Junior midwifery

Dash is anti-marriage these days. He doesn't mind it for other people, and agrees that men and women should be allowed marry whomever they love, but feels it's not for him. So he won't play marrying with Mabel any more, but she's managed to get around that, thanks to the Mr Rogers episode on d-i-v-o-r-c-e that she saw last week. "Let's play babies," she tells her brother. "We don't have to be married. We can be divorced, except you still live here and we have a baby."

Mabel loves to hear the story of when she was born. Or the story of when Dash was born. She particularly relishes the part about my waters breaking (first sign of labor, both times) and also how everyone I called in the early moments of my first labor had their phones turned off. (True story.)

We have a book called the Usborne Book of Knowledge, but neither of the children are remotely interested in learning about birds, or vehicles, or any of the sections other than the one on the human body. Mabel likes the page about how our bodies fight germs, and how bones fit together, but mostly she likes the two that detail how a baby is made and how a baby grows and is born. Lately she's been drawing babies in circles and telling me, "That's the bag of waters."

Then we have the first-aid book, which is a proper grown-up book that has somehow made its way onto the kids' bookshelf. Mabel likes to leaf through that and ask me what's wrong with all the people, or what might have happened to them if I don't know. There's a picture in there of a birth, just in case as a first-aider you come across some poor woman in the last stages of labor and need to do more than just boil water and find towels. It exhorts you not to pull on the head of the baby as it emerges. Good advice.

Yesterday I was complicit in a game of babies that was going on around me. Every few minutes a baby would be placed up my sweater, and then pulled out with a flourish.

"Oh, I can feel it starting to come down," I'd say.
"Push, push," they'd tell me, delighted.
"I can see the head," crowed Mabel.
"Twist it so it comes out," advised Dr. Dash.
"No, don't twist it," I said, concerned for my child's welfare.
"It's a girl! Congratulations!"
"Yayy! I always wanted a baby sister!"

Five minutes later I was safely delivered of two more babies in quick succession. Easiest pregnancies ever, I have to say.