What Price Fisher?

You are enjoying the plastic additions to your possession collection.

First Xmas

As an atheist who is anti-commercialism, Xmas (I have petulantly refused to write "Christ"mas for several years and don't buy cards to send with the word on it) poses problems now that I have a son. How do I treat this time of year? Yesterday was relatively easy and even next year it might be possible to just kop-out of really dealing with it, but I have to come up with a strategy both you and I are happy with.

Yesterday, you got presents from your Nanny & Grandad, Cousin Yvonne and family in Australia, Maki in Singapore and books from me and your mum. The Koala got the most stares and the keys that also travelled half the world made you laugh, continuously. Nanny & Grandad gave you a bowl with spoons for when you are on solids (very useful), your first stacking blocks and a set of teethers. Maki sent you a cute little yukata.

Happy

You laughed a lot today, Rock, but my Donald Duck impression made you cry. It was the first time you heard it but was not even the last today.

Mummy's Xmas Presents

You and this photo of you and mummy together on a large canvas are my main presents to her this year, son. (Oh, and a pot of moisturising cream.)

Hitting

Ah, it really started on Thursday night. Before that, we'd encouraged engagement with books by touch and perhaps the addition of a xylophone to your small collection of worldly possessions has played its part but on Thursday you looked at the image of Luther Blissett's face on my t-shirt and started to hit it. Then you hit it some more and just kept hitting it.
I thought you might be telling your dad that you don't want to be a Watford supporter but last night I recognised a look in your face as you stared at my stomach (clad in a plain green T) and you started hitting again. It's funny and cute, just like you, son.

Laugh

I got your first consistent laugh out of you this week, with a simple though lengthy game of peek-a-boo. You laughed so hard, you almost cried (tiredness, I guess). I have had trouble obtaining the same result for a similar performance though, son.

Rock's Playlist

Like most parents of our class and aspirations, we have taken the "it can't hurt" approach to the urban legend that classical music, especially that of Mozart, improves your intelligence and the Deutsche Grammophon CDs I bought when a pretentious student are being played (from a hard drive) more than they ever were in my flat in Hulme in the early nineties.
The symphonies, concertos and occasional opera are being supplemented by the sort of rock I listen to and so you will no doubt get used to the sound of Nirvana, Kings of Leon, Amy Winehouse (who died the day you were born) and a myriad of other talents. I sing "Lithium" to you more than any other song but mostly recite poetry (I learned If and This be the verse after your birth and am intending to learn one or two a month for the foreseeable future).
I never learned to play a musical instrument but I hope that you will, son.

Thriving

Today we watched your first Watford match (v Nottingham Forest at the Vic, we lost 1-0). It was a poor performance but at half-time there was a TV montage of the Golden Boys' golden era. I will try to get you to learn the details later. For now, you are about twice your birth weight at the two-month mark and are just beginning to reach for things. We finally plucked up the courage to take scissors to your monk-like hairstyle two weeks ago and you have less hair than me for a while. You're growing and developing, son.

Life begins

First (definite) smile

You gave me a beautiful smile and gurgled a giggle today. This was the first time I was absolutely sure it was not wind. Didn't get a great picture of it but what a beautiful development, son.

Five weeks in

I love being your dad. My routine at the moment involves waking at 7 and changing, feeding and rocking you to sleep before I go to work. When I return, I get to hold you and feed you again, normally. You are so gorgeous and all your little noises (including your tearless bawling) cause me smiles and laughs. I love this time with you and love the idea of being with you as you grow, son.

Ventricular septal defect

Son, there is a hole in your little heart. Blood leaks from one side to the other but the doctor has told us that it is a very small hole and may well close in time without intervention. It was found after we took you into A&E at the hospital where you were born. You had lost too much weight, son.


You are spending your third night in a row in hospital and I miss you and your mum, who is doing the hard work of caring for you while I go to college to teach.

Yesterday when I went in to see you before work, I was deeply affected by the tube going into your nose and the helplessness any parent would feel in seeing your care in the hands of others.

I left Imperial early to spend more time with you (though actually got some sleep after a restless night). They have been providing you with milk through a pump but your mum has now reintroduced the breast and we hope that your feeding will improve.

We are being told that the hole and your weight-loss & consequent dehydration are unrelated. I guess we hope that is the case. It is midnight in our lonely flat. I miss you, son.

Worry often gives a small thing a big shadow

You are with your mother in UCLH tonight, because you have lost 11.43% of your bodyweight since you were born, which is more than the "normal" amount of weight loss that many babies experience. When you were being examined, the doctor found a murmur in your heart. You were then X-rayed. Son, we are worried and I feel even worse for having left you and your mother there.

You have alternately disconcerted us by not seeming to poo enough, crying too much and having a smelly belly-button. First-time-parents suffer; it is as much their role as it is yours to shit, scream and not sleep at night. Today our anxiety feels justified: your mother called me just as I left my fourth day at Imperial College and I cycled to the A&E department and met you there. I did not expect to be cycling home alone, son.

Happy birthday!

Your mother went into hospital yesterday morning about 10am. She got a bed (and room) just after 12 and by four o'clock in the afternoon, a gel had been used to try to encourage labour. You were being induced because of a combination of the gestational diabetes that your mum had (and controlled so well) and the fact that at 42, giving birth can be less than perfect.

We had messages from your nan (my mum) and friends sent well wishes. A second dose of gel about half eleven led to your mother's waters breaking at about 1.15am (I went home an hour before that) and she had intense contractions all night and did not sleep well. (I did.) Your mum had a hormone drip inserted about 2pm today and took an epidural at 3.15. When the midwife - Mikala - came to check on you abour 5.30, she was surprised to see the top of your head.

Your mum pushed hard for half an hour but you wouldn't come out. Mikala decided on an episiotomy and then there you were - purple, lifeless, with the umbilical cord wrapped twice around your neck. Fear dried up the happy tears that had begun to roll down my cheeks. Mikala clamped and cut the cord and unwrapped it. When she moved you, life kicked in and you wailed. It was so beautiful. I am crying those missing tears now, knowing you are safe and well.

You lay on your mother for 15 minutes while they delivered the placenta. Then I held you for half an hour while they sewed up your mum. She worried about feeding you. She worried generally. She was so happy to get you back from me. You were reluctant to feed at first but after half past eight you began to suck and your little jaw moving below your downy skin was such a relief to your mum. By half past nine you were upstairs with mum in the birth centre and I was on the way home, relegated to writing to you and missing you already, son.

Nearly here

Well son, since I last wrote, we have crossed the world, stayed in Rotherhithe for a couple of months and ultimately moved back into our flat at Kings Cross, which is not far from the hospital in which you are to be born. We have been to antenatal classes and your mum is in a breast-feeding class as I write this entry. We have been given clothes by friends with babies, so most of the things you wear for the first 3 months at least will be cast-offs from Leo (Jade & Oliver) and Persephone (Helen & Matt), while Kung & Matt have given us Olan's cot, two prams and a car-seat and Ali & Grant have donated Elsie's moses basket and a rocker.

Your mum has made up a bag to take into UCLH with her when the contractions tell her it's time to go and we are both looking forward to that day. You aren't due for another 3 weeks but your mum has a feeling you will make your appearance next week. I am hoping so, for slightly selfish reasons, because I will be able to get time off the job I am doing now (Internexus, at Regent's College) but start a new one at the end of the month (in Imperial College) for which they have specified that no time-off is permitted. Of course your mum and your needs will be the priority but if I can have my cake and eat it, I will be even more delighted.

Firsts

This blog will undoubtedly be full of firsts though admittedly this is not even the first entry about firsts. On Tuesday this week I felt you kick for the first time (your mum had obviously felt that before) and today we received your first clothes, which Aunty Bao bought for you.
Meanwhile, your mum, despite being sceptical at first, has started to call you "Rock", her favourite of my suggestions so far.

You're a boy

Today (Tuesday 8th March in Auckland, these first few posts may be misdated because we are so far ahead of the US) we went for our third scan and were asked whether we'd like to know your sex. Within seconds of our affirmation, proof of your masculinity was on the screen for us to see.

Both your mother and I had a preference for a boy and have not been afraid to state it. Many prospective parents would rather say they are merely hoping for a healthy baby. We were not shy in that regard. So now the name decision can be narrowed down. "Katherine", which was a shoo-in for a girl (your mum suggested it and I like it and its derivatives Kate, Katie and Kat) is retired.
I had already looked up  boys names on the net.  The few I wrote down included "Neil", "Curtis", "Nate", "Gavin", "Rhett" and "Ryker". My early favourite is "Kurt" but your mum thinks "Kurt Yu" is too short (though "Kurt Goodchild" is fine by her). With the knowledge we have obtained today, the processes of thinking about and researching the decision will be stepped up, son.

Second sight

We returned to the clinic today to see you at thirteen weeks and six days. They are telling us that the 31st of July could be your birthday.
There were clear images of your hands and feet and then we saw your face, although it looked a little like an alien rather than you. At this stage you are the same as every fetus, the nurse said. Sex and ethnicity come later.