by Poppy Dolan
A few minutes later I hear the jingle of keys being loaded into his pocket and he shuts the front door behind him.
Confessions of a First-Time Mum
Blog Post 3.15pm
‘Fine’: the real F word.
‘Fine’ used to be a fun word, when I was younger and before I had a kid.
‘How’s your food?’ a stylish tattooed waiter in a London gastro pub would ask. ‘Fine!’ I’d chirrup back, tucking into my perfectly cooked rack of lamb served on a slab of tree trunk, getting to eat my food warm and just the way the chef intended, not stone-cold and with solidified fat marbling the meat, because I’d had to rush to change a nappy or awkwardly bring out a boob in front of gawking drinkers.
I might look at myself in a mirror of a changing room with a new, low-cut, slinky top on, turning this way and that, holding in my few extra centimetres of flesh with a deep breath. When I liked what I saw, I might cheekily think, ‘Girl, you look fine in this. Buy it and wear it out tonight!’ And just like that, I’d bought a new outfit and decided my evening plans without having to consult sleeping and feeding patterns like a star map, for weeks in advance. Without having to worry that even if I did beat the odds and make it out for a night, I might fall asleep next to a speaker in a night club at 10.23pm because I’d been awake 20 hours that day.
When friends would ask, ‘So, how are you?’ I would say, ‘Yeah, I’m fine’ and I would really mean that. I would mean everything in my life is good and easy and right. Because I never thought that much about what went into achieving that kind of natural happiness. Because I took it for granted.
And now fine is a totally different word, and laden with so much more meaning than ever before. It’s actually a pretty heavy word, now I think about it. ‘Fine’ means ‘acceptable’, ‘I can live with it’ and ‘This will do’. It’s not pub lunches or new tops or friendly chats. It’s pushing a pram around and around in circles even though my legs are so tired I think they might crumple underneath me, and then a sweet old lady at a bus stop will ask about the baby and I’ll say with a fake smile: ‘Fine.’ It’s about deciding that a jumper to pull on for the day is ‘fine’ because there are no major stains on it and it doesn’t smell all that bad. It’s muttering that the baby onesie is ‘Probably fine’ because you managed to wipe up the sick sharpish with a baby wipe and the thought of putting the washing machine on yet again today makes you want to scream. It’s the ‘Hey, it’s fine’ you hear down the line when you call to cancel a plan with your pre-baby friends because of a worrying temperature or a night before of only 45-minutes’ sleep. And in their tone you can almost hear yourself getting crossed off a mental list of people to socialise with.
It’s scraping by.
And when people ask, ‘So, how are you?’ I still say, ‘Yeah, I’m fine.’ Because to let it all out, all the resentments and complaints and hardships, sound like ingratitude. For being given a beautiful child. For having a baby. For doing what so many couples desperately want to do, and can’t. For having an extended maternity leave when some mums have no choice but to go back to work at three months to pay the bills.
I’m honestly not ungrateful, I swear. Sometimes the impossible perfection of my daughter’s round cheeks actually takes my breath away. And she’ll look at me with her quick, sharp eyes and pull a face and inside I feel like The Wizard of Oz when it goes Technicolor.
I love her, sweet Jesus, I love her to bits, but that doesn’t make everything ‘fine’.
So, my OH is going away, at the last minute, on a work trip. And he tells me, ‘You’ll be fine’ and I think that tells me everything I need to know about our different experiences of parenthood. He believes it. But I know the reality.
My thumb is starting to cramp up as I hit ‘Publish’. Cherry fell asleep after her mid-afternoon feed, like a warm Doberman on my lap, and I didn’t want to risk that by moving her. Besides, the warm heft of her on my lap, the sweet smell of her freshly washed babygro, the slow lift and fall of her chest as she snoozed, was so comforting. A little bubble of sofa love. So I shoved my boob back into my nursing bra and poured all my frustrations with Ted into a blog post.
It was the one thing I didn’t spill the beans about to Will and Nelle this morning – mostly because it doesn’t feel real, my little blog. I’ve had about 300 hits in the last month and I’m convinced it’s men after porn and, because I say boobs and nipples so much, the metadata wrongly brings them to First-Time Mum. I hope the reality of the mastitis and bloody, oozing nipple cracks I detail are their just desserts. First-Time Mum is not here for anyone’s sexual gratification, thank you very much. She’s here to say everything I’m too much of a scaredy-cat to say in real life.
But I suppose it’s the one thing I expected for my mum life before Cherry’s arrival that has actually come true: I had this vision of myself keeping a little blog going, journalising our adventures and milestones, ‘keeping my mind occupied’ in the time before going back to work. I saw it as flapjack recipes and pics of handprint collages, and baby and I in sunnies on our first beach holiday (which has still yet to happen). But what it turned out to be was an SOS. A catalogue of my shortcomings. A way to say ‘this is hard’ without saying it to a flesh-and-blood person who might judge me or dislike me or tell everyone I’m a bad parent.
And today it’s the space for the things I can’t say to Ted.
He’s still out – he texted to say he was going to swing by the supermarket and get me in some things for next week. And that’s a token effort and all, but I know really he wants to prolong his break out of the house. He has so much more freedom than me that sometimes it feels like I really am the mad prisoner behind the glass and I have to watch him swan off into the great unknown every time he goes to work. To a land where he can pee in private and take lunch just when he pleases and eat food he hasn’t microwaved himself. And the idea of that sweet freedom makes my domestic incarceration so much more of a bitter pill to swallow.
He’ll have drinks in Hong Kong. Dinners. Cocktail parties. He’ll bring back a cuddly toy for Cherry and think balance has been restored. But what kind of balanced relationship can you have when one person is free to hop continents and the other can barely manage a stress-free trip to Sainsbury’s?
Ted and I used to think the same about everything: food – you can’t have too much butter; travel – the path untrodden is all well and good but where can I get a decent glass of red around here?; domesticity – if you make a mess, you clear it up. Genitalia has nothing to do with it. So how has everything slipped so drastically since we’ve moved from a two to a three?
I was ready to take on more of the household chores, of course I was. He’s earning the money to pay the bills so it’s fair enough I push the hoover around more than usual. But all of a sudden I realise I’m doing all the washing. All the cooking. I’m remembering his family’s birthdays and organising trips up to Leicester to see them. And he doesn’t even seem to notice. It’s like it’s background noise to him these days. Home life is the brief pause between working weeks and international flights.
When no one else is listening, there’s always the internet. I disabled my comments section after a string of spammers, but I also didn’t want to log on one day and see a paragraph of badly spelled abuse about what a lazy, ungrateful harpy I was and how I should feel lucky to have a roof over my head and a husband and a healthy baby, especially when I’m such a bitch. I don’t need a troll to tell me that: I am lucky. Ted might feel like he’s on another planet at the moment, but in so many ways he is a great partner and dad – dependable, a provider, calm and steady. We’re OK for money and, bar her reflux, Cherry is fighting fit. I lost a pregnancy early on, about six months before we conceived Cherry, so I know what an incredible feat of biology and luck and magic dust it is when the stars align and you get that squirmy bundle to take home from the hospital. I wouldn’t have my life without her. Rather, I’d like to keep her, but with more sleep and time and sanity, please?<
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My phone vibrates on the sofa cushion and Cherry’s head wriggles for a moment, letting just a little cool air in on the sweat patch she’s leaving on my trousers. Another bout of luck that my miracle hasn’t woken up.
It’s an invitation to join a WhatsApp group: ‘Mums I’d Like to Befriend’, from Will.
Will: Coffee at mine on Monday? I can’t bring myself to say ‘play date’ but you know what I mean. 10.30? I’m off Roger’s Lane, no.5 The Annexe.
Nelle pings back before I can think of a snappy reply.
Nelle: Can’t wait! What can I bring?
Will: Tarpaulins. Hoses. Hazmat suit. Anything that will help clean up after a craft session with my girls.
Stevie: Hahahaha! I’ll bring my Marigolds and sheep dip. X
I might not be heard by my husband these days, but I have found two sets of ears who totally get me.
Chapter 5
It really isn’t all that much of a walk to Will’s house and, having done so many pram walks around the neighbourhood to trick Cherry into sleep over the months, I know every street and cut-through and back alley like the inside of my nappy bag. Also, from those agonisingly frequent pram walks, I did my fair share of snooping: creeping past at a glaringly obviously slow pace to rubber-neck into every grand living-room window the vicinity has to offer. I was only caught out once by a very well-coiffed OAP who was pulling back her curtains just as I was hazily wondering whether they were Laura Ashley or not. The look she gave indicated I would never have the chance to ask her.
So from my property perving, I know The Annexe is fancy – like tea at Claridge’s fancy: only for the elite, not how your average Jo gets his cuppa. I haven’t actually walked down it myself because it’s a private road and all gravel, so would have played havoc with my pram wheels, but I peeked in enough times to get a measure of each unique property: all relatively new builds but with differing styles and all hidden behind long drives and willowy trees. And I’d rather not park my battered old runaround on a drive like that. I’m not sure Will’s neighbours would thank me for that feeling of shame, too.
As we reach the front door – after what felt like a 5k fun run from the gate posts to the house itself – I crouch down to Cherry’s level and check her over for any strings of drool or protruding bogeys. Once she managed to grab a fistful of leaves from a passing hedge and I only realised when I stopped at a crossing and saw green smudges around her lips. Digging chewed-up leaves from the mouth of an angry baby is not a skill they teach you at NCT classes.
Cherry is passable enough and her legs are kicking about like billy-oh, excited by a new door and the noises behind it. This kid is nosey and seeing as how I knew the route here without having to Googlemap it, I know just where she gets it from.
‘Let’s not throw up on anything that looks expensive, OK? Aim for the machine-washable things. And Mummy will be careful of her tea on the sofa. It may well be bespoke. But we’ll have fun, OK? You get to see Joe, Esme and Olive again. Making friends is fun!’ I use my most gooey, positive tone.
Cherry briefly screws up her eyes and sticks her tongue out, as if to remind me I’ve sometimes said the very opposite after a disastrous baby group session.
I ring the doorbell and soon after the glossy, cherry-red door swings open. ‘Hello, come in. We’re already into our third Play-Doh session of the day. We’re having fun!’ Will gives the demented smile of a possessed ventriloquist’s dummy.
As I kick off my shoes in the tiled hallway, I admire the crisp light grey walls against the polished navy blue floor tiles. There are scuffmarks at knee height from pushchairs and scooters and toddler boots, sure, but there is still a very well put together air about the place. There’s a dado rail about a foot below the ceiling and the space in between is painted a matt gold. And I’m in love with it. There’s a dark grey painted hat stand with just one tweed trilby hanging on it. I admire anyone who can keep up that kind of interior accessory with two toddlers in their lives. I nearly trip over one of the girls as I wander through the hall, gazing up at the blue Tiffany lamp suspended from the ceiling. Beautiful. It’s a good job I never used to frequent Selfridges in my London days; if I had when Will was stocking the place, I would have been overdrawn faster than you can say vintage radiator.
‘Is this’ – I stroke my hands along the old-style radiator that runs along the wall, towards the kitchen – ‘real vintage?’
‘Pfft, no.’ Will shakes his head. ‘I love the look but I actually want to be warm in my house. I know a guy that makes them to look old. I don’t go in for many gay stereotypes – Madonna, I can take her or leave her these days – but interior decorating is a pretty big deal to me, and all of my people.’ He salutes a rainbow flag postcard that’s tucked into the big gilt mirror to my left.
‘It’s all so lovely,’ I breathe. ‘If you ever fancy a project I have a bijou cottage in need of an expert eye.’
Will nods. ‘I’ll be right round once the girls are at university. Come on through, let’s get the kettle on. Nelle said she would be a bit late due to some sort of diamond wedding crisis. I do hope one of the couple hasn’t…’ He pulls his mouth into a wide grimace and draws his finger across his throat.
Olive and Esme are at the kitchen table, which is covered in a big oilcloth with a giant mallard print repeating over it. The Play-Doh scattered in molehills around them is clearly much-loved: it has taken on that murky green sludge colour that mixed-up Play-Doh ultimately becomes. Their heads are bent in mirrored concentration as they smash and roll and chop and rip.
‘Ha! I think I’d only reach that many years married if I was heavily medicated for the next few decades.’
Will only raises his eyebrows as he gets out some mugs. ‘I’m guessing no big heart-to-heart at the weekend, then?’
After plonking Cherry in a high chair at the kitchen table, I cross my arms over my chest. Sometimes she insists on being held all the time in a new place, while she acclimatises, but with an entertaining duo to stare at, my cuddles are quickly forgotten. ‘Nope. He announced he was off to Hong Kong for the week. Left this morning.’
‘Ouch.’ He mirrors my stance. ‘Swine.’
I put my hands gently over Cherry’s ears and she wriggles to be free. I sneak a look at the twins but they are still fixated on their creations. ‘I would go so far as to say arsehole.’ I mouth the last word silently.
Will nods. ‘I don’t know the guy but if it were me I’d absolutely be calling him one of those. Loudly. I would get him a bathrobe with that embroidered on it.’
‘Maybe for Christmas.’ I take the thick ceramic mug he hands me. I feel like one of those jammy sods who gets to eat dinner with Nigella at her house at the end of her cooking show.
‘Christmas?’ Two small heads whip up in my direction. ‘Santa?’
My new friend closes his eyes ever so slowly. ‘No, loves, still a while till Christmas. Though Santa is watching you all year, to see if you’re being good and following all the rules.’ He points at a behaviour chart on the wall that is conspicuously empty of reward stickers.
I feel I should quickly make amends for opening such a can of worms in front of two very smart two year olds, so I aim for distraction. ‘So what are you guys making here?’ I pull out a scrubbed-pine chair and sit next to Olive.
‘This is a pizza shop,’ says Olive.
‘Tsk,’ snaps Esme, ‘it’s called a pizza cafe, Olive.’
The twin dynamic is quickly established.
‘Oooh, pizza! I love pizza. Could you make me one, please? And a little one for Cherry, if you have enough dough.’
Esme grabs a handful of green-grey. ‘Yes, we do. This is the dough. This’ – she grabs another lump – ‘is the cheese. And that’– she points at a ball Esme is squidging – ‘is the tomato.’
‘And, Esme, how much is one of your pizzas?’
Esme looks to Olive who nods. ‘Um, two pounds?’ Her voice goes up at the end.
‘Bargain. Could I h
ave ham and pineapple, please?’ The two girls fall into hysterical giggles, as if I were Mr Tumble in the flesh.
Olive rolls her eyes. ‘Silly! You don’t put pudding on a pizza!’
Will laughs with a low chuckle. ‘I wouldn’t bother trying to explain it, Stevie. I’m not sure there’s any logical way to explain a Hawaiian, actually. But while they’re safe with non-toxic substances, let me give you the tour.’
If I was ready to swoon at the hallway, I’m deep into fainting-Edwardian-lady mode as I gawp about the three large bedrooms upstairs. Will and his husband’s bedroom is lusciously papered in what must be a hand-painted print of thick green leaves and vines twisting and undulating together, with Victorian-era industrial-looking light fittings to offset the opulence. I never would have had the balls for the maroon velvet curtains but, boy, do they work. They have a guest suite and the walls are a perfect pale, powdery blue. Just the backdrop for lying in bed with the papers and a croissant, as you snuggle down in the thick and crisp sheets on the uber-enormous bed. Lush. The girls’ room has a similar subtle but stylish feel – dove grey walls with large, pewter-grey, sparkling stars painted all over in an artfully scattered pattern. The kind of kids’ decor that you dream you’ll have when you are pregnant and before you realise that most toys come in an undisguisable shade of lime green and that your child will reject the beautiful bespoke handmade caramel blanket your colleagues bought you and instead chooses as a comforter an old nightshirt of yours with the Guinness logo on it.
Just as I’m marvelling and cursing at Will for managing to keep out the tacky, tawdry baby stuff that seems to push the walls of my house further apart, I spot them: stickers. A-ha!
Over the heads of the matching toddler beds (navy blue and not a whiff of an IKEA locking nut between them) are matching rows of Peppa Pig stickers. Will spots my eyes lingering on them and I blush.
‘Yes,’ he deadpans, ‘the Peppa family portraits were not my idea. But when the girls moved into beds from their cots – they were escaping head-first otherwise I never would have given them that kind of freedom – I was desperate to give them an incentive to love their “big girl beds”. And I let them choose the wall stickers they wanted. Which, of course, was exactly the same choice. But it seemed to do the trick.’ He sighs and stuffs his elegant hands in his pockets.