From Here to Maternity

by Sinéad Moriarty

  Every time I tried to put his dummy into his mouth, he spat it out. The crying and spitting out went on for over an hour until I was at the end of my tether. I looked around for something to help and my eyes fell upon James’s tie.

  I looped the tie into the ring on the end of Yuri’s dummy, I then secured it by tying it in a knot at the back of his head. The dummy was now pasted to his mouth so he couldn’t spit it out. I laid him down in his cot. ‘I’m sorry, sweetheart, but it’s only two minutes while I shower,’ I said, feeling like a very bad mother. ‘Come on, now, calm down and go to sleep.’

  He sat up and stared at me. I looked at my watch. We were leaving in twenty minutes. I ran into the bathroom and had a speedy shower. When I got back to the room – literally two minutes later – Mrs Hamilton was standing at the cot, looking shocked.

  ‘Emma, what on earth… Is he all right?’ she asked. ‘Is that what they do, these days?’

  ‘Oh, ha-ha – no, not really, it was just for a minute to try to calm him down… I was just… you know… um… well…’ I was at a loss for words. How on earth could I explain it to her? I bent down to undo the tie. Yuri spat the dummy on to the floor and let out the most almighty roar. I picked him up as Mrs Hamilton muttered something about leaving me to it.

  A few minutes later, James came in. ‘What on earth is going on?’ he asked. ‘My mother just told me that she found Yuri with a dummy tied to his head?’

  ‘Well, it wasn’t quite like that. He wouldn’t stop crying – which I notice you completely ignored while you sat downstairs having pre-dinner drinks with your parents – so I had to resort to slightly desperate measures.’

  ‘Like gagging him?’

  ‘No, I just needed him to calm down so I secured the dummy in his mouth for a minute.’

  ‘He could have choked.’

  ‘He was breathing perfectly well through his nose. If you were so concerned you should have come up and helped me.’

  ‘My poor mother came down shaking. We had to feed her a stiff brandy.’

  ‘Well, I’d like a stiff drink myself, but, oh, no, while you and your dad quaff gin and tonics and talk about rugby, I’m left trying to settle a screaming child so that the babysitter won’t take one look at him and turn on her heels.’

  ‘Actually, Dad said he thought it sounded ingenious,’ said James, beginning to laugh.

  ‘But your mother thinks I’m certifiable.’

  ‘Well, she did say she’d never seen anything quite like it before.’

  ‘What did you say? That I’m just a lunatic, I suppose.’

  ‘No, I said it was family trick your mother had passed down and I used it regularly on you to great effect.’

  Chapter 19

  A week after we got back from England, I went to meet Lucy and Jess for drinks – well, fizzy water for me, drinks for them. They both commented on my bump, which had suddenly sprouted. I’m not sure if it was the baby or that my appetite had come back with a vengeance. I was permanently starving. With nineteen weeks still to go, at this rate I’d be the size of a house by the time the baby was born. The really worrying thing was, that all I craved was chips, toast lathered in butter, and ice-cream. I had heard of women who craved carrots or liquorice but unfortunately I seemed to need grease in truckloads.

  ‘So, how many weeks are you?’ asked Jess.

  ‘Oh, God, not the weeks thing,’ said Lucy. ‘I hate the way pregnant women do that. Everything’s about weeks. For us plebs it just means we have to divide everything by four to try and work out how pregnant you are. Why do months go out the window when you’re pregnant? Everyone talks about nine months until they get pregnant and then it’s all about forty weeks.’

  She had a point – and it was something I used to moan about too.

  ‘Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten how annoying it is.’ I grinned. ‘I’m twenty-one weeks – so, just over five months.’

  ‘You’re very neat,’ said Jess.

  ‘I won’t be for much longer if I keep eating at the rate I am. How much weight did you put on?’ I asked Jess.

  ‘For Sally I ate like a horse and put on nearly four stone, which took me over a year to shed. With Roy I was a lot more careful and only put on two.’

  ‘How much is considered normal?’ I asked.

  ‘They say two stone is about right,’ said Jess.

  ‘Is it really hard to lose?’

  ‘Nightmare.’

  ‘God, I really had better stop eating so much, then,’ I said.

  ‘On the positive side, your boobs are sensational,’ said Lucy, nodding at my now almost Playboy-sized breasts.

  I had always had a fine pair of boobs, but they had increased considerably in the last few weeks. I was heading towards Dolly Parton territory. ‘I know – they’re huge.’ I giggled. ‘I’ll have to get new underwear – I’m spilling out of all my bras.’

  ‘I’d love to have good boobs,’ said Lucy, looking down at her fried eggs.

  ‘Yeah, well, I’d love to have your figure,’ I said. ‘By the way, when will I start blooming?’ I asked Jess. ‘I’m as pale a ghost and I look like death at the moment. Or is it just bullshit?’

  ‘I found from five months on much more enjoyable and your energy levels go up.’

  ‘Well, if they went down any more I’d be horizontal. I’m permanently tired. I miss energy.’

  ‘Don’t worry, you’ve had a double whammy with Yuri coming along at the same time. You should get that book What To Expect When You’re Expecting. It’s really good – everyone in my mother-and-baby group has it,’ said Jess.

  I was a bit wary of her books after the ones she had lent me on child-rearing – and as for her mother-and-baby group…

  ‘I’m not sure about the information thing,’ I said. ‘I totally overdid it with the research when I was trying to get pregnant and I don’t think it did me any good – I was completely obsessed. I’m kind of avoiding all the pregnancy books. I think they’ll just make me over-analyse it. I think I’m a less-is-more type of person. And by the way Jess, no offence, but those women in your baby group were hard going.’

  ‘They sound like a bunch of bitches to me. Women with too much time on their hands are dangerous,’ said Lucy, who had had a blow-by-blow account of the morning from me, and been furious on Yuri’s and my behalf.

  Jess bristled. ‘They aren’t all women with too much time on their hands, Lucy, they’re just full-time mums, like me. I admit Sonia can be a bit hard to take, but she means well. She’s just got an abrupt manner.’

  ‘Emma said they were all dressed in designer gear at eleven o’clock in the morning,’ said Lucy, landing me in it.

  ‘What’s wrong with wanting to look nice when you spend most of your time in old clothes covered with dribble? It’s fun to dress up once in a while.’

  ‘They were pretty insensitive about Yuri, especially that idiot Maura,’ I said, getting a bit hot under the collar as I remembered how rude she was about him being adopted.

  ‘You’re the first person they’ve met who has adopted and they’re not used to the idea. They didn’t mean any harm. Anyway, it’s not as if you didn’t make your point. Maura was quite upset about it.’

  ‘Gee, poor old Maura! Maybe next time she won’t be so bloody insensitive. What about my feelings, Jess? They were implying that Yuri was some kind of charity case. How the hell do you think I felt?’

  ‘I know you were annoyed – I stuck up for you, remember? But you have to accept that adoption is probably something Maura has never thought about. She was just uninformed as opposed to being deliberately cruel. And you are a bit sensitive about it – understandably so,’ she said, backtracking when she saw my face darken.

  ‘Pfff, they sound like a bunch of losers to me,’ said Lucy.

  ‘They’re friends of mine, Lucy,’ said Jess. ‘I don’t slag off your workmates.’

  ‘That’s because my colleagues are interesting and don’t sit around all day talking about th
eir Filipina maids and designer shirts. Those women spend far too much time drinking coffee and being dissatisfied with everything. You’ve told us before that they talk a lot about material things.’

  ‘Sometimes they do go on about cars and clothes but, believe me, it’s light relief after a week of sitting on the floor reading Goldilocks and the Three Bears over and over again, changing nappies and watching The sodding Tellytubbies’

  ‘Fair enough. That does sound pretty dull,’ admitted Lucy.

  I decided to change the subject. We were treading on dangerous territory. Both Lucy and Jess had had a good few drinks and they were singing from different hymn sheets, and probably always would be, on the issue of non-working mothers. Besides, I’d never see those women again, so there was no point in falling out with Jess over them. She was welcome to them and their mindless chit-chat. ‘Can we talk about sex for a minute?’ I piped up.

  ‘Anytime, anyplace, anywhere,’ said Lucy, encouragingly.

  ‘Well, the thing is, between the sleep deprivation with Yuri and my pregnancy, my sex drive seems to have somewhat diminished.’

  ‘Define “somewhat”,’ said Lucy, cutting to the chase.

  ‘Vastly,’ I replied.

  ‘That’s completely normal,’ said Jess, who hadn’t had sex with Tony for eight months after Sally was born.

  ‘It just seems a bit strange, because we’ve gone from having sex twenty-four-seven when I was trying to get pregnant to having it sporadically.’

  ‘It was the same when I was pregnant with Sally. Although when I was expecting Roy I was a lot randier,’ said Jess.

  ‘It’s the tiredness I’m most worried about. It’s zapping me.’

  ‘Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’ve had a really emotionally, not to mention physically, draining few months,’ said Lucy.

  ‘I fell asleep in the middle of it last night,’ I blurted out, blushing at the memory.

  ‘What!’ they squealed, and laughed as they saw me squirm.

  ‘Details, please,’ said Jess.

  I explained that the previous day I had realized that James and I hadn’t had sex in ages, not since New Year’s Eve, more than eight weeks ago. The problem was that the relief I felt when I finally collapsed into bed was so enormous that nothing could have enticed me to give up a second of sleep. Not even George Clooney could have persuaded me to offer up sacred sleep. But this was bad: all the books and magazines said it was important to keep up a healthy sex life after having children. I didn’t want us to turn into one of those couples where the husband goes around leering at other women because he’s starved sexually at home.

  I put on a sexy little négligé – that was now not so sexy because my stomach was straining the seams but at least my cleavage looked good – and James came out of the bathroom to find me rolling about, trying to find a position that didn’t highlight my expanding midriff.

  ‘Hello,’ he said, pleased to see the lacy black number. He knew he was on to a good thing. There was nothing subtle about my efforts.

  ‘Hello, big boy,’ I purred, sounding as ridiculous as I looked.

  James laughed and hopped in beside me. We kissed and played around…

  The next thing I knew, James was calling. ‘Emma! Emma!’

  ‘What?’ I said, opening my eyes.

  ‘Were you asleep?’ he asked, appalled.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, I just had my eyes closed.’ My God, I had nodded off. I realized now that I must have fallen asleep right in the middle of sex.

  ‘I can’t believe you were asleep.’

  ‘I wasn’t.’

  ‘You were practically snoring.’

  ‘I was having a great time. I must have just nodded off for a second.’

  ‘In the middle of sex, Emma,’ said James, looking put out. Clearly, having your wife fall asleep during intercourse was not good for a man’s ego.

  ‘Yes, but not on purpose. I wasn’t bored or anything, I’m just really, really tired. Sorry.’ I felt awful. How could I have fallen asleep? It was so insulting for poor James.

  ‘You should have told me you were tired. I thought, with the lacy nightdress, you were up for a night of passion.’

  ‘I was. I am. Come on, let’s get back to it. I’m wide awake now.’

  ‘I hardly think that’s a good idea. You clearly need a good night’s sleep.’

  ‘Come on, it’s not as if we’ll be here for hours. Chop-chop.’

  ‘Darling, when your wife goes into a coma during sex, it’s a passion-killer to say the least. We’ll call it a night.’

  ‘No, come on, look, I’m full of beans now,’ I said, jumping up and down on the bed. ‘Let’s go for it. Will I get out the Rampant Rabbit to spice things up?’ I asked, referring to the large rabbit-like vibrator that Babs had ordered for me over the Internet when we were trying to conceive.

  ‘To be honest,’ said James, looking down at himself, ‘the Rabbit might be your best bet this evening. I don’t think I’m going to bounce back – as it were – from the shock of finding you asleep.’

  ‘Sorry, James,’ I said, hugging him. ‘You know it’s not that I don’t love you or find you incredibly sexy, it’s just lack of sleep.’

  ‘It’s OK. But you should go to sleep now and try to catch up. I’d like you to be a bit more involved next time.’

  Jess and Lucy were roaring laughing by the time I’d finished the story. ‘Poor James!’ said Lucy.

  ‘I know, I felt awful,’ I groaned. ‘I need some kind of female Viagra.’

  ‘You’ll start feeling more energetic soon,’Jess assured me. ‘The first few months of pregnancy are really draining, and with Yuri as well it’s no wonder you fell asleep. Are you taking any iron?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Well, you should start. Spatone do sachets that you can dissolve in orange juice. It’ll help.’

  ‘I’ll get some tomorrow.’

  ‘I’d start with a double dose, if I was you,’ said Lucy, winking at me.

  Chapter 20

  Lucy woke up to a silver rectangle being waved at her. She opened a bleary eye. ‘What are you doing?’ she asked, as Donal shook it under her nose.

  ‘I thought we had an agreement.’

  ‘What are you talking about? For God’s sake, it’s eight o’clock on Saturday morning and I’ve hours of sleep left. Whatever it is, it can wait.’ Lucy pulled the duvet over her head.

  ‘Lucy, why are all the weekdays gone out of this packet?’

  Lucy frowned. What on earth was he crashing on about at this ungodly hour? She poked her head out. ‘What?’

  Donal was holding her packet of Nordette contraceptive pills and pointing at the missing days. ‘Why are you still taking these yokes? We said we’d try for a baby.’

  ‘No, we did not,’ Lucy said, awake now. ‘You said you wanted to try immediately and I said I didn’t. We never agreed to anything. In fact, we disagreed. And since when do you go around rooting in my bath-bag?’

  ‘I was looking for a nail scissors and I saw these. Lookit, Lucy, you’re no spring chicken and it’s time these went in the bin.’

  ‘Thirty-six is not that old. Stop telling me I’m past my prime.’

  ‘Can you not stop with these things and give it a shot? I’d make a great father. I’ve done a good job with Annie and you get on well with her now.’

  Lucy snorted. ‘Annie’s the troublemaker who tried to break us up, remember?’

  ‘Believe me, I remember it well. Let’s give it a go, for the hell of it.’

  ‘I just don’t feel ready yet. I’m still reeling from the wedding. Can we just stall the ball for a few months?’

  ‘If you’re afraid you’ll be a bad mother, don’t worry. Look at your own – she’s a dreadful old boot and you turned out fine.’

  ‘Don’t call my mother a boot.’

  ‘You called Annie a troublemaker.’

  ‘Yeah, well, that’s different because she was a wench to me for a long time.�
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  ‘Every time your mother sees me, she practically hisses,’ said Donal.

  ‘I admit she’s not your biggest fan.’

  ‘She thinks I’m a joke.’

  ‘Not any more. When I told her you’d given up playing rugby and started a career as a sports presenter, you went right up in her estimation. I think she sees you as the new Des Lynam.’

  ‘I was thinking more Gary Lineker myself. We’re both young, good-looking sportsmen with a professional air about us.’

  Lucy laughed. Donal seized the moment: ‘So, will you stop taking these?’

  Lucy paused. ‘I’m scared.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Of having kids and becoming one of those couples who fight all the time. I like our relationship the way it is. I like my life. I don’t want it to change.’

  ‘It won’t, and to be fair, it’s not as if we’ve never had a fight.’

  ‘Yeah, but everyone has the odd row – it’s not like the constant sniping that harassed, sleep-deprived parents do.’

  ‘We’ll be different. We’ll only eat the face off each other once in a while, like we do now. There’ll be no sniping. Come on, Lucy, let’s at least try.’

  Lucy looked at his eager face. He was right: she wasn’t getting any younger and it’d probably take a while… and she thought she might want a child eventually… and it was day twenty-seven in her cycle so she had no chance of getting pregnant if they had sex now. She’d think about coming off the pill later. She wasn’t ready just yet, but for the moment Donal needed to be pacified.

  She nodded as Donal hopped on top of her to get some practice in.

  My bump seemed to be getting bigger by the second, along with my appetite. I called in to Mum’s to collect Yuri, having skipped lunch because of some mini-drama on the set at work. The head of the Flower Arrangers’ Society of Ireland had arrived for her slot, late and absolutely plastered. The woman could barely stand. She swayed from side to side, precariously carrying an enormous, award-winning floral creation, which looked the worse for wear. Amanda was freaking out because they had allocated twenty minutes to the slot and she had nothing else to fill it. I spent thirty minutes plying the woman with coffee to try to sober her up and she eventually stumbled on and managed to slur her way through the piece, although her attempts to show the viewers how to reconstruct the bouquet she had brought with her were comedic to say the least: she repeatedly dropped the flowers and cut off their heads. Amanda kept having to go to commercial breaks as the rest of us desperately tried to mirror the two flower arrangements.