A labour of love

Abstract

It was a cold and windy winter's night. Actually it was a warm September evening, but traumatic events can easily distort one's perception, so it might as well have been the former. You see, it was that night that I delivered my first baby and my last, if I have anything to do with it. Early evening my sister had gone to the nearby hospital in the first pangs of labour, and I breathed a sigh of relief in the knowledge that she was ensconced in the bosom of a maternity ward. Not for long, because a mere hour later she was back, having been told that she had “many hours to go” and “could go home” if she wanted. She wanted, and it was then that I had an overwhelming sense of impending doom. And I was not wrong. Inexperienced as I was (and still am) in matters parturient, I was slow to catch on that the guttural moans and look of agony on her face two hours later signalled more than just wind trouble—she was in the full throes of labour. And there was only me to help (my grandmother, as she was to say later, “didn't have a clue” even though she had had six babies. But, as she pointed out, she “was at the other end”); my sister's 7-year-old son, dog, husband, and my mother were equally useless for various reasons—asleep, asleep, working, and on holiday, respectively.