Birth Stories

"RUN AWAY! I said, Boy, you are not meant to be here."

But I was. My wife was about to give birth to our child and I was not only going to be around to witness the occasion, but I was the designated "baby-catcher." After nine months of living inside its Mother, the first contact with the outside world was going to be with Dad.

I'm sure a lot of men share my reservations. Pregnancy is strictly the domain of women. Although we cause it, our involvement pretty much ends there and the girls take over. It's an arrangement that largely suits both parties. And as I walked into our bedroom to join my wife and her two doulas, it was very obvious who the odd one out was.

My wife had chosen to have a homebirth and I was grateful to at least be in familiar surroundings, although there had been some serious mood alterations. We could have been celebrating my Grandfather's birthday judging by the multitude of candles that were burning, emanating a dozen different fragrances that fought for dominance. Flames flickered to the beat of the soft music that purred in the background. You could have been mistaken for thinking that this wasn't just a birth, but some sort of ceremonial cult involving the ritual sacrifice of the new born.

One step further into the room and the candlelight revealed the Finding Nemo paddling pool, and suddenly all visions of witches and demons vanished faster than Dory's memory.

My wife was in the tub, the warm water soothing the pain of her contractions and providing buoyancy for the space hopper she had in her belly. She looked calm – and why not, she was the one who knew what the heck was going on. She emitted a long breath and a low, moaning sound as another contraction gripped her. Immediately, her Doula was by her side, talking gently to her and evidently saying the right things.

At first I had thought the presence of a Doula would make me feel even more marginalized than I did anyway. A stark reminder that as a man I wasn't up to the job of childbirth and my wife would prefer another woman's help to her own husband's. While that was all true, I couldn't have been more wrong. Our Doula was indeed much better than I could ever have hoped to have been in helping my wife through childbirth. Her gentle support and encouragement were unrelenting and she always seemed to anticipate what my wife would need and instantly be there to provide it.

But it wasn't just my wife she supported. She knew the right time to involve me and she knew the right time to keep me out of harm's way. When she saw a bemused or concerned look on my face, she would quietly explain what was happening and reassure me that everything was going according to plan. Instead of being a barrier between the two of us, she was a bridge that kept us connected so that we could share as much of the experience as possible.

Another bonus was that she helped to remind me of what I had learned in the antenatal classes I had been forced to attend. (Guys have their own idea of what birth is like: It's roughly the same as the scene from Alien when the creature bursts out of John Hurt's stomach in a stream of blood and guts and squealing at the top of its lungs. Who needs lessons?) As the labour progressed I was surprised how much of the information from the classes seeped into my brain. I felt I actually had an idea what was going on and what my wife was going through. With our doula's help I was able to provide some support and comfort to her and not be totally useless. As I was also about to catch our baby, I needed to be aware of when and how it was going to make its appearance.

My wife later accused me of having been unemotional during the birth, but that certainly wasn't the case. It was more that I had so many emotions running through me, my face couldn't possibly keep up with the contortions required to express them. Or perhaps it was just that one thought overpowered all the others: Don't drop it.

The doctor seemed more than amenable to stand back and pass the responsibility to me. Who knows, perhaps he had previously dropped a baby himself? Or, as we'd all prefer to think, perhaps having lived the experience countless times already, he was happy to bestow the honour on the new father. Personally, I was just happy to have him there to provide a bit of male support. At least there was ONE guy here who knew what he was doing.

Even now, I can't possibly tell you what it felt like. To use the old cliché: You simply had to be there. And if you're reading this, then there's a very good likelihood that you soon will be. So congratulations.

As the baby's head crowned, I stepped into the breach, my hands cupped together so tightly that water wouldn't have escaped through my fingers. A tiny little face appeared, although really it was just a million little wrinkles, like a scrunched up balloon before you put air in it. I put one hand underneath – it felt like I was holding an egg yoke it was so soft. Like Harry Houdini breaking free from a straight-jacket it wriggled a shoulder free and then suddenly gravity took over and my child flopped into my hands. It was so tiny it could have been made by Sony. But everything was there: Little fingers and toes; pudgy little arms and legs; a beautiful mop of hair with more gel than David Beckham. No, wait. There was one thing missing.

"Darling, we have a daughter."