Okay all you soon-to-be dads, we know you’ve read all those books, watched all those videos, and printed off that checklist to help you prepare for the birth of your crib lizard, right? Good. Now tell me, you definitely know and can explain the difference between the different types of births, right? Unassisted, assisted, c-section, water birth, or spontaneous. (Sweet Jesus, that last one sounds like it’s right out of the movie Alien). And you know exactly what a birth plan is, and what yours consists of, right? And you know the difference between a Doula, Midwife, or Obstetrician? And of course, you have everything packed and ready for when it’s go time, right? Easy peasy, It’s not overwhelming at all! Here’s the real truth about childbirth for you, Dad, and sometimes it’s not what you always expect.
Photo by Jonathan Borba on Unsplash
- A speaker with her carefully selected birth playlist ✓
- Yoga ball ✓
- Scented candles or diffuser ✓
- Her favourite robe ✓
- Massage oil ✓
- Hairbrush ✓
- Toothbrush ✓
- Extra clothes for mom and the baby ✓
- Water bottle ✓
- Lip balm ✓
- Magazine or book ✓
- Hair ties ✓
You and your spouse have gone over it a million times together, the plan is simple: when she starts feeling contractions, your only job is to bust out that contraction timer app and hit the button to start timing, you’re going to massage and apply pressure to her lower back to relieve the pain, and you’re going to help guide her through those excellent breathing techniques you watched in that one YouTube video.
Then, once it’s time, you’ll know right away, all you have to do is follow the contraction app and that golden 5-1-1 rule – contractions that are within 5-minute intervals, lasting for 1 minute, for at least 1 hour, easy right? Then you’re going to casually make your way to the hospital while stopping for a coffee at Tim’s since you know it’s going to be a long night.
Then once you get to the hospital, your wife is going to change into her gown, lay down, you’re going to start to prepare and light the candles. Now that the candles are taken care of, you’re going to bust out that speaker – get those tunes going. Next, make sure the yoga ball is ready in case she wants to roleplay as a Kangaroo at some point, then you lay her book on the nightstand beside the massage oil, and get her a nice warm towel to soothe the aches.
Great, now that everything’s in order, and you’re ready to go – you take a sip of your coffee, kick your feet up and get settled in for a long night. Well done, dad-to-be! You’re officially prepared for childbirth!
Okay – now let me tell you how this shit really goes down – based on the true story of our youngest daughter’s birth.
Photo by CHUTTERSNAP on Unsplash
Hours Before Judgment Day
You know the sound of a coffee pot that’s done brewing its last drop of coffee, and now it sounds like it’s struggling to get that last bit of air out. Okay now combine that sound with the sound of a dying Walrus who ate a ton of rotten fish the day before, and is now choking to death on a piece of plastic someone threw in the ocean. That’s the sound my wife was making in bed beside me while I was trying to sleep.
Okay, I thought to myself, that must mean she must be getting close to being in labour. Let me get her a nice glass of water, and ask how she’s doing. “Hey, honey, are you okay? Here’s some water.” I said. “Does it look like I’m okay? I haven’t slept all night and your dumbass has been snoring away, must be nice!” Okay, sweet, off to a good start – this baby’s definitely coming soon.
While she was busy making whale calls and thrashing around the bed like a fish out of water, I decided it was probably best we head downstairs and start getting ready for the hospital.
A few hours later and things were escalating quickly, my finger was sore from pushing the contraction app button on my phone, and my wife was WWE wrestling the kitchen chair while screaming in what seemed like ancient Latin tongue, I also remember the sweat – oh dear God the sweat – she was sweating from places I didn’t know women could sweat from. And on top of that, the swearing, she normally swears like a trucker, so I’m already used to that, but holy jeez, this takes the cake.
I kept thinking to myself – this app, and that stupid 5-1-1 rule doesn’t make any sense, her contractions were 10 minutes apart, then 1 minute apart, then 4 minutes apart, 1 minute long, then 10 seconds long, then 30 seconds long – absolutely zero consistency, so the app told us meh – you’re still good, but when I looked into her soul-piercing eyes I knew it was a goddamned liar. All I could do was stare at her and tell her that everything’s going to be okay while I was witnessing an exorcism in front of my own two eyes. With no holy water in sight, I called her dad in a panic to come over and watch the other kids so we could hopefully make it to the hospital in time.
Now I rushed to pack everything up into the vehicle, including the overnight bag, the yoga ball, the robe, and everything else we could fit, while trying to make sure I didn’t forget anything because I kinda enjoy being alive and wanted to live to see another day.
By this point, it was pitch black outside, and I could barely see where I was going. I was also lost, but I knew I was close, and like the man that I am, I couldn’t dare to tell her. So I sneakily grabbed my phone, pulled up the GPS, and typed the hospital in trying to make sure she didn’t notice. I gave the old side-eye to look over and she was too busy making out with the window to notice, okay sweet – I’m in the clear.
We pulled up, I immediately panicked trying to find parking since her contractions were insane at this point. I completely froze, chose the nearest parking spot – handicap, shit. Like hell I’ll be getting a ticket today, nope. So instead of letting her out right there like the gentleman I am, I put that bad boy in reverse and mid-shoulder check I accidentally locked eyes with my wife. At that moment boys, I knew I screwed up.
Photo by Aditya Romansa on Unsplash
The Hospital
After I nearly dodged death, yet again, I held onto my wife’s arm as she penguin-walked her way up to the doors, which of course were locked due to Covid. The nurse at the front desk looked at my wife, then looked at me, and I must have had a terrified look on my face because she smashed the doors open faster than I could raise my hand. The nurse grabbed her, plopped her into a wheelchair, and took over. Perfect, I’ve had enough near-death experiences for the day. Little did I know the fun was just about to begin.
We got to the room and I remember thinking to myself, wow this is nice! look at those sweet paintings on the wall – must be custom pieces. Whaaaat! Look! There’s even a sweet recliner for me that turns into a bed!
I quickly snapped back to reality when I heard the call of the Walrus. Looked over and my wife was sucking the life out of the Nitrous Oxide machine. The second that funny gas hit her she was higher than Snoop Dogg on Super Bowl Sunday. Thank God, some relief… Nope – spoke too soon, she was back to her mating calls. She screamed at me to get the stuff out of the bag and get ready. Oh God, I had one job.
Okay focus, where’s the massage oil? What pocket was that again? Okay, sweet, found it, all I have to do is pull it out and put it on the table just like we discussed. Okay, check. Next, the yoga ball – oh God, the yoga ball, what the hell did I do with it. Okay don’t panic, I got this. Damnit, it’s in the vehicle, okay all I have to do is distract her. I frantically kept running back and forth organizing the room dropping things as I went, no time to stop, gotta keep going.
Before I could get everything positioned, the midwife told us we had to go for a walk to get this baby moving since apparently, she wasn’t coming any time soon. There’s no way – was she listening to the sounds that were coming out of my wife’s mouth? Cause I sure was – and so was the rest of the hospital.
Okay, fine, you’re the professional, let’s go for a walk. I grabbed my wife and not even 10 steps outside of the room she had given up on life, keeled over, her face pressed against the wall licking the pictures and handrail. The only thing I can remember at this point was the look on the poor man’s face across the hall that was on deaths-door hoping he would hurry up and die faster.
Once the contractions took a pause, she took a deep breath and handed me a scarf-looking thing. Where the hell did she just get that from? I don’t dare ask. All she said was “wrap this around my hips and squeeze!” What the hell does she mean??? I never read an article on this or saw any video that showed this magical scarf? Oh, God. Okay, focus. Keep it together. I wrapped it around the front of her and crossed it into an X behind her back. As soon as I heard that contraction coming on, I gently applied pressure like she asked. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! SQUEEZE IT!” She yelled at me. Oh God, oh no, oh no. Okay – I squeezed harder. “HARDER YOU LITTLE ******* *****” Oh jeez, oh jeez. Okay – I squeezed harder. “YOU HAD 9 MONTHS AND YOU DIDN’T WATCH A ******* YOUTUBE VIDEO ON THIS?!” I’ve never seen this contraption before in my life, I watched a million videos in preparation for this moment, and not one time was this stupid thing mentioned, where the hell did she even get this thing from? So I grabbed it like it owed me money and I gave it my all. “EEEHHAGHGHHHHHHHHH” was all that came out of her mouth. Was that relief? Was I hurting her? Oh my God, what did I do, I hurt her didn’t I?? Or maybe I hurt the baby?? She turned around and yelled, “I’VE NEVER MET SOMEONE MORE USELESS IN MY ENTIRE LIFE.” I almost passed out. My heart was pounding out of my chest, and I couldn’t stop sweating – not because of the intense workout I was enduring, no, because I was terrified for my life, and we hadn’t even gotten to the hard part yet.
I was terrified of her so I forced her back into the room, and the midwife without hesitation yelled to her student that this baby was coming, now. What the hell does she mean, now? She almost murdered a man with only her voice, and now you say this baby is coming?
She snapped her gloves on just like in the movies (it was awesome), she then told me to grab her leg and hold it up. What? Uh… Okay, I got this, I can do this. I managed to grab her leg but with the sheer strength of this convulsing woman, she kicked it free. By the way, nobody talks about the pure strength a woman in labour possesses, it should almost be an Olympic event, I swear. Before I could get another shot at wrangling this wild beast, the midwife kept yelling at me to take hold. I finally managed to grab it, but then I almost fainted as I saw my baby girl’s head for the first time.
Photo by Jonathan Borba on Unsplash
The Birth
Okay, now all of a sudden all eyes were on me. Both midwives and the nurse must have noticed I went pale and almost collapsed. Keep it together man! They told me to take a seat if I felt dizzy. No way, I’m a man, I got this! I grabbed hold of that bucking bronco, and a few seconds later, my baby girl took her first breath. I was in shambles, my tear-soaked mask was barely hanging on, my glasses were foggy, I couldn’t see a thing, and my knees were weak. I did it! I mean she did it! I looked over at my wife who I completely forgot about at this point, she looked like she just got kicked in the head by a horse.
Photo by Christian Bowen on Unsplash
The Aftermath
Once we spent a few minutes taking turns holding our beloved daughter, the nurse asked if we wanted a container for the placenta to take home. What are we taking home our Boston Pizza leftovers? What in the world are you talking about? Oh right, I’ve read about these people. “Uh, no thanks?” was all I could say. Then it hit me… the placenta is next.
Now, dads, you’re going to learn real quick that the scary part of childbirth is not when the baby is born, no, no. It’s the aftermath – I’ve seen some shit, okay. I’ll spare you the details, but what I saw that day will be burned forever into my eyeballs.
Photo by 🇸🇮 Janko Ferlič on Unsplash
Moral of the Story
Now, keep in mind this was the third ankle-biter that she spawned, and it very well could go completely opposite for you. It’s almost a guarantee yours will be different, so I’m not saying don’t spend time preparing, or watching those videos, or reading those guides, because you absolutely need to. And it turns out not every birth is the same, no matter how much we planned, how many days we spent packing our bags, and those countless times we went over the plan – none of it mattered. In our case, everything all happened so fast – we had no time to prepare any of the contraptions we brought with us. We didn’t end up using a single thing we packed in that bag, or any of the other items on that list. But I tell you what, dad-to-be, I know you’re going to do great out there. Now go get ’em.
Dad’s to be – Here Are the Lessons I Learned
- Sometimes the 5-1-1 rule doesn’t always apply
- Be wary of relying too much on a contraction app
- You better stay the hell out of the way
- You’ll do whatever she says when she says it
- You may or may not pass out at some point
- You’re going to learn real quick the woman you love turns violent, real quick
- No matter how much you plan, it might go out the window
- You might have to stretch in case you’re tasked with wrestling a leg or two – The sheer strength of those legs is unimaginable
