If I were to tell you all the things I knew about babies and motherhood prior to giving birth, this would be both the first and last sentence of this post. I’m sure some of you would have no problem with that whatsoever and frankly I don’t blame you. However, because I have the utmost of faith in the soporific qualities of my writing, I feel it’s my duty as a former insomniac to offer my services to those of you having difficulty nodding off at night. Read it and sleep, folks!
P.s. Because I like to enumerate, it’s another list; this time of all the things (purely pregnancy and baby-related for now) that no one ever told me about, primarily because I didn’t ask. Be warned, it’s in no sort of order at all.
“Call this crying? I’m not even getting started.”
1. Babies have bad attitudes. Controversial maybe but true. Would you be friends with someone whose personality vacillated from chirpy perkiness to irascible peevishness to blistering fury and back to snuggly vivacity sometimes in a matter of minutes? I’m not sure you would. Imagine how tiring it would be? I’m all for glorious moments of unscripted spontaneity but honestly babies, do you really have to fly by the seat of your pants so much? Your unpredictability is exhausting. And the fact that you show such a blatant disregard for the feelings of others, well, that’s just plain rude. See what I mean? Bad attitudes.
2. Babies have no shame. How else do you explain my then three week old daughter choosing to detonate the most noxious, putrid, ear-splittingly booming, volcanic eruption of a poo-bomb on a thronged rush-hour platform at Manchester Piccadilly? That her nappy failed to contain this faecal Vesuvius is almost beside the point. It’s the fact that she thought it was okay to do it in the first place. This outrageously antisocial behaviour hasn’t even remotely dissipated in the succeeding months. Why, only today she farted straight in my mouth. Remaining completely unmoved, she didn’t offer even the merest hint of an apology. Honestly, animals have a greater sense of propriety.
3. Breastfeeding does not come naturally to everyone. It was as alien a concept to my daughter as not farting in people’s mouths is to her. For weeks I existed in a cracked-nippled state of near-hysteria. She couldn’t latch on properly. I didn’t know how to latch her on properly. Neither of us knew we were doing it wrong. Like a pair of bumbling buffoons, we persisted with this pantomime until she lost too much weight and I near lost my marbles. I hadn’t grasped that the clue was in the name. It’s called breastfeeding for a reason; frenzied nipple-sucking just won’t cut the mustard. That we arrived at the stage where both my daughter and I fully intend to continue nursing until she leaves for university is testament to the ceaseless efforts of breastfeeding specialists we encountered along the way.
4. Once you have a baby normal adult discourse swiftly becomes a thing of the past. What follows is a verbatim transcription of a conversation I had with a woman of similar age while I was dressing Raffles in the swimming pool changing rooms:
Woman (to Raffles): Oh my God, aren’t you just gorgeous. What age are you?
Raffles: *tumbleweed*
Me: She’s thirteen weeks.
Woman (to R): Thirteen weeks! My, aren’t you a diddy little dot. Were you premature?
R: [passive indifference]
Me: She was three weeks early.
Woman (to R): Three weeks early! You’ll soon catch up, yes you will, yes you will. Were you swimming today?
R: *rolls eyes*
Me: Yeah, we were in the baby pool. The water’s lovely and warm.
Woman (to R): Did you love the lovely warm water? Did you! Aww, I can see that smile, you loved the lovely warm water.
R: *yawns*
Woman (to R): I think it’s time for your nap. Is it time for your nap? I’ll let you get changed and then you can have a nice nap after your swimming. Bye, bye pretty girl, bye, bye…
R: [dismissive aloofness]
Me: Bye!
Woman: *exits silently*
Not once did this woman acknowledge my existence. Honestly, she didn’t so much as glance in my direction. It really was the oddest experience but, as I’ve since found out, not a unique one. No one cares about me anymore. Never mind my opinions, no one even asks me my name. It’s all about the baby. It’s nonsensical! I mean, who would you rather be stuck in a lift with? A cracking raconteuse with a mean line in sparkling wit (Me) or a dribbling whinger who can’t even gurgle coherently (Baby)? On second thoughts don’t answer that.
5. Three words: postpartum hair loss. My jubilation at having evaded this unfortunate side effect of childbirth was markedly premature. I had naively assumed that having reached three months post-birth with blissfully unmolested follicles meant my hair had simply forgotten to fall out. After all, I know lots of women who’ve given birth and I definitely don’t recall any of them going bald at any point. This hormonal hair loss, or effluvium postpartum if we’re being scientific, must be a myth. Fast forward a few weeks and my hairline resembles Steve McDonald’s on a particularly bad hair day. To make matters a million times worse, my head is extremely hostile to any sort of covering. Hats, headscarves, rubber horse heads, they all look preposterous on me. I look better with a receding hairline. The things we go through for our kids, eh?
Me, yesterday. A good hair day.
Not Your Average Baby 