Tom Hollow
Given how many years I spent trying to get pregnant, you’d think I’d have been more clued up when I went into labour. Instead, when my waters broke three weeks early while I was at work, I just thought, ‘Wow! This baby is really putting pressure on my pelvic floor!’ and kept on working.
That evening, my husband Dan and I joked that I’d sprung a leak – but in defence of our naivety, it was much more subtle than you see in the movies!
I was possibly also subconsciously trying to keep the baby put for a little longer. I’d ‘decided’ I was going to go to full term, because Dan was shooting Tinā, his first feature film as lead producer, right up until the day before I was due. Given how many years he’d worked on it, I wanted him to be able to finish it before we were consumed by newborn life.
Instead, what eventuated was yet another lesson that when it comes to procreation, you don’t get to just ‘decide’ – something we should have known by then.
The fact we fell pregnant at all came as a complete surprise, which I’m aware sounds a bit ridiculous given we’d been trying to engineer that exact outcome for more than four years!
After many failed fertility treatments, three operations, a miscarriage, and diets and supplements up the wazoo, we felt as though we were banging our heads up against a brick wall of ‘unexplained’ infertility, with no clear path forward.
Then a friend kindly (and nonchalantly!) offered to become a surrogate. After a heart-to-heart with her and her husband, we all started having appointments to get the complicated medical and ethical approval process underway. We were daunted but hopeful.
Dan and I had also decided that whatever the outcome, something good needed to come from this. So we started work on our podcast The Human Race, aimed at making the lonely and frustrating fertility process less isolating for others. We were so proud of the intimate and raw conversations that resulted, and the way it seemed to give people solace.
In the middle of all of that, the unexpected happened – a home pregnancy test came back positive. Then another and another. In four years of trying to conceive, we’d never fallen pregnant naturally.
Instead of being delighted, we were wracked with worry. We’d been here before with an IVF pregnancy and had miscarried so felt we couldn’t celebrate. A nasty bout of Covid in my first trimester further stoked those fears, so there were no teddies or onesies purchased and we told no one. We just took each blood test and scan for what it was – proof that life was still growing inside me.
Eventually it seemed it was actually happening this time, at which point we became nervous for a different reason – we needed to tell our listeners. It almost felt a little too ‘convenient’ to drop that
news during a fertility podcast. It also felt incredibly delicate given how many of them had their own stories of heartbreak, so we fretted about how it would be received.
We needn’t have worried – what followed was the most overwhelming outpouring of love from people we’d never met, telling us they were crying happy tears for us.
But the careful attention I’d given to trying to conceive was clearly not matched by the attention I paid to what had started to happen – this baby was coming early, whether I liked it or not!
When I finally called my midwife, she said that given I hadn’t had any contractions, I should go to bed and call her in the morning.
But at 1am, the contractions came thick and fast. I paced up and down the hallway thinking how this felt like my dark night of the soul, then I started projectile vomiting. Dan cleaned me up (and the bathroom walls – sorry, darling) and packed me off to hospital.
When they examined me, they announced I was already 7cm dilated and they could feel his hair. That one detail made it suddenly feel incredibly real. They rolled the bed through the halls to the delivery suite with me on my hands and knees, gritting my teeth and idly wondering if everyone could see my backside. Dan called my work to let them know I would not be seeing my clients that day!
I was keen for an epidural but had heard horror stories about anaesthetist wait times, so I was surprised when one appeared promptly. But just as he was about to put local anaesthetic in, he got a phone call. He looked at me sympathetically and disappeared to deal with an emergency. ‘Oh, God,’ I thought. ‘That’s it then, I’m on my own.’
Mercifully, another appeared in time. A pragmatic and efficient Canadian anaesthetist got the job done between contractions, and I got a few hours’ rest. The mood was relaxed – it was just us and
our midwife. We chatted, played music and Dan even did a bit of work [his movie was still filming], while I closed my eyes. Then it was time to push. I’ll spare you the details, but Dan’s hand functioned well as a stress ball and our wee boy – weighing just 2.8kg – arrived at 12.38pm on Wednesday the 20th of September, with a head of dark hair.
When they put him on me, the poor kid got a rollercoaster ride as my chest heaved with the enormity of the moment. Our perfect wee boy snuggling up to me was easily the most surreal moment of my life.
We hadn’t chosen a name beforehand – our fears meant we wanted to ensure his safe arrival first. When we looked into his eyes, it seemed like we’d always known our little Frankie Beau.
The months since his arrival have been a blur. I can’t watch anything remotely emotional – becoming a mum has left me as tender as a gaping wound! I can’t stop kissing his chubby cheeks. When he stares at me, it’s as if he can see right into my soul. His giggle is the most beautiful sound imaginable.
Watching Dan with him makes me instantly well up. He’s so calm and content, it’s as if he knows what a struggle it was to get him here. I don’t wish fame or riches for him – just a life of contentment, love and belonging. I’ve written him a couple of children’s books to tell him the story of how he came to be, so he knows how wanted and loved he was before he even drew breath.
We now feel even more motivated to make another season of The Human Race. While we’d love this outcome for everyone who desires it, at the very least we can help those on the fertility journey feel less alone than we did.
It almost feels greedy to say we want more children, given what a miracle Frankie is. Plus, we’ve learned our lesson now – when it comes to procreation, you don’t get to just decide. And if Frankie is the only child we get to have, we’ll still feel like we’ve hit the jackpot.”
