A new world to discover

Orla turned six months shortly after our arrival for a two year stay in Penang. It seemed that a bizarre time paradox was in operation; in many ways, the previous months had flown at breakneck speed, but in others, it seemed that she had always been there. I had to stop to think about what my life had been like before. Every day, it seemed, she presented me with something new to marvel at - sitting unaided, experimenting with sounds, studying faces and expressions with grave concentration, starting the weaning process and gaining mobility.
As well as our new environment, populated by many different races and offering so many new sights, sounds, tastes and smells, Orla was beginning to explore objects at home with a new sensory awareness. I put together a ‘treasure basket’ - a heuristic play basket filled with everyday objects of different textures, shapes, weights, colours... made of any material but the all-too-common plastic used for the majority of children’s toys. Sitting on the floor, she emitted high-pitched squeaks and hiccups, mouthing a silk scarf. She rejected a cleaning sponge, but returned to it over again, both drawn to and put off by its wiry surface. A tennis ball was a challenge - she was unable to pick it up with only one little hand, but was fascinated by its luminous yellow colour. Finally she would tip the remaining contents of the basket onto the floor and would feast on the wealth of everyday treasures at her feet.
It was a new world for me, too, as I experienced it from her perspective. I relaxed to watch her at play and was struck by her tenacity. She wasn’t put off by the arduous task of trying to pick up the tennis ball, or stretching to pick up something that had fallen seemingly just out of her grasp. I watched, enthralled, as she selected an object, examining it closely, turning it over and over in her hands, before carefully raising it to her mouth to explore its texture. Even then, she showed a discerning nature, rejecting items that didn’t please her, and choosing something more satisfying instead.
Watching her watching other people was a favourite pastime of mine. Captivated by babies and animals, she squeaked and cooed with pleasure. Adults faces were studied carefully and judgments made, bestowing a sunshine smile if warranted, or burying her face in my neck if she was less certain. She was intolerant of over-familiar strangers, letting loose a howl of protest and distress if they pressed their faces too close, causing them to retreat swiftly and apologetically.
Sound came to play an increasingly key role in her world. She explored a wide gamut of vocalisations - squeals, shrieks, growls and creaks, messy, spluttering raspberries and ecstatic squeaks. Experimentation with plastic boxes and cups yielded strange, booming echoes that elicited chuckles of delight. Unfailingly, her attention was caught by music and singing. No matter how tired, irritable, bored or miserable she was, she was soothed within a minute by singing, her wails halting as she stopped to listen. I trawled through my memory for half-forgotten nursery rhymes, Beatles and Simon and Garfunkel tunes that I was brought up on, classics from vintage musicals; all were received with contented approval. I was enthralled by how innate our love of music and rhythm seems to be, how a series of notes can influence emotions so profoundly at such an early age.
It also struck me that I am one of an elite group - albeit a very large one. For so many people moving through their lives, these developments are barely noteworthy, overlooked, unimportant - but to me, and the wide and varied collective mothers across the world and throughout time, they may be miraculous and overwhelming. It’s hard to believe there will be so many, many more of them in the years ahead.

Being normal

So much has happened in the past year that I have neglected to record... how can I ever hope to catch up? There are a few sporadic entries in my journal, but most of it is stored in my unreliable brain, clinging desperately to misfiring neurons and hoping not to get lost. I’ll begin my updates with a précis version of moments, events and observations, in a vain attempt to fill some of the gaps.
Orla’s fourth month brought packers to our Istanbul home, where we parcelled up our life and posted it to Penang, where we would begin again two months into the future. I watched the blooming relationship between daddy and daughter with - I admit - a twinge of envy; their shared belly laughs and rough and tumble seemed so much more fun than my pedestrian trips to the park on sunny afternoons, where we played and napped in the shade of the trees. She amazed everyone with her alert curiosity, her determination to explore her world, and her experimentation with different sounds for communication. We ended the month with a farewell to Istanbul and a quiet family holiday in Spain, introducing Orla to sand, sea and swimming - all of which became immediate, firm favourites.
I had to share Orla throughout the summer - something I hadn’t had to do much of while Giles was working. It took a little getting used to. I loved being the centre of her world, and had to make a conscious effort to let him do what he is so good at - being a Daddy. Even though seeing them together made me glow with pleasure - Giles; playful, strong and funny, babbling nonsense and inventing mad games to make her laugh at changing time, and Orla; transfixed, delighted, chortling hard and waving her arms with glee - I felt moments of jealousy. I was more cautious, more afraid that something unknown and awful might take her away from us, and because of that, I worried that I would be less fun than Daddy, that Mummy would become the wet blanket who smothered the blaze of adventure and excitement they would create between them as she grows up.
But watching them together was good for me. Only by seeing Giles’ capability, by witnessing how very much she enjoyed her daddy’s company, could I increase my trust that other people were able to care for my precious baby for a while without it affecting my bond with her. I realised that she would need different people as she grows - maybe Giles’ role IS to be the fun one, with whom she can be wild, free and fearless. Maybe he will teach her to swim and to ride a bike, or who will help her to climb a tree or to paddle a kayak... but I will always have my own - very different, but just as necessary - role to play, too. Sharing parenting with Giles means that we can play to our strengths, and that Orla will have at least one of us to turn to, no matter what she needs or wants.
It wasn’t all a joyful love-in, though. There have been plenty of moments when I have dissolved into tears, wondering what on earth I’d done and raging against the monotonous reality of caring for a small baby, 24/7. The first weeks were easy, with Giles on leave, and my being so entirely besotted with the warm, sleeping miracle in my arms that I didn’t want to do anything but sit on the couch and hold her, gazing at her as she slept for hours on end. Who needs to pee or eat, anyway? Nature is brilliantly cunning.
Colic was the first real wake-up call. I began to dread mid-afternoon, when Orla’s knees would contract up to her tummy, her tiny hands would curl into fists and her face would crumple. I was helpless, unable to alleviate the pain; I endlessly swayed, rocked, massaged, worked her legs, lay her on my forearm to try to dislodge the trapped wind, all the while knowing that it was entirely normal for babies to suffer so, and that it might last up to 12 weeks, or even longer.
I found myself limited by my own anxieties. I was afraid to take her into the city on the bus in case she began to scream. I was plagued by the fear of her crying in public and being unable to help her, and of other people’s reactions. When I finally found the courage to take her to busy streets and cafes, and when one day she screamed inconsolably when she became overheated, I couldn’t have cared less what other people thought. I wasn’t aware of anyone else but her.
As she became older and heavier, I realised that sometimes I needed two hands - or two minutes - that were baby-free. I felt flashes of hurt and resentment when it seemed that my role was reduced to mere functionality. If she cried in someone else’s arms, it was clearly because she was hungry, so Mummy had better have her back. “She’s tired,” I would say. “She has colic.” My words fell on deaf ears. What would I know? After months of attention when pregnant, I was nothing more than a feeding machine. My self-esteem sagged as I became Just A Mum, and my silent fears simmered more insistently. My novel lay unfinished, a handful of chapters still to be written. Any motivation I had dwindled and I spent hours looking for reassurance and sharing experiences with other rookie mums on the internet. I made many friends whom I may never meet - we understood one another, and often, we were able to share emotions and thoughts that we felt we couldn’t speak aloud to even those closest to us. Terrible scenarios flashed into my brain without warning; dreadful accidents that could take Orla away from me. I was haunted by a woman whose baby boy was ‘born asleep’. I had to check Orla’s breathing as she slept and couldn’t stand on the balcony with her in my arms without my knees buckling. How would I cope - how would I live? - if anything happened to her?
A borderline smear test heightened my terror. What did it mean? A nasty little voice in my head told me that I wouldn’t live to see my daughter grow up. I fought it so hard, pushing it down, telling it - and myself - that I was fine, I was not afraid. But I was - terribly afraid - until the repeat test results came back clear. I was fully aware of the dull spite of depression lurking in the corners, and over the past year, I have had to draw on help from many friends and family to hold it at bay.
Gradually the darkness lifted. Infacol and Orla reaching ten weeks banished colic. I began to trust my instincts, instead of worrying about what Orla ‘should’ be doing by whatever date. Giles and I took a sleeping Orla to restaurants with friends, and if she woke and cried, I was unaware if anyone ever was bothered by it. I was not Just A Mum - I had become A Mother, but in addition to the whole gamut of people I was before, and still am. I realised that all of those facets of me were still there, even if I didn’t have as much time to dedicate to them as before.
Through my friends online, I came to see that my ghastly thoughts and horrors, and flashes of frustration and anger were completely normal - a part of coming to terms with the sudden, awesome responsibility our tiny additions had brought to our lives. A steep, hard learning curve; the hardest, but most rewarding and beautiful stage of my life. The dark moments were nothing more than parts of the process of change and adjustment. I was fully aware that these would not be the only low moments I would experience in the hurly burly carnival of chaos ahead, and that I must learn to embrace the fears, anxieties and negativity and cherish them in the same way as I would smiles, hugs and myriad little achievements. After all, they, too, would form part of our closeness and depth of love for one another. I knew that I would forget these insights and would rail against the trials of raising a child, and hoped that I would not be too hard on myself until I remembered these detached pearls of wisdom. Through all of these lessons, I realised that every dark cloud shall eventually pass. I am normal.

Three amazing months

I’ve done a fair few incredible things in my life – I’ve trekked to Kala Pattar, just above Base Camp Everest, been scuba diving with hammerheads and snorkelling with whale sharks, sailed around the Galapagos and written the first draft of a novel – but quite possibly nothing so exhilarating, exhausting and emotional as being a new mummy.

Just as with all of my most memorable travel adventures, I have had outstanding material to work with. Orla is extraordinary and I have watched her sleeping with as much wonder as I watched the light change the marble a myriad of colours on the Taj Mahal, listened to her coo and gurgle with more excitement and delight than the howler monkeys’ dawn chorus in the Guatemalan jungle. Her demands and needs can be just as challenging as a trek to Everest, but the smile she gives me each morning when she wakes up is even more rewarding.

We made a decision before she was born – not to buy any of the ‘How to…’ books by so-called experts. They work very well for many people, but I have never liked being told what to do or how to do it! We decided to trust our instincts, to listen to what Orla tells us and if something isn’t working, to try something else. The only times I have felt out of my depth, or that I am doing something wrong, have been when I have succumbed to temptation and peeked at what those experts have to say. I’ve tried a few of their techniques and found that they didn’t work as well as the ones Giles and I have worked out for ourselves; I haven’t read anywhere that putting your baby on an exercise ball and rolling her back and forth is a great soother for colic!

So far, the ‘Ginnie and Giles Guide to Bringing Up Orla’ has been working well for all three of us. I hate the term ‘co-sleeping’, but I adore the practise of it! I can honestly say that I think it’s the most important, and one of the most successful decisions we made. Giles was initially far keener than I was; I was afraid that, for the first few weeks, Orla would simply be too small. However, when Giles said a reluctant goodbye and had to leave us alone in the maternity ward that first night, I fed Orla and put her down in her clinical Perspex cot – and she began to cry. Anxious about her waking the other, exhausted new mothers – and desperate to hold her again – I picked her up, and slept with her cradled safely in my arms, my elbow supported by a pillow. Waking the next morning with my tiny, new treasure nuzzling at my breast was maybe the most moving moment of my life.

We continued as we began. Orla has spent every night of her life in our bed, and none of us have had a sleepless night yet. It’s almost sad that I am so accustomed to her little body, curled into mine as she feeds herself back to sleep, that I seldom gaze at her with the same wonder before I fall asleep. But in place of that is the warm and comfortable familiarity of her stirring as I get quietly into bed, reaching out her little hands and opening her mouth like a hungry hatchling, ready for a sleepy feed that will take her through until morning. Giles and I rise, go through the morning ritual of tea, preparing breakfast and seeing him off to work before she wakes and I go back to greet her and am blessed again by the light of her smile.
There are plenty of people who seem to think that we’re ‘making a rod for our own backs’ by not leaving her to sleep in a cot of her own. I think there’s plenty of time for that. I have a shadowy idea of how the transition may occur, a good many months into the future, and if it doesn’t work out that way, we’ll find another – hopefully one that, again, works for all of us. Until then, I’ll relish the closeness of my arms encircling my sleeping baby and the soft, regular sigh of her breathing next to me.

We ‘flout the rules’ in other ways and seem to be getting away these transgressions, too. I worried for a couple of days that we didn’t have a set ‘routine’, complete with scheduled feeds, naps, playtimes, bathtimes and bedtimes… until I realised that Orla is perfectly capable of letting me know what her natural routine is. It’s evolved of its own accord, without any interference from me, and is surprisingly flexible. We still visit friends in the evenings, go out for meals, go travelling… Orla will sleep anywhere, if she feels like it! Things take a little more planning or need to be adapted slightly, but Orla has proved to be a most compliant traveller. At twelve weeks, she had racked up three flights between London and Istanbul, a return journey from London to Newcastle (incorporating a full house clearance) in a transit van and a long-distance trip to the Phrygian Valley in Turkey. This summer, she’ll be touring Spain, Eastern Turkey and the UK before we fly to our new home in Penang, Malaysia. Giles and I don’t subscribe to the school of thought that states that we have to give up doing the things we love now that we have a baby; neither do we believe that we can carry on merrily as before, leaving Orla with a nanny while we try to prove to ourselves that ‘Having a baby hasn’t changed us!’. We want Orla to enhance our lives, and that means a balance between including her in as much of what we do as possible and ensuring that we’re fulfilling all of her needs, too. I may have travelled to a fair number of countries so far, but I’m so excited by the prospect of rediscovering the world through her eyes in years to come.

Sometimes Giles and I have forgotten to talk to one another, and those have been the times that have been most challenging. We’re making an extra effort to let each other in on our thoughts, triumphs and anxieties; we discuss our days, try to remember to do little things for one another that mean a lot and share the responsibilities and pleasures of raising our little girl. Because Giles works all day, he was concerned that his bond with Orla may not be as strong as the one that she and I share. I was missing having quiet time to write each day, so we agreed on some time each evening, dedicated to what each of us felt we needed most. Now Giles leaves his work until Orla has gone to bed and spends a couple of hours playing with his daughter; judging by the gurgles and chortles and other sounds of riotous play that drift into the room where I’m working, he has little to fear about the strength of their bond. I have space and time to write, or to focus on jobs that are awkward to do with a baby in my arms. We try to make sure that there’s time for us, too – not as much as before, inevitably, but we still share the laughter, love and affection that made us want to bring up Orla together in the first place.

We’re not doing everything according to the books, but we’re acting on a blend of our instinct, intuition and old-fashioned common sense. We’re blessed with an easygoing and accommodating child, but perhaps somehow, on some level, we’re getting a few things right, too.

Coming up for air... 10 weeks old

Thursday 7th May...

Unbelievably, Orla is going to be ten weeks old this weekend. Soon, I won’t be counting in weeks anymore, but months – I can’t remember when I stopped counting in days.

Already, she has completely changed my world. I’ve spent much of the past ten weeks alone with this little person; I carried her around like a secret increasingly desperate to be told for nearly ten months, gave birth to after 18 long hours, nourished her entirely from my own body both before and since her birth. I share astonishing and groundbreaking moments every single day – opening her dark, slate-blue eyes on day two, watching her face taking in my features as she feeds quietly and insistently at my breast, packing away newborn clothes that she had grown out of by two weeks old, lying next to her in bed in the mornings, sharing cooed conversations and gentle cuddles. Her smile is like the sun coming out, lighting up the room and enveloping me in its warm glow, and her tiny fingers curl possessively around my finger; she will not let me go, and I will never leave her.

How can I do anything but love this little creature entirely, more than I have ever loved anything? It’s a different kind of love to any I have experienced before. Not the lazy, restless, almost taken-for-granted love shared by family, nor the warm, cosy affection felt for friends. It’s not the loud, ostentatious sensation experienced with a new lover, or the safe, favourite jumper feel of a soulmate – it’s quiet, very quiet, but no less ferocious for that. It’s the quiet, nurturing, protective and unconditional love of a sleepy tigress in the sunshine. Don’t make any sudden moves, don’t bare your teeth or claws – I’m watching you.

Sometimes when I’m out walking, carrying this sleeping miracle pressed against my heart in her sling cocoon, and I feel it crawling through my veins like an opiate, drugging me so that I’m helpless to protest against her demands. Feed me! Change me! My tummy hurts! I can’t sleep! Hold me! I comply every time without question.

She’s so much more alert now, gazing around at her surroundings during every waking moment. She is still fascinated by light – especially the blue dragonfly fairy lights arcing over our bed - and her interest in the boldly patterned African mudcloth on the sitting room was has developed into an obsession. She chats merrily to toys and calls out to me when she gets bored or lonely after waking up alone. We talk for ages on all sorts of literary, political, theological and philosophical subjects, in a passionate and enthusiastic language of gurgles and coos, punctuated by smiles and chortles as we warm to our subject.

She’s so strong, too; she has been holding her head up since her first week, and has become ever-more accomplished at holding it steady as she sits in our arms, raising herself up on her arms as she lies on her tummy on her playmat or on the exercise ball, and pushing her legs straight to stand in our laps. The speed at which she’s growing is breathtaking, and although I mourn the loss of my precious, helpless little newborn, I am besotted with this startling and brilliant small person, who seemingly has a never-ending stream of new tricks and skills to dazzle me with.

For so many years I had managed to convince myself that I never wanted to have a child – it was far more fun to hold on to the self-image I had spent so long creating; independent, spontaneous, daring and fascinating - Peter Pan in female form. I refused to grow up, settle down and become a dull, middle-aged frump who conformed to every outdated stereotype I scorned. Arrogant and immature, stuck in limbo at 29 forever… until my mother pointed out for me what I stood to lose if I didn’t give myself a serious talking-to. I’ll be grateful to her for those words for the rest of my life; because of her sense and her daring to say those things to her wilful, compulsively independent and stubborn daughter, I now have the opportunity to bring up my own.

Of new babies, new passports and weddings...

The week beginning 23rd February was probably one of the potentially more fraught ones of my life, but it turned out to be rather a good one! After Orla and I were checked out at the hospital, Giles came back with a huge grin and a car seat so tht we could take our little girl home. Her fleecy snowsuit was so impossibly huge that she disappeared into its legs; we opted to bundle her up in a fleecy blanket and hat instead!

Back at the holiday cottage we'd rented, it was hard to believe that we actually get to keep her. Our families came to visit and to meet Orla; my nieces, Tayla (12) and Bethany (9), were so excited to meet their new cousin, and were quiet, gentle and patient, even though they didn't get to cuddle her much! And then we were on our own...

Giles and I have opted to try out the concept of childrearing found in most developing countries, and less common in our society; we aim to carry Orla with us throughout most of her first year. This means that the growing infant experiences the world from the same viewpoint as her parents, and is warm and secure. When they are left by themselves, babies may feel abandoned or cold, and consequently cry more. The idea is that the security of being close to a parent in the early stages enables the child to become increasingly independent at her own pace, returning to her parents when she wants to. We're also trying co-sleeping - Orla shares our bed so that her needs can be met during the night with minimal disruption to any of us. Her body temperature, which she has little or no control of initially, is regulated by my own temperature, and I can feed her and change her without having to fully wake up. I was a little nervous about co-sleeping to begin with, but having read about the incidence of cot death being so much lower in cultures in which parents sleep with their babies from birth, I was ready to give it a shot. Our first night together was so magical; I fell asleep looking at my beautiful little girl's peaceful face and listening to her light, fast breaths... I woke to feed her by the glow of a nightlight before she ever began to cry, roused by her shifting as she woke up. Waking up with Orla and Giles the following morning gave me such a sense of peace and contentment; we snuggled together, a blissful, new family.

Tuesday was a whirl of activity. We needed to register Orla's birth and to have her photograph taken so that her passport would be ready in time for us to return to Istanbul at the beginning of March. Her picture was taken when she was just 36 hours old, lying on a blanket on the floor of the photographer's studio! Then we hurried home to meet the midwife, who was pleased to see the progress we were making with breastfeeding. Orla opened her eyes fully for the first time as I fed her, and when she looked up at me, trying to focus, my own eyes filled with tears. Here was this tiny creature, entirely dependent and helpless; it was overwhelming to think of her as ours.

Giles dashed up to London on Wednesday to fast-track Orla's passport, while Grandma came to stay the night. I know that my mum's experience of bringing up babies and the methods I want to try are rather different, but although she may have raised her eyebrows a few times, I was ver grateful that she never criticised what I was doing. As the fortnight after Orla's birth went on, my mum became more and more supportive - she took me to see a dressmaker friend of hers to have my wedding outfit altered, and I'd never have got through Orla's TB vaccination without her!

We had visits from Auntie Lou, who drove all the way down from Newcastle, and Stinky Uncle Huw, who had flown back from Cologne for the wedding on Saturday. The orchids we'd ordered arrived and my mum made a gorgeous bouquet for me and beautiful corsages for everyone in the wedding party - even for our six-day-old bridesmaid! Orla's dress arrived from Monsoon, I found a pashmina to go with my altered and much improved salwar kameez tunic and Huw took charge of downloading the music for the ceremony. All we had to do was to get to the registry office in Oxford on time!

Giles and I had decided on a small, functional wedding - we needed to be married for me to be covered by health insurance when we returned to Istanbul, and to be counted as Giles' dependent and thereby qualify for a flight to Malaysia when we move in the summer - but we ended up with the most wonderful day to remember. The registrar was considerate and calm, putting us at our ease and taking the time to talk to us, altering little details to make the ceremony more personal. The Dexter Room is lovely, oak-panelled and with stained glass windows and the ceremony was intimate and really special; Giles and I were both welling up! My brother, Lewis, read from 'Daily Afflictions' by Andrew Boyd and Giles' sister, Amy, read 'The Owl and the Pussycat', complete with different voices for the characters! We exchanged rings that we had designed ourselves, based on designs by Salvadorean artist Fernando Llort, and Orla slept peacefully, first in her daddy's arms and then in mine, throughout the ceremony and the photos!

We had a marvellous lunch with our immediate families afterwards, with excellent food and wine, and lots of champagne. It really was a fantastic day, so much more than we'd anticipated, and we thoroughly enjoyed every moment. All that was left to was to drive home and spend a quiet evening and a sunny Sunday together, getting used to being Mr and Mrs...

18 hours with a TENs machine...

Giles and I are over the moon - Orla Rebecca was born at 9.15pm on Sunday 22nd February, weighing in at 8lbs 3oz. The whole labour and birth were completely natural in the end - no hanging about for induction after all!

A Gory Details Alert for the squeamish - skip to the end! - but I know some of you want to know it all...

On Saturday 21st, some erratic contractions had started late afternoon. As I'd been having them all week, I was hopeful but not counting my chickens... they'd had a tendency to come regularly for an hour or two and to then stop abruptly, to my intense frustration. I woke up with a start at 3am; it had either been a real one or a rather painfully vivid dream! I got up, distracted myself on the internet and timed them - about 8 mins apart - until Giles woke up at about 6.30am - by then they were stronger and about 5-6 mins apart. We called the hospital and went in at 8am, but although they let me stay for a warm bath (only a shower in the rented cottage) I was still only 1cm dilated - same as two weeks before! - so we went home.

By 2pm, I was throwing up, crawling on the floor and furniture, wired to the TENs machine and telling Giles that it wasn't strong enough to be much help, so we went back in. Hallelujah! I was about 3-4cm by then, so they kept me in... but the next 2cm went on for another four hours! I couldn't stand the tube for gas and air and it was making me throw up, so stuck with the TENs machine. Strangely, I knew when the big contractions were coming, as I started to shiver uncontrollably about a minute before they started - Giles got up a good rhythm of throwing a robe around me, then whipping it off my shoulders and replacing it with a cold flannel on the back of my neck as the contractions kicked in! It was a new one on Rachel, the midwife - she'd never seen anyone do that before!

By 6 or 7pm it was getting pretty bad - Rachel had to break my waters to speed up the contractions, so they were far more painful and frequent. I had to walk around and stand for a couple of hours as resting was slowing the contractions and dilation, and finally at 8pm, Rachel, told me I was at 9cm. It was so hard not to push by then, but she and Giles helped me to breathe through and resist for as long as possible. By the end of her shift, there was just a tiny rim of my cervix left, and Rachel held it aside with her finger as I pushed with a contraction to push the baby into the birth canal. The two incoming midwives only just had time to get their gloves on before one massive push delivered her head, and then the next contraction delivered the rest of her! The pushing stage only took about 5-10 mins - no tears, just two tiny external lacerations, so no stitches were necessary. The midwives put a wet, sticky little bundle of baby and towels onto my chest and there she was, at last. We were left alone for an hour or two to cuddle her, skin to skin - Giles had a go, too, though the baby was a little confused by his chest hair! It was so sad for him to go home when they took us up to the postnatal ward - through the rest of the night, Orla fed and cuddled up, sleeping in my arms. It was wonderful.

Apparently we were the talk of the labour ward - Orla has a huge thick mop of hair, and I had done 18 hours on a TENs machine - apparently not a common occurence! MWs also loved my birth plan - I had written (five weeks previously) that if the second stage was happening very fast, I wanted to "slow things down by pushing between contractions"! So birth plans really do go to hell in a handcart once you're in the delivery room...

So although it didn't feel like it at the time, it was actually a really, really good experience. Orla is just amazing, and is eating, sleeping, pooping and everything else like a dream! We can't believe we don't have to give her back. I never believed I'd feel like this, but my friend summed it up best in her text message the following morning -

"Nothing else matters now that she's here."

The waiting game...

After several weeks of sheer terror that the baby would put in an early appearance and that Giles wouldn't make it back from Istanbul in time for the labour, he finally arrived home for a mixture of paternity, personal and unpaid leave, topped with a half term holiday, that totalled three weeks. I didn't particularly mind which day of that weekend Little Miss decided to put in an appearance - Friday 13th had a certain melodramatic appeal; Valentine's Day had obvious connotations of love, cuddles and a lifetime of being guaranteed to receive cards and Sunday 15th seemed entirely feasible, as she had been such a considerate child throughout my pregnancy - never disturbing my sleep, not growing so big that I looked like an elephant in calf, not compelling me to eat coal or soil or soap, and so on.

However, in spite of a combination of old wives' tales and 'guaranteed' labour-inducing strategies, she decided that she was perfectly happy where she was, thank you. Checks at the hospital throughout the following week revealed a very content baby who was very comfortable and showed no imminent signs of movement. We tried everything - raspberry leaf tea dosage rose to four cups a day, consumption of curry increased, romantic interludes took on a new level of importance and we even tried going to London for the day, booking tickets for the theatre and an exhibition, in the hope of Sod's Law coming into force.

But to no avail.

By Friday, I was convinced that absolutely everything was about to go well and truly tits up. Family were starting to murmur about postponing the wedding - but until when? We had less than one week's leeway - and that was assuming that the registry office would be able to fit us in. It was looking doubtful that me and the baby would be able to return to Turkey with Giles on 7th March, and more likely that we would have to travel back alone a week or so later. Together with my putting myself under pressure as everyone looked at me hopefully for early signs or twinges, the fact that Giles had already spent a week of his leave witnessing false starts and the onset of Braxton Hicks contractions (at last), the disappointment of Little Miss not being as eager to meet us as we were to meet her and the fear of a protracted and painful induction the following Wednesday, I was not a person you'd want to be stuck in a lift with.

Saturday brought another hospital outpatient appointment to check my erratic blood pressure. The postnatal ward was full to bursting and the poor day unit midwife, Linda, had been displaced to a small, private room, from which she had to scoot off to find a sphyg, sonicaid and all manner of other bits and pieces. What a star she was! She offered to perform a membrane sweep (look away now if repulsed or terrified by biological details) - the insertion of her finger through my cervix to try to loosen the amniotic sac and to induce contractions without any assistance from drugs. She was extremely gentle and reassuring and the procedure wasn't painful at all. On hearing that my community midwife was on holiday the following week, she advised me to return to the hospital on Monday for a second sweep if nothing had happened by then.

A more hopeful, maybe slightly delirious, mood descended as Giles and I stocked up in Sainsbury's for the next two weeks in our rented holiday cottage. A chicken Madras and a bottle of wine slipped into our trolley - if we had to wait, it might as well be enjoyable...