The Bad Mother's Handbook (28 page)

‘You won’t believe this but I need to pee
again
,’ I said
heaving myself up off the sofa. There was a sudden rush
of water between my legs. ‘Oh, my God.’ We both stared
at the dark stain spreading over my skirt. ‘I think I’ve wet
myself.’

‘That’s not wee,’ said Daniel.

*

I
WAS STANDING
on the platform at Euston when my
mobile rang. I nearly had kittens when it went off.

‘Hello?’ I was expecting another ear-bashing from
Steve.

‘Hello,’ said a polite young man. ‘I don’t believe we’ve
ever met, but I’m just ringing to tell you your daughter’s
in labour.’

‘
Shall I phone
the hospital or your father first?’ Daniel
asked as I struggled with the bath towel he’d brought me
to mop up the mess.

‘God,
I
don’t know,’ I snapped. I was really frightened.

‘OK. I’m going to ring for an ambulance. Lie down
and try to relax.’

I stretched out on the sofa and willed the baby to keep
moving. ‘My antenatal notes are on the sideboard. You
might need to give them some details.’

‘Fine.’

Daniel disappeared into the hall. I started to pray.

When he came back he looked cheerful. ‘They’ll be
here in ten minutes. Now, what do you need to take?’

‘There’s a sports bag upstairs. I’ll come with you.’ I
started to haul myself up.

‘No. Stay horizontal. I’ll sort it.’

‘There are some extra things written on a Post-it note
stuck to the handle,’ I shouted after him. ‘Don’t forget
my Walkman. And try not to wake Nan. I can’t cope with
her as well.’

I lay there for about ten seconds, then got up. ‘Oh, little banana, hang on,’ I whispered. I shuffled to the phone,
still holding the towel between my legs, and dialled Dad’s
number. Thank Christ; he was back.

‘Yep?’ he said with his mouth full.

‘Dad? Can you come over right now? I’ve got to go to
hospital.’

‘Charlotte? Are y’awreet, love? What’s up?’

‘We think the baby’s coming.’

There was a choking noise followed by coughing. ‘I
thought it weren’t due till October.’

I started to cry.

‘I’ll be round straight away,’ he said. ‘Damn and blast
your mother.’ He hung up.

‘Get back on that sofa,’ hissed Daniel over the banisters.

When the ambulance came I wanted Daniel to come
with me.

‘No, Charlotte, that doesn’t make sense. I’ll stay till
your dad arrives, then I’ll follow in the car. That way I
can come and go from the hospital; otherwise my car’ll be
stranded here and I’ll have no transport.’

I started to sob even though we were standing in the
road with all the curtains twitching. ‘
Don’t
make me go
on my own.
Please
come. I’m so
scared
.’ I grabbed his
hand and squeezed the fingers desperately.

‘Has your father got a key?’

‘Yeah,’ I sniffed.

‘Fuck it, then. Come on, let’s get this show on the
road.’ And he lifted his long legs and climbed into the
back of the ambulance.

*

‘
I’m going to
strap this round your tummy so we can
hear your baby’s heartbeat,’ said the Irish midwife. ‘You’ll
need to lie fairly still. Do you think you’re having contractions?’

They’d met me with a wheelchair, which was pretty
freaky – did they think the baby might drop out if I
walked up to the ward? – and pushed me along the shiny
corridors at speed, Daniel trotting alongside. Now he was
lurking at the foot of the bed. I wouldn’t let him out of my
sight. Mum was on her way; he’d telephoned her from the
hospital foyer, but she thought it would be about another
five hours.

I didn’t know if I was having contractions or not.
‘There’s a funny feeling low down every so often but it
doesn’t hurt.’

The nurse nodded and pointed to a slip of paper
hanging out of the monitor like a long white tongue.
‘This will tell us if you’re in the early stages of labour,’
she said. There was a black wavy line drawn along the
centre.

‘It looks like a lie detector,’ said Daniel.

Pyow-pyow-pyow-pyow
went the baby. The midwife
left the room.

‘Your mother thought I was Paul.’ Daniel grinned.

‘Oh, God, what did you say?’

‘ “I certainly am not.” Then she decided I must be a
doctor.’

‘It’s the posh accent. My mum’s a sucker for BBC
English.’

‘Look, I could wheel the telephone in here, there’s one
outside, if you want to speak to her. She sounded fairly frantic. She said she’d never have gone if she’d realized,
but that first babies usually came late.’ He fished in his
jeans pocket. ‘I’ve got about a pound in silver.’

‘Put it away,’ I said grimly. He didn’t ask again.

Ten minutes later a doctor arrived to Do An Internal.

‘I’ll pop outside,’ said Daniel and slunk away. Poor
bugger, neither fish nor flesh nor good red herring.

‘My name is Dr Battyani,’ said the smily gentleman in
the white coat. ‘I will try not to hurt you. Now, will you
put your heels down, your ankles together and let your
knees fall apart.’ He poked about for a minute or so while
I stared up at the air vents in the ceiling, and it did hurt,
quite a lot. ‘You are only two centimetres dilated,’ he
announced, pulling the sheet back over my shame. ‘But I
can see from the monitor you are having mild contractions.
Although your baby is early we will not try to stop
your labour because of the risk of infection. What we
might do is administer a steroid injection to help your
baby’s lungs cope better.’

My heart cringed with fear. ‘Will my baby be all
right?’

‘You are in the best place,’ he said, and left.

The contractions
started properly about half an hour
later.

‘It hurts but it’s not too bad,’ I said to Daniel, who
was reading out the
Times
crossword to me. ‘I have to say,
so far labour’s been quite boring.’

‘I wouldn’t complain, if I were you,’ he muttered,
chewing his biro thoughtfully. ‘Whenever I’ve seen
women on TV giving birth it always looks grim. Loads of gripping onto brass bedsteads and rolling about
screaming. Maybe you’ve got a high pain threshold. Now,
what about “seed pod”, five letters?’

But an hour later, when the midwife was examining
me again, I was sick as a dog. Daniel melted away again
as I retched into a kidney basin and moaned. ‘It’s really
hurting now. Can I have something for the pain?’

‘Well, you’re getting there. Six centimetres.’ She
pointed to the chart by the bed which showed circles of
increasing diameter. The biggest one was like a fucking
dinner plate. I was never going to make it to ten, that was
just plain ridiculous; what the bloody hell did they think
I was made of, latex?

‘OhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh,’ I panted miserably, overtaken by a wave
of agony. My God, it was wonderful when it stopped,
but it was like being in the eye of the hurricane. You
knew it was only a temporary respite.

‘We can give you some gas and air. But you need to
try and work with the pain.’ She was all happy and brisk,
I hated her.

‘What do you mean?’ Why did they talk such
bollocks? I really couldn’t be doing with it.

‘Keep on top of your breathing. Deep, controlled
breath
as soon
as you feel a contraction coming on, then
slowly
out with the pain. Hum if it helps.’

‘But what about the drugs? I want drugs.’

‘Well, pethidine isn’t a good idea with you being a
wee bit prem, it can make the baby a little woozy and we
need him nice and alert. I’ll sort you out with the gas
and air.’

‘I want an epidural. It says so on my birth plan –
ohhhhhhhhhhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Jesus. Oh, I can’t do this.
I can’t.’

She gave my hand a squeeze. ‘Of course you can.
You’re doing great.’

Fucking five-star liar.

‘The epidural!’

‘Ah, the anaesthetist’s with another lady at the
moment. We’ll bring him in as soon as he’s free.’ She
nipped out sharpish.

My wail brought Daniel scuttling back in. ‘Charlotte,
what is it?’

‘What’s the good of writing a
fucking
birth plan if
nobody takes any
fucking
notice of it?’ I shouted at the
top of my voice. Let the evil bitch hear. Far off someone
else was yelling too.

‘Medieval women used to chew willow bark, I gather.
Contains natural aspirin. Sorry. I’ll shut up.’ He dabbed
at my neck and forehead with a cold flannel. His expression,
wide nervous eyes and fixed mouth, made me think
of a cod trying to smile. I could nearly have laughed.

Mrs Happy trundled the tank of nitrous oxide in and
invited me to bite on the mouthpiece. ‘Like the breathing,
start inhaling the second you feel the pain beginning.’

I took a huge great lungful and nearly fainted.
Another contraction hit me.

‘Is it any good?’ asked Daniel, trying to read the
writing on the side of the container.

‘Bloody rubbish,’ I said when I’d stopped groaning.

*

I
T WAS LIKE
being in prison, sitting on that train. All I had
with me was my own thoughts, one dreadful memory after
another layering themselves on top of each other, and
uppermost, fear. There was no relief. Wherever I turned my
gaze there was an awful image imprinted on my mind’s
eye, like the mad stain on your vision after you’ve looked
too long at a lightbulb. The pictures, some of them from
the past, some from the future, blotted out the placid faces
and the countryside around me. As we neared Manchester
night was falling and all I could see when I stared out of the
window was my own scared white face.

*

‘I want to get up,’
I raved.

‘We need to keep the monitor pads round your
tum. Concentrate on your breathing now. Not much
longer.’ The midwife wrote some notes and checked her
watch.

‘Well, I need to take this off, then.’ I’d managed to get
myself all tangled up in the T-shirt I’d brought. Why was
it so fucking hot in here?

‘Er.’ Daniel was hovering at the edge of my vision.
‘Look, Charlotte, would this be a good time to go? My
dad’s here and he’s going to drive me back to get the car.
But I’ll stay if you want me to. You know I won’t leave
if you need me.’ He reached out for my hand just as
another contraction swept over me.

‘Charlotte? Charlotte?’

‘It’s fine,’ I managed to gasp. ‘Yeah, go.’ I needed to
concentrate on the rhythm of the pain. I could see now
why animals crept off on their own to have their litters in bushes. I couldn’t cope with his concern, his anxious
questions, that bloody flannel.

‘Sure?’

I closed my eyes; perhaps he’d think I’d fainted.

‘I’d go if I were you,’ whispered the midwife. ‘You
can come back tomorrow, bring her a nice big bunch of
flowers.’ I saw her wink at him.

‘He’s not the father, you knowoooooooWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWooooooooooo,’ I howled. Her smile
never slipped.

‘See you then,’ he muttered and waved limply. It felt
better when he’d gone.

*

‘T
HE
10.05
TO
B
OLTON
is running . . .’ The TV screen over
my head flickered for a second . . . ‘thirty-five minutes late.
We apologize for any inconvenience.’

‘But I NEED to get to my daughter!’ I shouted up at it,
my voice echoing slightly under the iron rafters. No one
on the platform took much notice; after all, there are a lot
of nutters around these days.

*

‘Now, Charlotte,
I need you to listen to me.’ The voice
was coming as if from under water. ‘Charlotte, I can see
the top of the baby’s head when you push. Lots of lovely
dark hair. What I need you to do is to push as hard as you
can with each contraction. Yes? Tuck your chin down and
push through your bottom.’

I was beyond speaking now but I tried to do as I was
told. There aren’t the words to describe the sensations, I was only a heaving mass of muscle and pain, all control
gone.

‘Keep on top of it now. Down through your bottom.’

I pushed with all my might but I was getting
exhausted. ‘I can’t do it,’ I managed to gasp.

‘Yes, you can. Come on now. You want to get this
baby out, don’t you?’

Stupid fucking question.

I pushed till I thought my eyes would pop but we
didn’t seem to be making much progress. I thought of all
the women in history who’d had babies. Why did you
never hear what it was really like? Had it been this bad for
all of them? Some women had loads. Mrs Shankland at
the post office had
seven
; had she been through this every
time?

‘Charlotte.’ This was a man’s voice. ‘It’s Dr Battyani
again. How are you doing?’ Sensibly he didn’t wait for a
reply. ‘I’ve had a little look at you and I think we need to
make a small cut.’ He didn’t say where, but I knew. We’d
done it at antenatal class and I thought then, Whatever
happens, I do
not
want one of those, no way. ‘It’s OK,’
he consulted his clipboard, ‘we will numb the area with
an anaesthetic first.’

Oh, so you’ve
got
fucking anaesthetics
now
, have
you? I thought. ‘Nyerhhhhhh,’ I managed. He took this
as a yes; well maybe it was. I was so desperate to get
the baby out by now they could have threatened to use a
blow-torch and I’d have agreed.

The next part is confused because I was waiting for
the cut, and an Irish voice said, ‘There’s somebody here to
see you,’ and ‘Come in round this side and hold her hand.’ Then a huge wave came over me and I began to push
again. ‘That’s it, Charlotte, you’re doing so well, the
head’s nearly out.’ There was somebody crying near
my face and when I opened my eyes it was my mum,
my mum, and she held my hand tight then the head was
out, and with a great slither and a gush the whole baby
plopped onto the bed in a slimy mess. I was sobbing and
panting and my mum looked like she’d been dragged
through a hedge backwards with tears running down her
cheeks.