PUSH!!!

Chapter 4 - Siouxsie

Siouxsie

‘She put her hands between her legs and felt her baby’s head’

 

Siouxsie had responded to my advert with the words ‘…sixteen hours of almost bliss.’ That was enough for me.

Any woman who described her sixteen hour labour as almost bliss deserved my attention. I also thought it would be good to have some ‘normal’ pregnancies and labours so as not to scare the people who have not yet experienced the joys of motherhood. Although, I am not sure reading this book is going to convince them to pro-create.

I arrived at Siouxsie’s flat and parked beside an old Golf with a character from ‘The Corpse Bride’ hanging from a noose on the rear view mirror. I had to wonder what kind of person owned that car. Unbeknownst to me, I was about to find out.

Siouxsie welcomed me into her flat, immediately apologising for the array of shoes in the hallway. I walked through to the lounge admiring the blown up photos of a child I assumed to be hers on the walls. I looked around as she made coffee and concluded that the Golf parked outside was probably hers. The giveaway was the ornamental characters from Beetlejuice and Labyrinth that lined the shelf and that she described herself as ‘alternative.’ It all seemed to go well with that description.

Women tend to be so comfortable talking about their pregnancies and their children, the pride in their voices apparent and the love they feel is obvious in their words. Siouxsie was no exception to this.

She was immediately comfortable telling me that parenthood was not as easy as the pregnancy and labour and I whole heartedly agree with her.

It seemed reward charts were the in thing in her house at the moment.

I know this tact too well. It is not so much bribery, it is more rewarded negotiation.

Being pregnant was not something she had ever considered for her immediate future. She was twenty three, had been with her partner for only two months and worked full time at the post office. They had just come out of the honeymoon period and the relationship was starting to burn itself out. He was from a different town and the travel had become an issue.

Aside from that, Siouxsie started to realise something rather strange. Something suddenly felt different for her. She became very aware of babies around her. Not in a broody kind of way or in a weird baby head sniffing way, like me, she just noticed them more than usual.

Other things had started to change too. She would catch the bus to work every day but she suddenly felt the urge to walk everywhere. She couldn’t understand it as it certainly wasn’t a conscious effort to keep fit, it just felt right. She went from eating just about anything to eating healthy, again not a conscious effort. She simply lacked motivation to do anything remotely unhealthy.

I could do with bit of that myself.

Siouxsie knew without actually knowing she was pregnant. She had not long finished a period so had to wait for the confirmation but somehow she just knew.

Her suspicions were confirmed when she finally took a test and it was positive. 

Her first port of call was to tell her younger sister. They had a close relationship so it was important for Siouxsie to gauge her reaction first. She was excited, but Siouxsie sensed her sister’s trepidation regarding their relationship. It was inevitably going to change. Her parents were overjoyed if not a little shocked. This was to be their first grandchild.

Siouxsie had the support and reassurance she needed from her family. Now she had to tell the dad.

As a couple they had already drifted apart by time Siouxsie had taken the test. She called to tell him the news. He was shocked and needed time to process the information. He agreed to meet at a later date and tell her his decision as to whether he wanted to be part of the baby’s life.