The Baby Diaries

SAM BINNIE

The Baby Diaries

For M and F,

Singers in every weather

Table of Contents

Title Page

Dedication

October 31st

November 2nd

December 1st

January 1st

February 1st

March 1st

April 2nd

May 1st

June 1st

July 2nd

August 1st

September 5th

October 3rd

November 2nd

Check list for hospital

Birth Certificate

Birth Announcement Card

Acknowledgements

Babies, and all that jazz

Morning Sickness

Spreading the News

Maternity clothes

Baby Showers

Gifting a pregnant

Choosing a name

Oh God, now the baby’s arrived and it’s in my house

A million dilemmas

Finally, my attempt to make this whole parenting thing easier on everyone

About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

October 31st

Have you ever had that feeling you’ve forgotten something? Something nagging away at the back of your mind – until just the right movement in your memory triggers something else, which knocks another thing down, and like some Indiana Jones death trap, you can feel the clank-clunking of motion in the hidden rooms of your brain, gradually bringing the forgotten memory swinging like a battering ram into your conscious mind. You know that feeling?

That’s what I had yesterday.

I’ve been so busy since the wedding. Tony, my boss and head of Polka Dot Books (purveyors of fine supermarket fiction and glittery celeb books) was as good as his word with my promotion, promising me four new authors before disappearing off on a three-month ‘travelling sabbatical’ to God Knows Where, declaring he needed a break to ‘replenish his business strategies’. Of course, I was delighted that he’d kept his promise – even though that was more his mother Pamela’s doing – but soon realised why things had played out that way when I started trying to get details about them. Two were new, so their failure was liable to blow up in my face, one was an author I’d dealt with briefly and reluctantly and the final one I couldn’t get any details on at all.

Thom’s been settling into his new life as a trainee teacher: to no one’s surprise, he’s loving it. But as his enthusiasm has spilled over into our evenings, we’ve spent a great deal of time together marking papers – him, clunky essays on Wuthering Heights, me, swathes of mostly unreadable fiction: thirty-somethings who always dreamed of writing, aiming for Heathcliff and hitting Cliff Richard. So we’ve been dog tired, and when we’ve had time off we’ve been with my parents (with half an eye on my dad to check he was taking care of himself after his heart attack earlier this year), my nearly-new niece Frida, or our friends (those we hadn’t had to un-invite from the wedding). It was still great to be spending any time together where we weren’t arguing about money, or the importance of decorative accessories, or the social rules of such a complex endeavour as a wedding. But something kept nagging at me. Did we pay the register office? Had we thanked everyone? Was anyone still locked in the primary school reception venue? None of these nudged anything, although I worried at it like a tongue at a wobbly tooth. It would give eventually. And when it did, I just had to hope I didn’t have a huge apology to make to anyone.

Then, yesterday morning, Thom and I were comparing our weeks. Thom said he had me over a barrel, since I spent my time lunching authors and picking my favourite colour for a book jacket, while he was at the coal-face, earning every penny trying to hammer basic English in the heads of his students.

Me: You love it really.

Thom: I might love it, but I’m a hell of a lot more tired at the end of the day than I ever was making spreadsheets all day. Surprisingly.

Me: Can it really be that hard?

Thom: Kiki. I dare you to try dealing with a room full of hormonal teenagers.

That was it. Clink, clunk. Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Click. Click. Ka-dunk.

BOOM.

I must have just frozen while my brain went into its noisy activity, because Thom stopped laughing at the mental image he’d conjured and looked at me, puzzled. ‘What’s up?’ he said.

I stood completely still, calculating over and over, mentally flicking through the pages of my pocket diary – dates, dates, dates. Dates. When I managed to reconnect my brain with my voice box, I just said, ‘I think we need to go to the chemist.’

Thom got it immediately. We rushed out, no coats, no scarves, into the freezing October afternoon, hurrying to the chemist around the corner. Outside, it felt like Before for a moment – we teased one another about who would go in and buy it, until I remembered what the whole thing was about, and my face collapsed. Thom went in while I read the notices in the window again and again. A Great Time To Give Up Smoking! the sign read. Or indeed, start, I thought. Then he was out, and we were hurrying home again, and I thought, Is this time included in the three minutes you have to count off? If I walk home slowly will I know the result immediately? Then we were home, and Thom was bustling me upstairs, and I went into the bathroom and locked the door. When I took the little test out of the box, the adrenaline was coursing through me and my hands were shaking so much that I couldn’t read one word of the instructions.

Me: How does this even work?

Thom: [through the door] Haven’t you ever watched TV? Piss on the stick, then we can find out who the father is later.

Me: Please.

Thom: [quiet] Sorry, Kiki. Pass the instructions under the door.

Me: [hands shaking, takes several goes]

Thom: OK. It’s the bit on the end. Then stick the lid back on and leave it three minutes. Do you want me to come in?

Me: Come in? In here? I don’t really know. I don’t know. I don’t know.

Thom: It’s OK, Keeks. I’m right here. We can do this later if you want. We don’t have to do it right now. We can talk about it first, if you want.

And just for a moment, I thought: ‘we’? We? If a little plus sign appeared in this window, it wouldn’t be Thom squandering his recent promotion. It wouldn’t be Thom who was the only one of his friends changing his name to ‘Mummy’. It wouldn’t be Thom pushing a large ham-weight through his tiny little birth canal. We? Me me me me me. Then I thought: oh, fuck it. Just take the test.

So I did.

I was still shaking, so managed to wee all over my own hands, but I clicked the cap back on and let it sit. I opened the bathroom door, and Thom rushed in.

Thom: How are you doing?

Me: You’re holding the hand that’s covered in my urine.

Thom: I’m going to take that as a ‘good’.

He hugged me for a long time, not even commenting on how much the bathroom now stank, then we went over together to check the result. A giant glowing plus sign greeted us.

Me: Well.

Thom: That’s unambiguous.

Me: Best of three?

Thom: It was a two-pack. I don’t think you’ll need me to go out again.

Me: Oh. Shit?

Thom took me into the living room, where we sat for ages in silence.

Thom: But … when?

Me: Our honeymoon.

Thom: How?

Me: Remember that night? We’d been walking under the Eiffel Tower? And we agreed to start trying because it could take years? The night before we sobered up and realised our mistake. That one.

Thom: Wow. Honeymoon baby.

Me: [breaking down sobbing] It’s so taaa-aa-aa- ack-y-y-y-y.

I cried for half an hour, then calmed down into a state of steady shock. Pregnant. I’m pregnant. As if reading my mind, Thom said in a ridiculous over-the-top voice, ‘I can’t believe we’re pregnant already!’ which managed to get a laugh out of me; it’s an all-time Worst Phrase, and my laugh stuck around until I remembered that it was, at least in one sense, true. My catatonic state returned.

Me: How did this happen?

Thom: Oh Keeks. When a man and a woman love one another very much –

Me: Thom, please! Really!

Thom: I don’t know, Kiki, these things sometimes happen, don’t they? I do love you very much, if that helps.

Me: I just don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do. [whispering] This is ridiculous.

Thom: Shall we go to bed? Sometimes these things feel better in the morning.

Me: [staring at him]

Thom: Sorry, I don’t mean it like that. I know it’s not going to go away, and I know that no matter how much I say I love you and I support you and I feel for you, I know that it’s your body and I can only begin to imagine your panic and your fear. But I do love you, and loving you also involves knowing that sometimes you deal best with things by vanishing in a cocoon of sleep to work out what you have to do. Is that true?

Me: Yes.

Thom: Right. So let’s do one decision at a time. Would you like me to make you a drink before bed?

Me: Whisky.

Thom: Uh …

Me: OH GOD I CAN’T EVEN DRINK. Oh God! How much have I drunk in the last month? The last two months? OH GOD I DO NOTHING BUT DRINK.

Thom: Kiki. It’s fine. Let’s forget about the drink and just get into bed.

So we did just that. I amazed myself by falling straight to sleep – as Thom said, it’s how I cope with most things, but it meant it was an extra struggle this morning, having a mini version of the click-clunking remembering all over again. Pregnant. Pregnant. Pregnant. It still doesn’t make any sense. Yes, we both want kids very much, and yes, we look forward to having them, but now? Right now? I have just got my promotion, Thom has just started a mind-bogglingly poorly paid job, and we’re not ready for this. I feel so strange.

At work today, Alice noticed something was wrong, but only asked me once. She kept her distance for the rest of the day in the nicest possible manner, her excellent breeding (or lesbian superpower) knowing exactly when to press me and lavish me with attention, and when to leave me in peace. Alice, my best friend in the office, is head of Publicity here at Polka Dot Books and a far nicer, better and more capable person than the company deserves. Since Tony began his ridiculous absence, his mother Pamela (who also happens to be the founder of Polka Dot and its major shareholder) has tried to keep out of the office most of the time, wanting to believe her son knows what he’s doing. But we can all tell she’s worried the company will go down, even with people like Alice working here. Thankfully, this not being one of Pamela’s rare visiting days, I managed to get my head down and do work for most of the day; at lunchtime I had to get out of the office, so took my sandwich round the corner to window shop, and found myself in front of the giant Topshop on Oxford Street, facing the maternity wear entrance.

They had some lovely clothes. Gorgeous slim-fitting jeans with fatty pregna-panels in the sides, fabulous tops to show off pregna-busts and delicious high-waisted dresses. Not to mention the mini-me baby clothes: t-shirts and sweaters with the wildlife of the season embroidered on the front, so the infant can be just as sharp as the mother. Could I live like this? Is there hope? I started walking back to the office feeling better, feeling hopeful. Maybe we could do this. It’s not the seventies anymore: I wouldn’t have to wear huge frilly tents and give up my job. I could be like Rachida Dati, returning to work at the French government five days after having this baby. Only, not the French government. And not five days. Women do this all over the world, all the time. And this wouldn’t just be my baby. It would be Thom’s as well. And who’s going to make a better baby than me and Thom?

So I went to the beautiful stationery shop below our office and bought this diary. I had a sudden urge to keep a record of everything, all our decisions and mistakes and joys. It felt like the first good step in a long road ahead. But I felt good.

Then I left the shop and almost tripped over a woman screaming at her child.

Woman: Didn’t I tell you, Nicholas? Didn’t I say no?

Boy: [incoherent screaming]

Woman: No, don’t keep crying. Pull yourself together and answer me.

Boy: [screaming, but down a notch or two] I … want …

Woman: Nicholas, if you don’t behave right now, not only will Daddy be hearing about this, but you can forget about your skiing lesson with Joshua on Saturday.

Boy: [silent for a moment, weighing up the options, screams recommencing even higher and louder than before]

Woman: [crouching down next to him] Please, Nicholas, please, darling, just calm yourself down. What it is you’d like, Nicky?

Boy: [sensing his advantage, ups the screaming again]

Woman: Calm down, darling. You know Mummy loves you. Calm down. Shall we go back to the shop to get you the little car?

Boy: [pulling back the screams a little] Ye-ea-aah – [hiccupping sob]

Woman: Alright, darling. You were very good last night, weren’t you? You only got out of bed four times! I think you deserve a nice little treat, don’t you, darling?

Wait. I’d forgotten. OH GOD I hate children.

So my mood overall was unchanged this afternoon, and when I came home. Thom saw my face and pulled me into another big hug as I walked through the door, and took me to the sofa where he sat me down and smiled at me.

Thom: Do you know what I thought today, as I tried to convince a room full of thirteen-year-olds to not show one another photos of women’s breasts while I talked about Jane Eyre?

Me: Nope.

Thom: Whether it’s now, or whether it’s in a few years: our kid is going to be brilliant.

Me: Ha! I thought the same thing today. Just before I stumbled over a woman being emotionally blackmailed by her four-year-old.

Thom: You know we don’t have to be like that, don’t you? You can pick your parenting style: we can be Aloof Edwardian Parents. Or Distant Army Parents, who only see their children once a year. Or Caveman Parents, who feed any spare kids to their pet dinosaur.

Me: That’s the Flintstones.

Thom: I hardly think the Flintstones would feed a child to a dinosaur.

Me: [silence, thinking] We could be alright as parents. Maybe.

Thom: Maybe we could. But maybe … you’re too chicken to have a baby.

Me: [laughing] If ever that ploy was going to work on me …

Thom: Kiki, we will do whatever you like. For now, I’ll make us something to eat.

I sat, and I thought. God, if we can deal with Thom’s redundancy and Dad’s heart attack and my previously-very-badly-paid-and-very-high-stress job, all while planning a wedding that took over our lives, we should be able to manage a baby. Thom’s baby. And we might just be OK parents.

Me: [calling to the kitchen] Go on, then. Let’s have a baby.

Thom: [running back in] Wooohoooo!

Me: You can’t make noises like that in a labour ward. And I’m not telling my mum.

Thom: Christ. We have to tell people about this, don’t we?

Together: Shotgun!

Me: I called it. You can tell them.

So I’m happy. But I still blame you, Paris. I don’t know how this is your fault, but it is.

TO DO:

Grow baby

Have baby

Raise baby

November’s Classic Baby

Mrs Darling was married in white, and at first she kept the books perfectly, almost gleefully, as if it were a game, not so much as a Brussels sprout was missing; but by and by whole cauliflowers dropped out, and instead of them there were pictures of babies without faces. She drew them when she should have been totting up. They were Mrs Darling’s guesses.

Wendy came first, then John, then Michael.

For a week or two after Wendy came it was doubtful whether they would be able to keep her, as she was another mouth to feed. Mr Darling was frightfully proud of her, but he was very honourable, and he sat on the edge of Mrs Darling’s bed, holding her hand and calculating expenses, while she looked at him imploringly. She wanted to risk it, come what might, but that was not his way; his way was with a pencil and a piece of paper, and if she confused him with suggestions he had to begin at the beginning again.

Peter Pan

J. M. Barrie

November 2nd

I’ve spent the last two days at work doing internet searches for pregnancy, then shutting my screen off whenever somebody comes near my desk. Even Carol – our terrifying but secretly incredibly sweet senior Commissioning Editor, who, after a sordid and very exciting office affair, is now with Norman, our reserved head of accounts – has started giving me concerned looks. But I’ve discovered that the ‘classic wedding’ emails I signed up for during the wedding planning also come in a ‘Pregnancy and Babies’ version too. Which … is … something, I suppose?

What’s so strange is how much this new reality is in my thoughts all the time. I can’t put anything in my mouth without my brain suddenly doing a stop-and-search which makes me keep retching on what I’m eating, either because it might be dangerous or my tastebuds have suddenly banded together to bar certain foods. The radio plays nothing but songs about babies: Papa Don’t Preach, Hit Me Baby One More Time, pretty much anything from Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound, almost any pop song ever. Adverts are saturated with babies; pregnant women are everywhere; I’ve gone over my calendar again and again with my sketchy dates to try and work out at what stage I’ll be for everything we’ve got planned. And I’ll need to avoid Susie (my sister, and mother to seven-year-old twins Edward and Lily and baby Frida) – my vocabulary has suddenly shrunk to just a few phrases: the number of times I said ‘They’re such babies/why is he being such a baby/don’t be a baby’ at work today was absurd. Did I see Alice sniggering at one of those?

November 3rd

A baby. Pregnant. I’m still not used to this. I don’t even know where to start. New clothes? A cot? Thom said: ‘Maybe go and see a doctor.’ I’m glad I’m not doing this on my own.

At the doctor’s today, I looked around the waiting room at the other patients with new, wiser eyes. What could they be here for? A teenage girl looks nervous, and plays with her phone the whole time. Pregnant? A woman with three young children looks exhausted and keeps putting her head in her hands. Number four on the way? Then my name was called, and I saw my new doctor for the first time: a black woman a couple of years older than me, standing in the doorway, resting her hip against the frame and rubbing her pregnant stomach. In her office, we each tried to make the other sit down first. She said, ‘On three?’ and I laughed and sat down.

Dr Bedford: So, how can I help you today?

Me: [suddenly nervous] I think I might be … [indicating her]

Dr Bedford: Black?

Me: No! No, not … no, I mean –

Dr Bedford: I’m just kidding, Katherine.

I like her.

Dr Bedford: You think you might be pregnant?

Me: Haha, ha. Yes, I think I’m pregnant.

Dr Bedford: And what makes you think that?

Me: I’ve missed two periods, I did four pregnancy tests in the end and they were all positive.

Dr Bedford: Just wanting to make sure?

Me: Exactly.

Dr Bedford: And how do you feel about this pregnancy?

Me: It wasn’t exactly planned, so I freaked out a bit to begin with – we only just got married this summer –

Dr Bedford: Congratulations!

Me: Thank you – so I wasn’t really sure how to handle it all, but I’m really happy now. I think. We both are.

Dr Bedford: OK, congratulations for this too, then. You say you’ve missed two periods – do you think that’s how far along you could be?

Me: [suddenly feeling like I’ve made an embarrassing mistake] Ye-es. Is that a problem?

Dr Bedford: [laughing] Of course it’s not a problem, Katherine! We’re not going to send you away because you’re a little later noticing than some mothers! Now, I’ll give the hospital a ring to get you booked in for your twelve-week scan – obviously these things are often booked up a while in advance, but of course we’ll find space for you. How are you feeling in yourself?

Me: Fine, thanks.

Dr Bedford: Any tiredness, or aches? Any pains around your womb area?

Me: I did feel completely wiped out about a month ago. I kept coming home from work and falling straight to sleep. But I thought that was delayed trauma from everything that’s happened this year. Do you think it was related to this?

Dr Bedford: I think it almost certainly was. So you’re getting lots of rest now? Anything else, any aches?

Me: Some aching, but I thought it was just period pains. I assume that’s why I haven’t realised. I kept getting stretching, achey pains, then forgetting that the period itself didn’t actually show up. And my appetite has gone crazy – either I’m trying to eat everything, or there’s nothing I can eat without feeling sick. I actually kept meaning to come and see you about it.

Dr Bedford: That’s quite normal, I’m afraid. And how have you been taking care of yourself, generally? Do you smoke or take drugs?

Me: [triumphant] No! Neither!

Dr Bedford: [laughing again] Well, that is something. How about drinking? What’s your weekly intake?

Me: Average?

Dr Bedford: What do you think we’re talking; a bottle of wine a night?

Me: God, no! Actually, it has been way less recently. That’s weird.

Dr Bedford: As long as you’re cutting back now, that’s all that matters. What’s done is done, yes?

Me: I suppose so.

Dr Bedford: I’ll sort out that scan, and give you this booklet [hands over giant A4 folder]. It will hopefully answer any questions you’ve got, give you some idea how to take care of yourself, and let you know all the check-ups and scans you’ll be having. You might also want to think about joining one of the antenatal groups around here, to meet some other mums.

Me: [choking sound]

Dr Bedford: Are you alright?

Me: Mums. Other mums. Other mums. Is it hot in here?

Dr Bedford: It could help you, Katherine, if you want to talk about this with people who might know what you’re going through right now. Do you have any other questions?

Me: Doctor.

Dr Bedford: Yes, Katherine.

Me: Is this all going to be OK?

Dr Bedford: I can’t tell you that, Katherine, but you’re a sensible girl. If you’re eating well and taking care of yourself, I don’t see that there should be any reason to worry. But it’s the scan that can really tell you what you’re looking for. Anything else?

Me: Can you tell my parents?

Dr Bedford: Do you think they’ll be upset?

Me: No. I think they’ll be delighted. I’m just not sure I can cope with it.

Dr Bedford: Well, Katherine, I’m always here if you need support or guidance, but do bear in mind [leaning in, conspiratorial] I’ve only two months to my maternity leave and I do have quite a few people to see before I can go. So …