And Introducing.....

This Sunday is the nine month anniversary of an event that many people, myself included, thought would never, EVER, happen. Nine months ago this Sunday my baby boy Seth Nathaniel was born, and my life was forever changed.
For the better? That remains to be seen, but so far he has been a constant source of enjoyment, laughter, wonder, exasperation and paranoia. The last is due mostly to the fact that I have a terrible habit of imagining the worst possible scenario of any situation ... watching reruns of E.R. each morning probably doesn't help either. Regardless, Seth is a gorgeous child, and I have never for one second regretted having him....
...well, after he was born, anyway. The lead up to the birth of little boober (as I like to call him), was a vastly different story. I don't know if anyone has ever come across one of those women who swear that they 'just loved being pregnant' (yarg!) but they must have been doing something I wasn't, because I did not like being pregnant. Take aching legs, heartburn and nausea, fluid retention up the wazoo, constant tiredness and high blood pressure and wrap it all up in a big ball of over emotional nutcase and you come fairly close to nine months of last year. On the upside, Aunt Flow buggered off for almost a year, and it's amazing how much a pregnant woman can get away with. I lost count of the number of fights I picked with complete strangers. I think I aged my partner about ten years ( forgive me a cruel chuckle bwah ha ha ).
The birth itself was THIRTY THREE HOURS LONG! Geeze! It's not like the kid had far to travel for crying out loud! And I, like the gullible fool I am, listened to too much propaganda decrying the use of epidural, so tried to go through labour without it. I was dilated to seven centimetres before refusing to go any further, and as those mothers out there who know what I'm talking about will agree, seven centimetres is a long time to go without pain relief.
I did have other pain medications. I started off with entonox, which is air and nitrous oxide. You suck it in through a tube and it makes you high. It worked for a while, but when those contractions really start to hit, there's not enough gas in the world to knock that pain out. I was sucking down that gas until my eyes rolled up and I started hyperventilating, which made my hands cramp into claws and my face go numb...interesting sensations, those.
The second pain relief I had was a shot of pethidine, which did SWEET BUGGER ALL. I have since seen a program on telly in which a woman was doing research on medicines delivered through intermuscular injections, and the fact that many do not get to the bloodstream because the needle is not long enough to penetrate the layer of fat in the place where most of these injections are given - the butt. What do I need, a fucking harpoon? How depressing to think that the pethidine didn't work because my arse is too fat for the drugs to penetrate! AAARGH!
Anyway....epidural. What a wonderful invention. I sincerely wanted to kiss the anaesthetist. I'd heard all sorts of horror stories about the dreaded epidural, including one from an earnest but ultimately gullible aquaintance of how a friend of hers could remember being born and feeling cut off emotionally from her mother because of the drugs. Apparently this woman had some prodigious kind of memory. Personally I thought she'd just inhaled to many exhaust fumes. All I know is that there was pain, and lots of it, and the pain would continue and get worse....and then epidural came along and took it all away.
My advice for anyone thinking about having a baby and worried about the epidural is this...you are not going to know if you need it until the time comes. I thought I was strong enough to handle the pain of childbirth, but what the hell was I basing that assumption on? My pain threshold had only been tested by some facial piercing and bikini waxes, not exactly the kind of pressure that contractions can place on the body. The point is that you can't know what you will need until you get there. Don't let anyone bully you or persuade you or pressure you into making a decision until you are ready (and yes, they will try. Doctors!) and don't feel guilty if it turns out that you do need it. Leave the macho, I can handle pain pissing contest to the men. Childbirth doesn't have to be the endless ride of agony.
Enough scaring the rookies. At the end of the thirty three hours, my baby boy was born, and it was all so worth it. As those of you who know me will attest, I had sworn black and blue for my whole life that I would never have kids. That damn biological imperative got the better of me, but it rewarded me with an absolutely beautiful child, and yes I know every parent says that about their child, but in Seth's case it's actually true. He has big blue eyes and a fluffy crop of blonde hair, chubby cheeks and a dimple in his chin that he inherited from his father. He loves it when I sing 'Close to You' by the Carpenters to him, and he has just discovered the fun to be had in squealing as loud as he can. He's so beautiful he makes my heart ache. The epidural took the pain away, but Seth has made the memory of the pain fade.

Ciao for now
Becca