The Waiting Room

On Wednesday night we had our second appointment with our midwife. These appointments take place at the Birthworks clinic in Petone, which is at the back of a midwife’s property and is a small kinda hut/cabin structure. Everything is warm wood and coloured cloth. We wait in a small waiting room, but not for long, and Bridget turns up. We go into the office and, in what I now imagine will be the routine, Bridget sits at the chair at the desk, Sicily sits in the chair at the end of the desk facing Bridget and I sit on the single bed that is a bit too high for my feet to comfortably be on the ground and too far away from the wall for me to lean back. So I perch.

After the usual hellos &c... Bridget and Sicily start talking about things, generally to do with how Sicily is feeling, what changes she is noticing and, possibly because of the day at work I had, combined with not having had any dinner yet, aided by the general, shall we say, fema-centric conversation, I found my thoughts drifting. Occasionally I would zoom back in on the conversation and then waft out again.

Sicily was asking about why her lower back had been really sore and Bridget started to describe how her Uterus was starting to sit up due to it growing rather dramatically in size -- all the while using her fist to describe this movement and how, quite possibly, Sicily’s uterus had been exerting pressure on her lower back. Now, ashamedly, I don’t know that much about the inside of our bodies. I easily slip into the perception of having bodies without organs. Sure, I know about livers and kidneys and stuff but it’s a little abstract. Not to say I don’t know my body as such (and remember the conversation wasn't about my body) but when Bridget starting mapping Sicily’s insides with her fist and I tried to fit that map over the reality something got a little cross wired and the room started to spin.

Now I don’t know much about panic attacks, I’ve heard about them and seen them in action but I don’t know them. However, I swear that for the 30 seconds or so it took to right the cross wires in my brain, I thought I was going to have a panic attack. Of course I righted the situation and I did so by moving toward marvel. Marvelling at the development of our baby’s waiting room. A marvelous waiting room inside Sicily's body. So maybe I’ll sing this song for our baby as it does it’s thing in there:

I am a patient boy
I wait, I wait, I wait, I wait
My time is like water down a drain
Everybody's moving,
Everything is moving
Please don't leave me to remain
In the waiting room
I don't want the news
I'm not a part of it
I don't want the news
I have no use for it
Sitting outside of town
Everybody's always down
Because... they can't get up
But I don't sit idly by
I'm planning a big surprise
I'm gonna fight for what I want to be
I won't make the same mistakes
Because I know how much time that wastes
Function is the key
In the waiting room

(Fuguzi-Waiting room)