Children: Why do we bother?

Some people have their babies with alarming ease, much like hiccupping.  Others work slightly harder at it, something akin to coughing up a hairball.  Then there are those who end up with the child birth equivalent of bronchitis.

It’s a tough gig.  I have only met, in my entire parenting career, a tiny handful of people who glowed, and bloomed and all the other radiant appellations that are given to women who grow month by month to resemble a watermelon crossed with a duck.

Most of the people I know found it everything verging from unpleasant to downright disastrous, regardless of how lovely the end results were and are.

And now here we are, with the products of those disastrous, wonderful, endless moments, living the dream.  Sometimes living the nightmare, it’s fair to say.

We love them, we hate them, we love and hate them all in the same split second.  We watch them sleep and our hearts ache with love.  We watch them eat, and our gorge rises in horror.  We spend aeons worrying ourselves sick as to how the hell they’re going to survive without us whilst simultaneously packing their hanky on a stick and shoving them out the door.  It’s an education spending more than twenty minutes in the same room with them.

They take us to the limits of every emotion we’ve ever experienced and tired, knackered and sticky though we may be, it’s certain that we have never, ever been more alive than when we are with them.

Every now and again, through the haze of exhaustion and antiseptic wipes we are given a tiny glimmer into why we ever volunteered.  They smile at us with total joy, and in the moment our hearts open like flowers in the sunshine.  They confide in us because they can think of nobody better, safer and braver to help them and we become, just for a second, as noble as they believe us to be.  Even when they are in full and torrid tantrum it is proof of their utter trust that at their most naked and vulnerable we will not hurt them, but keep them as safe from themselves as from all the other lunatics out there trying to get them.

We watch them playing, absorbed in the moment, and we are gifted a glimpse of the adult they will become.  Those moments make it all worth while.

And we are lucky.  Truly lucky.

Like I said. It is not easy, this childbirth thing, this parenting thing.  And some people, try as hard as they might, never get the chance of this amazingly awful, heartbreakingly fabulous roller coaster.  And that sucks.  It really does.  And it is often the best of people, the most loving of people who get to experience that disappointment.

And what about the people whose journeys are more fraught than most?

My wonderful blogging friend Ann, over at The Hairy Farmer Family recently held a coffee morning for just those people.  Her kind of people. The kind of people like my best friend, who had three babies, all premature, all requiring special care, all surviving because of wonderful, dedicated teams of nurses, doctors and carers who give their all, even when there is very little there to give.

Read Ann’s blog about her experiences of bringing her wonderfully fierce son, Harry into the world, despite fertility problems that defy belief, a premature birth, an almost death and weeks in intensive care.  Give her major kudos for consistently and bravely being a dedicated, loving parent in very trying situations and fighting Harry’s corner with a kind of ferocity that we all wish we were capable of should we ever have to rise to the challenge, as she has.

Then donate to her chosen charity, Bliss, for babies who are born too soon.    Do it so that should you ever be in the same position, someone like Ann will be sure to help you, the way you have helped her.  Do it on behalf of your own children who have the great privilege of being healthy enough to drive you bonkers on a daily basis.  Or do it because you have no children, but if you did, you would so want that kind of support, care and dedication for yourself.

I don’t do many good things with this blog.  Mostly I moan.  Sometimes I carp. I do love a whinge.  It’s all gravy, but sometimes it’s more important to say something meaningful because you can.

Normal service will be resumed tomorrow.  In the meantime, dig deep people, dig deep.