After 3 weeks of discussions, a holiday to Spain, a trip to the Abortion Clinic, painful talks with parents, more discussions… we decided we both wanted to keep the baby. This idea of “Keeping” a baby might seem strange to some depending on view points of abortion but I will not go into that on this blog. We were going to become parents.
The early stages were strange, our parents were coming to terms with the fact they were going to become grandparents. Friends offered their advice, lotty’s (my partner) friends were supportive and kind. My friends had mixed views.. “you’re sure?..” “Why?” “you realise you won’t be able to do anything fun again right?”… these sort of reactions came from people who I use to think were some of my closest friends.. but as time followed we would drift apart, but I will go into detail about friendships in another blog. However, the friends which I am still close with today all had positive views. They understood the situation I was in and that our decision had been made, they had my back.
False Support –
Social media is a strange entity in our lives which we have had very little time to learn how to deal with. Through likes, shares, emojis and comments we can feel like we have hundreds of people who care and will support you. The sad truth is that they mean very little…
After our first 12 week scan, we decided to let all or friends and family know the news through social media. I got the most likes on anything I had ever posted, I had messages from so many people I couldn’t even keep up. I felt love and that all of these people actually care about us and felt happy that this baby was going to be supported by so many people… The lesson I have learned is that this is not the case, when times are hard and you’re struggling you realise there are actually very few people you can truly trust and rely on. This is a reason why I am carful with who I have on social media, I go through my friends list yearly and find myself removing dousens of “friends” who I never talk to and probably wouldn’t even If I bump into them in person. This lesson I learned humbled me and although made me sad at the time, It has shown me the small bubble of friends I know I will be friends with for life.
A mental blip-
Through the first 6 months of my partners pregnancy I was happy, excited, and regularly found myself counting down the days until the due date. But then things changed, I started listening to the more negative minded friends “your life is over”, “next time you’ll be going clubbing will be in your 30s mate..” what an idiot I was but I started to believe them. This could be the last few months I have of “freedom”, I started joining my friends more going clubbing or to bars and finding myself wanting to get drunker and drunker every time I went out. I wanted to push all my problems and worries away with alcohol. I stated arguing with friends, getting into fights, wasting money… During this time my poor pregnant partner was beginning to worry, I can’t imagine what was going through her head but at the time I was only thinking about myself. Looking back I hate that kid, I hate thinking of myself back then, I wish I could go back and tell myself to get away from this group and take responsibly for my actions. But I can’t.. and I have learned to be more selfless from it, and although these are memorise I hate I know they have made me into a better person today.
Things did start to get better, things started to ease the less time I spent with this group. I started to realise how selfish I was being and from then decided I was going to sort myself out.
Health scares
Half way through lotty’s pregnancy we found out she had a fairly rare blood condition. She would need weekly blood tests and lost of appointments. I would go to as many as possible but still felt completely useless. Doctors would be talking about things I didn’t understand, I didn’t like how they use to be so calm when talking about something so serious but I understood their reasons. I wanted to swap places with her, I hated seeing her worry It physically hurt. I would always reassure her and make her know I will be there every step of the way. Her condition would have a huge impact on labour which I am writing about in blog #3. What lotty didn’t know was that I was having constant nightmares, then the insomnia started. I either couldn’t sleep or I became scared to.. I couldn’t cope with the nightmares any more so I just would hold off sleeping until I literally could not stay awake any longer. Insomnia is something I have struggled with since 4 years later (just to give an example I am writing this at 2 am). At the time this effected a lot and had other mental repercussions which I will highlight in another blog.
The final weeks…
The final weeks went fast, preparations were in place, I had recently started a good job with a big pay rise. Things were looking good! We were planning on staying jointly at our parents house for a few months before looking for our own place. (This would actually take over 2 years) We thought we had pretty much everything planned out. A slightly over a week before our baby was due I went to my parents house to stay alone for the night and the next day I was planning on arranging my room for the baby. I fell asleep without much of a care in the world. Then at half 3am I heard the panic’d voice of my mum talking to me “James wake up, Lotty’s waters have broke”.. I look at my phone to see countless miss calls and texts! FUCK I had forgotten to take it off silent. I quickly got dressed, cleaned my teeth, washed my face and ran out the door. No one could have prepare me what what was to come.
Reflection
Looking back is painful, I was hanging around people who were having a negative impact on my life. But this process made me realise very important life lessons- Trust, Integrity, and Respect. These are huge parts of my personality now which I may not have found if past events did not happen. It also has given me a healthier view of social media and how important it is to value the good people in life, you never know when you will need them. On my next blog I will be talking about the best/worst day of my life… the labour.
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