Postnatal Diaries

Frankie

Brring Brring! Brring Brring!

“Hello?”

“Hi Francis, it’s Helen, one of the midwives from Midhaven Royal Hospital. We have a bed available for you now! Could you get here for three o’clock?”

“Great! Yes, definitely. We will see you then!”

I hang up the phone, an excited smile already splitting my face.

Ten years.

One miscarriage.

It was all leading up to this point. This one moment where I finally became a mother.

Nine long anxiety filled months were finally over. This last month had been the worst. Not only because I was just generally big and uncomfortable, but the doctors had decided after many tests that I had gestational diabetes, so I had the extra worry of trying to keep my sugar levels under control and pricking my finger after every meal, which was getting very boring. At forty-one, I was already in a slightly higher risk category for my pregnancy, so it had been advised by my obstetrician that I would be inducted at forty weeks, but this last-minute introduction of another risk factor meant they had moved it forward another week. So here I was, at thirty-nine weeks, finally being called into hospital for the induction process to be started.

“Miles…Miles!” I lean across the bed to my sleeping husband and shake his shoulder to try and rouse him.

“Wha…?” His word disappears into a wide yawn.

“The hospital just rang. We need to get there for three.” His sapphire blue eyes spring open and his excited smile soon mirrors mine.

“We’re having a baby, baby!”

“Well, probably not today, remember. It could take a week or more before the induction works.”

“Psh! This baby girl is ready to make her appearance,” he grins as he rests his large hand reverentially on my globe-like belly. “And I’m more than ready to meet her.”

Hauling myself off to the shower – feeling weird that it was potentially the last time I would be showering with my pregnant belly getting in the way – I can’t help but smile as I listen to Miles excitedly phoning our close friends and family to tell them that we were going into hospital this afternoon.

My hospital bags had been packed for weeks, checked and triple checked. Baby’s bag was also stuffed full of everything I could possibly think I would need, including the perfect coming home outfit – the very same pink baby grow and hand-made knitted cardigan my own mother had brought me home in. My most comfortable clothes were lying out on my bed ready for me when I walked back into the bedroom, along with a steaming cup of decaffeinated Earl Grey tea. All the way through my pregnancy, Miles had been looking after me like this. He was attentive generally, but I really felt like a spoilt queen the last nine months. The rest of the morning flies by, and before I know it, we’re all packed up and in the car on our way.

Miles slips his hand off the steering wheel and into mine. “I really don’t know how you are being so calm. I can barely concentrate on the road I’m so fucking nervous.”

“I don’t know.” I shrug, trying to keep the excited grin from spreading my mouth too wide. “I feel nervous and excited and anxious, but I’m just ready to do this now. I’m fed up with being pregnant now.”

“I know, baby,” he says, squeezing my hand gently. “But you’ve done fucking brilliantly all the way through. I love you so much.” He picks our joined hands off his lap and presses a kiss to the back of my hand, his few days old stubble tickling my skin a little.

I turn to my husband and exchange loving smiles with him. “I love you, too.”

After having two sweeps done, you think I would have gotten used to having people sticking their fingers up my vag, but it didn’t get any more comfortable or less embarrassing, especially as I hadn’t been able to shave down there for months. I was rocking a proper seventies bush right now, I’m sure. Plus, my legs were also in dire need of a razor blade.

“Okay then, Francis,” the midwife gives me a friendly smile as she perches on the side of the bed next to me. “If you can pop your feet together as close to your bottom as possible, and just let you knees flop open as wide as you can, that’s lovely.” I suck in a deep breath and try to remember my breathing techniques as she starts pushing deep inside of me. “Okay…so I would say you’re still at about one centimetre dilated. I’ll insert the pessary now and we’ll give it twenty-four hours. Once it’s in place, I just need you to stay still for about half an hour, but then you can get up and have a wander if you want.”

Holding still again, I try not to grimace too much as she slides the tampon-like hormone coated pessary up against my cervix. All being well, this will get my cervix dilating, and possibly kick-start my labour. If not, I will have to endure this whole procedure again tomorrow.

“You okay?” Miles asks, settling into the chair next to the head of my bed and taking my hand. I nod, my eyes pinned to the monitor next to me, which was tracing my baby’s heartrate, the soft whooshing a soothing soundtrack filling the room.

“I’m okay.” My default answer when I was asked how I was feeling. I knew it drove Miles mad. We’d been together for over twenty years, so he knew when I was lying, but most of the time when I was asked if I was okay, I just couldn’t articulate what I was actually feeling so it was just easier to say everything was fine.

The roll of his eyes gave away the fact that he knew I am bullshitting, but thankfully he let it slide this time. “I might go grab a coffee if you’re okay, then.”

“Yeah, fine. I’ll be right here.” I flash what I hope is a cheeky smile at my lame joke, and he leans down to press a soft kiss to my forehead.

“I’ve got my phone on me, but I should only be ten minutes or so.”

I nod, slipping my headphones on and loading Netflix on my phone. “Don’t hurry. I’ll be fine watching shit on my phone.”