It's Christmas, even in Dubai, and a bit o' politics, but not too much

It's that time of year again, when, just for my own entertainment, I go into my local supermarket and ask for Paxo stuffing, and have to explain in detail what it is, only to be greeted with at worst, abject horror and expressions that seem to say: "You want to do what to a roast turkey? What the hell is wrong with you? Are you some kind of pervert?" Or at best, abject disinterest, and being told: "This is for Christmas? Yes? Christmas section is that way," and being sent off to the festive deals aisle, packed with such Christmassy festive treats as Doritos, obscure brand sanitary towels and washing powder, fruit juice, Halloween-themed treats and row after row of sweets and chocolates. 

DB1 with our Christmas tree. It's lucky there is no problem with Christmas here because she tells everyone we meet about our tree and how she decorated it.

I am well aware that Paxo stuffing was considered pretty naff even the best part of a decade ago when we left the UK, and I seem to remember there was some kind of discussion about stuffing poultry being a severe food poisoning risk so most people just cook the stuff separately now, but I have developed a curious nostalgic affection for it in my time living away from home.

I have been a bit facetious above, and stuffing is, of course, available in Dubai, particularly in the British-leaning supermarkets, but you have to be quick before it sells out. I have learned a lesson about not buying marzipan early enough this year which has meant, horror of horrors, that I have foregone royal icing and my annual sieving icing sugar-related Christmas cake rage for fondant icing.

Dubai is not a bad place to be for Christmas. A lot of people leave for the holidays, but that's not really an option for us, as Him Indoors is in the "Grape" business, meaning it is his busiest time of year. We could go without him, which seems a bit mean, or go on a seven-hour flight and brave the UK traffic to the East Midlands for a day or two, before setting off back again, which I think we can all agree would be a giant ballache with two small children in tow.

So we stay. There are things I miss about Christmas at home. The mad, hysterical build up to the festive season in my homeland seems somewhat endearing now, as does the cosy feeling brought about by cold weather, frost and snow, even if a white Christmas is far from the norm in Dear Old Blighty. And I miss convivial celebrations with family and old friends. I also miss the way everything shuts down for Christmas, and you have no choice but to hang around complaining about how terrible the Christmas TV is this year, eating so much leftover turkey you develop poultry-scented sweat, as well as 75 mince pies and four tins of Quality Street.

Decorations in City Centre Mirdif

I realise my version of Christmas seems a little dated with the advent of Netflix and so on, but LoveFilm.com was still a thing when we moved here. The shutting down does not really happen in Dubai, you see. The Government offices close for public holidays which are of course based around Islamic festivals, but even those festivals see Dubai slow down, but certainly not stop.

Things I don't miss are horrendous, wet, cold or icy traffic-clogged drives to visit family, getting some horrendous 'flu bug which seems far worse when you have to go out in the cold, and also the prospect of paying well over the odds for a festive season flight, and then being marooned at an airport on the way back for 24 hours or more because there has been a three flakes of snow or a puff of wind. There is also the reason I wanted to leave the UK in the first place - the short, grey skied days, when it starts to get dark at 3pm, and being chronically deprived of Vitamin D.

I know plenty of people who leave the Dubai for the festive season every year, and I think this it is a mistake to not spend at least one Christmas here, as you get the best of the weather in December. The temperature can still climb to the early 30s in the middle of the day, but you get cool mornings and evenings, and usually the mercury doesn't trouble 25C too much, which is basically a fine British summer day. We get rain, we get breezes, we get grey clouds, we go out in summer clothes with a light scarf or cardigan, rather than several layers. Although the longer we live here, the harder temperatures below 15C are to cope with.

DB1 with recycled cardboard box reindeers at school. They had a sustainable-themed Christmas this year. 

Occasionally, when I talk to people back home about what it is like living here, people assume that Christmas is harem, or forbidden, because the dominant religion is Islam. Questions about whether it's allowed are one of the things most people ask me about living here, other than, "do you have to wear a burkha?" (No) "Can you drive there?" (That's Saudi Arabia you're thinking of, and yes) And "are you allowed to drink alcohol there?" (Yes).

I thought about the perception that Christmas wouldn't be allowed when I was dropping DB1 off at school on the day of her end of term party and I saw another mum, who was wearing hijab, dropping off her two sons, who were wearing Santa hats. DB1's last week at school was packed with Christmas stuff; letters to Santa, festive games, party clothes, treats, an optional church service in the neighbouring church and so on, and she has also been to visit Santa to tell him what she wants for Christmas.  

The Wafi Mall Santa. One of the best places in Dubai to meet him.

Christmas is emphatically not forbidden in Dubai and seems to get less so every year. There is plenty of Christmas about. Trees and festive displays in the shopping malls, wreaths on doors, shops stuffed with gifts and Christmas food and blaring Christmas music, and seasonal advertising in the newspapers, on the radio, and on TV. Hotels and restaurants are full of festive offerings and cheesy festive tunes. Quite honestly, there is plenty of Christmas because Christmas is big business, and there is one thing this town loves, it is business. No one has a problem with Christmas, even the locals, who can be spotted from time to time happily putting Christmas decorations into their trolleys in various shops.  

DB1's first Christmas in 2015

I also enjoy being in the Middle East for Christmas in other respects. This is a potential barrel of vipers to open up, considering the state we are talking about here, but we are 1200 miles from Bethlehem, as opposed to the 3400 we would be, were we back in London. It is a long time since I darkened the door of a church, but being in a sand-filled desert, which although you have to drive 20 minutes to get to it from the built-up areas of the city, is a much more similar environment to the one Mary and Joseph journeyed through than the UK, which makes me feel a little bit closer to where it all began. Did I mention there is a Mary, Mother of Jesus, mosque in Abu Dhabi? And yes, there are churches, a big Roman Catholic one next to DB1's school, and various others, including several of different dominations down at Jebel Ali. 

All in all, there is no way in which I feel I have to be quiet about Christmas, or not tell people I am celebrating. Me and my quaint little winter festival ways are more than accepted here, which makes what has been happening in my dear old homeland, and the talk of growing intolerance there over the past few years, all the more sad. I'm not going to get into Brexit, except to say that I think most of us Remainers have learned our lesson about boiling the Leave vote down to the single issue of immigration by now, and believe me, this country should be the last place to throw stones about such things, as there is racism in its most virulent forms here, but what I suppose I am saying is that although I am far from home in a dusty, hot, overheated climate, I am allowed to feel at home here, and that is something I am so, so grateful for, particularly when you consider how many people are displaced in the world right now.

So, what are we doing for Christmas this year? Well, this year, after being bitten on the boobs by a baby for the substantial part of the night, and having her sit on my head from about 2-4am saying "bah", I will be woken probably around 5am by a ridiculously over-excited four year old who will open her stocking presents on our bed as Him Indoors and I blearily open some baby snacks and a tangerine (DB2's favourite food) so the baby can play with the wrapping paper and suck on tangerine segments.

Festive brunch at Emirates Golf Club pre-kids. Feels like a lifetime ago. Me (wearing red sunglasses) and Him Indoors (purple hat). Pic courtesy of the amazing Rebecca Milford-Tromans. Not sure who the strange bloke is in the foreground...

Then we will all head to the lounge where we will try and fail to convince DB1 to eat some bacon sandwiches for breakfast (yes, you can get bacon here, albeit ludicrously over priced, but it's one of my Christmas traditions) as she will have already scoffed at least one chocolate Santa and half a ton of chocolate coins while Him Indoors and I mainline coffee before ill advisedly switching to alcohol at an inappropriately early stage in the day. Then there will be an orgy of consumerism based unwrapping, as DB1 opens the several million almost entirely Disney princess-themed toys she has expressed an interest in over the past few months, and then we will spend the day playing with her and the baby in between haphazardly attempting to prepare the Christmas lunch ingredients that we have assembled over the past week, over 19 or so trips to the supermarket, as we keep forgetting things due to having basically no brains at all due to sleep deprivation. We are having a chicken as turkey seemed to be taking it a bit far since one of us is only 11 months old.

It will be a late lunch, probably around 4, as the day will be punctuated with DB1 being taken to the park outside our building to play with toys and try to burn off some of the chocolate-based energy, and then we will probably collapse in front of the Muppet Christmas Carol after dinner, and then hopefully put the kids to bed, and then I will most likely be asleep by around 8pm in front of another festive film, which I will see about the first 10 minutes of before I pass out.

Other options for Christmas Day are a festive brunch - which can be a tremendous fun, we went to a fantastic one with friends one year pre-kids, and it was the most decadent thing, eating roast turkey in the sunshine soaked in fizz and listening to the band playing Christmas music. But perhaps not so much with kids, as even the family-friendly ones tend to be super overcrowded and the food therefore somewhat less than top notch, which you don't notice when you are a bottle or two of fizz down, but seems less forgiveable when you have festive-hyped children in tow.

Or, there's that ultimate Dubai trick, getting a takeaway turkey delivered to your door, which sounds hopelessly overindulgent, but honestly, by the time you factor in the cost of all your imported ingredients, it is no more expensive than cooking for yourself.

I know it has been a rough year politically for my homeland, after three previous rough ones, so I think a lot of you will be feeling happy to say goodbye to 2019. Whatever you are doing, and where ever you are doing it, including those of you who are on the other side of what currently appears to be an unassailable divide, I wish you a Happy Winterval! I am joking, of course. Merry Christmas, you bunch of lovely b**tards.

V-Bac baby, or how things don't happen part 2

Of course, that, as most of you know, is not what happened 

Our friend, who only lives about 10 minutes away, arrived, and sat and distracted me until Him Indoors got home from the airport. We picked up our hospital bag, and got in the car, and I entered the 'transition' stage of labour, that is, if the 'transition' stage is where you 'transition into being straightforwardly abusive towards your husband'. I castigated him for driving too fast, I swore at the yellow slow-down strips on the road, told him not to automatically drive to work without thinking, even though he clearly wasn't going to do that.

The hospital is a mercifully short drive, around 15 minutes, but not exactly blessed in the parking department. And here we enter the obligatory "So Dubai" section of the blog, because the hospital has valet parking at AED 30 a time. You don't get your money back if you produce proof you have given birth there. I know. Rude.

Because they get their money anyway, unlike most valet parkers in Dubai who work for tips, they are not exactly proactive in the service department, so we got out of the car and I stood clinging to the hospital door snarling to my husband: "You have to walk to them, to give them the keys, they won't come to you...." While a nice Japanese lady who caught sight of my face, rictus with agony, asked if I was OK, to which I responded something else abusive about Him Indoors, and then clung to him as we walked slowly to the labour ward.

There we arrived, me slightly calmer now we were at the hospital and slightly less abusive towards Him Indoors, to be greeted by an empty reception desk and an eerily quiet labour ward. Private healthcare, you see, there are soundproofed rooms and doors so you can't hear the screaming. I was pretty damned irrational with pain at this point, and after a nurse was summoned and I was dispatched to the bathroom to give a urine sample, a wave of pain crashed into me at the opportune moment, so I hurled the small plastic pot across the bathroom and yelled that I would "do it later". I'm not sure what I meant by "later". When the pain got better presumably, because that's famously what happens as labour progresses, obviously.

And against all sensible "ways to make labour less s**ing agonising" advice, I lay down on the triage room bed, clinging to the metal bars around it, gritting my teeth and gurning, pausing only between contractions every two minutes to tell Him Indoors to stop sitting/standing/breathing/holding my hand/existing in such a profoundly irritating way, if he knew what was good for him.

A nurse arrived shortly afterwards, performed what I only need to refer to as "the examination" and confirmed that I was indeed in active labour, and that it seemed likely that the baby would come "quickly". So I was booked into a room, while Him Indoors was dispatched downstairs to do various bits of insurance paperwork, and a nice Sri Lankan nurse briefly rubbed my back, making me realise I was basically tensing every single muscle in my body. If I had been more in my right mind, and yes, better prepared, I would have asked Him Indoors to do the same, but I was too busy telling him everything was his fault and "for f***s sake stop standing over me looking worried. Sit down for f***s sake."

He later told me that the chair was "quite uncomfortable", hence he chose not sit down. It was probably best that he didn't tell me at the time that this was the reason he was hovering over me like he was about to deliver the last rites.

Then they brought me some gas and air. Oh, the gas and air. I nearly forgot that crashing disappointment. I had thought that there was a small chance I may manage with just gas and air.

That was, so obviously, not going to happen

You may remember, best beloveds, that I had had rather bad morning sickness, which once again left me briefly during the end of the second trimester, but returned to a degree once I was very pregnant and my stomach got squished by the baby. This is relevant because I took one puff of the gas and air, and something about it, perhaps the rubbery, plasticky scent of the mask, had me puking everywhere, leaving poor old Him Indoors to carry away said puke in one of those kidney shaped medical instrument receptacles which was the nearest thing on hand. Away it went, that kidney shaped dish, and with it, away floated any hopes of me getting through the experience without an epidural. I can't remember much else about this time, except muttering sarcastically "this is fun" in between howling and abusing Him Indoors. He was really ever so sporting about it, and he has said afterwards that he understood it was because of the pain, but it felt like I really, really meant it at the time.

And so it came to the epidural. I have always been either way on whether or not epidural is a good idea, as I know people who have had some terrible experiences with them. If you ask earnest me, I can see the benefits of not doing it as they can increase the likelihood of intervention as it can slow the labour down. But if you ask me, in full knowledge of what it's like to be in labour without one, I will launch into a diatribe about why would anyone choose to give birth without them? Give me the f***ing drugs, beyotch.

Once Him Indoors was back from doing the paperwork, I got down to some more serious swearing and yelling. I was asked if I was planning any pain relief, I repeated the closest thing I had to a birth plan, on the advice of my doctor -  I was sort of medium risk, so have the epidural, as it makes it easier to monitor the baby than if you are, and I quote, from an experienced obstetrician here, "climbing the walls with pain".  "But don't have it too soon," she said.

We waited until the point that I felt like I had had enough, which I was probably about five minutes after the nurse asked about my plans. "Yes of course dear," she said. Private medicine, see? I would have to wait for the results of my blood test before they would give it to me, which would be, I don't know, an hour or so.

So, I carried on with my yelling and abusing Him Indoors, until I uttered the inevitable phrase: "Just....... Get..... Me .... the f***ing epidural.....Don't be polite ..... to them.....Get me it ..... now!"

A nurse was summoned  and listened kindly while Him Indoors told them ever so politely that his wife was in a lot of pain, and she would quite like the epidural now. And nodded sagely, and told me that the blood test was fine, and they would get the anaesthetist to come and see me as soon as he had finished his lunch....

A very short while later, I made Him Indoors summon the nurse again. "Is he on his way? I snapped?" "Yes, he's on his way." (beatific nursey smile) "Well tell him to run, not walk." "Yes, dear."

And then the really very nice man arrived, and I've never been so pleased to see someone who was about to stab me in the spine with a needle in all my life. Having forgotten any attempts to stay calm and breathe and all that stuff up until that point, preferring to screw my eyes shut and roar, I did actually manage to breathe ...2 ....3... 4... while I was anaesthetised. The movements involved in getting into the position, which also left me actually weeping with pain, broke my waters, so that was handy.

"You should find the contractions gradually recede now," said the nurse. Recede, schmecede. They completely disappeared. It was like the sun came out after a typhoon of pain. I apologised to Him Indoors and the nurse, and sundry other people who I had been fairly abusive too up until that point, and we sat and chatted for a while, in a manner that we had not really done for four years, since DB1 was born, while I shook with cold, which is a fairly common side effect of an epidural apparently.

When you are a couple, one of whom works rather long hours, the other one works reasonably long hours and you have a lively four year old, you don't have much time awake and alone. It may be that I was strapped to an epidural drip, shaking with cold like I was in the Antarctic, with a series of beepy monitors, and he was on the uncomfortable chair, I was on the bed, but I'll take it. I think of that time fondly.

I don't quite remember, but I think Him Indoors went to get a sandwich, and it was early evening by this point, when the nurse offered me a carton of apple juice to see if the sugar in it would get the baby moving again, because the epidural drugs had indeed slowed her down her urge to vacate a little.  Not too much, though, as a few drops of whatever hormone it is they give to labouring women to get babies moving did the trick, and my abdomen soon begun to lurch alarmingly outwards as if DB2 was headbutting it to get out.

The midwife, who it turned out, trained in Southampton in the UK, and was born in Albania and grew up in Italy, gently explained what I would have to do once the doctor arrived. They do that, you see, they have to explain to you what you need to do, because when push comes to shove, if you'll pardon the phrase, in Dubai, unless you pay for some very, very expensive classes, no one actually really tells you what you need to do until you are in the labour room. And I don't mean, the obvious "you need to get the baby out" - the actual mechanics of what you need to do with your body to encourage the baby down the birth canal.

Then it must have been around 9pm, and the doctor arrived, looking only marginally annoyed to be having to work late to deliver the baby, chatted away between contractions. I could feel some movement, but no pain, and I pushed as hard as I could until I felt like my head would explode and I dripped with sweat, and there was some cutting, and a bit of tearing, and the doctor summoned an extra midwife because DB2 was supposedly going to be large, so they might need some help for the shoulders.

That did not happen

Basically DB2 fell into the world while all the extra midwife had to do was watch. DB2 screamed, screamed and screamed and wailed as loud as an air raid siren. She retains this ability to be really quite ear splittingly loud, through the challenging colic period, and afterwards, to the degree that I have never really let her cry for more than a few moments, even when I am in the car with her and there isn't much other choice, because she is really quite unbelievably deafening when she puts her mind to it. Don't know where she gets that from. They didn't call me "the silent assassin" at my run club for nothing. Anyway.

I then accidentally reenacted the Harry Enfield scene, where Wayne Slob mistakes his baby daughter's umbilical cord for male genitalia, and assumed it was a boy. Yes, I really did that. In my defence it was quite dark and I did not have my glasses on, but no, she was a girl. A very loud girl, who after her cord was cut by Him Indoors was placed on my chest, waxy and blinking and crying her super loud cry. A short time later, the doctor said, OK, it's time for the placenta, this might be a bit.... Oh... There it is... Out that came without me even noticing.

DB2's temperature after her birth was ever so slightly raised, so we had a few hours with me marooned on the bed gradually regaining feeling in my legs, Him Indoors holding the baby, until the tiny increase in temperature settled down and we got the OK from the nightshift pediatric doctor, and the midwife wheeled us up to the maternity ward around 2am.

While private hospitals prefer to keep you in for at least a couple of days if they can, to really rinse your insurance company for as much as possible, my doctor visited me after we had attempted to snatch some sleep in between various nurses checking vital signs and pointing out to me that I should probably change the baby's nappy at some point, and sent us home.

I did definitely note a little pride in my doctor's usually unflappable demeanour as she patted me on the hand as she agreed to discharge me. Here I will return to the note of cynicism I detected when I had told her that I wanted a V-Bac. She told me at some point afterwards, I can't remember when: "These women sit in my office and tell me they want a natural birth, but when it comes to it, they don't want to push, they don't even want to open their legs." It was a light-hearted, throwaway comment, but ... but ....but. What she said actually makes me a little sad, and it relates to the fact that a lot of women don't really know what to expect from giving birth or what they need to do, particularly when cultural issues among some communities in the UAE come into play. That can mean that sometimes these things are not really discussed.

I once read an article, I cannot find the link now, that said that some women in the UAE arrive at hospital to give birth, and that is the first time they have seen a doctor, no prenatal appointments, no discussions about how they will give birth, no anticipating if there any problems with their growing baby, no antenatal classes, no contemplating hypnobirthing, water births, discussion of pain relief, nothing. They are clueless, apart from what they may have been able to read or see online or glean from family members. I cannot imagine how much more terrifying that must make the experience.

During the birth, my doctor asked me if it was OK for Him Indoors to have a look at the action, to witness DB2 being born, and I said yes, obviously, and even in the state I was in, I found it rather odd that she needed to ask me. I had always joked with him that he would need to stay by my head rather than the baby's head, as I was worried he would faint because he's been known to be a bit squeamish at times, but in reality it seems very strange to deny someone the chance to watch their own child being born because you feel embarrassed. I felt particularly strongly about this because neither of us were really present for DB1's birth. I was unconscious as it was a super fast emergency caesarean under general anaesthetic as DB1's heart rate had all but disappeared, and he was left to pace the corridor with only phone calls to the Motherland to tell them what was happening to keep him company. But, if your levels of understanding on the subject are as I laid out above, you can see why it might come to that.

For me, despite the medieval torture levels of pain, I was on a complete high afterwards due to the exhilaration of actually being mentally present this time to witness DB2's birth in all its messy glory. I even suggested to Him Indoors that we should have another baby straight away, such was the hormonal banishment of the misery I experienced while pregnant. I am pretty sure when I mentioned this stonkingly brilliant idea of mine, I saw his hairline visibly recede, a la Homer Simpson's, when Marge announces she is pregnant for the third time. I think I can say, now I am at a safe distance from that post birth hormonal high, that...

that will not be happening 

V-Bac baby, or how things don't happen

It occurred to me recently that DB1, should she ever stop viewing me as an elderly, incompetent version of herself whose main job is to spoil her fun (Wait. What am I talking about? That's never going to happen), she may take an interest one day in what I have to say about the circumstances of her birth. I can remember every detail as if it were yesterday but I am aware that this may not last forever as I get increasingly decrepit and daft. And even though like many people who write, I die slightly when I read my own stuff, it's nice to have a written record of her birth here.

Since then I have had another one, DB2, and I think it's only fair to make a similar record of her birth. So here it is.

There are differences between preparing for the birth of a child in the UAE compared to the UK, which I go into a bit here but one of the more perplexing, is when you read UK-focused stuff about it, they talk about this 'birth plan' business a lot. I did not have a birth plan written down. All I had was in my head, which was 'stay at home as long as possible, give me the f***ing drugs if I say I want them but don't force them on me, and don't cut me open unless you have to'.

I have heard tell in other places of mothers having a very good idea of how it will all proceed, having a written out and printed birth plan, and they know what will play on their phone, how they will be massaged by/shout at their husband depending on how things are going, at what point they will ask for intervention and so on.

That did not happen for me

My doctor was the chatty sort, and I quite often could not get much of a word in edge ways, which is fair enough, she has delivered hundreds, probably thousands of babies, I had delivered one, so she probably had more to say on the subject.

She surmised from my various head noddings and silences during my appointments that I would prefer a V-Bac, although she raised something of a cynical eyebrow about that, for reasons I will explain later in part 2 of this blog. DB2's due date was January 29th, and I was psychologically prepared to go sailing past that, be prodded and poked some time in early February, to no avail, and end up with a caesarean section.

So, it was, on January 26th, I dragged my large self, Him Indoors and DB1 around IKEA for a few last minute bits and pieces. I cannot remember what now, but it seemed important at the time, then ate a high blood pressure/low iron/high blood sugar friendly lunch, and headed home with me preparing for some pretty serious lazing around in the run up to the birth.

That did not happen 

It turns out, trudging around IKEA is exactly the kind of gentle, distracting exercise the doctor tells you to do to get a medium-to large sized second baby to think about exiting from her uterine home.
I had had a few practice contractions in the weeks leading up to this, but nothing that would send me running for the hospital bag. So while I was noticing a few interesting sensations as I put my head down for my last sensible full night's sleep until date, there were no indications that it was about to happen.

The next morning, I dropped DB1 off to nursery, came home and then sure enough, the pains started, getting more frequent, and I fired up one of those smartphone apps that any of you who have done this will no doubt be familiar with: "agony optimiser" "child squeeze" "baby bellower", I forget what they're called now, definitely something like that, and timed the contractions. I phoned Him Indoors at work to tell him that something was definitely happening, attempting to remain calm.

Here, at this point, I will go on a little diversion about hypnobirthing. I'm told that this is a very helpful tool for many birthing mothers when it comes to getting through the early stages particularly without the need for intervention.... and yeah, that hypnobirthing, that was definitely something I was definitely going to get me some of, yep, I definitely was going to get round to learning about that before having both my babies, yep. Totes.

That did not happen

DB1 was born just before the 39th week, and hypnobirthing was still on my to do list that time. It was irrelevant anyway because the closest I got to a contraction that time was a slight bit of indigestion over a cup of hospital green tea. I did get around to watching a YouTube video prior to DB2's birth,  as I am way too mean to pay for an actual class, you see, but I got as far as "breathe in...... 1....2...3...4....5.....6.....7......breathe out 1....2....3....4.....5....6...7....." before wanting to punch the woman on the video in the face.

It was the way she said, and this woman was both a midwife, and pregnant, by the way: "ooooooh, I feel so relaxed now...." after just two or three rounds of breathing in....1.....2....3....4....5.....6....7..., breathing out....2 ....3....4......5.....6.....7...."

I may not have experienced "natural" birth at that point, but people, I can smell BS a thousand miles away, and that woman was promulgating mega quantities of the brown smelly bovine byproduct. I don't care what any of you say.... "Breathe in....1...2....3....4....5...6....7" once or twice is not going to cut it when it comes to the raw agony of childbirth, and please don't pretend it will.

The thing is, you see, I know now. I know, I know now that the pain of childbirth is some gen-u-ine industrial strength, medieval-style BS, and no amount of breathing and relaxing is going to sort that out. Feel free to reply telling me how you got through it all with whale music and hemp and a few pats on the back from your partner, I would simply love to hear from you...Actually I wouldn't, don't do that.

Anyhoo. When it came down to it, I did actual give the old breathe in.....2....3 etc a go in the early stages, but I think I did not do much else right. The little I do know about labouring has told me that being upright is often preferable to lying down in terms of managing the pain. Well, I just wanted my bed, so I lay on my side, timing my contractions, listening to BBC Radio 4 until the sound became profoundly annoying, then tried some calming BBC Radio 3 throughout that morning, until the cervix scourger app started flashing something along the lines of: "What are you doing still at home, you ridiculous prego sow? Get the heck to hospital, are you out of your mind?!"

Again, I'm pretty sure that's what it said.

At that point, my terribly calm hypnobirthing attempts had become "breathe in 1....2.....3...4...AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRGH FER F**K'S SAKE...." I decided whether or not it was happening, it was probably time to call Him Indoors again and tell him to come home.

The thing is about Him Indoors is he works right down in the depths of Dubai International Airport, which is rather large, and it's about half an hour walk until he gets to the front of said airport and to any method of transport out of there. So I phoned him, then cut him off quickly so he wouldn't be freaked out by the sound of me yelling, and messaged our dear friend who agreed to look after DB1 while we were in hospital, and asked her to come and pick her up from nursery for us.

The fact that it would take him half an hour to get out of the airport weighed heavily on my mind as I lay there, trying not to yell my head off, as I am fairly sure I would not have been in any fit state to get there on my own without summoning an ambulance at this point. It was like one of those scenes in the movies, where you are outside yourself, watching yourself, from the ceiling - a large pregnant lady hunched over in agony clutching an iPhone that is playing some obscure classical music and making those low groans that you have never heard yourself make before.

As the pains got closer and stronger, I started to feel the kind of regret that only those of you who, like me, suffer from being perpetually stubborn and bloody minded about wanting to do things your own way, will know.

"Oh, Dubai Sand Witch, you have effing done it this time, you massive, pregnant idiot," I thought to myself. "You are a medium risk pregnancy, you have been so determined to avoid intervention and make a point that you can 'do this yourself', that despite the fact that you have private insurance and every possible medical care and intervention at your finger tips, and doctors who won't over rule you and will listen to you, despite that, you have left it to friggin' late to get to the hospital, and you are going to give birth, here, alone, on your own bed, howling in agony, except for a security guard, who will have been sent upstairs to pass along the noise complaints from your pathetic downstairs neighbours, who can't even cope with the sound of your child dropping a plastic ball on the floor, so how are they going to cope with you heafing a large baby into the world? How? How? How?