Today is my daughter's birthday. She is 22. I can't quite believe that she is 22 after all I am only 21. I asked her how on earth she could now be older than me and she pithily replied 'simple Mum, I do time travel'. Ah of course, it all makes sense now.
It is of course very easy to time travel, today my time travelling took me back 22 years to the gore and glory of the birth of my daughter. Today I allowed myself the indulgence of time which was used to sit near to the lake where I live and remember the hours before she emerged battered, distressed and bleeding into the world.
I had been realistically aware that birth plans are often not worth the paper they are written on but this was hardly the birth I had hoped for.
The experience was full of weird paradoxes, some of the staff were wonderfully kind and attentive, some were brutal and cruel. As I lay in pain, trying to focus on the music that I had chosen to welcome my baby, I was drawn instead to a choir of screams from the women in the other rooms, screams that I knew soon I would also contribute to.
After being allowed to go the full length and breadth of trying to bring my baby forth the hospital staff decided I was in maternal distress, an understatement if ever there was one, and decided to assist the birth with the use of a ventouse cap and a pair of forceps. The first of these horror inducing instruments fractured my unborn baby's skull, the second caused her to decide she had had enough, she was off to whence she had come and to prove the point her monitor 'flat lined'. Cue emergency caesarian.
For whatever reason before my baby was born I had been convinced I was carrying a son, not because I preferred a son I just thought I was carrying a boy. I was so convinced that I had a name for a boy but not for a girl. As I was rushed off to theatre and was put under the anaesthetic my last thoughts were they have killed my baby, they have killed my son.
A little while later, I surfaced from the anaesthetic with the sort of pain that I would equate to what it might feel like if the lower part of your body has been in a crushing machine and has been ripped and mangled. I begged for someone to be my friend, I can clearly remember crying out 'please help me, please help me'. Thankfully whoever was in charge of pain relief mercifully dosed me up and I was wheeled back to the ward in a fog.
Once there I asked for my baby, I was told 'you have a daughter' and she was placed into my arms. A girl? I have a girl? Oh lucky day oh happy day that I should have a girl.
That day was her birthday. Every birthday since I have felt the same blinding love. So for all of you Mothers and daughters out there who may be celebrating today on the 4th November I would like to share our story with you and a song.
Have a listen and to all of you Happy Birthday....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tT86AoSGEL8
It is of course very easy to time travel, today my time travelling took me back 22 years to the gore and glory of the birth of my daughter. Today I allowed myself the indulgence of time which was used to sit near to the lake where I live and remember the hours before she emerged battered, distressed and bleeding into the world.
I had been realistically aware that birth plans are often not worth the paper they are written on but this was hardly the birth I had hoped for.
The experience was full of weird paradoxes, some of the staff were wonderfully kind and attentive, some were brutal and cruel. As I lay in pain, trying to focus on the music that I had chosen to welcome my baby, I was drawn instead to a choir of screams from the women in the other rooms, screams that I knew soon I would also contribute to.
After being allowed to go the full length and breadth of trying to bring my baby forth the hospital staff decided I was in maternal distress, an understatement if ever there was one, and decided to assist the birth with the use of a ventouse cap and a pair of forceps. The first of these horror inducing instruments fractured my unborn baby's skull, the second caused her to decide she had had enough, she was off to whence she had come and to prove the point her monitor 'flat lined'. Cue emergency caesarian.
For whatever reason before my baby was born I had been convinced I was carrying a son, not because I preferred a son I just thought I was carrying a boy. I was so convinced that I had a name for a boy but not for a girl. As I was rushed off to theatre and was put under the anaesthetic my last thoughts were they have killed my baby, they have killed my son.
A little while later, I surfaced from the anaesthetic with the sort of pain that I would equate to what it might feel like if the lower part of your body has been in a crushing machine and has been ripped and mangled. I begged for someone to be my friend, I can clearly remember crying out 'please help me, please help me'. Thankfully whoever was in charge of pain relief mercifully dosed me up and I was wheeled back to the ward in a fog.
Once there I asked for my baby, I was told 'you have a daughter' and she was placed into my arms. A girl? I have a girl? Oh lucky day oh happy day that I should have a girl.
That day was her birthday. Every birthday since I have felt the same blinding love. So for all of you Mothers and daughters out there who may be celebrating today on the 4th November I would like to share our story with you and a song.
Have a listen and to all of you Happy Birthday....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tT86AoSGEL8
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