The Baby Diaries

December 2nd

So I’ve finished A Womb of One’s Own. Wow.

Wow.

What a mixture of preachy, hippie garbage and self-congratulatory smugness. Here are some of my favourite bits:

On discovering the news:

It was a moment I shall never forget. As Bill and I looked at the doctor’s report telling us that our great blessing had arrived, we held hands. ‘Our souls are fused together forever,’ Bill’s eyes seemed to say. ‘This is a child of love,’ mine replied. Bill started to cry, then I joined in, and even the doctor wiped his eyes. ‘I’ve been doing this job for thirty years, and I’ve never been so moved when I told a couple the good news,’ he exclaimed. ‘Thank you. Thank you for reminding me of the magic of this job.’

On going into labour:

It was a swelling wave, a jungle noise that I rode, crested, becoming stronger and more powerful than I ever could have considered possible. I reached inside my soul, and found myself as a small girl, a teenage beauty, a handsome woman, a wise old crone. We stood in a circle holding hands, and they guided me to the place I needed to be, delivering me strength and love. I knew my child was being born, and that it was a journey only I could go on. I could hear my doctor: ‘One more push, Ms Martel,’ and my selves nodded at me, smiling. With one final effort, I could feel myself doubled, grown, as the love Bill and I created became a person, a name, a life. It was Creation.

On feeding the baby:

I had watched others around me struggle with breastfeeding, discovering pain and bleeding. Others had simply given up, and turned to a plastic bottle for their newborn wonder. Blessed as we were with our child, so was I blessed with his feeding. He took to it like a natural – as that’s what it was, the most natural thing in the world. We stared into each other’s eyes, and I could feel the love flow between us. I knew that no pain could ever touch me, as I was giving him the greatest gift in the world – mother’s milk, which would be with him for the rest of his life, bettering him and lifting him among his peers, wherever he went.

On the baby’s toys and clothes:

Bill and I agreed from the start that we wanted only beauty for our child. We had no plastics in the nursery, which our own interior decorator had redone completely for us, in shades of dove grey with a yellow accent. The cot was made from an old altar from Brazil, with wood which was hundreds of years old. The changing unit was fashioned from a table Bill’s family had kept for generations, while the baby’s wardrobe was an heirloom from my grandmother, shipped from France in the eighteenth century. We carpeted the room in the softest New Zealand wool, with a feature rug from Morocco. The toys were handmade – an artisan in upstate New York made a whole family of wooden animals, and an Italian craftsman designed an original light fitting in a giraffe shape. All the bed linen and blankets came from handcrafters across the country when I’d sourced throughout my pregnancy. We even had a film prop-maker fashion us the baby’s name in lights, to go on the wall – Bill and I both knew how important it was for this baby to feel at home the second we brought him in.

I cannot wait to meet this woman. Orrrr … not meet. One or the other. Probably the latter.

TO DO:

Find out if Thom will repaint our living room in dove grey and accent yellow. That actually sounds lovely.

December 3rd

My final treat from Thom’s diary of treats: a trip to the local garden centre, choosing and buying a Christmas tree, plus as many Christmas decorations as I could carry. We both got slightly giddy, sniffing the needles and displaying the baubles to one another in very, very mature ways, but eventually we left with a tree that was, of course, slightly too big for our living room, and an enormous box of extra fairy lights, baubles, bells, bead ropes, robins, ribbons and a golden, glittering star tree topper.

We blew the rest of the afternoon getting the tree positioned and decorated (Thom: ‘I think we need to soak the base first.’ Me: ‘Do it later! Let’s get it up first!’), with me tying bows everywhere while Thom kept us supplied with tea and mince pies.

Thom: Do you ever worry you might peak too soon?

Me: Nonsense. Carpe diem. And the diem I carpe is Christmas Day.

Thom: I didn’t know one could pick.

Me: One can and one does. If Scrooge resolved to keep Christmas every day, I think starting at the beginning of December is the very least we can do. It’s not like I’m making us eat turkey and all the trimmings every day for the next month.

Thom: Don’t. I know you. You start off joking about these things …

Me: [pulling him down beside me] I promise. No turkey until at least the 17th. But thank you, for all these things over the year. It’s been lovely. And I think next year might be lovely too.

TO DO:

Double check which foods I’m allowed to eat, before Christmas kicks in properly

December 4th

Time to tell Eve. Why was I nervous? This wasn’t the Eve of old, this was new Eve. Nice Eve. Thoughtful Eve. Normal Human Being Eve. Since she’d tried to seduce Thom at her last birthday party, met someone she’d actually cared about for once (the lovely baker Mike) and faced my half-hearted wrath, Eve had changed. I loved seeing her now – she no longer made me feel guilty or inadequate. Yet, still so nervous.

She’d come over to mine for lunch, and was loitering in the kitchen doorway while I got everything together.

Eve: I brought some wine – shall I open it?

Me: Yes please. Just a bit for me, though, thanks.

Eve: Late night last night?

Me: [brightly] No, it turns out I’m pregnant! Oops. Didn’t mean for that to happen. Not that I’m an idiot or anything. Just … statistically unlikely. But it’s fine. I’m fine, and the baby’s fine, although I’m still not used to it actually being a baby – I just like to think of it as a thing I’ll have to get round to dealing with sometime next year. Ha!

Eve: Oh right. Cool.

And that was it. She didn’t ask any more, and I didn’t volunteer it. We ate lunch, and talked about work and our families, then she left. I felt flat.

When Thom got home from the pub, I was still lying with my face half-pressed into the sofa, watching something dreadful on TV with my open eye.

Thom: Eve back on form?

Me: No! She was fine. It was nice to see her. She just didn’t really … care.

Thom: Wasn’t that what you wanted? Better that than her telling you how to name it and where we should live and what clever little vintage items it ought to wear, isn’t it?

Me: I suppose so.

Thom: Keeks, I know she’s been different these last few months, but a leopard can’t change its spots entirely. Just think about all the other people who do make you happy: Suse, Zoe, Alice – have you seen Greta recently?

Me: No! That will be nice! You’re right. It’s just habit with Eve. But you’re right.

TO DO:

Stop having high hopes for Eve

Start enjoying the rest of our friends while I can

Remember I’m not dying, just having a baby

December 6th

An evening to try again with Jacki. She’d emailed me this time, asking if I wanted pre-Christmas cocktails at the Dorchester after work, even though we’ve only just seen one another. I knew I had to get there before her, to order my soft drinks again, so I left the office at 5; walking up Oxford Street towards Marble Arch, admiring the windows, but hurrying. I got there almost half an hour early, bursting into the bar in a sweat, and grateful that I’d have time to compose myself. But Jacki was already there.

Jacki: [waving] Woohoo!

Me: Jacki! Hello? Didn’t we say six?