I fell into motherhood you know. Mr Spider and I had been teenage sweethearts – him a slightly older teenager at 19, but was still young enough to not make our relationship sound totally illegal and perverse – since 2005. We met through friends in a time when Mr Spider drove motor vehicles of those resembling something from a budget reenactment of “The Fast and the Furious” Like, a really really budget version. But he did have under car neon lights. If I’m honest, that’s what sealed it for me. We grew up together, we made mistakes together – think 46 inch LCD TV’s on hire purchase…don’t do it kids – and we fell in love with eachother really early on in the start of our lives, but we still walk hand in hand today.
We planned to do everything “properly” – you know, careers, marriage, mortgage and then babies but in 2011, 6 years into our relationship, and after a weekend of far too much wine on my part – I remember it well…out with my darling friend from work, in the club acting as socially awkward as ever, but then coming alive like a banshee on a resuscitation table upon the beautiful sound of Robin S’ “Show Me Love” – we discovered we were in for a massive rollercoaster ride in the shape of a piss ridden stick revealing that I…we…were pregnant. We were going to have a baby!
If I’m completely honest my first thought was, “Shit. I am going to get fat. And stretchmarked. And there is a strong possibility that one’s lady garden may never recover from the harrowing act of child birth. Shit. Shit. Shit” but soon my thoughts turned to how magical it would be to have a mini us, and how maybe this was what I was truly meant to do with my life. Maybe, after years of soul searching and continuously feeling at a loose end it had come to me – I was meant to be a mother!
Oh, it was exciting and dreamy – this amazing little secret was ours, buried deep inside my tummy, what a womanly Goddess I was nurturing our unborn child from within…and then the morning sickness hit. OH MY GOD/insert other religious figure relevant to your beliefs – can I even call God mine in this instance being with child out of wedlock? It was awful, horrendous, a constant hangover, you know the ones you get after mixing tequila with a pint of Stella because it seems like a genius idea at the time? Yes, that. I vaguely recall asking to send the baby back so I could trade it for a Shih Tzu instead.
The NSPCC and RSPCA both frowned upon my proposition, so it was with a lot of nerves, raging hormones, and sheer unconditional love for the little person I was yet to know that I carried (read as waddled) my way to 40+6 weeks pregnant.
On the 11th January 2012 at approximately 2am I was awoken with a massive pop. A massive meconium filled POP. This did not bode well for my home birth I had been planning, it essentially meant my darling baby had taken a massive dump in their waters and was in serious danger of inhaling it and becoming very ill. To the hospital we went…nee naw nee naw! (you resist the urge to type that being a mother of 2 toddlers. Impossible)
We arrived, they examined me, took my stats, we walked around the hospital grounds to encourage the contractions to turn themselves up a notch, some pain came – not much – “this is easy, I’m a hero” I smugly thought to myself. Fast forward 5 hours…
What the fuck was happening to me? I thought I was in labour, you know – the beautiful act of giving life, I felt like I was going to have an uncontrollable bowel movement and produce a baby elephant. I’d asked for a fucking puppy remember, not an elephant! Still, I tried to remain a strong confident woman and with the gas and air canister firmly by my side I contracted my way through another 10 or so hours. The baby wasn’t coming, and neither was any hospital meal after insulting the nurse with a mid contraction outburst of, “Stuff your lasagna, I want chips! Chips, you bitch!” – how awfully rude and out of character, may I add that by this point I think I was tripping on diamorphine. Amazing pain relief for me – if you don’t know, get to know. In a controlled environment for medical purposes only, obviously. I could have killed for some chips though. Anyway, back to the baby. It wasn’t coming. It was getting distressed, I was on my 20th hour of labour – I can barely manage 20 minutes on the treadmill, I too, was feeling somewhat distressed. There was talk of surgery. I pleaded with them not to do a C section, I was so scared of the aftermath of my poor tummy, but my baby wanted out so we had to find a way…Hello forceps!
“David! David is that you?!” I called out, at this point I was on the spinal drip, gas and air, left over diamorphine and heap loads of nervous adrenaline. We were in theatre. Mr Spider was scrubbed up and looked like he was likely to pass out at any second, but the man who really caught my eye was David Wicks – the Eastenders bad man! He was peeking up at me behind the curtain separating my head and the lower part of my body which temporarily didn’t belong to me. “David! A man of many talents!” I excitedly shrieked.
“I’m not David” he calmly replied with a pitiful smile.
“David Wicks! Whatever would Pat Butcher say?!”
“I need you to push” said David.
I gave a half arsed, exhausted push whilst feeling honoured to be in the presence of a household name. Nothing. Boring. Back to David…
I turned to Mr Spider who was furiously trying to get me to focus on pushing fuelled by the overwhelming urge to meet his baby, just about to alert him – as if he hadn’t already heard – that Dave was delivering our sprog when I heard him say, “Here they come…here’s your baby!”
He appeared over the curtain, an imprint that will never leave my mind – my baby. Our baby. A tiny, grumpy little person, all 8lb 5.5oz of him – half of me and half of the man I loved the most. I’d wanted a boy and my wish had come true, but what gender he was became irrelevant and I didn’t even mind that he wasn’t a puppy, he was perfect and in that split second I had gone from a girl with no idea what to do with her life to a woman – a mummy! – who had every reason to live. It suddenly all made sense when I held him in my arms for the first time…no matter what happened, it would always be him and I. I had never realised it but I had been waiting forever to meet him, to know and love this miniature person. On the 11th January 2012, my life begin.
So, there you have it. Spidermum was born. We’re 3 years in and everyday is an experience, sometimes its out of this world amazing and sometimes it leaves me yearning for that puppy I almost switched him for. Its one big learning curve and a heck of a journey to be on and I would like to write about it and share with you all – if you’ll have me!
To be continued….there’s another kid, ya know.
If you made it this far, Thankyou!
Spidermum
charleymulaney 