09:02

Knock Knock.

Who on earth could that be? Having arrived home with an extra pair of legs at 1am this morning, having barely slept until about 8am, I am not particularly impressed with this slumber interruption.

Unbeknownst to me, a midwife is scheduled to come and check up on you (and the baby) on his or her first day at home. I stumble downstairs in a dressing gown, grappling with morning oral aromas. I mumble an offer of a cup of tea, trying desperately not to breathe in her direction.

The offer is declined.

This is a blow. The wife has often regaled me with tales of politely declining cups of tea on home visits, due solely to a distrust of the hygiene at the source. I am offended. She is clearly oblivious of the jibe often thrown at me by one of my brothers; that I possess ‘an unhealthy obsession with cleanliness’.

Her loss. And so the ‘inspection’ begins. And to be honest, it does feel like an inspection of the parents rather than the newborn.

The outcome is: He is a bit jaundiced. Your stitches are healing nicely. You’ve put too many blankets on. You haven’t put too many blankets on (said literally back to back).

As the midwife leaves, I stumble downstairs once again and look around at the state of the house following the last few days of using it as a bedsit whilst to-ing and fro-ing from hospital. I begrudgingly have to admit, I might just well decline a cup of tea if I liked the stuff. Which I don’t.