By KATHERINE COLLETTE
‘How was the birth?’
‘Epic. I had a 24 hour labour!’
‘Oh, really? I’d have killed for a 24 hour labour. Mine went for 38 hours.’
‘24 hours of pushing, I mean. There was another day, maybe two days, of just contractions.’
‘Yeah, that’s the same with me. When I finally went in to the hospital I was already six centimeters dilated!’
‘Six? I was sixteen!’
‘Really? I didn’t know you could be sixteen centimeters dilated!’
‘I know. I was so dilated they wanted to push parts of the baby back in.’
‘Wow.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Did it hurt?’
‘Nah. I have a really high tolerance for pain. And I meditate. I just visualised a flower opening up by a river of love and breathed deeply to the tune of Kumbaya.’
‘I visualised a flower as well!’
‘My flower was a single, perfectly formed sunflower swaying gently in a field of uncut grass.’
‘Mine was a tulip that had been picked by a mythical orphan fairy that was the spirit of my unborn child.’
‘Awesome. My sunflower was picked by an orphaned fairy too.’
‘I also had some laughing gas…’
‘Oh…’
‘Oh, the organic gas is meant to be great.’‘Yeah, the organic gas is great. Even though it barely did anything.’
‘And are you breastfeeding?’
‘Of course!’
‘Me too. I’m also pumping extra milk for starving babies in low socio-economic areas.’
‘Oh, that’s so altruistic of you.’
‘It’s to stop the cycle of poverty.’
‘Bravo, you! It also helps lose the baby weight.’
‘Did you gain weight? I didn’t gain a single kilo!’
‘I gained a kilo but lost it by the time I left the hospital.’
‘Uh-huh. How much did Jasper Junior weigh?’
‘Thirteen pounds! The nurse said he was the most well fed baby she’d ever seen! I said “You don’t need to tell me! I pushed him out!”.’
