GP

She had the wk16 appointment on Monday. A minor event which consisted only of getting the GP up to speed with what the midwives at UCH have done so far. I joined her, as usual, since two brains remember things better than one. For the most part it was going through what paper work the UCH had and what the GP needed, and how they kind of, but don't really talk to each other except via the folder we take to the appointments. So the wk16 appointment appears to be more administrative that medical.

However, Our attendance was rewarded at the end, when the doctor asked do you want to hear the heartbeat?

Of course, the answer was yes, so she spent the never several minutes waving a small wand over the wife's belly trying to find the heartbeat. We got to hear the placental blood flow plus the various standard noises the innards make, but the foetal heartbeat was being elusive. Eventually she found the little tyke, and we got to listen to the rapid thumping for a little bit before the batteries finally gave out. Which makes me rather glad she found it when she did.

It was nice to hear the heartbeat. Any reminder that my offspring is still in there is a good thing – there are not enough clear external signs yet. It seems to cheer me up as well, so I spend the rest of the day in a fairly good mood.

Ultrasound

Monday was the ultrasound scan. We found the place pretty easily this time since it where we accidentally ended up when we first went to UCH. At the reception they asked if we wanted photos from the scan, which would cost £2. The wife asked if they were on CD, to which they replied that the photos were on paper.

At this point a couple of things struck me. First that, really, in 2011, they would just print out the photos? Surely it would be trivial to burn to CDROM. The second was £2? Surely the cost of ink and paper would be only a few pence. I can see how they get away with it. £2 is certainly more than it actually costs to print the scan, but it's just small enough to say well, why not? So they get away with it (though I did overhear that some hospitals don't charge at all.)

We were called back immediately which was nice, especially since we were early (wanted to get to work at a reasonable hour, and the appointment was at 10). The usual height, weight and blood pressure, then we went to the ultrasound room.

The ultrasound machine had a massive CRT monitor. Another thing I'm surprised to see in 2011.

There were two technicians. One was obviously a bit more experienced than the other. However, the less experienced one was chattier and spoke loud enough we could clearly hear her, which was nice. She started the scan by pouring a mass of cold jelly on the wife's belly and moving around the magic sonogram wand. She said this is the bladder (big empty space), and this is your uterus (a smaller empty space), followed by you're definitely not 12 weeks pregnant.

At this point I do a minor very small panic. I mean, I know it's been 12 weeks. She tested positive at 5 weeks, and we couldn't be off by more than 2 weeks, and even a 10 week foetus would certainly be visible, and there was nothing there. One of the worries we'd been having was that there was no real direct sign she's pregnant. What if she's not pregnant? What do we do? Start trying again? Wait til we're more financially stable? What could have gone wrong? There's been no obvious showing or sickness. The only signs were the aching breasts. And lack of periods for 3 months. And oversensitive senses. And two positive tests. And she gets full really easily. And she.........

In the five seconds I'm doing my panic, the other technician comes over and says try looking over here, moves the wand a few cm and there it is on the monitor. A tiny little squirming person painted in little grainy specks.

Wow. It's real.

Still ultrasound pictures just don't prepare you for a real scan. The pictures are just blurry snapshots that you have to wrap your brain around. They never look like a baby. They look like… I don't know… something anatomical.

When it's live on video, it's clearly a baby. Your brain interpolates the video frames into the real picture. It's got the classic baby button nose and face. Hands and toes and it wriggles and sucks its thumb. Gets bored and turns over just when the technician is taking a measurement. All kinds of things a human would do (or a puppy, I'm not being prejudiced).

They measured all kinds of things. The more refined due date is 22 July, adjusted by 1 day from our initial estimates. We also got to hear the heartbeat (and see it). It's really very fast, like a beagle or something. For the nose bone measurement, the technician had to gentle prod the wee one to get it to move its hands out of the way. It was kind of cute watching it move.

I asked if they could tell the sex. The technician responded that it's not very clear this early and they wouldn't know for sure. She looked at the scanner for a bit and told us, saying that she was 70% confident. Given that that's only slightly better than the 50% chance of random guessing, I won't mention it here til we know for sure.

After the first set of scans they handed me the printouts of some of the better shots of the foetus. I flipped through them while the wife was having her BMI taken. They’re small and grainy (and at some point I'll have to find a scanner to get them digitised), but they're they only shots I have of the wee one, so they're kinda special anyway.

There was some more waiting while the test results came in. We hardly had time to slip through the scans before they called us back in for the results. All the blood tests and measurements showed nothing to be concerned about, which was a great relief. So I'm a bit more comfortable telling people now. So I think I'll start telling family and some friends in person (those we can manage to meet in person, it's so hard to meet up with people in January) before making any sort of public announcement.

The first antenatal appointment

We had our first antenatal appointment at UCH on Thursday.

First of all, the EGA wing at UCH has like fifty different maternity and baby-related departments, so even if you know what floor you're going to, that doesn't really help. Finding the right building was easy, especially since I went to UCL next door and have been up and down Gower Place hundreds of times (though that was before the renovations). But finding the right room... I guess they don't realise that to someone not used to the whole having children thing, that every single department is a synonym for pregnant, child, or mother (maternity, fetal, antenatal, etc).

We found the right room after a small diversion in the ultrasound waiting room.

About 1/4 of the women there were accompanied by men. I definitely plan to go with the wife to all her appointments. It's not that I don't trust her, I just want to know what’s going on with my offspring and what we should expect.

I also know how easy it is to get swept up in things and never get a chance to ask those burning questions which have slipped your mind. With two of you, there's more of a chance to not miss anything. It's like when one of us sees a spider – the one who sees the spider freaks out, and the other one mumbles "Oh, FFS" and just deals with it. It doesn't matter who sees the spider first. I guess it's the whole "I must protect my partner" instinct that kicks in. The same thing happens in doctors offices. The one who's being seen is intimidated by the doctor and the other one asks all the difficult questions.

They took blood and urine and a bit of a family history. Eventually they asked some questions about me, so at least I didn't feel too much like a fifth wheel. Then came the shedload of paperwork and information. I've only made it most of the way though one of the pamphlets, so I'll likely post about that later.

Apparently she needs to be seen every fortnight or so, alternating between our GP and UCH. We set up two more appointments and I suppose we have to sort out the GP ones ourselves. The next is the 12 week ultrasound which is coming up soon. I'm really looking forward to that since, so far, we have no idea if things are going well or not. I mean, the wife seems healthy and getting by just fine, but, beyond the sore bosoms, there's really no active sign anything's going on.

We're going with UCH now

The paperwork from UCH (UCLH?) arrived in the post the other day. They sent us two appointments, one for the initial "let's get the ball rolling" appointment (or at least I assume that's what it's for) in a week and another on 10 Jan for the first ultrasound. It strikes me as odd that they just say "and you show up here now" rather than "call to make an appointment for when it's good for you." Not that we couldn't just phone to fix it.

The other thing that strikes me as odd was some of the terminology. The ultrasound is described using both least-common-denominator words like "tummy" as well as precise jargon like "transducer".

The paperwork comes with the appointments, a couple of pamphlets (more on that later) , plus two forms to fill in if you want to do any studies. The scientist in me is fascinated. Yes please. I want to enrich human knowledge. I've always wondered things like where they get people for tests like this, or, for that matter, newborns for TV shows and movies.

I mean, you've got a really small window for when they look like a newborn. And births don't lend themselves to planning well. I can just picture planning the shooting schedule for a season:

"Ok, we need a newborn for next October for the birth show. We're shooting on the 11^th. Can you find six women due just before then? Whoever's got the most attractive kid by the 8^th we'll hire. "

Scientific studies I suppose are harder:

"I've got a theory that we can detect Foobars Syndrome as early as 7 weeks!"

"Great. Now we just need to find someone freshly knocked-up and knows it and has a GP aware and willing to pass on your study and can get referred to us in time."

"You're right. Maybe I should ask for volunteers in the department."

Picking a hospital

So the Whittington does a Maternity Ward tour on Saturdays at 3. We braved the cold to have a look. Turns out they do some Saturdays, and randomly cancel when they're too busy. Would have been nice if the website said that. Oh well. To cut a pocket-sized story short, we've decided on UCH. Now to start the referral process...