Pregnancy

I was, I was abused as a child and have a, have issues about men and it was very difficult because I had a little girl already. I was, I was petrified, actually, that I'd, I'd have a baby boy and I wouldn't love it, that I would hate it. On the day of my 20 week scan I was, I was saying in the morning, 'I don't know what I'm going to do, I'm so scared they're going to tell me it's a baby boy. I don't know what I'm going to do; I'm not going to be able to cope.' And during my scan I got to know this baby, he was lovely. It, this baby kicking about on the screen and then it came to sex of the baby and she said, 'Would you like to know the sex?' So I said, 'Yes.' And my sister was with me at the time and so she zoomed down and in this, in his little true male character [laughing] opened his legs and there, there it was. And it was just so funny the way he did it and my sister looked at me as though I was about to cry but it was, it was fine from then on, it was fine. But that, that was actually a huge issue, a huge, huge thing. Not many people understand it at all; very few people understand it.

So what made it okay, because you did have a little boy?

Yeah.

What was the moment where you realised, I'm going to have a little boy and it's okay?

I think I fell in love with him while I was having the scan. I think I just fell in love with him and I, I just thought, it doesn't matter. He's so gorgeous, you know, you see their face and, and you, you kind of see a personality shine through those scans and during the scan it just came across that it didn't matter at all. And I was actually quite proud that I was going to have this little boy in the end but it was, it was, you know, it was ruining the pregnancy, the fear of having a boy which, like I say, not, not many people understand.
 

Father: Well, it's quite funny because at work there was just a big group of us all of a sudden were, were having children - people I already knew quite well, so, and had worked with. There must be about four or five of us all had children in around four months of each other. So it did feel quite like we were in part of a gang because we were all talking about the same sorts of things and sharing experiences so.. And it also made you, because the company I work for, everyone's quite young, and so all of a sudden I felt quite grown-up amongst my peers because I was married and was having children. And some of the people I still spoke to were single still, were going out every night and getting drunk or whatever. So all of a sudden life had changed quite dramatically.

Mother: Poor you.

Father: Exactly.

Mother: [laugh]

Father: Poor me.
 

I think once we sort of went ahead and then, you know, everything was going smoothly with the pregnancy, I started getting a bit more positive, but it was worrying at the same time. But it was, you know, it was finally something happy coming out of all the sadness that we'd been through. And it was like making you believe again in life, I think. 

That was important for me because I thought life was not worth it. If it's like that, then it's not worth it, but now it is worth it. And that's been a turning point in our life, I think. To realise that, yes, miracles happen and, you know, because I always feel she's a miracle anyway, because first of all most people don't get pregnant first time - and she's been always healthy and so, you know, she's our little miracle, I think.

Yeah, nobody [laughs], you just don't get, you know the feeling when you go along for your antenatal check-up and you get excited hearing the baby's heart beat and looking - because I didn't buy anything for him, didn't buy any, any equipment or baby clothes, nothing. So I, I just wanted to be sure he was here first.

You said you bought one thing for him, did you?

A little babygro, which said 'I grow in my sleep' on it.

I didn't, well, I haven't, I haven't felt embittered or anything about that, you know - oh, all that wasted time, or how unfair it is, or anything like that. I haven't really thought about those sorts of things.  I also wanted to continue with the pregnancy because I thought, I don't want to cut this pregnancy short. I want to experience pregnancy to full term. I might not have another chance.. Because I'm thirty-nine now and I never know what's going to happen, do I? So I wanted that experience as well, and I thought it just felt more natural to go through a life cycle and to have a funeral.  Because if you terminate a baby, although you grieve over them it's very private, people don't acknowledge your grief.. the same way that they do, if the baby's been born and died.  

Did you, when you, when you started to sort of, you know, get bigger and your body was changing and stuff, how did, how did that feel to you?

Different, weird, it was really weird because I was still only slim when she was kicking me. I'd only had like a little pop and she was kicking away. So to me it felt weird because I had this like little tiny bump. And then it come to about, I think it was about six months, and I just ballooned out, and I went enormous and you could see her moving her arms and things like that. But it was, I felt dead weird, I felt disgusting.

Did you?

Yeah. Although it was in the middle of summer I was wearing trackie bottoms and big baggy T-shirts, to try and hide the bump, because I felt massive, I felt huge. They were saying, everyone was saying, “Oh, you've got a dead neat tiny bump” and things like this. I didn't, to me it felt huge. I felt enormous and it was just knocking me sick. I just wanted it over with so I could have my body back to myself, that was it. So, that's the only thing I'd have felt. It was emotional though when I first felt her kick and I first seen her move across my stomach and things like that. I did get a bit upset because you - as you do, don't you, when you're, you're lying there and nothing happens and then all of a sudden you get this big boot coming out, this big foot coming out your stomach or this big arm, and it's the first time you'd seen her and things like that. So I did get emotional with that. But that was it, I just wanted my body back to myself. It was knocking me sick being fat, [laugh] knocking me sick having this bump in front of me, because I felt like I was walking like a Womble.

Like a Womble?

Mm. I felt like I was walking like a Womble. And my auntie used to actually sing to me, “Remember you're a Womble” because I used to say, “I walk, I look like a Womble. I'm walking like one and I look like one”.

How did you cope for such a long time with all the sadness and all the trauma and all the difficulty and all the decision making? What got you through?

To go through all this five years of waiting for our daughter to finally be born, I think I spent enough time to grieve, especially for the termination. The miscarriage I didn't allow myself time to grieve, I only was off from school [as a teacher] for a week, and that was a big mistake. Because I think when the next pregnancy started I was really very, very, you know, emotionally exhausted and I don't think it was right. 

But for the termination I took six months. I didn't go to work, and I just sort of took time to grieve and think over, and talk to the psychologist. I think that helped a lot. Me having the kitten as well helped me a lot. And then once I'd got over that, and I went back to work I obviously continued to focus on how to have a baby and all that.

With the pregnancy itself, my last pregnancy, seeing the psychologist as well helped me. Unfortunately I couldn't do sports any more, at five months, but I, what I also remember is just having a diary and every week that I was advancing in my pregnancy I used to turn the page and tear a piece of paper from, in the corner, to say I've gone another week. So I think I was taking a week at a time. I was not, I was trying to not sort of look too much ahead but just taking one week at a time. And every time I had passed another week I was saying, "You see, I'm getting closer, I'm doing another week this time, another week, another week, another week", and then suddenly it came to 40 weeks. 

And that's how I coped as well, trying to - but it was very stressful. But I was, I was actually - in a way it's very strange - but I thought, this time it's going to work. It has to work. So I had a lot of faith in a way, at the same time I was so scared as well, but I had some faith that it was going to work. But the psychologist was definitely helping, definitely helping.

That's quite an unusual choice these days, to not have your husband there or your partner there?

I don't know. I just felt I didn't want him to see me in, in this state. The birth was a very scary thing for me. I suppose it's all psychologic, well, it is in fact psychologic. I think the first time I've seen a documentary on birth I was too young. I was a young teenager and I was probably too young to see, you know. It was just a mistake, flicking channels, and I saw something I should have not seen at that age and it just scared me. And all these years, the thought of the birth was just something so scary for me. Something you can't think of, it's just too much to take. And so I think I didn't want my husband to see me in that stage. It was a big, big step, the birth. Not too much the pregnancy. Even so the sickness was not nice [laugh]. Pregnancy was not that much of a big step, but the birth was the big, big step, you know, to go through, the big wall to go through for me. And because my expectation was so high, you know, the fear, the expectation of the fear and the, and the pain and, and the blood and all that was so high for me, I suppose that I had a pleasant surprise [laugh] that it was not as bad as I thought it would be.
 

Did the thought of becoming a parent worry you or was that also...?

Mother: [nods] [laugh]

Tell me more?

Mother: Well, I think it's things, for instance, you think about, well, how are you going to handle it when, if your child doesn't particularly like you? Well, you haven't been a parent before, so you think - well, I was thinking about these things - and 'If you need to discipline your child how will you feel about that? Will will you use smacking? Will you just reason? How will you handle things?' Those type of things, which is very far off. And I think I did think about, 'Well, how will I cope?' And 'Will I be a good mother?'  And those sort of things did run through my mind. But I just, and I just thought along the lines of 'What if I don't like the baby?' That was very strange though, because I just thought, 'Well, what if I really do not like this person?' But that hasn't happened [laugh].