Not Too Bad a Dad

Brad Pitt Ha Ha Ha

2008-08-28T19:35:00.003+01:00

Glad to see, on the front cover of this morning's Independent, new dad Brad Pitt looking like crap trapped in the neck of a bottle. Well when I say "crap trapped in the neck of a bottle" it's all relative: there's still not an ounce of him hanging the wrong way, that I'll grant you. But there was a definite crumpling around the eyes, a clear saggy knackered-ness that comes with being kept awake all night by the mewling of newborns. Next to him in the same photo was George Clooney, an older man by far, whiter of hair, but looking fresher and, yes, younger than his New Dad chum. George's secret to staying youthful? Is it Nadine Baggot and her famous pentapeptides? Nope. It's much simpler. George has no kids. So did I feel a twinge of sympathy for old Brad? A pang of empathy? Nah. Punched the air, frankly and thought "Good. Serves him right. Just goes to show you can't have everything." Small minded of me? Yes. I put it down to tiredness.

Running in St James's Park

2008-08-27T19:42:00.000+01:00

"We Won't Let Parenthood Change Us…"

2008-08-22T19:18:00.002+01:00

Saw a cartoon last Christmas – either in The Spectator or the New Statesman (a sign of the times that even the magazines of the political right and left blur – or should that be Blair? – into one another). It featured, topically, being Christmas, Mary and Joseph and the infant Christ in the manger. The two shiny, happy parents, whilst gazing lovingly at the new arrival, made a resolution” “We won’t,” they agreed between them, “let it change us.”

Raised a wry little smile, I can tell you, being, as I was, six months into parenting.

Eight months on the wry smile is gone. It its place there are peels, gales of laughter. Gales of long, loud, brittle laughter. The kind usually reserved for megalomaniacs in bad sci-fi and spy movies. The kind of take-over-the-world laughter the baddies are prone to, only shot through with notes of desperation. And tiredness. Lots and lots of tiredness.

“We won’t let it change us,” is the battle cry of the new parent. Yet here are just three of the ways I’ve morphed into someone utterly unrecognisable to my former self in just the last 24 hours.

i. Went on to water in the pub on a Saturday night (a Saturday night for Chrissakes!) after the second beer.
ii. Rearranged a night out with old pals over from Ireland because it interfered with Isobella’s routine.
iii. Stood in absolute, total and deeply uncomfortable silence at a party because I had nothing whatsoever to say about any subject other than my daughter.

Number iii may be the most disturbing. I no longer have time to watch football/check the sports pages (or any other newspaper pages, come to that) so don’t know what is going on in that area. So when someone throws me a conversational bone such as “What about that Ronaldo, eh?” I have no response. What about him? Did he die? Commit some horrific crime? Come out of the closet?

Ditto “Have you seen The Dark Knight yet?” It is only from the context (people at a party were talking about movies) and the vital clue of the word “seen” that I even realised that they were talking about films.

So I haven’t let fatherhood change me… aside from the fact that I have stopped paying attention to football, going to see movies or reading newspapers. But apart from that…

Well, apart from that there’s the beer thing I mentioned earlier. I’ve pretty much stopped that altogether. How radical a change can this really be, you may ask? Well, have you been following all those doom and gloom stories in the press about how pub takings are down and the British boozer is on the verge of extinction? I can’t help but think I’ve had a hand in this with my drastic change of habits.

So, to sum up: that’s no drink, no football, no newspapers or telly or new movies (see also books, theatre, music); and pissing off my old pals by my constant rearranging/cancelling nights out/meetings/parties. And that’s only the stuff that’s happened in that last 24 hours.

Does it get me down? Of course it does. Abso-bloody-lutely. But only until Isobella laughs or runs or smiles or says “Daddo!” or makes a soft jobby in her nappy or climbs the stairs or claps her hands or… or anything, really. In fact just to see her wipes all the difficulties away. Fourteen months ago I wouldn’t have dreamt of posting such slushy, sentimental pap on a website for all the world to see. Now, however, I don’t care. Soppy? Sure. Sentimental? You bet your ass. But with one smile from my daughter, I no longer care what anybody thinks. And that’s the biggest change of all.

Dad Aid from Tim Lott

2008-08-18T11:55:00.003+01:00

Excellent piece by Tim Lott in yesterday's Independent on Sunday on the complex joys of being the father of girls. It's ostensibly an opinion piece on how Bob Geldof must feel after his daughter ran off to Vegas to get hitched to her little drummer boyfriend of three weeks, but shines light into the complicated corners of dad-daughter relationships at the same time. Brilliant piece, a must for all dads. Find it at: http://www.independent.co.uk/incoming/tim-lott-were-helpless-there-is-nothing-like-a-fathers-love-for-his-daughter-899621.html

Taking Steps

2008-08-04T19:34:00.003+01:00

Above: Having mastered the basics indoors, Isobella makes her public walking debut in the street outside our house, a few days shy of 14 months old.

Isobella, if you're reading this, just keep walking until you reach the corner and then turn left. Go right to the end of the street until you get to the shop, where you can pick me up a copy of The Independent and this month's Record Collector mag (and a copy of Pregnancy, Baby and You, natch). Also, ask the nice man for a bottle - make that two bottles – of Meantime IPA. Yes, I know you're under age, but if you tell him they're for me I'm sure he'll understand. I'll give you the money when you get back. Ta.

(Worth a try, no?)

Brought to Book

2008-07-15T21:30:00.001+01:00

A version of this column featured in the June issue of Pregnancy, Baby & You magazine. My next column will be in the September 2008 issue…

I am a hoarder of useless stuff. It’s a guy thing. I will use any excuse to buy myself a book, a CD or a DVD. And I will shamelessly dub my random, space-eating collection as a “library” to dignify and justify its presence in our ever-shrinking home. At the first sign of pregnancy, I sniffed a book-buying opportunity.

My first few taps on Amazon, however, were unsuccessful at best. I typed in “Father”. Up came “My Father was a Serial Killer.” It didn’t sound helpful. I tried “Dad”. The Pocket Idiot's Guide popped up. An idiot? Me? Must be some other dad. Trying "daddy", I found a question on screen: "Did you mean 'dada'?" I didn't know if did, so I clicked on. Dada, it seems, referred to a bunch of mad artsy types who influenced the surrealists. All very nice but advice on Provider Panic from "starving", goateed, Bohemian trustafarians was really the last thing I needed.

As a last resort, I turned to the books I already had, starting with The Big One. Turning to the New Testament I thumbed the pages for a word of consolation from Joseph. Surely the earthly father of Christ could lend a hand? Not a word. Literally. In the whole of the New Testament, Joseph doesn’t utter a single peep. The message for new dads seems to be: keep your lip buttoned and just get on with it. But then, perhaps Joseph isn’t the best role model either. After all, it is one of the new dad’s responsibilities to make sure that mum and baby have a peaceful and restful environment after the birth. Yet within minutes Ol’ Joe had the place swarming with shepherds and wise men.

Towards the end of the third trimester, a friend had loaned me a copy of Ernest Hemmingway’s A Farewell to Arms. Now, I’d never read any Hemmingway before. All I knew about him was that his nickname was Papa. Appropriate, I thought. Until I encountered, towards the end of the book, a scene featuring a Caesarean section that would not have been out of place in the recent Sweeney Todd movie. Did it give me nightmares? Only when I was asleep.

All this is to make light of my trouble finding a serious, non-patronising book to help me through impending fatherhood. And this ”making light” is part of the trouble. Why is it that men can’t/won’t approach a subject seriously without making gags about it? Even in my pre-natal NCT class, when we were asked to split into groups (male and female groups) to discuss different aspects of the imminent event, the women’s heads were always huddled together deep in debate while we were roaring our heads off with laughter. If it’s not yet known as Chandler Syndrome – named for the pathologically emotionally stunted (but in a nice way) gag-cracker Chandler Bing out of Friends – then it damn well should be.

Is it an expected response? Are we playing up to the GSOH clause in all those lonely-hearts ads? “Don’t care if he looks like an even porkier, melted version of Adrian Chiles but GSOH essential”. Or are we just trying to mask the fact that we are terrified? No bad thing, this, being terrified. In fact, it’s because we’re terrified that we’re looking for a book in the first place. And round and round it goes.

Help, for me, was at hand in one of the many books my wife Karen ploughed through during the pregnancy. So much so that she remains a Delphic oracle on the subject? “Colic? Just rub coal and jam on the soles of her feet. Simple.” Yeah, right. But the book that stood out was Miriam Stoppard’s Conception, Pregnancy & Birth. I remembered Stoppard from TV in my childhood, and she proved to be a reliable advisor, stopping in the narrative from time to time to address the dad in a direct and non-patronising way, with no gags. Good old Mizza Stoppo, that's what I say.

And so, having been unable to find satisfaction in the dad books field, I started my blog to educate other would-be fathers in the ways of parenthood with hard information presented in a concise and frank fashion revealing all the mysteries once and for all. Well… no, actually, it's just a stream of daft gags and nice pics. But it does keep me cheerful. And keeping cheerful makes me a better dad. Maybe old Saint Joe was right: just shut up and get on with it.

Pregnancy, Baby & You magazine

2008-07-14T14:59:00.002+01:00

A version of the following appeared in the June issue of Pregnancy, Baby & You magazine in the My Story section. The July issue is on sale now...

“No kids?” other couples would ask. “No kids,” we’d reply, cool as cucumbers, non-plussed, unconcerned. If it happened, it happened, that was our attitude. And as the years passed, five, six, seven of them, people just stopped asking. Yet our easy-going attitude held true: until, that is, we went to the doctor, just to make sure.

It was only when we were told that we couldn’t have children that our minds became focused. In fact, after that, having a child was all we could think of.

We wanted a baby. That much we now knew. And we found out that one in seven couples, according to NHS Direct, experience the need for assisted conception. With IVF, there is an average success record of 15 percent. In our case, the Doctor handed us this statistic sharp end first: we had an 85 percent chance of failure. The numbers were bamboozling.

The words, which should have made sense of the numbers, only served to complicate matters further. First came “motility”. This new word, combined with plain old “low”, denoted that my sperm didn’t move very well. Combined with Karen’s age – we were just north of the “optimal” 39 mark, our chances of success now shrunk to “around” two percent. Sad-eyed shrugs and impeccable bedside manner did little to help either.

Action was the only solution. Go ahead with the procedure, give it one go, as futile as it is, and, if we make it to 80, we won’t look back and regret that we never tried. And so, pretending that everything was normal, we carried on planning our big, annual Christmas party.

Some friends showed up and announced their pregnancy. We fought a raging internal battle to be truly and genuinely happy for them. A battle, I’m pleased to say, that we won. To have added bitterness to despair would have been to dig a whole too deep to ever have clambered out of again.

After Christmas, the numbers and the words turned into a blizzard. Hycosy (a detailed examination of the womb); Progesterone injections (seven of them);
A fibroid – one of them, benign, as it turned out.

Our friends would ask: “How’s all it going?” We’d pause. In that pause we’d review the feelings of alienation, of invasion, of inadequacy at being unable to partake in the simple animal imperative of reproduction. “Oh, fine,” we’d reply, “fine…”

My mate Pete May, a West Ham nut, often says of being a West Ham supporter: “The despair I can handle: it’s the hope that kills me.” And indeed, the despair threw us together. And we stuck, tighter than ever before. Long walks, tears and talks of the unthinkable dominated that winter. I quoted Pete on one of our long rambling walks. “But there has to be hope,” said Karen. “Without hope, there’s…” At this point we turned a corner and slap bang in front of us was a pub. Its name? The Hope. We both laughed: there was Hope after all. “If we ever have a baby girl,” said Karen, “we’ll call her Hope…”

Another number came next: two. The number of eggs taken from Karen for fertilisation. Two is a low yield. But the word used by the nurse to describe them gave us hope: “magnificent”. Magnificent eggs. We dreamt immediately of twins – I know now that we both did – but at the time we each took a deep breath and looked the other way. Having been made to stare down the barrel of a scant chance for so long, this flake of good news was almost overwhelming amongst all the pain.

A funny thing, pain. If I asked you to describe your last toothache in precise and vivid detail, you couldn’t do it. Go on, try. Sore? Inadequate, isn’t it. Agony? Still doesn’t cover it. Anyway, now that it’s better, it doesn’t seem to matter, does it? Our IVF story is the same. The idea of the pain of IVF and potential childlessness haunts us still. But the news that one of the eggs had “taken”, that Karen – that we – were pregnant, delivered in an anonymous room in a corner of south east London, wiped all the months of pain away in a moment.

Are we grateful? Too small a word. But it’s impossible to live a life at such a high emotional pitch. We said we’d never complain if she woke us up in the middle of the night… but of course, we do. Besides, the pressure on Isobella to live up to the hefty billing of Miracle Baby is just too much for any person. But sometimes – the first time I fed her, the first time she waved, when she started laughing and then began to crawl – that miraculous feeling surges through us like delirium.

It turns out that Karen was right: There is Hope. Isobella Hope Scott-Goulding. She’s 10 months old now. And we still can’t believe she’s here.

Dumbstruck

2008-06-24T08:58:00.000+01:00

Twenty-fourth of June today, celebration of the birth of St John the Baptist. When John’s mother Elizabeth – a woman of advanced years and the cousin of Mary Mother of God – announced her pregnancy to her husband Zachariah, the poor fellow was struck literally dumb. He remained thus for nine whole months.

Zachariah, I know how you feel, mate.

ESSENTIAL Listening

2008-06-20T08:58:00.004+01:00

One of the best things about being a stay-at-home dad (at least part of the time – Karen and I are both freelance and split the childcare) is catching the mighty Woman's Hour on BBC Radio 4. I've just caught up with a programme from Friday 13th June in which Tony Parsons and a variety of fathers and "experts" talked frankly about dadding. Fascinating, moving, insightful (three words you don't always associate with Tony Parsons), if you can still get it on Listen Again, it's the best programme I've ever heard on the topic. It may also still be available on podcast. The Woman's Hour website is at www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/womanshour.

Norfolk: No County for New Men

2008-06-20T08:53:00.000+01:00

First family holiday – a short break to Norfolk.

Exotic, I know. But it was fun to watch the average age of the place plummet to 79 just by our arrival.

The seafront at Cromer has a pleasing Edwardian aspect. But the social mores of the place seem to be rooted firmly in the period of Edward's long-running old ma. I was treated to confused and, on one occasion, filthy looks and given a wide berth as I pushed the pram along the seafront. Being a God's Waiting Room sort of a place, Cromer was perhaps not ready for the sight of a man pushing his own daughter along in a pram without his wife in attendance. And I use the word "wife" as opposed to "partner" advisedly – for Cromer, it seems, is not yet ready for unmarried couples breeding. The previous day, when my wife Karen had been making the same journey – i.e. a pleasant stroll along the prom prom prom tiddley-om-pom-pom – she was approached, and by "approached" I mean "assailed", by a nonagenarian in a brace of hearing aids and a big bad attitude. "You're not one of these bloody single mothers are you?" he railed, "getting all the council houses for free and sponging off the state? I've seen 'em. Here in Cromer I've seen 'em. Here in Cromer!"

His shock at the phenomena of single mothers in Cromer, noted Karen, was akin to someone having found a Martian invasion scene in an Emily Bronte novel.

Say what you like about London, but complete strangers who want to chat about babies stop me at least once a day when I'm out and about with Isobella. Almost always they wistfully turn to memories of their own children. And it's always lovely to listen. On one occasion, a be-suited, middle aged City gent sprang out in front of me, pointed at Isobella in her pushchair and announced gleefully: "I've got two of those." Lifting his finger to point at me, he added, "But the oldest one's as big as you now…" And off he went into a monologue about how he wished his generation had been allowed to be more hands-on as dads. Nice fella.

There's always an exception, of course. And this came in the shape of the miserable old crone on the H3 bus through Hampstead Garden Suburb (I ask you, where else?). Isobella was tired and hungry and was, quite naturally, grizzling about the whole state of affairs. Mrs Hampstead Garden Suburb, after a concerted campaign of vicious looks, finally spat:

"Have you nothing to put in that baby's mouth?"

My reply of, "Have you nothing to put in your own mouth?" although not a vintage slice of invective, had the planned effect of bringing a cessation to the (mercifully) brief episode.

Pregnancy, Baby & You magazine June 2008

2008-05-30T06:04:00.003+01:00

The new issue of Pregnancy, Baby & You magazine is out now with both my Dad Column and the story of our IVF journey with Isobella. See also www.thinkbaby.co.uk.

Me & Isobella

2008-05-17T23:55:00.000+01:00

Pregnancy, Baby & You Magazine II

2008-04-09T07:13:00.001+01:00

The new issue of Pregnancy, Baby & You mag is out now (their website is at www.thinkbaby.co.uk). My next column appears in the April issue, but for those of you who missed the mag last month (shame on you!), here's my April 2008 column:

Whatever happened to pacing up and down the corridor, a big stogey poking out of the breast pocket in anticipation of a celebratory smoke after the happy event? I blame the 60s. Those Hippies going all gooey over “the miracle of birth”. Move away from the joint, dude, that’s what I say. That and King Louis the somethingth-or-otherth of France who, keen to get a view of the, erm, proceedings, had his Queen lie on her back, as opposed to the more natural squatting position. So at least, among all your squeamishness, there is an upside: you get to blame the French.

It’s the unwritten 11th Commandment: thou shalt attend the birth of your child. Pulling a sickie is not on the birthplan. Oh, you’ve got tickets for the Cup Final, have you? And your team hasn’t won the Cup since 1991? Tough dung, buster. And no one will believe that the dog ate the birthplan so, no, you can’t be excused.

But what, you ask, if I faint at the sight of blood? What if I throw-up? Here’s a tip: At the birth, just sit on the side of her weaker hand and any blow she lands on you should have trouble breaking the skin, let alone drawing blood. Indeed, this is good advice for life, let alone childbirth.

Worried about pain? So you should be. There is a period of the labour known as Transition – or The Zone – during which you may well find your partner’s fingers meeting behind your Adam’s apple as she clasps you, viscously yet lovingly, by the throat and bellows words that, these days, would get her ejected from a football match. Chances are this will cause you a very great deal of pain indeed.

Rationalise it by adding it all up: sick, blood, pain, losing consciousness. Don’t try to tell me that at least one of those doesn’t feature in the aftermath of – if not during – your average night out. Looked at like that, it doesn’t seem too bad, does it? Now, just one tiny extra little mental gearshift will cure your fears for good. Move your thoughts away from the Y-word – “You” – and on to your partner.

It’s an old chestnut, this, but it works. Take your mind off what you are worried about. Your partner will most certainly appreciate it. Just a slight shift of focus and bob’s your uncle, you’re a dad. It would be a shame to besmirch your birthday with a whole load of unnecessary worries, wouldn’t it?

Hang on: don’t I mean your child’s birthday? Nope. I mean yours. This, as those aforementioned Hippies were so fond of saying, is the first day of the rest of your life. You’ve just been killing time until this point. This is where the good stuff really begins. And it would be a pity to miss the first day of the rest of your life, wouldn’t it? Perhaps, like me, you’ll even emerge so changed, so enhanced, so unrecognisable from the ante-natal wimp that you once were that you’ll even consider eating the placenta. Be sure to email me your recipes.

They Hate Babies Here No.1

2008-04-08T08:31:00.001+01:00

They Hate Babies Here: No.1 in an Occasional Series: It’s strange, but before Isobella was born, I would never have been seen dead in an All Bar One. Indeed, on the only occasion I ever found myself crossing the threshold of this dreary and homogenised chain of “aspirational” (ahem) bars was the birthday bash of a friend of a friend. And even then I, in the best News of the World investigative hack tradition, made my excuses and left as soon as I could. (A snob? Me? Absolutely.)

So when I found myself drawn to the empty branch of ABO (one letter away from ASBO: how appropriate) at London Bridge one morning recently, it was something of a surprise. But it was, as stated, empty (this being just after opening time); the smoking ban was in place and so pubs were now in bounds for babies (I had Isobella in the pram); and my companion’s nappy was full of poo. So ABO it was.

Upon entering, however, a member of staff swooped down on us in a boiling fury: “You have to be 21 to come in here!”

“That’s okay,” I smiled, “I’m 22.” (Ahem ahem).

“Not you, not you!” screeched the next CEO of ABO, “HIM! HIM! HIM!”

If she hadn’t been pointing at the pram, I’d never have known that she was talking about my daughter.

As I struggled back through the swing doors and down the steps (she wasn’t so keen to eject me that she helped me off the premises by holding the door open), you could almost smell her sense victory. “Gotcha!” her whole being seemed to say. So if you’ve ever wondered who the One was in the name, then the mystery has been solved: It’s your baby.

Clocked

2008-04-02T10:37:00.000+01:00

31st March 2008: Woke up all off kilter yesterday morning completely unaware that clocks had gone forward by an hour. That’s how all-encompassing childcare has been: I am so separated from my old media habits (watching TV and reading newspapers) that I can’t even keep up with rudimentary events such as the change from spring to winter. I’m prepared to bet that Prime Minister Tony Blair, Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho or the movie star Heath Ledger didn’t have the same trouble yesterday morning.

Shit, This is the EASY Bit?

2008-03-30T10:59:00.002+01:00

A Road to Damascus moment. Isobella was crying her air raid warning cry. Her bottle had leaked all over me. I hadn’t slept a whole night through since Kennedy was assassinated. It was 3.20 a.m. And it suddenly hit me: this is the EASY bit. She can’t crawl yet, can't throw food around the place. Nor can she stamp her feet in the supermarket aisle, demand expensive trainers, take drugs, have innappropriate boyfriends with motorbikes and piercings or scream (to a volley of slamming doors) those six magic words “I didn’t ask to be born!”

Felt, bizarrely, despite the hot-knitting-needles-in-my-ears intensity of my daughter’s screams, a little bit better.

Isobella: Thoughts on Bob Dylan

2008-01-18T19:32:00.000Z

Isobella peruses the sleeve note of her favourite Bob Dylan L.P. 1965's Bringing it All Back Home:

Pregnancy, Baby & You Magazine

2008-01-18T19:29:00.000Z

The new issue of Pregnancy, Baby & You mag is out now (their website is at www.thinkbaby.co.uk). My next column appears in the April issue, but for those of you who missed the mag last month (shame on you!), here's my January 2008 column:

Are you sitting comfortably reading this at home? Yes? Then stop. Stop immediately. Fold up this mag, tuck it into your coat pocket and head for your local.

Done that? What do you mean you’re embarrassed reading PB&Y in the pub? Okay, tuck it inside a copy of Nuts, then. Got a pint? Best get a shot, too. You’re going to need it. Because, my friend, your pub days are over.

Pub culture is dying. We’re getting healthier, snuffing out fags, cutting out booze. But you are playing a part too. Yes, dear reader, you.

“Not me,” I hear you mutter, “I’d never help the patron saint of coffee – St Arbucks – convert my beloved local.” I said that, too. Once. But like some St Peter of Booze, by your partner’s third cry of “Epidural!” you will have denied the pub at least three times.

Naturally, you will have celebrated the news of your imminent arrival in the pub. Most important events of your life have probably been celebrated in the pub – if they haven’t actually occurred there in the first place. Excluding, I’m hoping, conception.

Your first denial, however, is already in the post in the shape of Provider Panic. It arrives at the moment when you find your Lotto fantasy no longer features a new Maserati but a Bugaboo with on-board i-Pod and climate control. That’s the moment when you suddenly realise that baby stuff costs money. And if babies love anything, boy do they love stuff. Prams, cots, sterilisers. All this and stuff you’ve never even heard of before: topping and tailing bowl (£39.99) anyone?

Thanks to PP you will cancel all mag subscriptions (apart from PB&Y, natch), start taking sandwiches to work and – shock horror – ditch the pub. You are now an embryonic Responsible Parent, my son. And this will delight your partner. Until, having cleaned up your own act, you start lecturing her on the dangers of half-a-glass of red wine with Christmas dinner. Then she will just wish you’d piss off back to the pub where you belong. She may even tell you this. (A word of advice, here: Don’t put it down to hormones. You really are being a sanctimonious pain in the arse.)

In the meantime Champions’ League nights in the pub will slip by, all denied with increasingly flimsy mendacity (“Sorry, bad night: I’m bare-knuckle cage fighting with Jeremy Clarkson.”). And on it will go until the major pub-based event of your life hoves into view. The Wetting of the Baby’s Head.

Why on earth, you might ask, would I miss out on a legitimised, tradition-sanctioned, recrimination-free night on the lash? Am I mad? Well, it’s a kind of madness, I suppose. It involves gazing at your firstborn for hours on end, marvelling at her unique ability to utter the word “Ak” and make green pooh. She is clearly a child prodigy.

This might not sound like good news. But just think of it like this: which event would you rather relive? Your stag night or your wedding night? It’s a no-brainer, really. Unless, of course, you married Tracy Barlow out of Corrie.

Expectant Dad: The Movie

2008-01-17T07:27:00.001Z

So how are you finding it all, this dad-to-be malarky? A bit like it’s all happening to someone else, is it? Does it all feel like you’re a character in some movie? Well, that’s not too bad an analogy, as it goes. In fact, a trilogy would be more accurate. And just like a real movie trilogy, the same rules of diminishing returns will apply.

Just as the original is inevitably better than the sequel, and the sequel in turn is superior to the third part – or “threequel” in movie geek-speak – so too will your own personal trilogy, your Action-Dadventure epic, deteriorate in quality as it progresses. For example, in the original, you would be played by Al Pacino. In the second, not-so-good instalment, you will be played by Jean Claude Van Damme. In part three, Tyrone out of Coronation Street will be offered the part. And he will probably turn it down.

Part one is set in the pub. Most important events of your life hitherto have probably been spent in the pub. Why change the habit of a lifetime? Most stages apart from conception, I hasten to add, although maybe that’s just me. Perhaps you have another story. If so, please don’t share it. Some things are better kept to yourself. (Although I suppose our conception could have taken place in a bar as Isobella is an IVF baby and one of the top drawer mixologists at Claridge’s or the Savoy’s American Bar could have made jiggly with the petrie dish.)

The pub is also where you will pick up the first flotsam and jetsam from the ocean known as the Sea of Wisdom. Nuggets will include: “You don’t want a girl, mate: boys’re less bovver as teenagers”. Luckily, like most pub pronouncements, you will have forgotten it all by the morning.

Part Two moves location away from the pub, and is subtitled The Provider Panic Months. This shift of location will make for a pretty dismal movie for the viewer, being set largely in the marital home. And it will start out as a love story in which the leading lady (your partner/wife) will be all moon-faced at the fact that you have at last grown up and are ready to shoulder your responsibilities. This will only last, however, for the first reel. After this she will grow increasingly annoyed at your fretting and paranoia and lectures on the dangers of half-a-glass of wine with Christmas dinner. Long before the credits have rolled she will be wishing you’d just piss off back to the pub where you belong.

Reviews for the sequel will be bad. So bad that moviegoers will stay away from the third instalment in their droves. This movie will be subtitled “Whatever Happened to Old Whatsisface?” due to the fact that you will be seen so seldom down the pub that sightings of Glenn Miller’s plane will be more commonplace. But you are the star of this movie. And it is the best part you will ever have. It will be a very long movie, too long to hold anyone’s interest other than your own. But this is a real case of art for art’s sake. You will be listed in the cast list at Happy/Confused/Tired Dad. And it will win you no Oscars. Your new co-star will steal every scene. And none of those scenes will be set in the pub. But you won’t care. In fact, you won’t care if you never see the inside of a pub again as long as you live. And then you will be a true star.

Movie Dads

2008-01-04T07:11:00.002Z

A selection of role models – and otherwise – from the movies.

HARRY DEAN STANTON in PRETTY IN PINK: A broken man, tries his damnedest, but just can’t do, just can’t say the right thing. But, man alive does he try. Fail again. Fail better. The absolute role model in the business of being Not Too Bad a Dad.

GREGORY PECK in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD: Here’s the only guide to dadding that you’ll ever need: Watch the movie To Kill a Mockingbird. Observe Gregory Peck as the loving, principled, sensitive, morally upright and generally legendary Atticus Finch. If you try to be a tenth of a hundredth of a thousandth as good a dad as him, then you’ll leave all the Not Too Bad Dads in the shade. An unreasonable goal. But worth shooting for.

MARLON BRANDO in THE GODFATHER: Great scene where, in his dotage, Vito Corleone rues his life of crime in almost confessional tones, while handing the mantle to his son Michael. “There just wasn’t enough time, Michael. There just wasn’t enough time.” Poetic, moving, intensely dramatic, tragic on an ancient Greek scale, this is movieland’s finest equivalent of the Empty Nester’s battle cry “Make the most of it: they grow up SO fast!”

ROBERT DE NIRO in GODFATHER PART II: “I have,” says Brando in The Godfather, “a sentimental weakness for my children.” De Niro takes this line and weaves it into the young Vito Corleone’s makeup beautifully. Standing in their coldwater apartment in Little Italy, De Niro’s young Don watches, biting his fist, wracked with anguish, as the womenfolk apply a hot poultice to the infant Fredo. Tears to a glass eye.

AL PACINO in THE GODFATHER PART III: Touching moment when he produces a drawing made by his son Anthony on the day of the boy’s confirmation. He’s kept it for all these years. Awwwww, how surweeet is that? Okay, so he’s killed anyone and everyone who ever got in his way – including his own brother, Fredo – but he still loves his little boy. If that’s not being Not Too Bad a Dad, then I don’t know what is.

JOE PESCI in CASINO: Robs houses. Shoots people. Beats people to death. Has an affair with his best friend’s wife. Swears like a docker with Tourette’s. Puts a guy’s head in a vice and pops his eye out. But always gets home in time to make his son’s breakfast. Not Too Bad a Dad? Who’s gonna argue?

DARTH VADER in STAR WARS: Who knew? Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s dad? V. bad dad role model in the worst movie (and movie franchise) ever made. Once described by Isobella’s Godfather John as “the death of culture”. Indeed this insight was what led us to appoint John as a Godfather in the first place.

What Kind of Question is THAT?

2008-01-03T19:36:00.000Z

I have been asked some extraordinary questions over the past six months, but this one surely takes the biscuit. Consider that it fell from the mouth of a new father and it seems even more outrageous.

“Were you disappointed?” he enquired.

“Disappointed in what?” I asked

“That you had a girl and not a boy?”

Looking at his little boy bouncing on his knee, I could only hope that he would grow to take after his mother and not his vile father.

Happy Christmas

2007-12-24T07:22:00.000Z

A couple of Christmas thoughts: Was Mary, mother of God disappointed that she didn't get to follow her birthplan? And wasn't Joseph told at NCT class that one of his responsibilities was to make sure Mary had peace and quiet after the birth? Peace and quiet? The place was crawling with shepherds and wise men. Once again, Old Saint Joe personifies the Not Too Bad a Dad mantra perfectly: fail again, fail better. happy Christmas, all! x

Bella & me again again

2007-12-24T07:19:00.000Z

Vote for the Daddy Party

2007-11-20T17:39:00.000Z

Caught David Cameron on TV doing his Family Man routine, claiming to change nappies. He looks good on it. Not a hair out of place, barely a shadow beneath the eyes. I compared his shiny face on the TV screen to my own in the mirror this morning: eyes like dog’s balls, complexion of a deep-fried adolescent, hair like Bob Geldof nailed to a Van de Graff Generator.

Maybe I’m not so much Not Too Bad a Dad as just a plain, old-fashioned Bad Dad.

Either that, or ol' Dave is being economical with the truth regarding his hands-on daddy role?

Heaven forefend.

A thought: if he and Gordon Brown both really are the feeding, nursing, pramming, playing, up-to-the-elbows-in jobbies-and-sick, 50-50-with-mum kind of dads that they claim to be, then don’t vote for either of them. The sleep deprivation involved this kind of parent sharing renders both of them incapable of running their bladder off into a swimming pool, never mind running the country.

Diary: Neurotic? Me?

2007-11-19T18:37:00.000Z

(Diary entry 26th June) Now I consider myself to be a pretty neurotic kinda guy. On my big days, I have been known to make Woody Allen in Annie Hall look like Owen Wilson in Starsky and Hutch. I thought I was at least the most neurotic person in our house. That was until tonight.

I’d noticed that my wife had “looked in” on the sleeping Isobella a little more often than usual.

“Are you checking,” I asked,”to see if her feet are getting any smaller?”

“No,” she replied. ”I was…”

The pause was thunderously Pinteresque.

“You were what?”

“Nothing…”

“What? Tell me.”

“Nothing…”

We ping-ponged this back and forth for a short-ish rally until Karen became more confessional:

“I was… well, do you do this? You probably do. It’s not just me, is it?”

“Do I do what?” I was intrigued.

“Do you go in to check that she’s still breathing?”

To be honest, even to me, the King of the Neurotics (a crown that I fret about losing on an hourly basis) that seemed a little excessive. Through a snort of derisory laughter I said, “No! Of course I don’t!”

But the thing is: I will now. Seventeen, forty-one, a-hundred-and-twelve times a night I will, from this moment forward. Now that the notion has been presented to me, I can think of little else.

Nice one, Karen. Thanks a lot.

Diary: It's a Man's World

2007-11-14T20:23:00.001Z

(Diary entry 20th June) Out and about with the baby in the sling for the very first time. Popped into the local garage to buy a bottle of water. With Isobella sleeping peacefully in the sling, I approached the counter only to be met with a sneer from the guy at the till. Nodding in the vague direction of the slumbering parcel on my chest, he snarled: “Where’s its mother?”

Carrying a baby in a sling is no job for a man, it would seem, in the opinion of Petrol Station Guy.

I would have asked him when selling fags and Milky Ways had suddenly become the apex of masculinity, only he had that look about him that suggested he was comfortable with violence. Plus, with the baby slowing me down I’d have never outrun him.

Pass the Sick Bag No.2

2007-11-09T18:42:00.001Z

Noticed today that my wife, Karen, and I now address each other as “Mummy” and “Daddy” even on the telephone.

If my 21-year-old self could see me now, he'd set about me with a cricket bat. And you know what? He'd have my full blessing.

Me & Bella

2007-11-09T18:41:00.000Z

Travels With My Pram

2007-11-07T21:24:00.000Z

The worst vice, as the old cliché goes, is advice. And most of what I heard during the nine months of Karen’s pregnancy was worse than useless. At the bottom of a very deep and dingy barrel I encountered an occasional colleague who, upon finding out our baby was to be female, imparted the following pearl: “A GIRL? Nah, you don’t want A GIRL, mate, too much trouble in later life they are. ‘Ave a boy, much better.”

Among the few nuggets of sensible advice was this from Steve, the ever-friendly and cheery husband of Janine and father of twin boys who, like me, is sharing the child-rearing chores:

“Whenever I felt like screaming because they were screaming, I just put ‘em in the pram and walked and walked and walked.”

Sound advice, as it turns out, providing both stimulation and fresh air to help baby sleep, and buzzy endorphins for the frazzled parent. I have taken to it so well that Karen now calls me Prambo.

As a result of my long rambles, I have covered parts of London hitherto unknown to me. Enclaves such as Herne Hill in south London, a kind of neither-Dulwich-nor-Brixton netherworld that should work but doesn’t. In an ideal world it could be as posh as Dulwich with the vibrancy of Brixton. Unfortunately, it comes out as posh as Brixton with all the vibrancy of Dulwich.

What blows away the pervading flavour of south London anonymity, however, are the shops. Particularly the shops on Half Moon Lane, where almost every one is concerned with children. Books for kids, clothes for kids, toys for kids, travel systems (that’s prams to you and me), you name it. The final shop in the parade is an estate agent and, as it hoved into view, I was almost surprised to find real properties in the window and not a selection of Wendy Houses with conservatories and off-road parking for pedal cars.

Nearby is a shop called Starburst, which does natty pop-art-ish tops and baby grows. We already have the blue Elvis and the pink Audrey Hepburn numbers, bought in the first flush of the let’s-treat-baby-like-Barbie stage. This stage passed for me when I turned my back for two seconds only to look back and find that Isobella had spewed up all over the face of the King of Rock’n’Roll. Gentle reader, in that moment I began to doubt her paternity, I really did.

Hanging on the rack was an all in one in devil’s red emblazoned with the legend “Drama Queen” in gothic lettering. I laughed out loud and reached for it, when an image flashed through my mind: it was four o’clock in the morning on what F. Scott Fitzgerald once described as a dark night of the soul. Little Macbeth - as played by my daughter Isobella – had murdered sleep. Her air raid siren scream of tired/wet/hungry/windy all-at-once was ripping the arsehole out of the sacred night. Would a devil’s red all-in-one with the words Drama Queen be quite so funny in this context, I wondered.

I put the garment back, made my excuses and left.

Don't Say…

2007-11-02T08:29:00.000Z

Redundant Things to Say to a New Father – No.1 in an occasional series

Don’t say “Did you read that article in the paper the other day?” I won’t have.

When I last had time to read a paper, the front page carried a picture of Neville Chamberlain waving a piece of paper in the air and the headline was “Peace in Our Time”.

The Centre of the Universe

2007-10-30T08:54:00.000Z

Godfather Pete arrives. He informs us that, until around the nine month mark, babies believe that everything that they see – from daddy to a bus to the moon in the sky – is a part of them. That they are, in short, the whole universe and the universe is them.

This fascinating fact immediately clarifies two things:

1. It explains Isobella’s Take Take Take attitude over this past four months. Four months in which she has yet to wash a dish, do a little grocery shopping or even offer to put the hoover round. And;

2. People are divided into two distinct subsections: Those who, after nine months, accept that they were wrong and are not, after all, the centre of the universe, and get on with being a small part of the universe, rubbing along nicely with all the other little parts of the universe. And those who, upon hearing the LIE that they are NOT the centre of the universe spend the rest of their days trying to right that terrible wrong, drawing attention to themselves and generally being an egomaniacal, sociopathic mess. Which category do I fall into? Well, I’m writing a blog, aren’t I? And like all bloggers, I am a high-ranking officer in the latter camp.

Pass the Sick Bag

2007-10-28T08:13:00.000Z

Cutesy Pie Stunts That You Once Thought Were Infuriatingly Naff But That You Will Indulge in Unashamedly After the Birth of Your Child

1. Mother’s/Father’s Day/birthday/Christmas/etc. cards written on behalf of a child whose vocabulary consists solely of the word “Ak”. (See earlier post.)

2. Writing letters/emails on behalf of your child starting with the line, “My daddy is typing this so please forgive his spelling…”

3. Captioning photographs of your child and sending them to friends/relatives. You will laugh your own socks off at your wit. But in truth, the captions will be no funnier than the old “You Don’t Have to be Mad to Work Here… But it Helps!!” posters.

4. You will make your friends pose for pics with baby, forgetting completely how much you once hated being handed such parcels of jobbies and sick and how the forced smile gave you a pain behind the eyes.

5. You will purchase scandalously over-priced hats adorned with cute animal ears for your child to wear. For this last, you should be truly ashamed of yourself. And somewhere I AM ashamed of myself. But not ashamed enough to stop buying, and making her wear, the hat.

6. You will make a DVD-slide show of pictures of all your friends visiting the infant. You will chose Paul McCartney’s Let ‘Em In (that’s the one that goes “Someone’s knockin’ at the door/Someone’s ringing the bell”) as the soundtrack. Somewhere in the sleep-deprived recesses of your rational mind you know that this is neither funny nor cute. But like a brainwashed patsy from some bad sci-fi flick, you will be unable to stop.

The worst thing of all is that you will have lost the ability to spot this because your child is involved and your child is the greatest event the world has ever known, more important even than reversing climate change. You will do well to remember this when you are bemoaning the fact that nobody visits you anymore.

Diary: Fathers' Day

2007-10-26T08:23:00.000+01:00

(Diary 17th June) Yesterday morning, Karen went out and left me alone with Isobella for the first time. Exhilarating and terrifying experience. Felt short-changed that there was not more praise upon her return. After all, Isobella had been neither injured nor lost during the whole, complete and entire 17 minute (nearly 20, in fact) period during which she was in my sole care. I am obviously cut out for this fatherhood malarky.

This morning, the reason for Karen’s trip to the outside world was revealed. She was buying my Father’s Day present from Isobella. And the perfect farty old dude gift it was, too: the Travelling Wilburys triple CD box set. Ten days ago I would have blanched at both such a Jeremy Clarkson-ish gift and such a cutesy-pie stunt. Today I am overwhelmed with joy.

Jesus, Mary and Whatsisface?

2007-10-24T06:21:00.000+01:00

Thumbing the New Testament for words of wisdom from Christ’s earthly father on parenthood, I find that poor ol’ Joe has not one single line to his name. On reflection, what was he going to say anyway? With all the relatives squeezed into his family home in Nazareth gazing at the new arrival, the lack of paternal likeness must have been something of an elephant in the room. “Oooh!” did they coo, “he’s certainly got his Father’s omnipotent streak.”

Diary: It's Competition Time

2007-10-23T08:37:00.000+01:00

(Diary entry 14th June) A visit from nearby neighbours, one child, another on the way, in full-blown competitive mode. Isobella, it would seem by their reckoning, at six days old, is way, WAY behind their own daughter at that stage. Sharp intakes of breath through teeth and raised eyebrows as they brighten with each revelation.

“Not sleeping through the night yet? Our little Georgie slept from the moment she got home!”

“She sleeps in the same room as you? No, no, no, you need to show her who’s boss from the word go. Our little Georgie is very obedient!”

“She’s very small. We didn’t breastfeed little Georgie and she thrived, simply thrived!”

Karen remains serene, a satirical smirk dancing the edges of her mouth. I, however, rise to the bait.

“Well Isobella just finished reading À la recherche du temps perdu in the original French. And you know what? She didn’t rate it.”

Did I really say this? No, of course not. But what’s the point of a blog if you can’t make yourself Stephen Fryishly wise after the event?

They leave us a copy of The Contended Little Baby and I reflect that it is the first book recommendation they have ever given us. Feel like suggesting that all the parenting advice they’ll ever need is in the first line of Anna Karenina: "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Germane, I feel, as I reflect that I’ve never seen the prodigy Little Georgie smile even once in two years of life.

Diary: Rose-Tinted Spectacles

2007-10-22T23:03:00.000+01:00

(Diary entry 12th June 2007) Our friend Kate arrives, laden down with lovely presents for Bella. Conversation turns, inevitably, to the size of Isobella’s feet (see earlier posts), and once more I smugly congratulate myself on my ability to see my own child without rose-tinted spectacles. It is already clear that I am not going to be one of those nightmare parents who think the sun shines out of their feral child’s fundament. How impressive am I?

Kate joins in with our observations on Isobella’s titanic tootsies, agreeing that they are, indeed, on the large side of big. We make jokes. It is fun. We each embroider upon the last remark, laying exaggeration upon exaggeration. Until Kate cracks: “It’s not her feet I’d worry about. It’s her ears.”

It is an impeccably timed joke, delivered with vaudeville aplomb. Karen laughs on cue. I, on the other hand, merely shoot her a cold stare – after a checking glance at Isobella’s PRISTINE, PERFECT, BEAUTIFUL, EXEMPLARY, COVETABLE, PROBABLY-SOON-TO-BE-AWARD-WINNING AND REALLY VERY PETITE THANKS-FOR-ASKING ears. All this from behind my newly acquired eyewear: a pair of solid gold Ray-Ban Aviator Rose-Tinted Shades.

Disappointment at my new-found inability to laugh at a joke at my child’s expense will come later. In the meantime I find myself editing Kate’s name out of the Christmas card list, compiling a list of reasons why she can never come to our home again and wondering if assassins advertise in Yellow Pages.

That night, while Isobella sleeps, I peer over the Moses basket to check on those ears again. They are fine. The feet, however, remain the same. I reflect that the number of feet – two of them – is infinitely more important than their size. Count my blessings and marvel at the explosion of another myth:

Not ALL babies, it would seem, look like Winston Churchill after all.

Only OTHER PEOPLE’S babies.

Diary: Pain. It's All Relative

2007-10-20T07:55:00.000+01:00

(Diary entry 12th June 2007) To King’s College Hospital where Isobella was born just a few days ago. This time on very different business. An endoscopy. “So called,” laughs Godfather John, “because it goes up your end.” He apologises for such a lame “crack” and for making me the “butt” of his jokes. These three merely the tip of the iceberg of bum gags. I wonder to myself at my choice of Godfather and role model for my child.

“We’re going to insert a camera,” I am informed by the doctor, “about the size of an index finger.” I wonder if I get to choose whose index finger we are using as a yardstick. Isobella’s index finger is tiny and would be perfect for my purpose. Unfortunately, it seems that one size fits all. And it would seem to be the Incredible Hulk’s index finger. With a bad case of swollen joints and arthritis. Perhaps a bit of water retention, too. And without having removed his rings.

Reflect, as I watch my innards in glorious technicolor on a screen that, a) I have indeed finally disappeared up my own arse as so many before had predicted and, most importantly, b) that I wont be able to complain to Karen about my discomfort given that she is still walking like a giraffe taking a drink and sitting on a rubber ring. “You would be, too,” she growls, “if you’d just passed a ping-pong ball through the hole in the end of our knob.”

Pic: Bella & me again

2007-10-20T07:51:00.000+01:00

Diary: M.I.C.K.E.Y M.O.U.S.E

2007-10-19T18:09:00.000+01:00

(Diary 9th June 2007) Out to work. Being a freelancer, there’s no such thing as paternity leave for me. Console myself that it is only for a couple hours, bite the bullet and get on with it. Pass the Disney shop on my way. Against my better instinct, I go inside. Once in, the slushy side of my disposition floods my common sense, and I buy a cuddly Mickey Mouse for Isobella. Odd, this, as I never found MM particularly funny, being more of a Daffy Duck man, myself. The awesome power of The Disney Brand at work.

When I get home, I present it to Isobella and find myself swelling with pride when she ignores it. That, I tell myself, is her innate distrust and contempt for such a symbol of the corporate world of greed and exploitation. Daddy has been a sucker and his daughter has taught him a valuable lesson.

Nothing to do, of course, with that fact that she is only two days old and cares for nothing but milk and having her nappy emptied.

The Myth of the “Head End”

2007-10-15T10:09:00.000+01:00

Years ago I worked beside an Australian guy who was going to be a father for the first time. He was touchingly keen to be all New Man about it – that’s how long ago it was: New Man was still currency.

“Are you going to be in at the birth?” I asked. “Sure,” he said emphatically. Then he paused. Then he repeated, “Sure…” only this time with a little less conviction. There was another, longer pause, after which he added, patently aware of the horrific magic lantern show that had begun to flicker in both our minds’ eyes, “At the head end, of course, mate. Head end, definitely…”

From that moment on, the concept of the “Head End” consoled me through any contemplation of childbirth. And I’d like to pass that consolation on to you now. I’d really love to. But the thing is… well, let’s just explode the myth of the Head End once and for all.

1. Head end? What length is your wife/partner if you can stand at one end of her and have absolutely no sight of a baby emerging from between her legs? Is she related to the Welsh one out of the Fantastic Four?

2. You think you will have a choice as to where to look? What else is there in the delivery room that will distract you from a woman who will have grasped you so firmly by the throat that her fingers will be meeting behind your Adam’s apple? Not even the spectacle of the two surviving members of The Beatles jamming by the birthing pool with the two surviving members of The Who will tear you away. (It would work, that, too. The Beatles and Who thing, I mean: drummer and bass player (Ringo and Paul), singer and guitarist (Daltrey and Townshend). Whether they’d be called The Whotles or The Boo is a debate for another blog.)

3. Midwives can smell male squeamishness at fifty paces. And, when it comes to men, they can be a merciless bunch. The withering looks and well-honed satire of a tired midwife will leave mental lacerations deeper than the sight of any labour ever could.

4. NB. Try not to deploy the phrase “Head End” around your partner/wife too often. She already feels more than a little bit like a big, fat cow, and such agricultural, indeed objectifying terminology as “Head End” (see also “Business End”) can tend to exacerbate her need to knee you in the “Testicles End” – an act of violence that she can chalk off to hormonal confusion. And, as we all know, there’s not a court in the land that would quibble with hormonal confusion in pregnancy.

Diary: The Labour – A Review

2007-10-12T13:20:00.000+01:00

(Diary 9th June 2007) Wake up to carnage in the bathroom. Just before we left for the hospital, Karen’s waters broke and brought with them an explosion of blood. Our smallest room looks like a scene from the play Marat Sade. Or a particularly imaginative Quentin Tarantino set piece.

I review the labour. For a man prone to squeamishness, a squeamishness that can often manifest itself in an effeminacy surpassing the outlandish, I feel I have coped admirably well. I begin to make a mental note to ask Karen for congratulations on my performance when I remember: she has just undergone 26 hours of labour with no pain relief save a tens machine and a boxset of Waltons DVDs.

The tens machine – a battery pack with electrodes that attach to the lower back – is as effective a pain reliever as having someone you don’t really like standing nearby and shooting you withering looks while barking from time to time “Try not to think about it, ducky” and “Focus on something other than the pain, you big wimp”. The Waltons, on the other hand, was invented to sedate 250,000,000 Americans at the height of the Vietnam War into believing that the world really was a lovely, folksy, apple-pie place. And, according to Karen, it worked a treat for her, too.

After cleaning up the bathroom, I head for the hospital where I find Karen and Isobella dumped in a room partitioned by a makeshift curtain. Joy at our little bundle (with the big feet) tides us over for the first eight hours of being ignored. When, as we head for nine hours in purdah, I ask when the paediatrician will see us, I am met with a filthy look from the young Irish midwife on duty, who seems to be mimicking some demonic matriarch from a Victorian penny dreadful. The look says: “How dare you question my authority you big-mouthed NCT ponce.” The tone, when she finally barks, backs it up.

Our own midwife – the midwife who brought Isobella into the world – has gone off duty long ago. And with her she seems to have taken 99 percent of the ward’s sunshine and compassion. Her performance was particularly impressive given that she only seemed to be marginally older than Isobella herself. Only one complaint: when I asked if we could try the gas and air – Karen hadn’t used it during her frantic labour – she, the midwife, just laughed. Her tinkling laughter was utterly charming and only doubled when I insisted, “No really. I’m not kidding.”

Home by eight p.m. to ignore the phone and doorbell and just gaze at our new daughter. Karen had noticed the feet thing. I felt a little less of a bad parent.

Diary: Isobella’s Birth Day

2007-10-12T13:10:00.000+01:00

(Diary 8th June 2007) Isobella arrived at 21.55 yesterday night (7th June, the 8th as I write).

Six pounds, four ounces. Blue eyes. Gorgeous. The most beautiful thing – the most beautiful person – in the world.

With huge feet. Vast. Really. I wonder if Karen has noticed, but decide not to mention it until she brings it up.

Why Blog? The Intro

2007-10-12T13:07:00.000+01:00

Why Blog?

Emerging from beneath a pile of self-help books on how to be the perfect, superhuman 24-carat parent, I felt a little overwhelmed.

Sharing the parenting duties with my wife Karen, I strive on a daily basis for that ever-elusive parental perfection. Unlike the authors of all those books, however, I am only human. Thus I end up each bedtime having been merely NOT TOO BAD A DAD. Luckily, my daughter, Isobella, doesn’t seem to mind…

I’ve started this blog as an adjunct to my occasional column in Pregnancy, Baby & You magazine, to let off steam at the frustrations of first-time parenting, as well as to capture the many joys of this startling experience.

First, the frank truth. Give it to me straight, Doc. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin: No number of NCT classes or books can fully prepare you for the fact that life as you know it is OVER. Really. Done. Finished. Kaput. That’s it. Sayonara. Goodnight Vienna.

And that’s the good news.

The even better news is that you’ll be so happy/overwhelmed/tired/blissed out/fascinated/challenged/besotted that you won’t care. It really is the best drug known to mankind.

I hope you’re enjoying life with your new arrival - and that you enjoy the blog, too.

All best

Adam

Pic: Bella & me again

2007-10-12T11:50:00.000+01:00