SPD 2: cruise control*

My wife is now over fifteen weeks pregnant. Our new creation is apparently the size of an apple. But a big apple, like a cooking apple or a New York City. It's not really the size of a New York City. Can you imagine how uncomfortable that would be for her? The cooking apple is causing enough trouble as it is.

It's interesting to compare and contrast the effects of this pregnancy with the previous one. I think that, by this stage the last time around, the phenomenally unbearable itching had begun its assault on my wife's physical and psychological comfort. Mercifully, thus far, this ordeal has failed to present itself to her. I'd give my right arm to keep it that way. And I'm right-handed.

One symptom from which she is suffering once again is the propensity to fall asleep at about 9pm every day. This could, of course, be related to the infinitely energetic one year-old with whom she now spends most of her time - a factor which was absent from the prior gestation, being as it was the gestation of said one year-old, some time before she became a one year-old. The onus, then, is on me to step up the level of assistance I provide. I'm trying to do so, although one thing I have learned from a combination of parenthood and my instinctively lazy nature is that you can and should always try a bit harder. And I will.

The symptom whose return we feared the most has now, sadly, come back to haunt my wife's existence. Furthermore, it has embarked upon this haunting earlier than it did before. My understanding (assisted by Christine Hill at ivillage.co.uk) of SPD, or Symphysis Pubis Dysfunction is thus:

The human pelvis is actually made of three bones which meet at the front and sides, where they are held in 'fixed' joints (the one at the front called the symphysis pubis) by determined ligaments which create the illusion I always shared with most other people: that the pelvis is one, uninterrupted bone. Only pregnancy dispels this myth, when production of the hormone relaxin is increased to help these ligaments do some relaxin' in preparation for the birth. So far, so sensible. But the dysfunction occurs when the relaxin starts the relaxin' too early.

Imagine, if you will then, your pelvis splitting in two down the front, each half grinding on the other every time you put any weight on it. This is what my wife went through for several months when pregnant before, and now knows that she will suffer for even longer this time. By the time she was in labour with our daughter, she literally could not move for the pain the SPD caused her, rendering the hormone's name ironic at best. It is apparently normal for victims of this affliction to be struck again, and worse, during any subsequent pregnancy.

This normality offers no consolation. And with the aforementioned bundle of energy to chase around the house, I am frankly astounded by my wife's ability to not crumple in a small heap of despair in the corner. Opinion is divided as to any possible treatment for this affliction. Some say physiotherapy can help; others that there is nothing you can do whatsoever. We're going to try physiotherapy. In the meantime, as I have said, I need to up my game. On which note I'm off to clean the bathroom.

*I fully acknowledge that the "cruise control" element of this post's title is entirely inappropriate and quite possibly insensitive. But what sort of a man would turn down the opportunity to make a heavily contrived reference to such a landmark of modern cinema?

A tale of two hospitals

We went for our twelve week scan last week. It wasn't until afterwards that my wife and I revealed to each other that we had each independently allowed paranoia to get the better of us, and had expected something untoward to be revealed. I suppose this fear was a residual effect of the miscarriage we once suffered. Even the successful birth of our most excellent daughter couldn't quite banish that demon.

But we needn't have worried. As far as it is possible to tell at this early stage, all is well with our next project. He or she is a relatively ordinary size and shape, and is also a wriggler. My wife reflected that this does not bode well for our hopes of a calm, gentle baby to contrast with our daughter. But we'll settle for another healthy but energetic one.

What was interesting about our latest scanny adventure was the contrast it demonstrated between the two hospitals we have graced in search of sonography. You may not know or recall that we moved house half way through our daughter's gestation. So - although she was born at our current health emporium - the early medical attention with which we are now being reacquainted took place at a different venue.

The prior experience was one of long waits in vast (yet somehow still stuffy) waiting rooms, which rendered appointment times a ridiculous notion, as one's patience was tested to the limit before being rewarded with the attention of a delightful and attentive team of sonographers and assorted helpers. They really seemed to care. Admittedly this may have been why everyone's appointment overran.

Our new hospital adopts a contrasting ideology. You, the expecting, are but cattle, to be efficiently herded from one corridor to the next in a ruthless system which spares nobody in its merciless pursuit of timely box-ticking. My wife was duly provided with a scan, several forms to fill in (quickly), a blood test and at least two conversations with a terrifying but deceptively witty receptionist, who seems to have perfected a kind of Jack-Dee-of-administration persona. And we were in and out in about twenty minutes.

I can see the merits of both systems. One can't underestimate the benefit of feeling cared for but, in principle, surely it's better to help as many people as possible than to make a few people feel really good about themselves? I suppose, ideally, hospitals would achieve both. But that would require more staff, and there doesn't seem to be much money about at the moment, so we'll resign ourselves to being herded through the next six months.

Sister act 2

And now, as advertised, further musings upon the areas in which my daughter shows early signs of big sister prowess:

Generosity

From the first time we allowed our daughter to handle her own food, she has demonstrated a quite touching inclination to share it. She simply will not let any rusk, carrot stick or blueberry pass her lips until she has successfully offered it to whichever person initially provided her with the morsel in question. To see this person nibble (or quite convincingly pretend to) upon her snack fills our daughter with glee.

This instinctive generosity is an adorable and highly commendable trait, and one which should ensure that she will always do her utmost to provide for her sibling, as well as setting him or her an excellent example.

Of course it could be that our daughter suspects my wife and I of attempting to poison her, and is simply taking the sensible precaution of having us taste her food first to attest to its safety. I should stress that - inadvertent egg crises aside - we have never poisoned her. Nevertheless, the self preservation instinct implied by this theory is also a very useful characteristic in a sister.

Coolness

I can honestly say that my proudest achievement as a father came only about a week ago, when I taught my daughter to high-five. Oh yes. I need only hold my outstretched palm near her, and her little mit slaps satisfyingly away at it, spreading contagious joy across the faces of all present. Anybody who has ever been anywhere near the 1980s will know that there is no greater indication of whether a person is cool, or perhaps rad, or bodacious.

Thus, I can now claim indisputably that my daughter is worthy of all of these adjectives. And this, above all else, will cement her position as trusted life mentor in the eyes of her younger brother or sister.

Abrupt Ending 2

I don't have to go to work today. But I can't think of any more examples. Which is not to say that there are none. But that is all for now.

Sister act

As I observe and interact with my daughter, I cannot now help but look for indications of how she will fare as a big sister. Our first scan of Child Number Two in Terms of Chronology but Certainly Not Preference is due to take place next week. We may or may not then discover whether our daughter will be the big sister of a little sister or a little brother. Depending upon your attitude towards gender stereotypes you may feel that this is a crucial factor in determining the older sibling role, but there are some generally useful characteristics for which we can already be on the lookout.

Presence

My wife and I are often moved to accuse our daughter of bullying us. Since minute one she has been big for her age, and this size is increasingly attributable to muscle rather than fat. Whilst we do our utmost to be consistent in calmly admonishing bad behaviour and celebrating good behaviour, inevitably our daughter still has an inclination to do things we would rather she did not. In these instances any attempt at gentle restraint usually ends in our daughter causing injury to the restrainer. For example, my effort to prevent her from diving off the edge of our bed this morning was successful, but only at the cost of a bitten leg for me. And don't get me started on the tugs of war over the TV remote.

How does all of this relate to her potential as a big sister? Well, I envisage that this physical and psychological relentlessness will help her to fulfill the protective older sibling role more traditionally taken on by a big brother. Our new addition will never have a big brother, so I am grateful for the prospect of our daughter transcending the stereotype in this manner, for there is no messing with her, and surely never will be. The very best protagonists in this role achieve results through their potential for action alone. In football, this quality is known amongst top defenders as presence.

Independent Responsibility

This morning, when my wife retrieved our daughter from her bedroom, she found the little lady stood in her cot, turning her bedroom light on and off, having somehow removed herself from her sleeping bag (which we use - as is practical as well as fashionable - in lieu of a duvet for her). She had also cleared her cot of all toys. In short, our daughter had got herself up. Admittedly we still had to brush her teeth, but I was much older than one year before I started doing that voluntarily.

I choose to see this behaviour as encouraging evidence of our daughter's responsible nature. As such I confidently look forward to the day when she relieves my wife and I of parental responsibilities, offering to change all of her brother or sister's nappies and clean up after their meals. This will be nice.

Entertainment

Crucial to a good relationship between our daughter and her sibling is the elder partner's capacity to attract the attention of the younger by being suitably entertaining. My wife and I have never been in any doubt as to the quality of her personality. She makes my wife laugh a lot more than I do, and I'm really funny. Just this week our daughter has added to her considerable repertoire by perfecting the piggy grunt style noise of which she herself was so fond in her early months. She has also already mastered the Amazing Tongue Circus which I fine-tuned, to the unanimous amazement of my friends and acquaintances, at about 17.

I am confident that she will be of interest and inspiration to her protege.

Conversation

The sentences our daughter utters, although apparently still nonsensical to our naive ears, are increasing daily in both frequency and the proportion and variety of consonants they contain. By the time she is a big sister I have no doubt that she will be a walking, talking Oxford English Dictionary, from which her sibling will learn, as common wisdom suggests that younger children do. Having another little person from whom they copy their early habits and activities gives them a head start in learning the best of these, or so goes the theory. Our younger one will be learning from the best.

Abrupt Ending

There are more, but I have to go to work. I can't wait until my children relieve me of that responsibility.

Landmark

Today was my daughter's first birthday. The happiest and most bewildering experience of my life was exactly one year ago. Well, almost one year and a day now. I meant to write this earlier but I've been clearing up wrapping paper and that sort of thing. It seems only proper that I commemorate the occasion in writing. I want to somehow embrace all of the highs and lows of the past twelve months, but without being tedious or repetitive. I want to condense the considerable variety of lessons I have learned into one snappy conclusion, but without resorting to patronising cliche.

I had thought I might approach this by writing about the ways in which fatherhood has changed me since a year ago. But honestly I'm not sure if it has. I'm still quite vain, a bit lazy and prepared to go to incredible lengths to avoid confrontation. If you had asked me before my daughter was born whether one could be a good parent in spite of these characteristics, then I would have offered a vain but non-confrontational response to the effect that no, I would need to change, and fully expected to.

Of course I have only my own experience to comment upon, and it's not easy to generalise about these things, but I think that parenthood in fact magnifies any strengths or weaknesses in one's character. I can only hope that my daughter (and her impending sibling) learns from me to take pride in her qualities, rest during pertinent opportunities and settle disagreements in a calm, mature manner.

One cliche, the use of which I can justify only because it is so unequivocally true, is that the positives of parenting outweigh the negatives. Admittedly, for a long time I struggled to cope with the disruption of sleep, managing to do so only because of my wife's vastly superior ability not to be lazy. And anyone who claims to enjoy changing nappies is in need of either psychiatric or olfactory treatment. But most difficult of all to cope with is the relentless weight of responsibility. In my previous life I had only to make it through the day at work before resuming a carefree existence at home each evening. Now I must continue to put the needs of at least one other person before my own for twenty four hours a day.

But sleep can be caught up with. Nappies, in reality, smell no worse than any bathroom recently visited by me. And, as a vain person, I am easily capable of appreciating the power of responsibility as a source of pride. But actually none of these rational considerations are even necessary to justify the cliche. Because when my daughter wakes me up in the middle of the night, I have come to relish it as an opportunity to spend more time with her. Every trip out with her is a chance to show off the adorable bundle of joy and curiosity which I helped to create. I cope with my responsibilities at work only by thinking of how much I enjoy my responsibilities at home.

For a long time I thought that these were ideals of which I had to convince myself. But at some point unnoticed by me I realised that I genuinely feel this way. All the hard work really does pay off. Hard work which I achieved in spite of my limitations, I think because I sensed that there was something in it for me. I'm greedy as well.

In short, my daughter makes me very happy. This is a simple, wonderful truth. My shortcomings and qualities have no discernible bearing upon this. I sincerely hope that this is the experience of all parents. If not, then this is a tribute not to parenthood, but to my daughter. Happy birthday to her.

Love spreads

Another fear which accompanies the prospect of Number Two is one which, I suspect, forever tickles the conscience of all parents of more than one: how do you spread the love evenly? Favouritism is, sensibly, something of a parenting taboo, and will certainly never be our intention. But balancing the time, love and worry you devote to your offspring already feels like a tactical minefield. For example: I shall have to stop referring to our expected as "Number Two".

Naturally, when Baby B (also an inadvisable epithet) arrives, we hope and expect to lavish upon her or him the same level of care and attention our daughter quite rightly enjoyed (and still does). But how do we do this without neglecting our daughter? I remember experiencing the same fears, albeit on a smaller scale, when my sister's second son was born. What if I didn't feel the same natural inclination to fulfill with gusto my uncle duties the second time around? I needn't have worried: both boys are equally entertaining, adorable and excellent, and I trust that I have reflected this in my interactions with them.

Another interesting aspect of this - and really the crucial one - is how the siblings involved feel. Our daughter will be about 19 months old when she starts learning to share. To what extent will she appreciate the nuances in the family lifestyle? I'm sure she will at least be sensitive to any reduction in the level of attention she receives. I believe the common manner of reconciling this difficulty is to describe it as character building.

Already I am occasionally aware that my mind is on my wife and the contents of her womb when previously it would have been on my daughter. Whilst she is a very perceptive young lady, I think I have thus far managed to shield her from this bleak truth. Nevertheless, as if in response to the impending competition, she does seem to have raised her game of late.

The days when pulling herself up was an achievement at which to be marvelled are long gone. This act is now a simple norm, to be expected whenever she arrives at any landmark taller than herself. She has now advanced to free standing. Oh yes. Admittedly she seems not be doing it deliberately, but perhaps that's why it looks so effortless. Her communication skills have also progressed to the point where she is fully capable of uttering any sound in the English language. It's just that she doesn't want to. She wants to say "Nana," again and again and again. About which Nana seems quite pleased.

But our daughter's current coup de grace is the stair climbing. We were impressed a few weeks ago when she managed one step unaided. But, virtually overnight, she pioneered a method of turning one step into two through an ingenious combination of knee and elbow work, and just sort of fearlessly repeated this until there were no more stairs to scale. Of course, we have conducted the relevant risk assessment and ensure that she is cautiously followed at close quarters when performing this feat, yet I still find it extremely impressive. Even I get a bit confused on the stairs sometimes if I think about it too much. A bit like Theo Walcott in on goal.

Child 1b can't climb the stairs.

Seriously though, I'm not sure I or anyone else will ever know the answer to the division of parenting labour question. But I'm hopeful that the answer is that, instead of dividing the love, you are able to multiply it. Of course, you can't multiply time, but we'll have to cross that bridge when we come to it. Maybe Science will have come up with something by the end of September.

Commence phase 2

My wife and I are not great believers in waiting three months before telling people you're pregnant. We consider our jointly held opinion on this to be reasonably well-qualified, having previously suffered the not uncommon - but nevertheless devastating - tragedy of miscarriage. On that occasion we questioned whether we had been foolishly premature in our glee, but ultimately concluded that the support and sympathy of those who knew what we had lost was invaluable in overcoming it.

Now why would I bring this up now?

Indeed. We're only about six weeks in, but our family oven is once again accommodating bun. My wonderful wife is up the duff redux. Our daughter is to be a big sister. And we are very much delighted about this.

Of course there are fears and worries to acknowledge before they can be rationalised away. How the Dickens are we going to afford to sustain such an enormous family? The savings upon which we relied during my wife's previous maternity leave are now somewhat more meagre as a result. Already we have embarked upon a frenzy of commerce: desperately selling off the less valued members of DVD and CD collections which had grown better appointed than self-respecting parents of two can afford. Besides which, we have no family silver.

Mercifully, many of the major expenses will this time be unnecessary. We already have the cot, buggy, toys and clothes (provided our new creation is either female or develops an early curiosity for cross-dressing). The daunting prospect of rearranging all the bedrooms, upon reflection, pales in comparison to the full moving house experience to which we subjected ourselves last time.

Crucially, the biggest fear presented by our first child barely registers on the scale this time around. This concerns the dread that I suspect all first-time parents feel but struggle to articulate, and that many parents of more than one fail to appreciate the lack of: that of simply having what it takes to be a parent. Well I am still very much aware of the terror I felt (but struggled to articulate), regarding my ability to take on the basic responsibility and selflessness required by fatherhood. I'm not sure how, but so far it seems that I am capable not only of making these sacrifices, but of enjoying them. I refuse to mask my pride in this fact, and I enjoy its implication: this is one big worry I need not feel this time. As for my wife, I was never concerned about her capacity for selflessness in the first place.

So, all things considered, whilst I am aware that we have opted for a smaller than average gap between child one and child two, I am confident that our reasons for trepidation are vastly outweighed by those for joy, delight, optimism and that sort of thing. For a long time, my wife and I have been in agreement that our daughter would benefit from the company of a sibling. Their closeness in age will surely mean that this benefit is all the more keenly felt.

So, in summary: Yay! We have once again successfully procreated! Does anybody want to buy a CD?