The Swine Flu Vaccination During Pregnancy

Firstly, let me state for the record that I am not a doctor or scientist, so please read the official advice carefully.

However, as expectant parents there is a dilemma about whether my wife, now at 30+ weeks, should have the swine flu vaccination. Our consultant said that the official advice he must relay to us is that it is recommended that pregnant women should have the vaccination. He also said, as an unofficial aside, that there had been little medical research done on the effects of the vaccination on pregnancy. This stands to reason - most of these vaccinations have been hurried to market and there has been little time to do the usual studies, specifically on pregnancy.

So it put us in a dilemma. My wife, being ultra-conservative when it comes to her health and that of our unborn child, was erring on the side of not having the vaccination.

The dilemma was solved last night when we went out for an annual Christmas dinner with some friends, one of whom happens to be one of the country's leading virologists, Professor Jim Robertson. Jim and his wife, Lynn, are good friends of ours and he is often the unassuming man with a great sense of humour who quietly chats about anything, rarely ever blowing his own trumpet about his expertise. In fact, his pet subject last night was that his daughter is also pregnant and is expecting in early February - he is so proud about being a grandad. I suppose one of the few advantages of being an older dad is that I am more likely to have friends like Jim - I am not sure that is a compliment for Jim!

Now, what I am writing was his answer to my wife's question and I should caveat that all pregnant women should seek the advice of their mid-wife, GP and consultant and take this as just my personal comments. It should also be noted that I referenced Jim without his permission and therefore he is in no way liable for the advice.

Right, with all that off my chest, Jim's answer was that my wife should have the vaccination but he took pains to point out that little research had been done in the area of affects on pregnant women. With that in mind, his answer was that there are various forms of the vaccination and some act to suppress the immune system, which is something that should be avoided in pregnant women. One vaccination that he knows does not work in this way is the Celvapan jab by Baxter. The UK Government has approved two vaccinations, and this is one of them. You would need to request this specifically.

If you Google Baxter's swine flu jab there is a bizarre reference to a conspiracy theory about swine flu being a man-made phenomenon and that Baxter are in the middle of it. If you are that way minded it's a good read - if you speak to a scientist they will have a laugh. However, Baxter seem to be embroiled in some scandal involving avian flu and the Czech Republic allegedly turned down the vaccine on safety grounds which appear to be associated with that. More recently, Baxter have been involved in paying back money for over-charging for medicines, but I don't think any particular pharmaceutical company has an unblemished past on such matters.

I suppose we could read every detail on the subject, but for my wife and I, Jim's word on the subject was more than good enough as he is a personal friend as well as being a boffin. Of course, he also recommended the same for his daughter and she has already been vaccinated.

What's a Birth Plan?

In the past few days, perhaps because of the snowy weather and concerns about travel, my wife has had two calls from people who have mentioned a) have you got your overnight bag packed and b) have you got your birth plan ready?

The former seemed obvious to me until my sister told me that apart from the normal things you would take to a hotel you would also have such items as nappies and baby clothes, which frankly hadn't occurred to me even though it was pretty straight forward what the whole thing was about. The theory is that any time after about 30 weeks, you should be prepared for an early onslaught of labour and therefore have a bag packed and ready. I should imagine there is a long checklist somewhere on the subject but it occured to me that I need to have a shovel on standby, de-icer, WD-40 and enough fuel in the tank to get to the hospital. I draw a line on having towels and a thermos of hot water in case the whole thing occurs on the way.

The birth plan was a revelation.

The NHS recommends at around 34 weeks that an expectant mum writes a detailed birth plan. It's a frightening thought as it basically lays out what you would like before and during labour in terms of pain relief. My wife is now at around 31 weeks so it is slightly ahead of the game but I sat poised with pen and paper to get her wishes down. Asking what pain relief she would prefer, she answered simply, 'Whatever they have got, bring it on.'

I dare say nearer the time we may fine tune that plan but she was being serious - having decided on the natural birth option she has no intention of being in agony for several hours.

Fair point.

The Kick Inside

The kick inside. Not the excellent old album by Kate Bush, who I used to fancy when I was a teenager, but the brutal assaults of our growing baby on my wife's insides.

Is this normal?

Last night, we lay watching her tummy and it was like seeing one of those cartoons where the characters are fighting in a sack. Whole shapes of legs and arms were bulging from the service and we even balanced the TV remote control on the top, several times it was booted clear off. While it looks quite funny, it takes several minutes of stroking her tummy and soothing murmurs to the baby within to calm it down. That's fine while we are watching the film 'Eagle Eye' (excellent film starring the unlikely named actor, Shia LaBoeuf, which reminds of the name Pepe La Pew for some odd reason) but in the small hours of the night, it keeps my wife awake.

It may not have helped that we had a curry on Friday night or that my wife has a craving for pickles any time of day or night - maybe the poor brute is was suffering the after effects of Dhansak - I know I do. But the baby is now booting ever more vigorously, more regularly and it's getting more and more like a scene out of 'Alien' inside my wife's tummy.

Is the mite trying to get out?

We have consulted online information and our small library of books and it all appears normal for a baby to kick. However, it says nothing about the ability of a growing baby to hoof a ball placed on the mother's tummy through two large sticks and then somersault at the feat. Okay, I'm exaggerating, but I kid you not, this little one has the boot power of a decent fly half.

Is the little thing trying to tell us something? Is he or she ready to make an appearance?

Of course, that is our concern, that this may be a rather uncomfortable lead up to an early birth. My wife is visiting the mid-wife on Tuesday and this will be the sole topic of discussion, I can assure you. Like any man at Christmas time with a wife 30+ weeks pregnant visiting the mid-wife, I will be on a golf course.

What?

Dilemma - Natural Birth or Not?

The birth of our child has been a hot topic lately in our household and we are facing the dilemma of what is best all round.

I have to say, this is not a debate easy for men to relate to. We watched some program for a bit last night called 'Out of My Depth' where Amanda Holden spent time as a nurse on a maternity ward. She was all laughs and jokes, much to the chagrin of her mentor, until she got a full graphic view with stereophonic sound effects of a live natural birth.

That shut her up.

To be fair it shut me up too. My wife, when suffering badly at week 22 with a fibroid, had to spend time at Watford Delivery suite and we were stuck in a waiting area next to thin wall behind which we got the full, blood-curdling screams of agony of a lady in labour. It sort of focused my mind on why a woman would go through that sort of agony for any price. The only possible thing I could think of as an equivalent would be going to the toilet after a long period of constipation and passing the stool the size of a garden gnome. The mere thought brings tears to my eyes.

My wife has a dilemma. She is 43 and this has been a precious pregnancy in all respects after we have waited so long and so many varied efforts. Then came the massive fibroids which induced contractions which caused my wife to be hospitalised for a few days - to boot she has a great deal of internal scar tissue from laser treatment and operations on her endometriosis and a cyst on her ovary. There is a lot that could go wrong during birth, and my semi-scientific viewpoint would be surely it would be better to have a controlled birth in the presence of a team of medics ready for any eventuality rather than the ad hoc team on hand for a natural birth. To me it just makes sense.

My wife sees the logic of my argument but like most women dismisses the pain as a short term price for a long term gain. She is sort of backed by our consultant who believes that because there is so much scar tissue present that maybe it would be more sensible not to cut as the healing time would be longer and the process subject to less variables. I am not convinced. After all my wife has been through, I cannot see the medical argument at all when based on nothing concrete.

I am sure many husbands understand my views and perhaps those as old as me, who appreciate this is all rather incredible late in life, would believe that a controlled, monitored and painless birth would be the wisest choice.

Or maybe I'm the daft one.

Getting Prepared

After a work Christmas Party is not the best time to go shopping - men, it is a time when we are at our most vulnerable.

But I succumbed. I found myself at Bicester Village Outlets - busy with frantic Christmas Shoppers and ostensibly we were there to do the same. But our course among the fashion, sports and baggage shops was changed and we seemed to drift into 'Petit Bateau' as if by magic. About an hour later, after several unknown women had lent their oar on the subject of what is required in the crucial first few minutes, hours, days, weeks, month and quarter of a baby's life, I found myself at the checkout with a large bag full of enough clothes to dress octuplets and £185 lighter on the wallet front. This, I was reassured, was for the first few vital minutes of our yet-to-be-born baby's life. It's no longer about survival in our evolutionary history, it's about how you look.

It's a complicated business, this clothing thing. You see, the problem is that we do not yet know the sex of the brute, despite it kicking its mother like Jean-Claude Van Damme in a training session every few hours - I think we might have the new Jonny Wilkinson in there. So the issue was all about the colour of the clothes. Pink was off the menu - it's a bit binary as that is a girl's colour; even I know that. For me pastel blues are pretty metrosexual these days but for Mum this was not the case - too boyish. So we ended up with stripy suits of different colours that will make our baby look much like a small convict like Baby Face Finlayson out of the old Beano, and pastel yellows, creams and whites all highly impractical as they will show up the vomit a little too obviously for my money. I was over ruled.

There were several options in the wardrobe for the first few minutes let alone weeks by the end of it all - the baby will pop out and slip into something quite casual first thing, but have some formal wear for meeting people in the first few hours and days. It will be as well dressed when it gets its head down for 40 winks and it will look pretty sharp as it wakes its parents up in the wee hours each night. Best to look your best at all times, allegedly. There is also the vital small woolly jacket for coming home, complete with a little off-the-shoulder cardy for lounging around the house, plus a small array of vests with buttons up the front and those at the back as you never know which the little tyke will prefer.

To be frank, we were a little short on socks, booties and bonnets but I was not going to quibble after parting with so much cash in such a short time. I had been bushwhacked hard enough as it was. I have got up early today to see if I can find a good online course for knitting for the rest of it - surely it can't be that hard? And then there is the buggy - or should I say, buggies. I had toyed with the Mamas & Papas brochure and was horrified to find the complex array of equipment deemed essential for starting up in parenting. I mean, a buggy is a buggy, right? No.

I surveyed the various configurations but couldn't get the price down below £650 for a start up kit including buggy frame, pram, car seat and fold away trestle to put the thing on. That is only marginally less than the current worth of the car in which it will all be transported. And apparently, it is also essential to have a second buggy - a lighter, more sporty model for quick release and whizzing around Tesco's.  None of this includes the cot, which looks like a portable prison, changing blanket, weaning clothes, comfort blankets, bottles, sterilisations tanks, bottle warmers, baby and temperature monitors, sleeping jacket-cum-bag and the paraphernalia to adorn the cot. And that's before we get to the toys, DVDs etc. Then there is the minor cost of converting a perfectly nice room into a baby suite - and don't forget the 'changing unit' and small bath.

It's endless - and we haven't even got to the toys yet. Thankfully my sister has sent us a fantastic baby monitor unit which is ex-NASA by the looks of its features. But, men, the best parts in all this are the technical bits - the ones where no expense is spared and is in our domain. The photographic department.  I love such gadgets and I now have a strong array of essentials.

We start at a decent phone with built-in high end pixel camera. I happen to dislike these so I have stuck with my Nokia E71 and that's that. For quick photos, the ad hoc ones, I have a compact Nikon Coolpix with 10 megapixels in natty metallic puce which accompanied me to South Africa on a trial run to see the Lions Final Test - these things have to be field tested, you know. I already have a Nikon D40 SLR camera with telescopic lens options for the all important close ups - this is a trusted friend which has photo'd our dogs in every conceivable pose and place. It's a great camera. Latest addition to the portfolio is a fantastic Panasonic High Definition lightweight Video Camera - spanking thing that is simply the cat's backside. I haven't quite mastered this yet but I'm getting there and little baby will be featuring in more movies than Harrison Ford pretty soon. I suppose I should buy an Apple Mac or video iPod to make sure I can carry all these films around and bore anyone, anywhere by endlessly replaying them or having my laptop set to slide show to show the baby in proper historical sequence minute by minute. I can't wait.

Meanwhile, it is back to the repainting of the bedroom and selection of new lampshades. Lack of money and sleep are some things I am just going to have to get used to. Call me stupid, but I'm quite looking forward to that too.

How To Be A Dad

It can't be that be that difficult, surely? What's the worst that can happen?

It has always been my easy-going view that parenting can't be that hard. After all, my parents seemed to thrive on the whole thing - my sister does now. My wife and I look after our 3 nephews regularly and we never have any real problems - the advantage being that we always get to give them back. I've even read a fine book on it from a bloke's viewpoint - all very technical but no curve balls. Pah, there's nothing to it.

Then we had the details arrive of joining for an NCT course in January. Suddenly, it struck me - I'm going to be a dad. Yes, I had gone through the middle-age crisis bit of it - first time dad at 50, but this was reality striking home. The NCT, a superb parenting charitable organisation, offers a 4 session course, one of which I don't have to attend as it is solely on breast feeding - one of the many pieces in the jigsaw of parenting that I cannot contribute to. The other 3 sessions are full day ones.

It's fair to say that I am scared. The little mite boots away at its mum's internals nightly causing her discomfort and interrupted sleep. She is the one who has had to deal with fibroids degenerating and the excruciating pain it caused, the phantom contractions that left in her in hospital for two nights, the tragedy of no clothes fitting anymore and the awesome responsibility of working out which colour the walls need to be painted. I joke little - I'm a spare part for most of this.

As the birth date looms, I now have to train myself to be a decent, responsible parent. I have to confess, I have only once attempted to change a nappy - if it had been filmed it would have made compulsory viewing for anyone handling radioactive materials. The result was that the baby had to be bathed as effluent got everywhere and the gaps between the seal and skin meant that pressurised effluvia was jetting to all parts of the room. As first attempts go, I am sure it was not bad but it had a lasting effect on me.

One of the biggest things I fear is having to work with a dummy baby. I have seen couples wheeling prams with model babies inside and secretly scoffed - they clearly were the dunces of the ante-natal classes in my ignorant view. Now the reality is that I actually need to get my hands on one of them and work out how to properly wind the brutes and attach nappies secure enough to stop escape of seepage while not cutting off the circulation to the legs. What about the routines, the night time crying, bathing, feeding, etc. I am going to have to swallow all my stupid preconceived ideas and knuckle down to training to be a decent father at the very basics.

That's just when the poor thing arrives - just imagine a dolt like me trying to teach it to work, speak or read. First things first, though.

They say you can't teach and old dog tricks - well this old bowser is going to learn a few.